What if you knew data behind the fastest growing SaaS companies today? Each morning join Nathan Latka as he spends 15 minutes interviewing SaaS founders. You'll learn how SaaS CEO's launched their startup and grew it into a real SaaS business. SaaS Founders range from bootstrapped to funded, MVP to 10,000 customers, pre revenue to pre IPO.
Solo Founder, No Employees, Exits for $1m+ Keeps 100%
Launched in 2016 selling software to Music Repair Shops, TudoDesk exited for $1m+. This is the low stress, high wealth way to build a software company. TC won't write about you, but it doesn't matter, you'll get wealthy fast!
2/20/2024 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
This CEO Does $20m/year Selling Software to Chiropractic Offices
Launched in 2016, CEO Matt Prados got rich off dividends and profits. He's bootstrapped to $20m in revenue with plans to hit $32m in 2024. Can he do it? His outbound call center strategy might get him there.
2/15/2024 • 21 minutes, 18 seconds
How he's going to ask 30 beta users to pay $1k/mo for his Partner Management Software
2/13/2024 • 12 minutes, 59 seconds
This Mom of 2 Wants to help Hotels Clean Sheets Faster but needs to update her Andriod App first
2/8/2024 • 10 minutes, 51 seconds
She's using her marketplace to fund $1m in ground heating systems in Finland and charging a SaaS Fee
Tarja recognizes that energy in Finland is a hot space. She's launched a marketplace connecting 100 apartment complex owners with 100 providers of energy services like solar and heat. Shes raising a $15m fund to then back these projects that go through her marketplace. Will she get the $15m SPV closed and change the course of energy efficiency before 2025?
2/6/2024 • 19 minutes, 8 seconds
How this 1 person team did $2m in Revenue Last Year
2/1/2024 • 14 minutes, 20 seconds
Suzy.com did $65m Revenue Last Year. 18% was services so how did he keep 75% gross margin?
Matt Britton sold his agency for $50m in 2010 then launched Suzy.com in 2011. The original version, Crowdtap, was a mobile app where consumers could test new enterprise products like candy bars, detergents, and other items. The firm struggled and then doubled down on Enterprises paying for user research through its software, hitting $10m Revenue in 2018. Last year the firm did $65m in revenue and burned $12m. Britton says “We’ll hit $82m revenue this year and plan to burn $9m with a track to $100m ARR by mid 2025.” Will he get there?
1/30/2024 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
Proof you can build a $2m SaaS in any Niche (even with big competitors!)
Despite large competitors like CloudBooking, Guesty, and other hotel management platforms, RoomChecking CEO Jonathan Weizman has carved out a $2m niche. He specifically helps hotel owners in France organize cleaning schedules by hotel cleaners as guests check out.
1/25/2024 • 11 minutes, 53 seconds
How to Make $3m Building a Slack Clone with no money, experience, or sales team
He turned down $20m in 2021 for his Slack competitor, Chanty.com. Today, the company has over 24,000 paying customers and does $3m revenue, profiting $1.2m in 2023. The company is fully bootstrapped. Can he find a sales co-founder willing to hustle hard for 15% equity?
1/23/2024 • 25 minutes, 55 seconds
Why he shut down his $40m Revenue Grocery company and moved into data recovery
He raised $16.9m and hit $40m in revenue. Success? Wrong. He shut his unprofitable grocery delivery company down in 2021 then spent a year working with liquidators. Today, he’s moved industries to the Dev Ops space and launched his disaster recovery SaaS Bennudata.com.
1/9/2024 • 12 minutes, 18 seconds
How To Make $30,000 Instantly off a Viral Linkedin Post
His first company grew to a few million in revenue before exiting in 2021. After a 2 year earn-out, he left to build a new company. When his Customer Health Tracking excel template went viral on linkedin, he capitalized and launched his SaaS. The post led to 6 customers paying $500/mo for his revenue operations platform, Revos.ai
1/4/2024 • 16 minutes, 24 seconds
How to Double Your Company From $16m to $30m Revenue Using Multiple Product Lines with Chilipiper CEO
After Tiger gave the founders $7m in a 2021 secondary at a $625m valuation, they took their team to Morocco for a team retreat. Seeing a weak market, they chose to cut the team from 225 down to 150 and become profitable. Despite these cuts, they’ve doubled revenue by selling 5 key product lines to sales teams. Will they do $50m in revenue in 2024? Chilipiper.com
1/2/2024 • 23 minutes
How to Generate $6m of Revenue and keep 100% Equity with BadgerMaps CEO
His 13 person sales team does 2,000 calls per month. This engine has landed him 4,100 customers who pay him to help plan their field sales reps driving routes to save gas and make more money. He’s bootstrapped the company to $6m and made a full recovery from COVID down year 2021. He’s used debt to scale to keep 100% equity. Will he get the exit he dreams of in 2024 and reap the rewards of bootstrapping and keeping equity? Badgermapping.com
12/28/2023 • 22 minutes, 33 seconds
Fireside Chat with James Isilay of Cognism: Fundraising during the current economic climate
12/26/2023 • 14 minutes, 56 seconds
How to turn your sales playbook into a revenue machine that adds $Xm in new ARR per quarter
12/21/2023 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
How to build a $4.5m revenue company with 0 Full Time Employees
300,000 homeowners cut their lawns every month with Greenpal who connects them to 35,000 lawn care companies. In 2023, the company did $30m in total lawn cuts and kept 15% of that revenue to generate $4.5m in revenue. They do this all with 0 FTE’s. Why? Bryan wanted freedom. He wanted to travel 11 months of the year while building a company he loved. VC wasn’t an option. Listen in if you’re looking to build a business and life you love with no external pressure. Yourgreenpal.com
12/19/2023 • 16 minutes, 33 seconds
Masters of Debt: How I bought a $5m SaaS Company Using Debt, Grew to $20m, Then Flipped for a Huge Gain
12/14/2023 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
How PandaDoc Uses CI to Manage 800 Product Updates Per Month on Path To $100m+ ARR
12/12/2023 • 16 minutes, 18 seconds
How I raised a $15m Series B in a downturn
12/7/2023 • 20 minutes, 31 seconds
$100m in revenue selling software to 27,000 AirBNB hosts?
12/5/2023 • 20 minutes, 17 seconds
Smart way to use ZoomInfo to get first $60,000 in B2B SaaS Sales
11/28/2023 • 11 minutes, 33 seconds
How to build a $30m SaaS in 18 Months focusing on an unsexy niche
11/23/2023 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
How to land your first $5k SaaS Pilot
11/21/2023 • 12 minutes, 59 seconds
How to raise $500,000 with no code, no customers, and not based in the US
11/16/2023 • 13 minutes, 22 seconds
Founder Hits $13m Revenue with No VC Raised selling SaaS to Defense Firms
11/14/2023 • 19 minutes
How This Founder Plans to use AI to help Remote Sales Team Managers Run Better Teams
This founder has spent 12+ months in R&D with no revenue. He generates income from consulting. Will his SaaS ever take off if he keeps his consulting job as a safety net?
11/8/2023 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
How to do $500,000 Revenue in 8 Weeks launching new AI SaaS Tool
AI is a buzz word. No one asks "Can I buy AI". Ideally, they want your product, which happens to be better than everyone else because you use AI. This CEO is taking advantage. Can he hit $1m in ARR in his first 16 weeks?
11/7/2023 • 19 minutes, 29 seconds
Bootstrapper Reveals $7m Profits on $40m Revenue Selling to Banks, 2 Customers Pay $10m+ Each
Launched in 2012, this company hit $1m revenue 1 year after launch. Today, they do $40m and the founder still owns 69%. 17% investors. 14% ESOP pool. Can he bootstrap to $100m by 2026?
11/6/2023 • 28 minutes, 18 seconds
First time Kenyan Founder Uses $1.50 FB Ads to Get First 100 Users, 64 DAU
SaaS is worldwide. This Kenyan based founder creatively used underpriced FB ads to get new users for $1.50 each. 60% of signups are still active on a daily basis. Will they convert to paid when he launches his paywall?
11/3/2023 • 16 minutes, 12 seconds
18 Month Old Startup Already Has 3 Customers Paying $100k/yr. Is AI over valued?
Most founders think you can't launch and ask customers to pay $100,000 per year. This founder got his first 3 customers to pay $100k each. He's managed to hold on to 80% of his company. How'd he do it?
11/2/2023 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
He Hit $8m in Revenue Helping UK Companies Train Employees Faster and Comply with Regulation
Sometimes, government regulation forces companies to pay for software. Aptem has taken advantage of UK vocational law to hit 170 customers paying $40,000 per year on average. Can they break $10m revenue by December?
11/1/2023 • 24 minutes, 2 seconds
How he plans to convert to beta users into paying customers for his team collaboration tool
$50,000 is a lot of money for this founder. He's all in but still pre revenue. Whats holding him back from asking happy beta users to start paying?
11/1/2023 • 17 minutes, 35 seconds
He hit $120m in ARR Then Sold $70m Unit for $250m, Today His Secrurity SaaS is Cash Rich... whats next?
This security SaaS hit $120,000,000 revenue in 2022. Then they decided to sell a $70m business unit for $250m cash. Today they are cash rich with $50m in ARR. Who will the CEO acquire with all that cash? How fast will it take to get back to $100m in ARR?
11/1/2023 • 31 minutes, 7 seconds
How to Grow Faster with $0 CAC
10/18/2023 • 20 minutes, 54 seconds
mostlymetrics.com
10/17/2023 • 21 minutes, 1 second
How Chaser hit $294K revenue and 3 person team in 2023
10/16/2023 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
How he spun his software out of a corporation and hit first 5 paying customers
They've spent $225k building the MVP. If burn stays this high, they need to raise $500k in Dec. They only want to sell 20% of the company implying a 40x multiple. Can he get it done?
10/13/2023 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
This SaaS For Fund Manager's Just Hit $40k of MRR charing a % of AUM Managed
100 fund managers pay Avestorinc.com 400 per month and 30 to 50 bips of $60m AUM. With $40k in MRR today, can he scale to a $1m run rate by december before he tests the equity markets?
10/12/2023 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
Learn from Organice: How to get free customers from the Slack App Exchange
Genius 24 year old launches agency. Now does $3m+ per year in revenue and is spinning out SaaS tools. Only a matter of time before one hits $1m. Will it happen this year with Organice - his slack tool for org charts?
10/11/2023 • 17 minutes, 9 seconds
AI Tool Profited $70k Last Month on $195k of Revenue. Plans to hit $3m ARR By December then Raise $5m.
Rayban and 800 other customers use Wordlift to write meta-descriptions with AI to boost SEO. The company did $195k in revenue last month up from $103k in Sept 2022. He profited $70k and is targeting a $4m raise on a $20m valuation in Q1 of 2024. Can Wordlift hit $3m in revenue by December?
10/10/2023 • 17 minutes, 59 seconds
He's Spent $2m to Build a Better Quickbooks, Can he hit $1m ARR by Dec?
He owned 3 franchises of the Estonian based ride sharing company Bolt which he sold. Using that money, he starting building Binderr in 2020 and just landed his first customer in March 2023. He still owns 50% of the company and as invested over $2m of his own money. Can he hit $1m in ARR this year building a better Quickbooks for Accountants in Malta?
10/9/2023 • 19 minutes, 4 seconds
Economics of a $37,500 Pre Seed Uncapped Convertible Note
10/7/2023 • 15 minutes, 9 seconds
Crazy years: from $60M in secondaries to layoffs & back to cash positive
10/6/2023 • 18 minutes, 5 seconds
How We Bootstrapped Backblaze from $0 to IPO and $87m in ARR
10/5/2023 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
How to Convince High-Performers to Take a Pay Cut & Work for You
10/4/2023 • 21 minutes, 2 seconds
9 Lessons from Building Marketing Teams at HubSpot, Drift, and Airmeet
10/3/2023 • 16 minutes, 1 second
SaaStock Starts Oct 16th in Dublin, 5000 SaaS Founders and Big Bootstrap Stage
October 16th in Dublin. Meet 5000 SaaS founders in a week or so. Aircall Co-Founder will share how he hit $130m ARR. Muck Rack founder will share why he did $180m Series A and secondary after bootstrapping to $50m.
10/2/2023 • 22 minutes, 12 seconds
Can this company leverage 250 engineer beta testers for bug testing tool to close $3m pre seed round?
Mobile bug testing company got 20 companies and 250 engineers using their platform to identify 50 bugs per week. Question is, can they convert these users into real paying customers? They quit their full time jobs in June and hope to have revenue by this December.
9/29/2023 • 15 minutes, 5 seconds
Ukrainian Volunteer Group Uses This App to Raise $200k/mo, Now Available to Western Customers
9/28/2023 • 16 minutes, 3 seconds
24 year old hits $30k MRR in 6 months with unique SaaS cold email scripts
Zero to $30k in MRR in 8 months. Yash reveals the scripts he used to cold email and linkedin message his first 5 paying customers. He profits $10k/mo and things a valuation of $2.5m is too low. How long will it take him to hit $60k in MRR for his influencer marketing search tool?
9/27/2023 • 14 minutes, 7 seconds
HR Tech Exec Invested $200k into his own HR SaaS, Raising $200k on $3m Valuation Now
Ex Corporate HR Exec builds nest egg to launch HR tech SaaS in 2019. Today he's doing just $10k in MRR but says pipeline is biggest it's ever been. Can he use that data to close his $200k seed round next week?
9/26/2023 • 16 minutes, 38 seconds
This Hotel Tech SaaS Just Exited to Constellation Group After Hitting 30% EBITDA Margin and sharing 25% of profits with employees
Constellation software just bought this company after the bootstrapped CEO hit 60% yoy growth and over 200 paying customers. The company did 30% EBITA margin last year and is now part of Constellation Software Juniper Group.
9/25/2023 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
Behind The Term Sheet: How this $76m Seed Stage Fund Really Works
3 questions every smart founder asks this VC. How much follow on capital for a $1.5m initial check? How many deals does he look at each year? How long will his current $76m last?
9/22/2023 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
How this Hotel SaaS Hit $1.3m ARR and 1400 Customers
This father and son SaaS team turned down a $7m all cash offer - a 6x multiple. They serve 1400 small hostels and vacation homes to help them manage bookings. Should the bootstrapped team have taken the $7m?
9/21/2023 • 21 minutes, 19 seconds
How He Built a $10m Revenue Company Around Camp Ticket Software, Bootstrapped!
His largest customer pays him over $150,000 per year to manage after school camps. This 3 pronged revenue model has allowed founder Asaf Darash to hit $10,000,000 in total revenue. 40% comes from SaaS, 40% comes from payment processing where he takes a 1% fee, and 20% is an insurance like product - if your kid gets sick and can't make the camp you paid $2k for, they'll refund.
9/20/2023 • 21 minutes, 42 seconds
His First Exit Was for $200m, His Next Startup Hit $1m Then Almost Failed, Now 100% YoY Growth at Customer.ai with unique LLM model
Are you smarter than everyone else or did you just get lucky? Larry Kim sold his first company for $200m. His second company got down to $500k cash in the bank before he leveraged non-dilutive funding from Founderpath to extend runway. The runway enabled a big pivot and revenue doubled to $3.7m. Can Customers.ai hit $6m ARR this year?
9/19/2023 • 24 minutes, 47 seconds
I smell a $10m ARR SaaS Company. Why this 22 year old is smart to start with an Agency!
22 year old convinces 4 customers to pay $5k/mo. None of the have churned over the last 8 months. Will he use this "recurring professional services" model to eventually get into SaaS?
9/18/2023 • 12 minutes, 33 seconds
UserTesting Competitor Has 40 Beta Users, Here's How She's Gonna Convert them to Paid
She makes lots of money consulting. Is it possible to run a successful SaaS gig with such a big safety net?
9/15/2023 • 14 minutes, 26 seconds
How 3 University Grads Plan to Take on Buffer with AI Social Media SaaS
3 university graduates launch their no code SaaS on Bubble. How'd they get 15 paying customers in 3 weeks? Why'd they split equity 33% each? How did they get Linkedin Navigator for free?
9/14/2023 • 12 minutes, 52 seconds
Finally! How to move from consultant to SaaS CEO (from a consultant who did $800k revenue last year)
Bsolve agency did $800k revenue in 2022. 50/50 Co-founders decided to take a pay cut to invest $150k in their new SaaS tool SPRobot to help with document management. Will they hit $1m ARR in their first 12 months?
9/13/2023 • 13 minutes, 49 seconds
Startup Hits $3k MRR by selling through podcasts. $2.5m Valuation on $255k Pre-Seed too expensive?
They have $125k cash left in bank, burning $7k/mo and revenues just hit $3k MRR. Will this team of 8 have enough runway to hit $1m ARR by helping customers turn their employees into marketing machines?
9/12/2023 • 13 minutes, 27 seconds
How this SaaS For Music Venues Survived Covid Then hit $3m ARR
COVID should have killed this SaaS tool for live music venues. Instead, he's grown ARR 3x to $3m+ and has investors knocking down his door. With 300 customers paying $7k+/mo his team of 27 is considering embedded finance next.
9/11/2023 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
The King of India Workspaces: How he Logged 20k Bookings Last Month and Took Home $30,000
This marketplace processed over 20k bookings in India last month helping workers find quick co-working space. They take 20-30% of bookings generating $30k in MRR. Now that they've been acquired, the question is, can they grow the value of the parent companies stock to make the exit a big win for everyone?
9/8/2023 • 17 minutes, 14 seconds
Non Tech Founder Quickly Gives Up 50% To Tech Co-Founder To Scale Revenue Faster
Non-Engineer launches SaaS using no code. Realizes he needs a co-founder to compete and gives up 50%. Now at $2k in MRR across 30 customers helping them repurpose podcast content. His goal is $20k MRR by December 2023.
9/7/2023 • 16 minutes, 20 seconds
The Ultimate Challenge: Selling a SaaS to Universities, he hated what his Daughter went through
This father hated watching his daughter struggle with college admissions. His SaaS for Colleges has its first 12 customers and $120k of ARR. Can he sustain the revenue growth to $1m+ or will he have to kill it before it gets a real chance?
9/6/2023 • 16 minutes, 48 seconds
How He Doubled Revenue To $2.4m Using a 5 Page Google Doc over the past 12 months
His sales team uses a unique 5 page google drive Doc. It helped him hit $2.4m in revenue up from $400k in his first year in business (2021). Today he's bootstrapped serving 160 customers with his buyer collaboration platform. Is a big 2024 fundraise next?
9/5/2023 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
The $30m ARR Battle: How 1 VC Forced a 5x Exit When Restaurant SaaS CEO Wanted to Keep Building
CEO, "I'm not happy with VC ArrowRoot who forced us to sell for 5x when I thought we could have gotten 8x". How this experienced SaaS CEO led his company through multiple debt and equity rounds since 2008 to $35m ARR today.
9/4/2023 • 25 minutes, 47 seconds
Nigerian Founder Uses WhatsApp Group to Go $0 to $60k in 5 Months for Testing Tool
This Nigerian SaaS founder used a secret WhatsApp group to get his first $60k in sales. His new SaaS helps companies automate their code testing so they can release faster. $45k invested in the MVP so far. He owns 51% of the company, bootstrapped.
9/1/2023 • 14 minutes, 13 seconds
22 yo Launches B2B Fraud Prevention SaaS That Will Tell you if the China Steel Company is Real or Not
8/31/2023 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
Why He Spent $5m on Fintech API MVP, 20 Customers Today and $20k in MRR
8/30/2023 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
6 Oil Drilling Companies Pay Him to Map Hard to Quantify Oil Well Pay Zone's
8/29/2023 • 17 minutes, 15 seconds
Smith AI Breaks $22m ARR Helping Companies Manage Voice, Chat Support, $100m Cap, Burning $300k per Month
8/28/2023 • 22 minutes, 21 seconds
Team of 12 Hits $2.5m in ARR, $64m Valuation for Customer Success Tool. Can they beat Gainsight?
$90k Burned Last Month: $2.2m SaaS founder is “ok” with $90k net burn since they have “$10m cash in bank today” and plenty of runway. Here’s how they scaled to $2.2m after almost running out of money in 2017 (down to $16k cash balance).
When $200k Monthly Burn Kills You: He has 110 FTE’s but monetary policy in central america is killing his SaaS customers. Revenue drooped from $13m in 2021 to $6m in 2022 and he made the tough call to fire 85 FTE’s (80% of his team) for a shot at sustainability. How he did it. How to survive when you’re burning $200k per month and your revenue drops from $13m to $6m in 18 months.
8/24/2023 • 22 minutes, 18 seconds
Proof you don't need a new idea, just better execution. Firm hits 160 customers, $25k MRR
Taregeting $2m raise at a $12m valuation to take on data tool Apollo.ai. Will they be able to justify the valuation considering $25k in MRR from 163 paying customers?
8/23/2023 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
Zero to $1m in 12 Months, how he used personal brand to scale SaaS Fast
Workforce communication SaaS spent $800k on MVP before 1st paying customer. Today they have 400 customers paying $700/mo for $100k in MRR. They relied on a volume seat based pricing approach to scale fast ($3-6/seat).
8/22/2023 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
How He hit $12k monthly revenue building the Zapier for Data
8/21/2023 • 16 minutes
18 year olds quit $30k jobs to launch software, get first $10k customer
8/18/2023 • 11 minutes, 51 seconds
How he grew $1k to $23k SaaS MRR for HR Tech over last 12 months
8/17/2023 • 13 minutes, 22 seconds
Airtory Did $120k Last Month, Profitable with ad creation and management tool
8/16/2023 • 17 minutes, 1 second
Candidate Review Platform Convinced First 5 Customers to Pay $250 Each
8/15/2023 • 14 minutes, 25 seconds
ECommerce SaaS Hits $1.5m after Co-Founder Replaced Herself
From running a female clothing line, to becoming CEO of the SaaS they relied on. Here’s how Elliott vertifcally integrated to hit $1.5m ARR with a team of just 4 ($375k revenue per employee!)
8/14/2023 • 22 minutes, 11 seconds
Can this new AI tool grow into their $10m valuation?
8/11/2023 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
How Cyber SaaS Hit $2m ARR and 190 Customers So Fast
8/10/2023 • 21 minutes, 13 seconds
20,000 AI Lip Sync Vids Created, Now Raising $2m on $10m Valuation
8/9/2023 • 16 minutes, 51 seconds
How Hirize Hit $14k MRR in 60 Days
8/8/2023 • 15 minutes, 45 seconds
Deal! How She Spun SaaS out of $5.5m Agency
8/7/2023 • 15 minutes, 44 seconds
10 Person Agency Does $2m Revenue, SaaS Tool Next
The first customer they landed signed a $1m contract. How? Service contract (‘that’s terrible… I can hear you thinking). False. The most successful SaaS founders almost always start with some sort of agency or service revenue. Their new SaaS could beat out Yoast SEO wordpress tool.
8/4/2023 • 13 minutes, 36 seconds
Here's how to build a waitlist, launch pricing for any new SaaS founder
8/3/2023 • 14 minutes, 58 seconds
Bootstrapped doing $2.4m Revenue, $600k Cash in bank, helps retailers manage inventory
$50k Profit Last Month: We don’t celebrate these stories enough. Launched in 1993, this founder bought out his co-founder and has been slow and steady at $2.5m ARR supporting 80 customers. With huge profits, he’s built a wonderful life with total freedom!
8/2/2023 • 19 minutes, 2 seconds
Coro Breaks $25m ARR, Hits $600m Valuation Growing 300% YoY in CyberSecurity for Mid Market Space
$600m Deal Closes: This SaaS Sold 12.5% for $75m as it hit $3.1m in June revenue ($36m ARR). They only use 3 growth motions.
8/1/2023 • 25 minutes, 54 seconds
How We Scaled Founderpath to Process 200 Million Rows of Financial Data Per Day
7/31/2023 • 20 minutes, 32 seconds
Top 3 Growth Opportunities for Founders in 10 Mins
7/28/2023 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
From (almost) bankruptcy to $20M ARR / $2M profit within 3 years
7/27/2023 • 22 minutes, 26 seconds
Helping a bootstrapped founder go from Twitter only to omni-channel marketing to grow past $1M ARR
7/26/2023 • 17 minutes, 1 second
CEO Systems: 5 Lessons Learned from Scaling at Every Growth Phase
7/25/2023 • 14 minutes, 45 seconds
3 Frameworks to Help Forecast & Inform your Board in Your First Three Year
7/24/2023 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
Don't do these 68 things in your SaaS company
7/21/2023 • 27 minutes, 4 seconds
How I leveraged marketing analytics to scale from $1M to $11M
7/20/2023 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
SaaS Founder Confessionals: Lessons Learned From Raising $500 Million Dollars
7/19/2023 • 27 minutes, 22 seconds
How we built a successful sales team and scaled to +$10m ARR
7/18/2023 • 20 minutes, 10 seconds
7 SaaS Sales Techniques I Used to Help Grow Gong from $200k to $200M in ARR
7/17/2023 • 21 minutes
The 25 problems you don’t need to solve
7/14/2023 • 18 minutes, 37 seconds
Top 3 Considerations When Growing Your Business from Single Product to Multi-Product
7/13/2023 • 16 minutes, 48 seconds
Startup to $100Mn Proficorn: Building an enduring, bootstrapped, profitable and valuable SaaS business
7/12/2023 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
Product vs. Engineering: The surprising way to create alignment in 2023
7/11/2023 • 18 minutes, 1 second
108 ways of getting to a million dollars in ARR
7/10/2023 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
Your Untapped Resource for Creating a Compelling Product Roadmap
Your SaaS will die from 1000 tiny churn cuts. Here's how to fix that with product UI and UX tactics.
7/6/2023 • 21 minutes, 30 seconds
5 Secret Ingredients for Moving Up Market
7/5/2023 • 14 minutes, 25 seconds
The Sales & Marketing Tech Stack to Scale Successfully from $1 - $100M+ ARR
7/4/2023 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
Lessons From $1bn in Exits: Behind The Scenes of the ThriveCart Exit
7/3/2023 • 23 minutes, 47 seconds
How I use sales data to increase revenue without hiring more reps
6/30/2023 • 21 minutes, 17 seconds
$10m playbook for getting sales/marketing to work in harmony
6/29/2023 • 14 minutes, 47 seconds
The 5 levels of great customer analytics experience
6/28/2023 • 20 minutes, 3 seconds
Financial habits of the best performing startups
6/27/2023 • 17 minutes, 48 seconds
Tips for Creating a $1m Customer Onboarding Experience
6/26/2023 • 20 minutes, 51 seconds
Emotion is a superpower: how I leveraged mine to drive $5m in revenue
6/23/2023 • 20 minutes, 52 seconds
How we pivoted our customer experience map to hit 80% Gross Margin
6/22/2023 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
Reduce Your Employee ‘Burn Rate’ to Improve Your Startup’s Burn Rate: 5 Tips for Talent Retention
6/21/2023 • 21 minutes, 20 seconds
Transform your business from a EBITA multiple of 4 to a revenue multiple of 5+
6/20/2023 • 18 minutes, 59 seconds
Top 5 SaaS Performance & Revenue Efficiency Metrics that Matter in 2023
6/19/2023 • 22 minutes, 27 seconds
How We Built a Culture To Drive Efficiency, $8m ARR, and $150k in ARR per Employee
6/16/2023 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
Doing more with less: Increasing productivity for finance teams
6/15/2023 • 14 minutes, 10 seconds
Why Tiktok is the Best Marketing Channel for Bootstrapped Startups in 2023
6/14/2023 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
5 Ways to Grow Revenue in 2023 - Lessons from Analyzing 3M+ Deals
6/13/2023 • 19 minutes, 7 seconds
Partnerships helped us scale to $10m+. Here's what we learned.
6/12/2023 • 18 minutes, 37 seconds
12 Founders disciplines that helped to bootstrap to $10m+ ARR
6/9/2023 • 19 minutes, 5 seconds
Document Automation AI SaaS Hits $50k MRR in 12 months
6/8/2023 • 13 minutes, 29 seconds
Rare! A YC company that profits $300k/mo, $25m revenue
6/7/2023 • 26 minutes, 40 seconds
How Investors Bought 50% of Data.World with 2.1m free users, accounts at 31k paid seats
6/6/2023 • 29 minutes, 33 seconds
AI tool hits $2.4m ARR Helping Walmart Generate Thousands of Images
6/5/2023 • 17 minutes, 13 seconds
I’m a fangirl for your SaaS business, here's why you need me to survive an economic downturn
6/2/2023 • 14 minutes, 30 seconds
How a $3 billion company leads fully remote teams
6/1/2023 • 18 minutes, 16 seconds
Fireside chat with Bridget Harris and Alex Theuma - How to take care of business: 5 lessons in bootstrapping to $5m ARR
5/31/2023 • 22 minutes, 33 seconds
Sniper Targeting: Tactics your competition doesn’t know about, even with the 2021 LinkedIn changes
5/30/2023 • 19 minutes, 41 seconds
Why Velocity is the #1 Sustainable Advantage
5/29/2023 • 16 minutes, 10 seconds
Why You Should Start Measuring Psychological Safety Today
5/26/2023 • 17 minutes, 50 seconds
How I Helped Rippling Hire Their First 5 CSM's after $45m Series A, and lessons from Gorgias, other SaaS Brands on building CSM teams
5/25/2023 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
How We Bootstrapped to $50k MRR with Team of 2
5/24/2023 • 20 minutes, 21 seconds
Learnings from 35.7K SaaS companies to help make you recession proof
5/23/2023 • 18 minutes, 15 seconds
Profitable Growth is sexy again. How we hit $1.7M profitably with only 6 FTEs and plans to scale profitably by 5x YoY.
5/22/2023 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
How We Hit $30M ARR with only 4 Sales Reps. in 5.5 years
5/19/2023 • 9 minutes, 4 seconds
3 Demand Gen Tactics That Paid off Big time
5/18/2023 • 26 minutes, 22 seconds
A New Way to Think About SaaS: How to Build a 9-Figure Company by Giving Software Away For Free
5/17/2023 • 20 minutes, 47 seconds
How I’m transforming a $1b+ publicly traded company into SaaS and why
5/16/2023 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
Pricing and monetization in a downturn (and beyond)
5/15/2023 • 18 minutes, 4 seconds
SaaS SEO Shortcuts That Drive $10M+ ARR, Building A Media Moat, & More!
5/12/2023 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
3 Phases: Get People, Product, and Profit Right at Each Growth Stage
5/11/2023 • 16 minutes, 48 seconds
Using data to find product-market fit
5/10/2023 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
Customer Empathy: The key to 10Xing your company
5/9/2023 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
SaaS Storytelling: How I generated 50+ demo requests from a single story
5/8/2023 • 14 minutes, 9 seconds
How I Built a Media Company (within Gainsight) that Created a $1B Brand
5/5/2023 • 15 minutes, 5 seconds
How We Help ScaleUps Measure Efficient Growth
5/4/2023 • 20 minutes, 49 seconds
There's no one right way to get to an 8 figure exit. Here's how I did it
5/3/2023 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
How we bootstrapped to $20m ARR using asynchronous work
5/2/2023 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
How to recession-proof your SaaS: 3 keys to surviving just about any economic downturn
5/1/2023 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
Pivot City! How we pivoted 6 times on our way to $20m in revenue
4/28/2023 • 16 minutes, 40 seconds
How to upsell discounted customers to generate 10x more in MRR
4/27/2023 • 16 minutes, 42 seconds
How we grew to $15M with less than $1M marketing spend
4/26/2023 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
How We Grew ARR 3X by Upselling Existing Customers
4/25/2023 • 25 minutes, 27 seconds
How to consistently win 7-figure software sales deals
4/24/2023 • 17 minutes, 2 seconds
30 Customers Pay Him $20k/year, $150k Cash in Bank on track for $1m ARR This Year for Analytics Tool
A marketing data platform.
4/24/2023 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
How SafetyWing Doubled ARR to $24m and Closed Series B at $195m Post Money Valuation
Insurance for digital nomads.
4/10/2023 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
How He Grew Nutrisense From $12m to $45m ARR Last 12 Months for Health SaaS
Tackling the metabolic health crisis.
4/8/2023 • 23 minutes, 17 seconds
Rippling of Brazil Solides Hit $35m ARR up from $15m ARR and Raised $100m at a $800m Valuation
HR Technology to improve performance.
4/7/2023 • 19 minutes, 49 seconds
Restaurant SaaS Grows from $8k MRR to $35k MRR in 12 months
Matching workers and employers in Horeca.
4/6/2023 • 12 minutes, 27 seconds
Acquired! Why She Sold her Bootstrapped $800k ARR Company for $3m
Customer Experience Design and Diagnostics.
4/5/2023 • 18 minutes, 41 seconds
How she went $0 to $35k MRR in 12 months selling SaaS to RIA's
We predict extreme portfolio outcomes.
4/4/2023 • 18 minutes, 3 seconds
$100m All Cash Exit, Bootstrapped. Now $50m in ARR growing 100% YoY
We support corporate innovation.
4/3/2023 • 15 minutes, 43 seconds
How to get 27k signed up for your 2 sided market place, fast
$13m ARR company gets $7m raise done on $40m Valuation for Customer Success SaaS
SaaS for Customer Experience.
1/23/2023 • 18 minutes, 57 seconds
CMO at 106 year old Wine Brand Launches QR Code, Tipsy on ARPU!
QR Code and BioLink builder.
1/22/2023 • 18 minutes, 5 seconds
$1m Ecommerce Agency Spends $200k to Launch Shopify SaaS
AI-driven growth for Shopify merchants.
1/21/2023 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
Bootstrapped to $35m Revenue, $15m recurring, $20m One Time Connecting Smart cities in Japan with local farmers
Marketplace SaaS for enterprises and government.
1/20/2023 • 18 minutes, 15 seconds
$50m Revenue Selling Salesforce for Real Estate Brokerages, Beauty of Multi Year Deals with Accelerators
Leading Resdiential Real Estate Platform.
1/19/2023 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
He hit $100m Revenue, Built the Zoominfo of China, then quit last month. What happened?
DTC B2B Data Intelligence Tool.
1/18/2023 • 22 minutes, 39 seconds
Evotix hits $17m ARR, 6 Months from breakevent, 5+ Year Track record of 40% YoY Growth
EHS solutions for safer workplaces.
1/17/2023 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
Bootstrapped team of 2 hits $15k in MRR for video editing tool
Video and podcast speed editor.
1/16/2023 • 15 minutes, 25 seconds
23 year old launches SaaS for hotels, hits $250k revenue in under 12 months
Visibility optimalisation for rentals.
1/15/2023 • 17 minutes, 17 seconds
Why he regrets selling 30% equity in $200k pre seed round
Task Management Tools for Events & Restaurants.
1/14/2023 • 17 minutes, 41 seconds
How he bought out his $130k Seed Investor with $200k in new money, $7.5m valuation
Forecasting platform for non-data science person.
1/13/2023 • 19 minutes, 49 seconds
He Sold his First Company for $425m, Here's What He Did Next
Help companies forecast, manage, & grow revenue.
1/12/2023 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
How They Used #1 Product Hunt Launch to Hit $20k+ MRR for Expense Management Tool inside Slack
Spend approvals in Slack / MS Teams / Email.
1/11/2023 • 18 minutes, 5 seconds
Gong of Japan Hits $20m Revenue with just $15m Raised! Prime Takeover Target?
Self-Coaching tool MiiTel.
1/10/2023 • 21 minutes, 1 second
How he went $0 to $1m/mo in under 24 months for Waste Management SaaS in India
Web3 Based Waste Management.
1/9/2023 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
She built secret software to add $4m in deal volume to her brokerage last year
Software to find RE Investments!
1/8/2023 • 16 minutes, 13 seconds
Sole founder hits $1.1m run rate, profitable selling ESG data to 30 fund managers
1/7/2023 • 16 minutes, 55 seconds
He launched $1.2m ARR SaaS Tool out of $5m Agency. Here's the playbook.
Identity Graph Platform with Big Data.
1/6/2023 • 23 minutes, 11 seconds
How He Got First $2k in MRR From His Community of 1,000
Personalized Product Demos for Enterprise Sales Teams.
12/31/2022 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
24 Year Old Invests $340k of His Own Savings to Launch new AirBNB Data Tool
Homeshopping sight with airbnb underwriting.
12/30/2022 • 20 minutes, 7 seconds
FinTech Helps Hotel Bed Owners in US Hedge FX Risk Selling to Travelers in Other Countries
Grain offers the only end-to-end embedded cross currency solution that allows software platforms and marketplaces to eliminate FX risk for their end customers. With a simple, automated tool, Grain's partners and their customers can lock currency rates and transfer funds across borders without the hassle of banks or brokers.
12/29/2022 • 22 minutes, 29 seconds
He closed $3.2m at $17m valuation with $20k in MRR last week for Estate Planning Tool
Estate Management. Simplified.
12/28/2022 • 15 minutes, 17 seconds
He got 17 customers to pay $80k/yr up from $40k/yr 1 year ago for Employee Onboarding SaaS
Employee Data & Onboarding Orchestration.
12/27/2022 • 20 minutes, 35 seconds
A SaaS founder makes $1m off those NFL highlight clips you see on twitter
Software to automate video production.
12/26/2022 • 21 minutes, 37 seconds
How She Landed $13m Valuation with $1.8m in ARR Last Week for SMB SaaS
Get rid of bad customer experience.
12/25/2022 • 15 minutes, 9 seconds
How he hit first $2,500/m in revenue after investing $25k of his own money in his OKR SaaS MVP
Enabling startups to achieve "North Star".
12/24/2022 • 12 minutes, 57 seconds
Why he spent $8k on his MVP and how he got first paying customer today
Brand-building SaaS to generate brand assets.
12/23/2022 • 17 minutes, 51 seconds
He spent $15k on MVP now has first $1200 in ARR helping Engineering Teams Measure Output and Efficiency
Maximise performance of engineering teams.
12/22/2022 • 12 minutes, 51 seconds
He was doing $7k in MRR, now $200, here's how to shut down your SaaS
Gamified Engagement Platform.
12/21/2022 • 14 minutes, 19 seconds
He just hit $60m Revenue but burned $25m net last year. Here's how Market Research SaaS Suzy fixed their runway in volatile economy
Enterprise Market Research Software.
12/20/2022 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
How JobPaths Hit $1.2m in Revenue Helping Ex-Vets Get resources and jobs
SaaS-Enabled Marketplace.
12/19/2022 • 24 minutes, 57 seconds
This founder hit $90m ARR last week, took $30m secondary in last round for Document Management SaaS
Metadata-driven document management platform.
12/18/2022 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
Last raise was at $900k valuation with $875 in MRR. Will his restaurant engagement SaaS take off?
Social menu for nightlife.
12/17/2022 • 12 minutes, 19 seconds
SMB Tax App hits $20k MRR by getting 1k+ Signups and Converting 20-50% to $35/mo paid accounts
Robo-accountancy for small businesses.
12/16/2022 • 22 minutes, 9 seconds
He'll do $500k in revenue this year with 3 person team helping consumers prepare to get loans
Make humans happier.
12/15/2022 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
Nigeria Based Referbox hits 52 on Waitlist. Student Founder Launching Paywall Next Month Targeting $1k MRR
Referral marketing tools for Africans.
12/14/2022 • 10 minutes, 49 seconds
Typeform On Steroids Hits $50k in MRR up from $20k 1 year Ago
Enterprise forms and automation .
12/13/2022 • 15 minutes, 27 seconds
$500k in ARR with team of 4 helping consultants manage their business with SaaS dashboards
Grow your independent consulting business.
12/12/2022 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
How to get your first $10k in MRR within 4 months
AI assisted lead generation Platform.
12/11/2022 • 14 minutes, 1 second
She has guts! Turned down $20m offer with $15k in MRR for her Ad Management SaaS
Ads production project management & scaling.
12/10/2022 • 16 minutes, 3 seconds
He's spending $40k on MVP then plans to hire 50 sales reps commission only per month. Will it work?
We are a team of 8 developers who are developing a CRM for shop owners.
12/9/2022 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
How he hit $1m Revenue His First Year Building Leasing API's for Real Estate Industry on back of $1.75m Agency
Virtual Leasing Agent for Multifamily.
12/8/2022 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
Farms in Egypt To Pay This SaaS $1/mo/active Acre to Manage Seasonal Potatoe Crop Harvest
Workforce Management for Agriculture.
12/7/2022 • 14 minutes, 59 seconds
His 50% Co-Founder Hacked Him, Paid $15k to Buy Out, Now $600k in ARR Growing Fast
Cloud reservation software for tours and activities.
12/6/2022 • 14 minutes, 21 seconds
She hit $250k MRR in November for Partnership SaaS, 4000 Customers, approx $90m Valuation
Platform to scale partner revenue.
12/5/2022 • 17 minutes, 19 seconds
How he grew 400% by acquiring his smaller $450k ARR competitor without using cash
12/4/2022 • 16 minutes, 1 second
They Doubled Revenue This Year to $300,000 Helping Real Estate Agents Edit Photos
Real estate visuals that sells!
12/3/2022 • 12 minutes, 55 seconds
New SaaS goes 0 to $2.4m in 9 months using genius growth strategy
Cold Email Outreach At Scale.
12/2/2022 • 19 minutes, 11 seconds
How he sold his $2.3m SaaS with approx $500k EBITDA for $6m+ Cash
Help company scale and prepare to sell.
12/1/2022 • 21 minutes, 51 seconds
He's ok burning $150k/mo right now with his $600k ARR Connected Vehicle Data SaaS
AI-Powered Connected Vehicle Data Platform.
11/30/2022 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
How they hit $12m ARR with just $4m Raised helping RevOps teams with Firmographic Data
We collect firmographic data
11/29/2022 • 21 minutes, 31 seconds
His Agency did $800k First Year Sales, his secret new SaaS tool is growing even faster
Studio building SaaS products w/ low-code
11/28/2022 • 13 minutes, 49 seconds
His chip is Inside 176,000 Dogs, $1m in Revenue, Big Help for Vets
Pet microchip ID system / central medical database.
11/27/2022 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
He acquired a company for under $100k, lead engineer kept 20%, what's his GTM plan?
Leave Management for Positive Cultures
11/26/2022 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
Bootstrapper hits $5m ARR using $2m in debt, keeps all his equity
Routing, mapping, and gathering data from the field for Field Sales Teams.
11/25/2022 • 19 minutes, 59 seconds
Imagine doing $6.1m in revenue helping Loom, Dropbox, and G2 break $100m in ARR
We grow companies like Loom, Dropbox, Calm etc
11/24/2022 • 18 minutes, 45 seconds
How this pre-revenue SaaS startup raised $1m last week at a $5m cap
WordPress blog alternative for startups.
11/23/2022 • 18 minutes, 17 seconds
How we got 5,000 on our SaaS waitlist using community
11/22/2022 • 15 minutes, 11 seconds
The Simple PR Template We Used to Bootstrap to $1m in ARR
11/21/2022 • 17 minutes, 23 seconds
How we bootstrapped to $60k MRR with no product team
11/20/2022 • 20 minutes, 31 seconds
Cheat Code: I learned what SaaS to build for dentists by building a $7m agency first
11/19/2022 • 18 minutes, 43 seconds
How I competed with $1M at TaxTaker vs. $100M in competitor funding
11/18/2022 • 33 minutes, 29 seconds
We call 30k cold leads per month and land 5% as customers. Here's the playbook
11/17/2022 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
$1 Trial Map: How we used a $1 Guarantee to Break $75k MRR, Instant CAC Payback
11/16/2022 • 24 minutes, 23 seconds
Founder Net worth Map: How to use your SaaS to cash out, diversify without losing control
11/15/2022 • 19 minutes, 35 seconds
How my shift from SaaS to SaaS+ moved retention from 74% to 107%
11/14/2022 • 16 minutes, 53 seconds
How I hit $3m in ARR during a pandemic, a war and a looming recession
11/13/2022 • 24 minutes, 51 seconds
How we acquired a competitor for $40,000 (and why we'll never do it again)
11/12/2022 • 22 minutes, 57 seconds
How my $5k hobby project used 1 to many selling to reach $700k ARR in a year
11/11/2022 • 24 minutes, 31 seconds
How we grew our GovTech SaaS from $50k to $350k ARR in the last 12 months
11/10/2022 • 27 minutes, 27 seconds
Partnering with an ERP as an OEM VAR-deal terms, code ownership, exit value impact?
11/9/2022 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
How I Pivoted From Flat and Unhappy to $6m and High Growth
11/8/2022 • 27 minutes, 53 seconds
How I Generated $250M In Leads As A One Person Marketing Team
11/7/2022 • 23 minutes, 17 seconds
How to shoot through the scale gap (hardest part of scaling rev is between $1M ARR - $6M ARR)
11/6/2022 • 28 minutes, 27 seconds
How Metadata grew 700% to $15m in Revenue in 24 months while switching from high burn to profitable
11/5/2022 • 21 minutes, 11 seconds
How Clickup Bootstrapped to $25m, Then Decided to Go All In and Raise $530m to Take on Giants
11/4/2022 • 24 minutes, 51 seconds
The $100m Pendo Story: The Crazy Not-Scaleable Stuff We Did At Every Stage
11/3/2022 • 29 minutes, 3 seconds
Unlocking B2B Influencer Marketing: How I used $20k to get over $1M in ARR
11/2/2022 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
How we bootstrapped to $2m ARR, $800k in Profits, and what we plan to do with extra cash
11/1/2022 • 44 minutes, 37 seconds
High Volume, Low ARPU Sales Playbook: 14 Page Process We Used to hit $3m Revenue, Profitable
10/31/2022 • 23 minutes, 19 seconds
How we bootstrapped to $1m in ARR using services, now high multiple SaaS
10/30/2022 • 16 minutes, 23 seconds
Building Culture, Processes and Accountablity as Remote Team.
10/29/2022 • 23 minutes, 13 seconds
Life After Freemium: Why we killed our model, built a new one, and increased LTV by 400%
10/28/2022 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
How i built a team that was as invested emotionally as me
10/27/2022 • 14 minutes, 41 seconds
Professional Services Playbook: How we used services to bootstrap our way to $3m in SaaS revenue
10/26/2022 • 27 minutes, 33 seconds
How we use LinkedIn to get 61 inbound 5-figure opportunities in the first year
10/25/2022 • 19 minutes, 9 seconds
9 mistakes sales reps make when they finally send the docusign to the prospect
10/24/2022 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
Scaling enterprise sales with digital transformation for a niche industry
10/23/2022 • 20 minutes, 51 seconds
3 Systems Cookie Information used to grow to 50 employees and a $50M secondary
10/22/2022 • 22 minutes, 51 seconds
How I hit $5m ARR, kept control using 3 different debt providers
10/21/2022 • 31 minutes, 51 seconds
How Vroozi leveraged two internal hackathons last year to achieve $1M new ARR?
10/20/2022 • 18 minutes, 37 seconds
How Tenfold went from $5m ARR, Burning $1m per Month to 100% YoY Growth and a big exit
10/19/2022 • 26 minutes, 11 seconds
Free Customer Formula: How I grew Expandi from $0 to $7m in 20 months without spending money on ads
10/18/2022 • 35 minutes, 53 seconds
How I bootstrapped to $20m in 5 years (and 3 growth channels I used to hit first 100 customers)
10/17/2022 • 27 minutes, 45 seconds
Team Retreat Playbook: Why We Spend $2,500 per head for our SaaS team retreats
10/16/2022 • 26 minutes, 43 seconds
Details behind David Hauser Selling Grasshopper for $176m and how he acquires companies today
10/15/2022 • 22 minutes, 51 seconds
How to build an A+ team to drive 700% growth on a shoestring budget
10/14/2022 • 22 minutes, 25 seconds
Masters of Debt: How to buy a $5m SaaS Company Using Debt, Grow to $20m, Then Flip for a Huge Gain
10/13/2022 • 22 minutes, 1 second
$100m Deck Builder: Bootstrapped to $100M Valuation
10/12/2022 • 24 minutes, 59 seconds
How to 5x Your Bookings with a Transactional Sales Model for SMBs
10/11/2022 • 24 minutes, 3 seconds
How we pivoted our way to a near hundred million dollar exit
10/10/2022 • 15 minutes, 7 seconds
Founder First PE Playbook: Growing from $24m Revenue Bootstrapper to $400m PE Valuation
10/9/2022 • 25 minutes, 15 seconds
How We Acquired our PLG Competitor to Break $30m in Revenue
10/8/2022 • 21 minutes, 25 seconds
Copy vFairs Used to Get 1,000+ G2 Reviews and $30M ARR without hiring any outbound sales team
10/7/2022 • 17 minutes, 23 seconds
How FreightWaves used their $20m Media Business to build a $20m ARR SaaS with Zero CAC
10/6/2022 • 21 minutes, 31 seconds
He's spent $200k already, pre revenue, list of 3,000 users. How to convert them to paid?
Workspace for 'Build In Public' teams.
10/5/2022 • 19 minutes, 35 seconds
How Biami Used OpenSource As Top of Funnel to Break $1.2m ARR
10X Your Business!
10/4/2022 • 19 minutes, 9 seconds
How he closed $3.3m Seed (sold 25%) for Agile Management Tool Last Week
Strategic Portfolio Management for Agile.
10/3/2022 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
How he bootstrapped to $45k MRR in under 6 months for Employee Engagement SaaS
Digno turns employee performance data into a measurable score.
10/2/2022 • 16 minutes, 7 seconds
1 Employee, $600k ARR, How He's Scaling with Systems for Marketing Collateral SaaS
Creative / Design Automation Platform.
10/1/2022 • 16 minutes, 47 seconds
How Flatfile Built $100m+ WarChest to Create Data Onboarding Category, Hit $6m ARR
Flatfile’s vision is to enable seamless data exchange between companies — large and small — throughout the world. With AI-assisted data exchange, Flatfile eliminates repetitive work and makes B2B data exchange fast, intuitive, and error-free. The Flatfile platform automatically learns how imported data should be structured and cleaned, enabling customers and teams to spend more time using their data instead of fixing it. Flatfile has completed over 25 billion data mapping decisions for companies like Sage, ClickUp, Square, AstraZeneca, CBRE and Spotify. For more information, email sales@flatfile.io or visit flatfile.com.
9/30/2022 • 34 minutes, 47 seconds
This Google Analytics Alternative Just Broke $6.3m Revenue, valued at $70m, Considering a Raise
Privacy-friendly alternative to Google Analytics.
9/29/2022 • 14 minutes, 24 seconds
Bootstrapper Does $25m Round with Secondary Building Future of Email Marketing for Enterprise Teams
Enabling People's Creativity.
9/28/2022 • 27 minutes, 48 seconds
Practice Ignition Breaks $24m Revenue, Raises $50m at $330m Valuation Helping 5,000 Accounting Firms Scale
Client engagement & commerce platform for professional services businesses.
9/27/2022 • 23 minutes, 31 seconds
VR Builder SaaS Hits $5m Revenue, Targeting $10m Series A Now
Developer of immersive VR training.
9/26/2022 • 14 minutes, 59 seconds
How He Patiently Bootstrapped To $4.5m in Revenue In Legacy Space
Complete workflow CRM/PSA/Helpdesk.
9/25/2022 • 14 minutes, 58 seconds
Edtech SaaS Breaks $4m, Looking at $10m Series B Next
Student platform that improves conversations.
9/24/2022 • 18 minutes, 54 seconds
How this Reporting Tool Bootstrapped to $4.2m ARR, 2600 Customers
Digital marketing reporting software.
9/23/2022 • 14 minutes, 54 seconds
How She Bootstrapped to $4m in ARR Helping You Fight Negative Reviews
Reputation Management Social Media Platform.
9/22/2022 • 22 minutes, 27 seconds
Popular Identity Verification Tool Raising $60m on $400m Now with $10m in Revenue
Fraud prevention for any business.
9/21/2022 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
Venture Studio Spinout Hits $250m Valuation for Clean Data Room SaaS
Data clean room software innovator.
9/20/2022 • 28 minutes, 47 seconds
How Bootstrapped YouCanBookMe Hit $5m using team profit sharing as internal motivation
9/19/2022 • 20 minutes, 19 seconds
Founder spends $150k/mo on 21 FTE's to build tool that helps your product teams launch
Unify and automate GTM processes.
9/12/2022 • 27 minutes, 21 seconds
Vidboard hits $20k in MRR in 2 months to help create videos from static images, text to video
Create Human Presenter led videos from Text.
9/11/2022 • 14 minutes, 51 seconds
Should you launch a new SaaS when your current one is doing $5m in ARR?
Automated Video Interview Software (One-way video interviewing).
9/10/2022 • 16 minutes, 3 seconds
$30k in MRR but wouldn't sell for $750k, would you?
CLOSEM provides tools to help increase sales.
9/9/2022 • 20 minutes, 1 second
She spent $100k on an agency for MVP, now has 11 FTE's and $1m ARR helping 55 brands teach their teams faster
Team-building and talent development combined.
9/8/2022 • 20 minutes, 15 seconds
Look Back: How Shipmonk CEO Kept $5m of $10m Series A Round, Breaking $80m In Revenue 2019
Ecommerce Order Fulfillment.
9/7/2022 • 13 minutes, 57 seconds
Look Back: FlockFreight Grows 400% YoY, 500k Pallets Shipped, Still Shy of $1b Valuation
Transform the freight industry.
9/6/2022 • 24 minutes, 25 seconds
Look Back It's been a year since Bill acquired Divvy: Founder Sees Clear Path to $100m, 20k Customers, Most Revenue from CC fees, $1b+ in GMV
Divvy is a platform that helps businesses manage payments and subscriptions, build strategic budgets, and eliminate expense reports.
9/5/2022 • 26 minutes, 5 seconds
Look Back: UserZoom Eye's 2022 IPO, $100m Run Rate in User Experience Management Space
Experience insights management solution to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences.
9/4/2022 • 24 minutes, 3 seconds
His software does $15k/mo helping you rent empty tennis courts (and 22 other sports)
Now everyone can play.
9/3/2022 • 15 minutes, 31 seconds
Flooring engineers builds tool for himself, breaks $11k MRR as 1 person team
ERP Software for Flooring Companies.
9/2/2022 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
He spent $30k to build a text based version of Calendly, here's how he got first 50 customers
Online appointment scheduling software.
9/1/2022 • 17 minutes, 27 seconds
Largest SaaS Founder Event in Europe Will do $3m+ This Year, Starts Oct 17th!
Events, Media and Peer groups (for SaaS Founders).
8/31/2022 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
They were valued at $2.5m last month. This is their plan to make money with influencer list of 55,000
We're building tech to solve the problems related to Influencer Marketing.
8/30/2022 • 16 minutes, 39 seconds
Mini PE firm grow new acquisition to $2m ARR for gov contracting SaaS
Actionable Insights for Government Contractors.
8/29/2022 • 15 minutes, 1 second
HealthTech Hits $1.4m ARR in 12 months with genius medicare reimbursement model
Building Virtual "First" Care Platform.
8/28/2022 • 24 minutes, 9 seconds
Surprising reason banks pay $1m+ for this SaaS, $10m+ ARR today
Extract important information from documents.
8/27/2022 • 0
How Tettra hit $1m ARR for its internal knowledge base tool
Knowledge sharing for growing teams.
8/26/2022 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
How much revenue do Jason and SaaStr make?
8/25/2022 • 41 minutes, 49 seconds
Bootstrapped SEO SaaS Hits $1.8m ARR, 28% Profits!
Automating SEO.
8/24/2022 • 22 minutes, 3 seconds
He shut down his $50m quant fund to launch AI agency. I bet big SaaS is next.
Data Science, AI and ML.
8/23/2022 • 22 minutes, 45 seconds
How he sold his $1m business for $20m Last Week
Diligence as a service.
8/22/2022 • 19 minutes, 49 seconds
How she broke $25k MRR SaaS revenue by starting off as an OKR coach
Help companies align teams with OKRs.
8/21/2022 • 16 minutes, 19 seconds
How he negotiated term sheet to raise $10m and pivot his no code platform from services to SaaS
Low-code development platform.
8/20/2022 • 17 minutes, 31 seconds
You should hire him to be your SDR. He's crushing it for 45 B2B SaaS founders already.
Sales development as a service.
8/19/2022 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
Genius Combo of SaaS Marketplace hits $2.4m ARR for Sales Burnout Tool
Employee performance & mental health platform.
8/18/2022 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
India Based SaaS Breaks $25m ARR, Lands First $600k ACV US Customer for Conversational AI Tool
Enterprise grade conversational AI platform.
8/17/2022 • 0
Just $10m raised to hit $30m in ARR, how the king of capital efficiency did it
All In One Local Marketing.
8/16/2022 • 25 minutes, 43 seconds
How he Broke $10m ARR moving from 65k B2C Customers to 20 B2B Enterprises
Stops spam calls and messages.
8/15/2022 • 22 minutes, 49 seconds
Bootstrapped to $1m in Under 18 Months, How he's growing his ATS SaaS
Recruitment Sourcing Automation Platform.
8/14/2022 • 15 minutes, 33 seconds
How he's structuring his first 10 pilots to optimize for first $1 in revenue
Quantify carbon emission of companies.
8/13/2022 • 13 minutes, 17 seconds
$225k in MRR with $50k/mo in profits. How this non-tech founder built a bootstrapped SaaS selling to furniture stores.
Help retailers automate their financing.
8/12/2022 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
He Shut down SaaS to Print Money ($700k) in High Margin Agency model
ABM and demand gen training for B2B companies.
8/11/2022 • 15 minutes, 19 seconds
Secret tool you should use to manage documenting systems to have contractors run
Workflow software.
8/10/2022 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
G2 Will Break $100m ARR This Year, not from reviews. Guess their 2 new lines of business.
Where you go for software.
8/9/2022 • 13 minutes, 1 second
How He Did $100m Secondary but also raised cash to buy a $5m+ ARR Competitor
Inspire and Enable the Best Board Meeting Experience.
8/8/2022 • 26 minutes, 13 seconds
They Used ProductHunt to Make $60,000 for their New SaaS, 6,000 signups
Async video collaboration for hybrid teams.
8/7/2022 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
He got diluted to 25% at his first SaaS company, now wants to keep new thing "private"
Software pricing.
8/6/2022 • 15 minutes, 43 seconds
How He increased ARPU from $50/mo to $800/mo with one simple change
Personality-based adaptive selling software
8/5/2022 • 18 minutes, 43 seconds
How Uberflip Doubled ACV to $60k By Doubling Down on Customized Content at Scale
Content Experiences for GTM Personalization.
8/4/2022 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
How he Negotiated $9m valuation with $1m ARR sales attribution SaaS tool
Solve tracking and attribution headache.
8/3/2022 • 15 minutes, 55 seconds
How he Doubled ACV to $480k selling niche SaaS to 10 Grocery Stores, now $4.5m in revenue
Loyalty & Personalization.
8/2/2022 • 14 minutes, 51 seconds
How he acquired a SaaS startup for $1 (now $14m in revenue, not a typo)
EHS software.
8/1/2022 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
Bootstrapper hits $1m Revenue, Now wants to Raise $3m on $70m, but why?
Technical Hiring in 4-clicks.
7/31/2022 • 13 minutes, 41 seconds
I love these guys. 3 co-Founders bootstrap to $2m in ARR. Beautiful business.
Team inbox, chat, and tasks.
7/30/2022 • 20 minutes, 35 seconds
What you can learn from Vista Equity's former head of pricing
Helps B2B SaaS companies accelerate growth.
7/29/2022 • 16 minutes, 15 seconds
He just hit $12m in ARR. Took 7 years to hit $1m. Don't get discouraged!
Nieche CRM / sales Development tool for SaaS companies.
7/28/2022 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
$0 to $1.2m in 8 Months, How this Sales Enablement SaaS Founder Bootstrapped with super fast growth
Helps sales teams close deals
7/27/2022 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
Guess what this $3.6m ARR Timesheet SaaS Profited last year
We publish enterprise timesheet software
7/26/2022 • 14 minutes, 1 second
Million Dollar, No Sales Team Playbook: How he hit $720k in ARR as a 1 man team
Business Growth on Autopilot
7/25/2022 • 14 minutes, 45 seconds
Ukraine Based Virtual Event SaaS Grows 4x to $800k ARR over the last 12 months
Metaverse events for remote teams and online communities
7/24/2022 • 13 minutes, 13 seconds
PLG Playbook: How Jotform hit 10m Users, Targeting 5% Free to Paid, Min $19/mo Price Point, Bootstrapped
Online digital forms
7/23/2022 • 23 minutes, 53 seconds
Clientpoint Breaks $3m ARR, Raising $5m on $45m Valuation now
Gives you business relationship workspaces
7/22/2022 • 16 minutes, 45 seconds
Spiffy Hits $50m Revenue Cleaning Cars with automated software stack and 280 vehicle cleaning fleet
on demand car care
7/21/2022 • 21 minutes, 31 seconds
Accucode Builds $30m ARR SaaS Tool Inside of $70m Revenue Hardware Business
Solves problems with technology.
7/20/2022 • 16 minutes, 25 seconds
She's a 1 person bootstrapped founder with $500k in ARR, here's how she did it
Automated webinar platform
7/19/2022 • 19 minutes, 43 seconds
$0 to $2m in 6 months helping SaaS companies hire engineers fast
Insourcing for software developers
7/18/2022 • 18 minutes, 41 seconds
How To Run 1000 TV Commercials For your SaaS Without A Ton of Work
Industry leading ad-tech/martech personalization platform
7/17/2022 • 16 minutes, 37 seconds
Pandemic should have killed him, he doubled revenue to $1.8m helping live event venues pay and manage talent
We make planning live music evvents easier
7/16/2022 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
How she increased ACV's from $5k to $150k in under 20 months for App Building SaaS
Rapid application development
7/15/2022 • 15 minutes, 35 seconds
Flip Your SaaS Playbook: PE firm Acquires $1m ARR MightlySignal for .5-1.5x, Sold 24 months later for $4.5m.
Builds and sells small SaaS
7/14/2022 • 19 minutes, 7 seconds
She sold 20% for $4.5m for one SaaS. She's bootstrapping the other one. Key differences
The notification inbox for web and mobile products
7/13/2022 • 12 minutes, 13 seconds
The Perfect Life: $1.5m revenue with 10% profit margin helping 100 enterprises with employee feedback software
Increase Employee Engagement
7/12/2022 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
Bootstrapping King: $4m ARR with 6 Person Team, $2.8m Profits
Communications platform that drives revenue
7/11/2022 • 15 minutes, 31 seconds
He sold his bakery to launch software for Restaurants, $36k in revenue already
Online ordering system for restaurants
7/10/2022 • 15 minutes, 41 seconds
DataLab Hits $15m Revenue Charging Farmers Price Per Cow, Largest ACV $100,000
Develops farm management information systems
7/9/2022 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
Is Growing 85% YoY From $5m ARR Fast Enough Considering They've Raised $13m?
Providing the leading software platform in the Enterprise AV-over-IP market
7/8/2022 • 14 minutes, 5 seconds
ServiceMax Breaks $150m ARR, Kills 2021 SPAC, Growing 20-35% This Year Helping 400 Customers Schedule Technicians to do Physical Repairs
Asset-centric Field Service Management Software
7/7/2022 • 28 minutes, 17 seconds
SaaS company and want to move into payments? Justifi helps you do it fast. Almost $5b in platform GMV across 36 customers today.
Vertical SaaS Payments Infrastructure & Strategy
7/6/2022 • 22 minutes, 55 seconds
Professor launches new Security SaaS, Breaks $30k MRR Fast
Enable data to protect itself
7/5/2022 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
SaaS Bootstrapper Hits $3m Revenue with genius niche product
Billing and crm software for telco
7/4/2022 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
How he makes $7k/mo from app the fund his new SaaS tool
Reduce churn and improve LTV
7/3/2022 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
How 30 year old broke $200,000 in revenue for construction project management SaaS
Construction project profitability forecasting software
7/2/2022 • 14 minutes, 27 seconds
This is how I want to live. Buy 1/8th of a house, stay for 44 nights. Founder Raises $17.4m, $2m+ in revenue already.
Ember is enabling the dream of second homeownership for millions
7/1/2022 • 16 minutes, 25 seconds
Rockstar Guitarist Launches SaaS, Breaks $3.6m in revenue, $30m valuation
We are integration service provider
6/30/2022 • 32 minutes, 5 seconds
He hit $35k revenue last month with 100% outsourced dev team
Custom Mobile Apps
6/29/2022 • 14 minutes, 59 seconds
He's the Real Unicorn: Bootstrapped to $10m, Owns 100%, Shares Profits with Team
Managing the Entire Software Lifecycle
6/28/2022 • 18 minutes, 29 seconds
Details of $20m Revenue Profitwell and $55m Revenue Paddle Deal and what led to the $200m Acquisition
6/27/2022 • 1 hour, 26 minutes, 53 seconds
They want to rent out your luxurious car using software, hit first $24k in ARR
Subscription vehicle as a service
6/26/2022 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
SaaS for developer productivity hits first $3k in MRR
Fitness tracker for work
6/25/2022 • 11 minutes, 5 seconds
950k QR Codes Installed and $1m in Venue Revenue, Digital Seat Closing $5m Series A Now
QR-Code Based Fan Engagement Technology
6/24/2022 • 16 minutes, 25 seconds
18 year old raises $32m to build opensource version of Calendly
Scheduling infrastructure for absolutely everyone
6/23/2022 • 25 minutes, 3 seconds
First B2B SaaS for VR Headsets Breaks 1.5m Downloads, $1m in ARR, $33m Round Closed
Help design teams communicate in 3D
6/22/2022 • 18 minutes, 9 seconds
Perfect timing Security SaaS Hits $12m Revenue, Closes $80m on $500m Valuation last week
Cybersecurity for Mid Market companies
6/21/2022 • 22 minutes, 25 seconds
$10m revenue founder uses debt to get leverage in $22m Series B for help desk software
Help desk built for Google workspace
6/20/2022 • 19 minutes, 5 seconds
Pay per car scan model generates $30k MRR helping Insurers decrease fraud
Remote vehicle inspection software
6/19/2022 • 19 minutes, 41 seconds
Side project accidentally hits $7k, when does he go full time?
Help organize calls for applications
6/18/2022 • 16 minutes, 31 seconds
How to Set Up Profit Sharing Plan from $2m+ Bootstrapper
Protect Business Critical Websites
6/17/2022 • 23 minutes, 15 seconds
How he Raised $20m+ to turn his College Thesis on Dental Data into a SaaS Company
Transforming dentistry through AI
6/16/2022 • 21 minutes, 33 seconds
Fitness SaaS Hits First $80k in Revenue, 400 Hours of Video Content on Platform today
Fitness video content produced at scale
6/15/2022 • 15 minutes, 35 seconds
Very Natural Path from Consumer to B2B Helps Tribute Founder Break $1m Run Rate for Meaningful Montage VIdeos
#1 Group Video Montage Platform
6/14/2022 • 17 minutes, 41 seconds
He Can Earn 40% IRR with Fintech + SaaS Helping Polish Employees Get Their Paycheck Early
Salary on demand
6/13/2022 • 19 minutes, 19 seconds
Why he shut down $35k/mo agency to launch SaaS for ecommerce sellers
Centralized Back Office for E-commerce Automation
6/12/2022 • 13 minutes, 47 seconds
How he used community to raise $1m for his Backend as a Service SaaS
Backend as a service platform
6/11/2022 • 15 minutes, 55 seconds
He pays senior engineers $30k/yr, building new Employee Engagement SaaS
B2B SaaS HR Tech Platform
6/10/2022 • 12 minutes, 25 seconds
He hustled to close $30k in consulting before closing $250k round for his new API documentation SaaS
Developer experience to boost sales
6/9/2022 • 14 minutes, 49 seconds
This SaaS makes sure your gas station doesnt' run out of chargers. You won't believe their revenue.
Dolado enables small business in Latam to increase efficiency, reduce costs and sell better through a full suite of e-commerce and financial services.
6/8/2022 • 20 minutes, 25 seconds
He hated his remote guitar lessons then spent $8m on new SaaS MVP, 5 patents later he's preparing for launch.
Remote cloud coworking space
6/7/2022 • 21 minutes, 1 second
How ShapShap is creating jobs in Nigeria with Marketplace SaaS
Online marketplace/on-demand logistics services
6/6/2022 • 6 minutes, 5 seconds
Would she be better off with no revenue? Focus on engagement for her productivity App?
Achieve calm, focused productivity
6/5/2022 • 16 minutes, 43 seconds
He'd sell this side project for $100,000. Is that the right price?
Storyboard video ideas, collaboratively
6/4/2022 • 21 minutes, 15 seconds
Watch him pivot from $20k/mo consulting to pure play SaaS
3 co-founders own 33% each of new recruiting marketplace and SaaS tool
Reinvent external recruitment
6/1/2022 • 19 minutes, 15 seconds
She saved equity, used dev shop for new PropTech SaaS, breaks $1m in revenue
Rental rewards and credit building platform
5/31/2022 • 22 minutes, 21 seconds
They sold $400m in NFT's last month, made $8m, broke $200m valuation during Series A
The leading NFT Marketplace on Solana
5/30/2022 • 24 minutes, 25 seconds
15 year old launches unique app, breaks $1m revenue, raises $10m
Uber for laundry
5/29/2022 • 24 minutes, 59 seconds
She Hit $6m Bootstrapped for HR Tool, Will Place 200,000 Candidates This Year
Human learning via machine learning
5/28/2022 • 20 minutes, 59 seconds
Employee time tracking app hits $180,000, founder owns 100%
WFM Platform to reduce OpEx & enhace productivity
5/27/2022 • 16 minutes, 31 seconds
She did $30,000 Last Month from Ukraine HQ helping Founders Understand Finances
Fuel is your cloud-based financial department. We do your spreadsheets, graphs, and automations. You get P&L, CF, Financial Projections, Plan/Fact, Unit Economics, and finally, peace of mind. All in familiar to you Google Spreadsheets. Forget about months of integrations and insane setup costs.
5/26/2022 • 15 minutes, 33 seconds
He used software to fix 10,000 bikes last month, made $400,000 revenue
Bike maintenance in your neighborhood
5/25/2022 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
How he used Twitter to hit $24,000 sales for new SaaS Tool
Personalized sales outreach
5/24/2022 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
He's Processing $100m+ in GMV Run Rate Connecting Lenders like Affirm with Consumer Brands like Lenovo
ChargeAfter is the leading network for Buy Now Pay Later Consumer Financing.
5/23/2022 • 26 minutes, 25 seconds
How he built 10k beta list, used it to raise $3m for new Calendar Tool
Helpful Schedule Management Software
5/22/2022 • 17 minutes, 43 seconds
Is there room for another Breather? $800k raised on rolling $10m valuation Seed
Airbnb of Commercial Real Estate
5/21/2022 • 20 minutes, 24 seconds
CustomInk Paid Over $20m for Swag.com, Will do $60m+ This Year, 30% Margins
all-in one swag platform
5/20/2022 • 18 minutes, 23 seconds
5 Kenya Customers Pay $25k/yr For this AR Management Platform, $6.5m Valuation
Account receivables automation
5/19/2022 • 13 minutes, 29 seconds
Typeform Breaks $75m Revenue, How the Founder Structures R&D Team of 2 To Build Fast, Launch new Products
5/18/2022 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
How He Got First 4 Customers Paying $50-$200k ACV's for New CLM Tool
Connect companies and customers on value
5/17/2022 • 16 minutes, 49 seconds
Genius Founder Hits $10m Revenue With Just $3.2m Raised
Contact Center in Emerging Markets
5/16/2022 • 17 minutes, 3 seconds
Skiff is Privacy Focused Notion, Breaks $60m Valuation, 10k MAU's
Private, end-to-end encrypted collaboration
5/15/2022 • 25 minutes, 13 seconds
Drone Safety Software Raises at $4m Valuation, Lands first $100k Pilot for 25 Drones
AI-driven urban safety drones
5/14/2022 • 16 minutes, 25 seconds
Fund management tool breaks $500,000 revenue on way to $1m+ this year
Private markets fund and portfolio accounting
5/13/2022 • 15 minutes, 37 seconds
Deep Tech Founder Lands First Customer at $150,000 per year
Make AI accessible to everyone
5/12/2022 • 12 minutes, 21 seconds
Fintech For Gig Workers Breaks $1m ARR, 10k Customers
Income stability solutions for the gig economy
5/11/2022 • 24 minutes, 13 seconds
How ThreeKit Plans to Grow into their $300m+ Valuation, Break $10m Revenue This Year
Visual Commerce
5/10/2022 • 21 minutes, 37 seconds
Genius Way to Pre-Sell $5k of Your Product
Enterprise robotic advisory
5/9/2022 • 19 minutes, 1 second
Hacker Buys a SaaS Project for $7,500, Now Does $120,000 in Revenue
Buy & Sell Online Businesses
5/8/2022 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
How He Used PLG to Hit $70k in Revenue this Month
Captable management for Startup founders
5/7/2022 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
You won't believe the profits this $10m revenue bootstrapper makes
5/6/2022 • 26 minutes, 53 seconds
Congrats! Bootstrapped founder hits $5m
5/5/2022 • 20 minutes, 21 seconds
$20m Payday and he still controls ChiliPiper with his Wife Alina
5/4/2022 • 35 minutes, 31 seconds
He Acquired Companies through Whatsapp. Bootstrapped with $30m in revenue today.
5/3/2022 • 21 minutes, 59 seconds
Henry Schuck turned down $40m for 70% when he was 24
5/2/2022 • 36 minutes, 45 seconds
How he hit $1m with no FTE's (Fiverr contractors only)
5/1/2022 • 33 minutes, 25 seconds
Bootstrapper killing his VC backed rivals who raised $500m+
4/30/2022 • 26 minutes, 53 seconds
This Founder Built 3 SaaS Companies, hit $40m ARR 3 times. Here's how
4/29/2022 • 33 minutes, 17 seconds
He Used Community to Hit $7m Revenue, VC's chased him
4/28/2022 • 23 minutes, 21 seconds
3 things this $2m revenue bootstrapper would do differently
4/27/2022 • 25 minutes, 49 seconds
Notre Dame Owns 20% Of this Safety SaaS Spin Out, Raising $200k Now
Automate Software Safety Case Analysis
4/26/2022 • 13 minutes, 25 seconds
3 Power Companies Pay More than $250k for this SaaS To Monitor their High Voltage Lines
AI-based software platform for powerline inspections
4/25/2022 • 14 minutes, 57 seconds
Bank Calculator App Hits $400k ARR, Hit $7m Cap
Answers to life's toughest (financial) questions
4/24/2022 • 17 minutes, 11 seconds
$12m profits, Bootstrapped, $95m ARR out of India
Global b2b SaaS martech company
4/23/2022 • 21 minutes, 15 seconds
New Event Tool Worth $40m with $2.5m in ARR, Raising More Now
Event platform for B2B marketers
4/22/2022 • 19 minutes, 1 second
He's Making $100k/mo Helping Construction Companies Rent out their Idle Pieces of Equipment
We enable construction workflow automation
4/21/2022 • 20 minutes, 55 seconds
From $5k to $24k in 12 Months, KFactory is Digitizing Factories for 12 Customers
KFactory is turning factories into smart factories
4/20/2022 • 17 minutes, 1 second
She Fled the Syrian War Then Raised $1m, Fraud AI Tool now Worth $10m
A service for integrating machine learning within minutes, at scale
4/19/2022 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
The Math Behind the $360m Sage Paid to Acquire BrightPearl
Retail Operating System for Merchants
4/18/2022 • 19 minutes, 51 seconds
Bootstrapped Maropost Hits $60m Revenue, 52% Profits, Doing $1.7b Secondary Right Now
4/17/2022 • 24 minutes, 21 seconds
He Left GainSight to Help D2C Brands Sell More, 260 Customers, $30k in GMV Last Month
Decentralised Commerce for Web 3.0
4/16/2022 • 14 minutes, 21 seconds
5000 Building Owners Manage Jobs Using This Vendor Management Tool
VendorPm
4/15/2022 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
Can This Quantum Compute Startup Get 11 LOI's To Convert to $100k+ ACV's?
Providing a quantum/hybrid computing SaaS platform
4/14/2022 • 21 minutes, 7 seconds
He Raised $15m to Help Your New Customers Pay for your Expensive SaaS Plans
B2B BNPL
4/13/2022 • 24 minutes, 33 seconds
$1m ARR to $50m in 28 Months. This AML KYC SaaS Is A Secret Unicorn, only $6.5m Raised
The world’s most powerful plug & play mobile app security testing solution used by enterprises around the world
4/11/2022 • 20 minutes, 47 seconds
Founder with $4m raised hangs up after tough questions
Plan, Predict, Prove, Pivot
4/10/2022 • 8 minutes, 49 seconds
Car Technology SaaS Hits $1.2m ARR, Sold 14% for $500k
Zeliot offers connected mobility platform to enterprises and OEMs
4/9/2022 • 17 minutes, 13 seconds
Founder of $6m SaaS Pingboard Replaces Himself as CEO To Grow Faster
Employee engagement software
4/8/2022 • 23 minutes, 29 seconds
LendingPoint Hits $600m ARR, Will Profit $120m on AI platform for consumer loans
AI-Driven CreditTech lending
4/7/2022 • 28 minutes, 39 seconds
His Chrome Extension Just Got $60k Offer, He Said No, Now 400k Users, $40k ARR
Link management service URL Shortener
4/6/2022 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
Raising Now: This SaaS Tracks 5m Truck Shipments Per Month, $1m in ARR across 100 Enterprise Customers
Founded in 2004, WebXpress is a Global Transportation and Logistics SaaS provider, headquartered in Mumbai. WebXpress serves over 100 leading supply chain companies and 10,000 users. It is a globally proven solution with deployment in 8 countries in SE Asia, Middle East, and Africa. WebXpress essentially has two lines of offerings - Transportation as a service and LogiCloud: Supply chain visibility platform. WebXpress is founded by Apurva Mankad, Founder & CEO. WebXpress is a cloud-native digital logistics platform. Some of their customers are leading names such as Linfox, Agility, Madura, Toll Logistics, Snowman, Future Supply Chains, DTDC, Coldex among others.
4/5/2022 • 18 minutes, 49 seconds
Their Upsell Org is Hitting 150% Expansion Quotas on Way to $6m ARR
Local search and marketing technology
4/4/2022 • 19 minutes, 19 seconds
Language Optimization SaaS Hits $23k MRR in 6 Months, 9 FTE's, $3m Valuation
B2B SaaS for inclusive language
4/3/2022 • 16 minutes, 13 seconds
Full Stack Permissions as a Service Launches, $6m in Fresh Capital to Buy Time
Empowers developers to bake-in permissions
4/2/2022 • 24 minutes, 17 seconds
Supermetrics Does $4.3m in March, $51.7m Run Rate Helping Marketers Get All The Data They Need
How he built MVP for $20k in 5 weeks, now $10 Customers Pay $400/mo to Track Carbon Emissions
3/30/2022 • 12 minutes, 47 seconds
$25m Gong Acquisition? New Founder Hits $2m Run Rate in 5 Months
Real-time call coaching software
3/29/2022 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
He left Kiev on March 10th, His SaaS Hit $12k ARR Helping 3500 Freelancers
Helping freelancers to manage business online
3/28/2022 • 12 minutes, 5 seconds
Burning $55k/mo Building Freemium Tool for Developers, 15k users, $1.2m Raised
Help developers write better code faster
3/27/2022 • 15 minutes, 57 seconds
Can $20k MRR Founder Get $5m on $40m Fundraise Done?
Vonza helps creators to monetize their business
3/26/2022 • 0
Productivity Tool Profits $15k/mo, Bootstrapped team of 3
File Annotation Developer API Library
3/25/2022 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
Latka IPO Watch: 24.7 About to File? A look back
[24]7.ai is redefining the way companies interact with consumers. We help businesses attract and retain customers, and make it possible to create a personalized, predictive and effortless customer experience.
3/24/2022 • 18 minutes, 17 seconds
The Quiet Confidence of Zapier's Wade Foster (Look Back)
Automation / Productivity
3/23/2022 • 26 minutes, 7 seconds
Look Back: Is Gong looking to IPO?
Revenue Intelligence Platform
3/22/2022 • 25 minutes, 11 seconds
Look Back: Can Outreach beat Vista Backed Salesloft?
Outreach is a sales engagement platform that uses AI for predictive analytics as it relates to sales
3/21/2022 • 26 minutes, 7 seconds
Look Back at $100m Salesloft Before Vista Deal
The #1 sales engagement platform
3/20/2022 • 25 minutes, 21 seconds
Look Back: Cognism Prospecting Tool Hits $10m Revenue, 40% Of Last Round Was Secondary
Cognism is GDPR-compliant B2B sales and marketing lead generation platform, providing B2B revenue teams with a blend of real-time company, people and event data to streamline prospecting, find and deliver new revenue
3/19/2022 • 24 minutes, 21 seconds
Disco Helps Hundreds of Customers Facilitate Live Learning, Can They Beat Hopin?
Enable knowledge creators to build and scale a live learning empire!
3/18/2022 • 25 minutes, 29 seconds
Cloud Management Starts Grows 100% to $35k MRR This Month
Simplifies Operational Complexities For Cloud Management
3/17/2022 • 20 minutes, 39 seconds
Software Procurement SaaS Hits $1m, 50+ Customers. Can they beat Vendr?
procurement software and B2B marketplace
3/16/2022 • 13 minutes, 31 seconds
100% YoY Growth to $1m Today, Raising $5m on $30m Post
Ad campaign optimization: turning lead gen businesses into e-commerce
3/15/2022 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
Can they convert 11k Designer Installs to Revenue, $40m+ Valuation?
Native iOS Design Tool.
3/14/2022 • 20 minutes, 25 seconds
Pipelyne Is Pre Launch SaaS with $50k ARR, Boiler Installer Company Spinout
Pipelyne helps home service companies double inbound leads
3/13/2022 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
$800k Bootstrapped SaaS Spun Out of $3m Agency, how'd she do it?
Customer Experience Management Software
3/12/2022 • 17 minutes, 1 second
SaaS Startup Raises at $3m Valuation Helping Precious Metal Dealers Verify Buyers and Sellers
The first end-to-end transaction platform for commodities
3/11/2022 • 15 minutes, 31 seconds
This Pendo plus Loom Startup Just Got First Paying Customer, $3m Valuation
Customer education platform that customer love
3/10/2022 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
Trucking Software Goes $0 to $1.4m in 11 Months, $35m Valuation
Make transportation a competitive advantage
3/9/2022 • 24 minutes, 17 seconds
This Developer Tool Doubled To $240k ARR And Raised at a $14m Post Money Valuation
Git for data
3/8/2022 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
How to Sell $50k Contracts on Day 1 of your Startup
Visually build and manage cloud infrastructures
3/7/2022 • 19 minutes, 1 second
Fastest Growing Ever? How He Went From $0 to $1.2m in 4 Weeks
Work management platform
3/6/2022 • 23 minutes, 55 seconds
Venture Studio Spinout Hits $250m Valuation for Clean Data Room SaaS
Data clean room software innovator
3/5/2022 • 0
He Just Sold 25% For $2m, Can he Hit $1.2m ARR Next?
Digitises vehicle rental operations
3/4/2022 • 21 minutes, 13 seconds
How he plans to sell first $2k/mo plan
enables marketing experts to derive market analysis without the use of user data
3/2/2022 • 20 minutes, 45 seconds
DevOps Tool Fig Raised $2.2m in 2020, Now Approaching 100k MAU's, Whats Next?
Makes the terminal easier for developers
3/1/2022 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
Why he raised $150k at $4m Pre Seed Round
App helps chronic condition patients
2/28/2022 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
He Converted SaaS to Blockchain, Now $230m Market Cap to Kill Fiverr
2/27/2022 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
Payment Processor in Brazil Hits $27k in MRR and $72m GMV Run Rate
recurring billing automation for businesses growth
2/26/2022 • 17 minutes, 39 seconds
Popular Identity Verification Tool Raising $60m on $400m Now with $10m in Revenue
Fraud prevention for any business
2/25/2022 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
Bootstrapped to $3m, Now Raising to Grow Field Operations Management SaaS
Field workforce automation
2/24/2022 • 16 minutes, 35 seconds
Ask Experts Anything Marketplace Did $1.5m Last Year, 20,000 Experts Paid, 80 Customers, $5.5m Raised
2/23/2022 • 21 minutes, 19 seconds
The Next Redfin? Real Estate Broker SaaS hits $2.4m Revenue, $50m Valuation
Software brokerage for real estate agents
2/22/2022 • 26 minutes, 25 seconds
How this Reporting Tool Bootstrapped to $4.2m ARR, 2600 Customers
digital marketing reporting software
2/21/2022 • 16 minutes, 1 second
Architecture Professor Launches $4.3m SaaS Tool on Back of Infoproduct, 90% EBITDA
Test prep for architects
2/20/2022 • 0
Edtech SaaS Breaks $4m, Looking at $10m Series B Next
Student platform that improves conversations.
2/19/2022 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
How He Patiently Bootstrapped To $4.5m in Revenue In Legacy Space
Complete workflow CRM/PSA/Helpdesk
2/18/2022 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
Bootstrapped To $1m With Cookie Monitoring and Security SaaS
Privacy Software-as-a-Service
2/17/2022 • 17 minutes, 49 seconds
AI Powered Internal Search Tool Grows 200%, Breaks $1m Run Rate, $15m Valuation in 2020
Enterprise Search
2/16/2022 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
$30m Agency Launches $1m SaaS Building Intranets for B2B Brands
Intranet as a Service
2/15/2022 • 15 minutes, 37 seconds
Workplace Management SaaS Hits $4.7m in ARR, up 70% YoY, Price Increase Added $55k/mo last 20 days
Workforce Management Software
2/14/2022 • 21 minutes, 35 seconds
B2B Hardware Plus SaaS Business Breaks $4.5m in Sales Volume, Super Sticky SaaS Revenues
Free motion Gaming
2/13/2022 • 23 minutes, 17 seconds
Whitelabel Frame.io Competitor Hits $1.2m in Revenue, Very Capital Efficient
Enterprise video content management
2/12/2022 • 20 minutes, 25 seconds
Linkedin Automation Tool Bootstrapped to $38k/mo From Parents Basement, Big Profits
LinkedIn automation tool for sales teams
2/11/2022 • 14 minutes, 11 seconds
Digits Wants to Replace Quickbooks, $30m Raised, 4 years of Building Distribution, Launch is Next
Financial Management Platform for SMBs
2/10/2022 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
MVP Power: Found Tech Co-Founder on Upwork, $0 to $180,000 in under 12 months
Automate Real Estate Sales Process
2/9/2022 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
Software For Soccer Leagues Raises at $7m Valuation, Hits $35k in Monthly Revenue
We are the Saas solution for digitization of sports
2/8/2022 • 19 minutes, 5 seconds
Security SaaS Hits $1m ARR, $70m+ valuation on $15m Series A
Provides the market’s only security investigations control plane
2/7/2022 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
POS System Does $15m GMV, Biz Makes 1%, $1m+ Run Rate Serving 150 Customers
Increase revenue through purchase data & consumer relationships
2/6/2022 • 15 minutes, 41 seconds
Mozart Helps You Clean Your Data, $0 to $750k ARR in 12 Months, $6m Seed
Modern Data Stack
2/5/2022 • 18 minutes, 17 seconds
Doctor Turns SaaS Founder, $0 to $1m Revenue Instantly with OroHealth Software
Asynchronous telemedicine, specializing in dermatology
2/4/2022 • 14 minutes, 19 seconds
Restaurant SaaS Pivots From Marketplace, Hits $50k in MRR, Raising $7m Now
Unified API & Intelligence for the restaurants tech industry
2/3/2022 • 17 minutes, 43 seconds
VR Builder SaaS Hits $5m Revenue, Targeting $10m Series A Now
Developer of immersive VR training
2/2/2022 • 16 minutes, 39 seconds
Launch AR Campaigns Easily, SaaS Hits $25k MRR Under 8 Months
No-code WebAR marketing platform
2/1/2022 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
$0 to $65m Valuation in 8 Months, $1.65m Revenue For This Passwordless Authentication SaaS
One Stop Solution for your Authentication Needs
1/31/2022 • 14 minutes, 13 seconds
100% Growth, Now $1.4m ARR Helping 500 Customers in LATAM Manage Whatsapp Channels
Our software manages IM channels like WhatsApp Business with multiple users so companies can sell more
How She Bootstrapped to $4m in ARR Helping You Fight Negative Reviews
Reputation Management Social Media Platform
10/8/2021 • 21 minutes, 11 seconds
50,000 Customers Have Paid This Fitness Brand $6m, App Doing $12k in MRR
Cut Fat, Keep Your Curves
10/7/2021 • 14 minutes, 55 seconds
Rosterfy Hits $3.2m ARR, Raising $4m on $30m Pre with 100 Customers
Contingent Workforce Management Technology
10/6/2021 • 12 minutes, 39 seconds
Customer Support SaaS Hits $60k MRR Using On Prem Installations, Raising $1m at $10m Valuation
We help SMEs to automate and consolidate customer support using AI and ML.
10/5/2021 • 17 minutes, 39 seconds
TakeTask is Clickup for Deskless Workers Grows 80% to $2m ARR
Task management for deskless workers
10/4/2021 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
Brazilian Cloud Security SaaS Hits $750k ARR With $350k Raised, Opening $5m Series A Soon
Compliance for the public cloud
10/3/2021 • 16 minutes, 49 seconds
Solar Power eCommerce Brand Hits $5m In Sales, 100,000 Customers, Software Next?
Portable Solar Appliances
10/2/2021 • 18 minutes, 47 seconds
ChoreRelief Launches SaaS for Contractors to Manage Invoices, Breaks $800k in ARR, Raising Now
Marketplace and operations software for home services
10/1/2021 • 13 minutes, 37 seconds
Big exit or Acquihire? SpirdTech Exits With $2m+ in ARR and $4.5m Raised
Customer service platform for public safety
9/30/2021 • 15 minutes, 49 seconds
Britech SaaS For Financial Firms Hits $10m ARR, up 70%, on just $3m Raised
B2B SaaS for Investment Managers
9/29/2021 • 18 minutes, 15 seconds
UserZoom Eye's 2022 IPO, $100m Run Rate in User Experience Management Space
Experience insights management solution to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences
9/28/2021 • 22 minutes, 43 seconds
Agiloft Founder Feels Good About $50m Run Rate In Next 12-24 Months
Contract Lifecyle Management
9/27/2021 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
Quanthub Helps you Hire Engineers, Raised $2m on $8m Valuation, On Track to Break $1m ARR
Data literacy hiring and upsilling
9/26/2021 • 16 minutes, 27 seconds
He Built Shopify's Content Machine, Now Working With SaaS Founders
We build content marketing programs.
9/25/2021 • 15 minutes, 31 seconds
They Help Companies like Fan Duel Stay Compliant, Raising $3m on $150k of ARR
Gaming licensing made easy
9/24/2021 • 18 minutes, 25 seconds
Slack Tool KarmaBot Doubles to $400k ARR, Turns Down $1m Offer
People culture as a service.
9/23/2021 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
SalesImpact In Talks to Raise $6m at $80m Valuation as they pass $4.5m Run Rate For Their Sales Coaching Platform
Learning platform for GTM teams
9/21/2021 • 19 minutes, 43 seconds
Translation Tool Breaks $1.2m Run Rate, 3,000 Customers, New Raise Soon?
Translation with the combination of AI and human translators
9/20/2021 • 17 minutes, 19 seconds
He Does $10k/mo Helping SaaS Founders Book Sales Calls
9/19/2021 • 17 minutes, 3 seconds
They Shut Down $3m Agency to Launch API SaaS tool, Hit 200 Customers
Treblle helps developers with APIs
9/18/2021 • 18 minutes, 11 seconds
Folderly Email Deliverability SaaS Hits $1.56m ARR In Under 9 Months, Bootstrapped
Email Deliverability Platform
9/17/2021 • 17 minutes, 5 seconds
API Integration Tool Hit $1k in MRR, Raised $150k on $1.4m Valuation
API integration platform and B2B software marketplace (3 min video demo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBySL5eK0PE&feature=emb_logo )
9/16/2021 • 17 minutes, 1 second
Husband Wife Team Taking on Drizzly, Hit $1.5m Run Rate, Ecomm for Alcohol
Ecomm for Alcohol Companies
9/15/2021 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
ChiliPiper Meeting Tool Hits $12m Run Rate, Approaching Unicorn Status
Automate lead qualification, routing & scheduling
9/14/2021 • 24 minutes, 39 seconds
Linkedin Automation Tool Bootstrapped to $25k/mo From Parents Basement, Big Profits
LinkedIn automation tool for sales teams
9/13/2021 • 16 minutes, 37 seconds
Sales Automation SaaS Hits $480k ARR After Spinning Out of $1m Agency. Raising $150k on $5m Now
Sales Automation
9/12/2021 • 13 minutes, 25 seconds
How Funnel-Builder SaaS Convertri Used Affiliates to Hit $1.5m in ARR Without Raising Capital
Fastest Funnel Builder
9/11/2021 • 22 minutes, 5 seconds
Board Meeting Software Breaks $24m ARR With Just $5m Raised, New $100m Last Month
Board Meeting Platform
9/10/2021 • 14 minutes, 1 second
HealthTech SaaS Bootstrapped to $600k ARR, 1200 Customers and 500,000 Patients
Practice Management Software for Healthcare Professionals
9/9/2021 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
DevOps SaaS Data Tool Breaks $4.9m ARR Bootstrapped Using Its Marketplace To Grow
Help companies utilize data to grow profit
9/8/2021 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
FlowChat Goes From $0 to $40k MRR in 4 Months Using 1 Tactic
Build lead lists, book calls
9/7/2021 • 15 minutes, 46 seconds
Was Selling Majority to Vista The Right Move? Gainsight Customer Success Platform Hits $100m ARR, 1,000 Customers
Customer Success Software
9/6/2021 • 18 minutes, 55 seconds
He Exited his CRM, Now Car Software Hits $40m Run Rate
He Exited his CRM, Now Car Software Hits $40m Run Rate
9/5/2021 • 20 minutes, 51 seconds
MessageDesk Hits $15k MRR, Targets $2m Seed Early 2022
Business Text Messaging Platform
9/4/2021 • 13 minutes, 35 seconds
SalesPanda Founder Wouldn't Sell for $1m, Has $400k in ARR, 80% yoy growth
SalesPanda is a SAAS based PARTNER RELATIONSHIP MGT (PRM) software
9/3/2021 • 11 minutes, 35 seconds
Claap Is a More Feature Rich Loom for Product Managers, $3m Raised on $17.5m Post Money Valuation
Asynchronous meetings
9/2/2021 • 19 minutes, 43 seconds
Local Marketing SaaS 2x Last 4 Months, Breaks $3m ARR and 1200 Customers
Marketing automation for wellness businesses
9/1/2021 • 19 minutes, 59 seconds
Estated Grows 100%, Breaks $1.7m ARR for Property Data Platform
Property intelligence
8/31/2021 • 21 minutes, 25 seconds
CPG User Research SaaS Suzy Hits $40m ARR, Flirts with $500m Valuation, IPO Next?
Enterprise market research software
8/30/2021 • 19 minutes, 59 seconds
Webboss Raised $500k on $1m Vlauation in 2015. Where are they now?
The only alternative to WordPress
8/29/2021 • 16 minutes, 47 seconds
HR SaaS Hits $500k ARR Helping Teams Give Rewards to Employees
Cloud-based employee recognition platform
8/28/2021 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
Former Top Sales Rep Will Help You Hire First SDR at Your SaaS Company for $2,500/mo
Build Sales Development Teams
8/27/2021 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
Keap Acquired CustomerHub For $1-2m in 2011, Founders Bought Back in 2018, Now $500k in ARR
Simple knowledge commerce platform
8/26/2021 • 16 minutes, 53 seconds
Team Collaboration Tool Hits 3 Pilots, $15k Each, Real MRR Growth next?
Workforce collaboration & insights
8/25/2021 • 14 minutes, 11 seconds
400 Firms pay $1k/mo For This Investor Database, Growing 100% YoY Bootstrapped
Raise Money for investment firms
8/24/2021 • 20 minutes, 1 second
New Sales Enablement Tool, $1m to $3.5m in 2 Years, Now Raising $7m on $50m Valuation
Sales Enablement
8/23/2021 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
Gusto Killed Their $3m Business, Pivoted to $7.8m ATS Business in HR Tech Space
HR Software and Services
8/22/2021 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
No Code Agency Moves to SaaS, 1200 Customers, $2m+ ARR
Low-Code Development Platform
8/21/2021 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
Oil and Gas ESG SaaS Hits $1.2m ARR in 12 Months, $5m Raise Next?
ESG compliance-as-a-service
8/20/2021 • 20 minutes, 15 seconds
Retail SaaS Taking Off Post Pandemic, $1m+ ARR, Raising $8m Series A Now
Michelle Bacharach is CEO and Co-Founder of FindMine, an award-winning content engine that uses machine learning to scale content curation for the world's top retailers. As a product and strategy expert, Michelle is experienced in growing companies by launching software, apps and websites to millions of people, putting together joint ventures, and conceiving of new products. She has an MBA from NYU Stern and a BA from UC Berkeley (Go Bears!), where she wrote her honors thesis on managing innovation in multinational organizations. Previously, Michelle served as Director, Program Management - Univision.com and Entertainment with Univision Communications, Inc. where she was responsible for creating the digital roadmap for Univision's cross-platform digital properties (including TV shows, tentpole events, Univision.com, and the Univision App), ensuring KPIs, user experience, and alignment with business strategy are upheld. She also executed roadmaps using Agile & Scrum methodologies: including writing user stories and acceptance criteria, groom the product backlog, manage overarching priorities and balance workload between 6 different sprint teams to deliver on product vision. She managed delivery of Univision's first digital property built on a responsive framework, which drove triple digit growth in engagement over the previous year's site for the same tentpole event as well as sourced, negotiated, and executed large-scale integrations with vendors. Michelle also served with Univision as Associate in the Office of the CEO. In this role, she worked directly with C-suite leadership to evaluate, plan and execute CEO and Board-level strategic initiatives spanning Univision's assets in Broadcast, Cable, Local TV, Radio, and Online/Mobile, including an overhaul of Univision's digital content and product strategy, structuring and valuation of a joint venture with El Rey, Robert Rodriguez's new cable network, and formulation of Univision's long-range, cross-platform English language strategy. Michelle has also helped venture-backed startups, agencies, and fortune 1000 businesses with their digital strategy and consumer experience: She founded and led the customer innovation team at BigTent, Inc. (acquired by Care.com) and quantified the value of a Facebook “like” for a billion dollar apparel brand while at ReadySet Rocket. She also has raised over $150,000 for her alma mater, U.C. Berkeley and led a team of cold-callers to a record breaking $3M fundraising year for the Cal Calling Center.
8/19/2021 • 18 minutes, 45 seconds
Can This Data Company Win? $9k to $40k MRR in 6 Months Bootstrapped
Like you, I am passionate about technology, making the world better and having fun doing it.
8/18/2021 • 13 minutes, 17 seconds
He's Beating Cancer While Building Fintech Health Tool, $1.6m ARR Bootstrapped
Founder and CEO of CoverMe, healthtech SaaS company using AI to help people find paying sources for healthcare bills in a real time marketplace. Bootstrapped and profitable, CoverMe’s team has doubled along with revenue in each of the last four years.
An immense passion for technology, company culture and customer experience with business experience spanning 20+ years launching his first business at 19 years old. In May 2018, Tom joined REVIEWS.io as Chief Operating Officer (COO) with the sole purpose of growing the business globally. REVIEWS.io is a digital feedback solution that enables online businesses to build brand trust, and is internationally renowned for its innovation.
8/16/2021 • 17 minutes, 9 seconds
New NFT Tool Helps Artists Sell Work for $20/mo
I use my background in TV, news, branding and technology to help creators earn without ads on the world's first NFT social network where we make everyone an influencer natural. Plus, we enable digital content creators to build communities and monetize their content using blockchain enabled technology.
8/15/2021 • 13 minutes, 51 seconds
20 Year Old Sells $15k Lanyards, Now Ecomm Research Tool
I'm a 20 year old degree apprentice, meaning I work full time as a software engineer and part-time completing university that is paid for. In my spare time I'm working on Ecom Pilot, a SaaS product research tool for dropshippers. We are currently pre-launch, and have been lucky enough to find some partners who are working on a complementary tool now raising a series A. I'm also working on Afiliatree, which is more of a bootstrapped effort at a social enterprise looking to do some good.
8/14/2021 • 17 minutes, 45 seconds
Brazilian Quote to Cash SaaS Hits $10k in MRR up from $2k, $250k raised at $2.5m Valuation
Passionate computer scientist in the fintech space. Past HSBC, EBANX (soon to be listed), cofounder at PLIPAG.
8/13/2021 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
0 to $20k MRR in 4 Days? How This SaaS Startup Did It.
I'm the CEO of Sales for Life (a LaaS company), the pioneering Social Selling training program for mid-market and enterprise companies. Sales for Life has trained over 250,000 sales and marketing professionals, in dozens of industries. We recently founded PipelineSignals (a BPaaS company) that mines Signal Intelligence from LinkedIn, for any accounts in our customers TAM, for sales opportunities vs. risks.
8/12/2021 • 16 minutes, 17 seconds
$15k in MRR From $50k Raised Helping you Turn Blogs into Audio Content
Administration graduate, shines at problem-solving and creativity applied to business and product development. Albert is co-founder and CEO at VOOOZER, Audio Marketing leading solution in Brazil, selected by Google for Startups as one of the most promising startups in 2019. Advocates for harmony between startup life and family life.
8/11/2021 • 15 minutes, 35 seconds
How He Built The Largest Rev Ops Community In The World (and $500k of revenue!)
15 year sales veteran that started revgenius at beginning of pandemic bringing it to 15,000 sales, marketing and revops pros in a years time.
8/10/2021 • 18 minutes, 45 seconds
BillBee Fastest Growing Bootstrapped Ecomm SaaS, $2m to $4.5m ARR in 7 Months
1st employee of Billbee in 2015, now Chief Revenue Officer and Managing Director / Co-CEO togethet with Founder Jan Krause.
8/9/2021 • 13 minutes, 49 seconds
He Plans to Beat Zapier, Has 6 Customers, But Will Stop if Can't Hit $5k MRR By Feb
Born in Minsk, emigrated to Barcelona (Spain) pursuing a carrer in a global multinational. Last 7 years led the innovations unit and built super successful things, got multiple innovation awards and finally left to build own thing. A month before COVID lockdown. A husband, a father. Loves basketball and video games (bf 3). A fan of Steve Blank, Ben Horowitz and Peter Thiel. Would work for Elon Musk just for food and bed.
8/8/2021 • 14 minutes, 21 seconds
Egypt Based Seafood Marketplace Launches, Does 70 Orders, Makes 15% Commission
Ahmed Shalaby, founder of Ayooh infotech co. Operates Ayooh seafood ordering app launched January 2021 in Alexandria, Egypt. Mechanical engineering background with passion in tech. Holding MBA from the University of Northampton back in 2018. I plan to expand in the MENA region as the first niche in seafood delivery.
8/7/2021 • 15 minutes, 27 seconds
EstateSpace Grows 200% to $2.2m ARR Bootstrapped Helping You Track Your Physical Assets
Jonathan B Fishbeck is the founder and CEO of EstateSpace, LLC, a technology platform that simplifies lifestyle management service and operations to maintain real-property assets to help reduce risk and protect wealth succession. Jonathan was previously the Founder and CEO at a design-build firm whose focus was advising, designing, constructing and operationalizing sizable estate properties for UHNW families and family offices.
8/6/2021 • 22 minutes, 3 seconds
Ardius Finds $500m in Tax Credits for Startups, Exits to Gusto
8/5/2021 • 22 minutes, 47 seconds
How HyperProspector Got First $4k in MRR
I have launched HyperProspect in August 2020 when covid started and I got a lot of time to work on my things and from there. I went from $0 to $4k MRR bootstrapped no funding. HyperProspect is a team of growth hackers that works with the LinkedIn automation tools that we have in the house and we give ""done for you service"" to clients. The pain point was lots of founders Don't know how to use automation tools and at the same time, they need someone who is an expert in these fields. So here HyperProspect comes in pictures. We have a lot of clients and working with Big Companies having $Billion dollar revenue, I have been working with their founders closely. For me, this was a great journey starting from nothing to $4k MRR. I Got lots of ups down and lots of learning I am 23 right now (solo founder) and still working on lots of projects and still exploring more and more. I would love to share tons of value around LinkedIn and how I go from $0 to $4K? www.hyperprospect.com Https://www.linkedin.com/in/neerajnegi
8/4/2021 • 12 minutes, 55 seconds
$500k Consulting to $45m Prop Tech VC Fund
Kunal Lunawat is a co-founder and managing partner of Agya Ventures. Previously, he was an investor at Blackstone Real Estate and has advised several real estate technology startups. Kunal is an alum of Yale College and Harvard Business School.
8/3/2021 • 18 minutes, 35 seconds
vFairs Breaks $30m ARR bootstrapped, turns down $500m Offer
Younas is the Founder and CEO of vFairs - the leading Virtual and Events Hybrid Platform in the world. Younas led the growth of the company from 2 people back in 2016 to 250+ team members now in 2021 with over $40MM in revenue.
8/2/2021 • 18 minutes, 41 seconds
Bootstrapped Founder Buys $1.4m Dream Home Funded by his Marketing SaaS Tool
Aurelian Amacker is a French marketer whose success first started in 2010 after he started his own blog. He later wrote a book about his journey ""I Earn my Living with a blog"", which was a number one bestseller on Amazon. He then began teaching digital marketing to his French audience and generated $500,000 with his very first launch. He still actively teaches his audience about digital marketing today. He is also the founder and CEO of systeme.io, an all-in-one marketing platform that has garnered over 8,000 customers since its launch in 2018.
8/1/2021 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
Groupfio Using Resellers to Break $1.3m Bootstrapped
7/31/2021 • 13 minutes, 43 seconds
Legal Tech Merger Drives $1m in ARR, $5m+ Investment
Bill Bice is the CEO at nQ Zebraworks, which is tackling the challenges created by Work From Anywhere in legal organizations. Bill started his first software company at age 18, and has since been on the founding team or a seed investor in 27 startups.
7/30/2021 • 21 minutes, 39 seconds
Course Creation Tool Doubles in 6 months to $7m ARR
As CEO of Easygenerator Kasper is both the initiator and driver behind the Employee-generated learning trend. He has made an impact on the field of learning as a blogger (kasperspiro.com), author (trainingindustry.com, Learning Solutions magazine, CLO magazine, and others), and as a speaker at various e-learning conferences around the world.
7/29/2021 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
Cleaning Marketplace Hits $1.2m ARR, Now Scaling with $35k Franchises
7/28/2021 • 17 minutes, 13 seconds
How they built 300 person waitlist for new co-browsing SaaS tool
👋 I'm a product designer/manager hybrid who works with companies to take their digital products from good to great. 🔥 I'm on a mission to find ways to make customer service amazing for companies. 🚀 I wanna help companies 10x their customer support. All-round innovation seeker ⚡ Optimist 🥬 I speak 🇺🇸 and 🇪🇸
7/27/2021 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
ZenOutreach lands first 2 customers, $2k in MRR, How she did it
Previously co-founded a tech-based real estate service and led sales at an Amazon seller management company. I founded ZenOutreach in February 2021. ZenOutreach is a lead generation company. We offer different packages from list building, email outreach and custom plan. We do 100% of the work for our clients, optimize their campaigns and convert leads into sales opportunities.
Panos Siozos is the co-founder and CEO of LearnWorlds – a Cyprus-based e-learning company that is transforming self-paced learning through hassle-free textual and video-based learning. Panos co-founded the company in 2014, during a period in which the economies of both Greece and Cyprus were not conducive to new ventures. LearnWorld is now a multi-million-dollar SaaS company based in over 70 countries, with a team of over 30 employees!
Mads Wedderkopp is a young but experienced founder, he took Quickorder from 0 to 40 people, raised multiple funding rounds, and completed two acquisitions as Founding CEO. He has since grown the company to 60+ people and an ARR of 6M+ USD as Group COO. Beside Quickorder Mads is also chairman of Dreaminfluencers a rapid growing martech company that has more than 10x'ed the first 6 month of 2021.
7/24/2021 • 17 minutes, 19 seconds
How this DevOps Tool Plans to Break $1m in First 9 months
Gil Feig is the co-founder of Merge. Previously the Head of Engineering at Canvas, he’s led projects at Wealthfront and LinkedIn. A graduate of the Columbia University, Gil lives and works in San Francisco.
7/19/2021 • 20 minutes, 49 seconds
He'd Sell Keyword Research SaaS $750k ARR For $1.5m, $250k in Profits
Petersen was #13 at a staffing industry startup that grew from $7M to $65M during his tenure and went public in 1996. The business is still operating today in 26 countries and has a $4B market cap. Petersen then spent 20 years consulting before launching Growth Stack Inc, a Saas portfolio on a path to IPO in the next 30 months.
7/18/2021 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
They Help Banks Underwrite Cannabis Founders, $500k ARR Now, $1m Soon?
Justin Fischer is CEO and Co-Founder of RiskScout, a leading company helping financial institutions bank higher risk businesses such as Hemp, CBD, Cannabis, MSB, Private ATMs, Crypto, and many more. Small to medium-sized businesses in higher-risk and specialty markets are not able to access financial services because many providers lack the resources, expertise, or infrastructure to expand their business portfolio into higher-risk markets. This compliance barrier leaves many hard-working entrepreneurs and community businesses without the financial services they need to grow. By helping financial institutions solve complex compliance with technology solutions, RiskScout helps local businesses in higher-risk markets find a community partner that they can trust.
7/17/2021 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
He couldn't have a baby, built software to solve the problem, now $500k ARR
Jake Diner is a former Big Ten Track and Field Champion, who graduated from Michigan State University with a degree in Computer Science in 2001. He spent the first 10 years of his career in a global product management leadership roles working for multinationals like Dell and Belkin. Since founding his first startup in 2011 and raising tens of millions in venture funding, Jake has been in entrenched in an entrepreneurial journey of building companies and solving global tech problems affecting millions. His current company Fertility Cloud, where Jake serves as a CEO, is on a mission to bring affordable and accessible fertility treatment to all in need.
7/16/2021 • 14 minutes, 27 seconds
CPG Data SaaS Doubles to $1.6m ARR, Raising $3m on $18m Now
Pan has been managing projects and firms across various industries with a focus on eBusiness & Technology. Amongst his roles was Head of Business Planning, for the leading mobile commerce firm, Upstream, with business development responsibilities in 40 countries. He founded Convert Group on 2014 as an eCommerce Consultancy and in 2019 they pivoted into an Enterprise SaaS with his partner, Elena.
7/15/2021 • 16 minutes, 11 seconds
Will Bizzabo Announce A Major Acquisition Next Month? (Flashback)
Eran is the CEO & Co-Founder of Bizzabo, an all-in-one Event Success Platform and one of the fastest growing event tech companies in the world. He has led Bizzabo in winning the People’s Choice Award at the Event Tech Awards for three years in a row. Before he founded Bizzabo, Eran was an event marketer and served as the CEO of the Rosh-Pina Media Convention. He also was a team leader and systems engineer at Elbit Systems. Eran graduated cum laude from The Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, where he studied Business and participated in the prestigious Zell Entrepreneurship Program - often considered the Y Combinator of Israel.
7/14/2021 • 23 minutes, 19 seconds
PE Just Ate JazzHR, Here are their metrics 1 year ago
Results oriented executive with a 25 year history of a strategic, metrics-driven approach to accelerated revenue. Focus on the global small business market with deep experience in B2B high velocity new customer acquisition. As CEO of JazzHR, Lamson is responsible for JazzHR’s strategic direction, company performance, day-to-day business operations, and serves as a support center for our revenue teams.
7/13/2021 • 17 minutes, 35 seconds
My Favorite Bootstrapped SaaS Founder ($122k MRR)
Dmytro Okunyev is the founder and owner of Chanty, a team communication platform. Dmytro started toying with the idea of a chat app back in 2017, he realized that team communication should be made easier, more flexible and powerful so that it encompasses chat, audio and video.
7/12/2021 • 16 minutes, 49 seconds
Why SaaS Founders Use Them as SDR's, First Sales Hire
Founder of Fullfunnel.io ( Full-Funnel B2B marketing for B2B Service-Based, Tech and SaaS companies) and ROIplan (marketing planning platform). I live and breathe B2B marketing since 2007. Author of ""LinkedIn Content Marketing: How to generate high-quality B2B leads on LinkedIn without cold messaging and ads"" book that was awarded as the best B2B marketing ebook and was included to 100 Best B2B Marketing Books of All Time by Bookauthority.
7/11/2021 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
ScholarshipOwl Breaks $4m Revenue Helping 15k Students Get Loans
An engineer from a young age, previously CTO/R&D manager in a number of Israeli startups, ex-Googler turned entrepreneur and CEO, changing the US education financing. Running a successful all-remote company now for 5 years, and a strong believer in remote as a way of life.
7/10/2021 • 16 minutes, 11 seconds
Did Everyone Make Money in the Bizzabo X.AI Deal?
"Dennis Mortensen is the CEO and co-founder of x.ai. Dennis is an expert in leveraging data to solve enterprise use cases and a serial entrepreneur who’s successfully exited several companies on that theme. His long-term vision of killing the inbox led to the formation of x.ai and the creation of Amy + Andrew, artificially intelligent assistants who schedule meetings. He speaks frequently to anyone who’ll listen, from the crowds of Web Summit to his building’s doorman, about an optimistic future for AI, productivity, and the future of work. Dennis was also an accredited Associate Analytics Instructor at the University of British Columbia and the author of Data Driven Insights, on collecting and analyzing digital data. Originally from Denmark (and keeping his accent), Dennis is now a New Yorker for life."
7/9/2021 • 35 minutes, 15 seconds
Today G2 Is Worth $1b. What happened 24 months ago?
Entrepreneur delivering success to B2B tech buyers and vendors via G2.com marketplace...and supporting ThreeKit in building the world's most amazing 3D visual selling platform. Previously built cloud CPQ software pioneers BigMachines (acquired by Oracle) and SteelBrick (acquired by Salesforce). Following the conscious path to reach the PEAK in my work, personal, and family life.
7/8/2021 • 18 minutes, 17 seconds
Shiphero Raised $50m last week, inside their metrics
Founder and CEO of ShipHero. Previously founder and CEO of an online retailer of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu apparel that I founded in 1999 at age 19 and ran until I started ShipHero.
7/7/2021 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
ConvertKit Raising at $196m Valuation?
7/6/2021 • 1 hour, 3 minutes, 57 seconds
Will Gong Break $10b Valuation by October?
Amit Bendov is the CEO and founder of Gong.io. He brings more than 20 years of leadership experience in hyper-growth enterprise software startups. Before co-founding and leading the team at Gong.io, Amit was CEO of SiSense, and also held the role of CMO for Panaya.
7/5/2021 • 24 minutes, 33 seconds
How Knowledge Hacking App Raised $20m Pre Product at $100m Valuation
Patrick Walker is the co-founder of Uptime, an app that presents expertly curated five-minute Knowledge Hacks of the world’s best books, courses and documentaries.
7/4/2021 • 20 minutes, 55 seconds
BetterAgency CRM for Insurance Hits $1m ARR, Raises $2m on $15m Valuation
I am the Co-Founder of Better Agency, the first Sales-Driven AMS and the industry's top CRM for Independent Insurance Agencies. We are on a mission to help agents issue $1Billion in new business premium by 2024. I am an Ex-Professional Athlete, and my ""playing field"" is now the Tech & software Space.
7/3/2021 • 19 minutes, 59 seconds
Indie Riches: He Makes More Now Than The $100k Job That Laid Him Off in 2019
Cam Sloan is a Canadian entrepreneur who worked as a full-stack developer until he was laid off in 2019. Instead of finding a new job, he started freelancing with the goal of eventually starting a product business. Today he juggles both as he works towards building a profitable software business.
7/1/2021 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
Brazil Customer Success SaaS hits $25k MRR, $3m Valuation
Leonardo is an expert in customer relationship management who worked in small and large companies through his career. In 2017, decided to change the side and invite some friends to build CustomerX, a SMB Brazilian Customer Success Management Platform.
6/30/2021 • 14 minutes, 47 seconds
What Happened: Only $7k in Bank, Now $4.5m ARR, 100% YoY Growth
6/29/2021 • 26 minutes, 9 seconds
Husband Wife Team Goes From Almost Dead to 100 Customers
12 years into my programming career, I finally landed my dream tech job. Great team, great salary, great projects. But after 3 months, I started feeling bored. I realized that not even the perfect job could fulfill me, as I craved a bigger challenge. I had no other choice than to start my own company.
6/28/2021 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
ProjectCor Hits $1m ARR, Raises at $40m Valuation for Profit Tracking Tool for Agency's
Santiago Bibiloni (born in Buenos Aires., October 20, 1989) is a Silicon Valley based technology entrepreneur and co-founder & CEO at COR, the next-generation solution for creative and professional teams that intelligently suggests how to manage your projects, teams and finances. Prior to COR he founded Balloon Group, one of Argentina’s fastest growing digital agencies, among other businesses. Today he continues to grow COR and is also a Sales and Fundraising mentor at 500 Startups as well as speaker and jury in big technology, advertising and entrepreneurial events.
6/27/2021 • 22 minutes, 27 seconds
HockeyStack Hits First $800 in MRR in 2 Months
I'm an 18-year-old, who is passionate about making things people need and use. I have tried a lot of things varying from personalized book boxes to a social media app to solve different problems with my friends and now growing my first SaaS, HockeyStack.
6/26/2021 • 13 minutes, 7 seconds
Freightos Grows GMV 800%, Exits COVID Stronger Than Ever
6/25/2021 • 21 minutes, 13 seconds
Why RambleChat Sold to Terminus Last Year at 10x Valuation Multiple
6/24/2021 • 17 minutes, 23 seconds
Windsor Breaks $55k MRR, Turns Down VC, Loves Bootstrapped
6/23/2021 • 12 minutes, 59 seconds
Slintel Breaks $6m ARR, $20m Raise on $100m Valuation Ready to Take on B2B Intelligence Space
Founder and CEO of Slintel. Hired Anupreet Singh Lamba early on who is currently leading Sales at Slintel, a SaaS Sales Intelligence platform. He has set up sales teams and functions from scratch for various companies and firmly believes that the initial revenue target is achieved only when the entire organization works with the grit to support them.
6/22/2021 • 26 minutes, 37 seconds
This Bootstrapped Startup Makes Crazy High $4.5m in Revenue Per Engineer
Founder Dux-Soup
6/21/2021 • 19 minutes, 37 seconds
They Raised $300k on $1m after B2B SaaS Pivot for Job Applicants to Record Videos Easier
Mike Beck has a background in financial trading and selling complex software before setting up Reliving, a B2C software company focused on helping people preserve their loved one’s life stories. The pandemic forced a pivot to what is now Reworking a B2B one-way video interview platform for employers.
6/20/2021 • 12 minutes, 29 seconds
$3m in Revenue and $227m Market Cap? How is Resonant thinking about Software?
Mr. Holmes joined Resonant in 2016 as CEO. Prior to joining Resonant, Mr. Holmes served as Chief Commercial Officer for Tigo Energy, where he was responsible for expanding the company's demand creation activities.
6/19/2021 • 22 minutes, 49 seconds
DropBox Competitor Bootstraps to $9m Revenue in Austin Texas
Madhan drives CodeLathe’s overall strategy and execution. Over the last 15 years, prior to founding CodeLathe, Madhan has worked on diverse systems and technology, including building highly scalable MMORPG game server technology, high speed real-time video acquisition systems, digital video engagement solutions, and Artificial Intelligence (A.I.). He has authored the ‘Getting Remote Work Done’ book and is also the original contributor of Money Manager Ex open source personal finance software. Madhan holds a Master of Science degree in Engineering from Boston University.
6/18/2021 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
How He Hit $10k With Side Project
Software engineer, indie hacker, and former college soccer player living in Chicago.
6/17/2021 • 11 minutes, 43 seconds
Ingo Breaks $100k/mo Helping Major Media Brands Get More Conference Attendees
Michael Barnett’s extensive experience in community growth led him to found InGo which empowers communities to grow by connecting current and potential members. The power of these communities to shape decisions is massive. One report shows that 92% of consumers trust a suggestion from a family member or friend over any other form of communication.
6/16/2021 • 16 minutes, 43 seconds
Hype4 Breaks $500k, Massive Design and Dev Community, SaaS Next?
Designer since 1998, university lecturer and author.
6/15/2021 • 18 minutes, 1 second
Gong Competitor: "We'll Raise at a $120m Valuation" after breaking $6m in ARR
Sindre Haaland was born and raised in Norway but lives with his beautiful wife, son, daughter, and Maltipoo-dog in Brooklyn, New York. Founder & CEO of SalesScreen, the world's most comprehensive gamification platform that creates a fun, motivating, and competitive atmosphere for revenue teams.
6/14/2021 • 22 minutes, 53 seconds
Can Law Pockets Help Solve Racial Injustice By Empowering Atlanta Residents?
We make the law easier not harder.
6/13/2021 • 17 minutes, 31 seconds
DeckRobot Breaks $1m Revenue Helping You Create Slide Decks Faster
ex-McKinsey who turned into a serial entrepreneur
6/12/2021 • 17 minutes, 15 seconds
How to Use Twitter to get first 200 Users for Your SaaS product
I am Dominik and recently founded a company together with my friend Anki where we're working on our own products and help other companies with our profound web development experience.
6/11/2021 • 15 minutes, 37 seconds
Quit $200k Job for $4k MRR Side Project, Can he Hit $100k by December?
A software engineer turns to be a bootstrapper, from building side hustles, to quitting my full-time job, to making Testimonial full-time.
6/10/2021 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
Prediction: Freshbworks IPO Coming Next Month? Founders Thinking in 2018
My name is Girish Mathrubootham and I am the Founder and CEO of Freshworks (previously known as Freshdesk). I am 36 years old, married and live with my wife and two boys in Chennai, India. This is the story of how I quit my comfortable job and launched my own startup. Hope you like it.
6/9/2021 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
Throwback: Before Loom Was Worth $1.5b, Founder Describes Paywall Launch
Shahed Khan is the Founder of Loom. He previously worked as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at NFX, a venture capital firm focused on investing in networks and marketplaces. Prior to NFX, Shahed was an Analyst at Los Angeles based venture capital firm, Upfront Ventures.
6/8/2021 • 25 minutes, 17 seconds
He Spent $300k Buying SaaS Companies, Sold them For $2m
Former Fortune 500 growth consultant turned digital entrepreneur. Currently runs a product studio that builds, grows and sells profitable internet companies and teaches online entrepreneurs how to grow their businesses faster.
6/7/2021 • 18 minutes, 45 seconds
Build a Website On Notion? Founder Gets first 70 Customers at $10/mo!
Noah started is entrepreneur journey creating multiple projects in college. After college He started his first real startup CoffeePass with his roommate. CoffeePass was an app like the Starbucks app but for local coffee shops. After working on the startup for two years it was acquired. Now Noah is indie hacking building businesses at a smaller scale that can at least work for him and his family. Potion.so is his current focus. Its a website builder built on top of Notion. Create custom styled websites on top of your Notion content.
6/6/2021 • 15 minutes, 17 seconds
Turning a $500k Course Into a $20k MRR SaaS Play. Next Russell Brunson?
Built an Instagram agency by sending cold emails, transitioned into an agency that sends cold emails for other people, made a cold email course, then made software apps for those who bought the course and other cold emailers
6/5/2021 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
HRForecast Bootstrapped to $3m, Signed $300k Deal, How They Handle Profits
2014 I founded HRForecast (peopleForecast GmbH) together with Florian Fleischmann. Prior to joining HRForecast, I gained interdisciplinary industry experience in various finance and planning roles. I bring with me comprehensive, cross-industry expertise in solving strategic problems in complex, fast-moving environments. I studied business administration at the Technical University of Ingolstadt.
6/4/2021 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
Process Automation SaaS: From $600k Pivot to 300% YoY Growth, How Indico Turned the Corner
Founder and CTO of indico data solutions, an Enterprise AI solution for unstructured content with an emphasis on text and NLP. He has been building machine learning solutions for startups, governments, and Fortune 100 companies for the past 5 years and is a frequent speaker at AI conferences.
6/3/2021 • 23 minutes, 17 seconds
He's stepping down as CEO. Strange move with $6.6m in Revenue?
Started being an entrepreneur at 40 Co-founded Qualifio and a few other companies, including 87seconds (Europe's leading video content agency, sold in 2018 to Datawords) Will step down as Qualifio's CEO in July (and stay Active chairman) Based in Belgium but started my professional career at PwC in Washington DC Father of 2 sons
6/2/2021 • 22 minutes, 51 seconds
LivingSecurity SaaS Breaks $3m ARR, 150% Retention, New Unify Product To Create More Insights for Security Leaders
As the CEO of Living Security, Ashley has been the driving force behind the company’s rapid growth. Since its founding in 2017, Living Security has raised more than $20 million for growth and product development and accelerated revenue growth for three consecutive years. Ashley is also continually working to build a diverse and inclusive organization around the belief that the team should reflect the community at large. An adaptable problem solver, Ashley is thoughtful and transparent in her approach to running the company and working with clients toward a singular goal: reduce risk by making people a security asset instead of a liability.
Andrea Volpini is the CEO of WordLift, a visionary web entrepreneur, focusing on semantic web, artificial intelligence and SEO. WordLift is a semantic platform for online content developed by working at the intersection between semantic technologies, natural language processing, and search engine optimization. Andrea has 20+ years of world-class experience in online strategies and web publishing.
5/31/2021 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
Bootstrapped to $4m, $2m profits, Wants to Exit by End Of Year
Adam Robinson is a SaaS entrepreneur who lives in Austin, TX. After spending 10 years on Wall Street trading credit default swaps at Lehman Brothers, Adam started his first startup called Robly Email Marketing. Robly was bootstrapped, ranked #1 in customer satisfaction in 2017, the company distributed mid 7-figures and was sold for 8-figures. Adam’s current venture, GetEmails, helps its e-commerce and publishing customers identify their anonymous web traffic and retarget them over email. Adam launched GetEmails in November of 2019 and just crossed 4mm ARR with 6 full-time employees.
5/30/2021 • 22 minutes, 25 seconds
13 Year Old Building Indie Builder Community, First $8 in Revenue!
Hi! I'm Arav, I'm 13 years old and I'm building Indie Icebreakers,and Indie Rocket. I'm create content, and share Indie stories.
5/29/2021 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
How to Make Money On Top of Opensource Protocol with Linktree Alternative SingleLink
I'm a 22-year-old, formerly obese college dropout turned founder and triathlete. I've lost over 115lbs and completed races up to the 70.3 mi distance while I'm currently training for Ironman Florida (140.6 miles). Passionate about open-source, startups, and pushing myself to the limits.
5/28/2021 • 17 minutes, 57 seconds
$20k Upwork Side Gig to $200k ARR SaaS Project Editing Real Estate Photos
Filipino by birth, architect by training, salesman by vocation, catholic by faith, family man by commitment, public speaker by demand, and a humanitarian by choice. After 3 heartbreaking business failures in his 20s in the Construction and outsourcing industry. He founded REVAstaff.com in 2018, then everything just fell into place.
5/27/2021 • 17 minutes, 9 seconds
How his side project hit $200k in revenue, new way to A/B test pricing
Ch Daniel (23) created Legit Check By Ch with his brother, David (17) and have gathered 6,000,000 all-time users. Their company helps people authenticate luxury items: clothing, sneakers, bags, watches etc. Currently they're making $200,000/year using the simple ""send order note"" function of an e-commerce system.
5/26/2021 • 15 minutes, 55 seconds
Zoom Recording Tool Grain Hits 300 Teams, On Track for $1m ARR, New $3m Raise in Upround
Mike Adams is the CEO and Co-founder of Grain — a tool that empowers remote teams to record, transcribe, annotate, and share the most important moments from virtual meetings in a highlight reel. He previously co-founded Degreed and MissionU (Acq. by WeWork). Mike believes that recorded conversations and the spoken knowledge they generate fundamentally expand our ability to listen, empathize and connect with each other.
5/25/2021 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
1,000 Companies Pay List Buying Site $150/mo For New Leads, $1.8m in Revenue
Jimmy Alamia is a professional digital marketer and "The New Age CMO", located in Essex County, New Jersey. Jimmy has been marketing on the internet since 1999 and has helped hundreds of clients grow their businesses by utilizing his proven marketing methodology. Jimmy Leads focuses on the building blocks of: Creating Goals, Formulating Strategy, Building World Class Assets, Executing Tactics & Media Activation, Aligning Marketing with Sales, and Testing, Measurement & KPI. Jimmy is the creator of MEGALEADS.COM and has worked with SMB and Enterprise companies such as AUTOMATCH, Comodo Cybersecurity, Momentum Solar, Sun Power Solar, NASDAQ, Pershing, Bear Stearns, Citibank, Bank of New York and Kraft General Foods. Jimmy has a B.S. in Mathematics from Pace University in New York City..
5/24/2021 • 16 minutes, 53 seconds
Google Analytics Alternative Adds $23k in MRR in 12 Months, Open sourced!
Co-founder of Plausible Analytics, a simple, open source, lightweight (
5/23/2021 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
Manage your Twitter from Notion? He's doing it, first 5 customers paying!
Senior Software Engineer, previously a fellow at Entrepreneur First, a global startup incubator, bootstrapping SaaS products for creators/makers in public
5/22/2021 • 11 minutes, 51 seconds
Referral Program Software Growsurf Bootstrapped to $26k/mo in Revenue, Pricing Page Secrets
Kevin Yun is cofounder of GrowSurf, referral software for tech startups. He's sharing their journey to $1MM publicly at https://growsurf.com/open as they bootstrap growth for their B2B SaaS. Previously, Kevin founded a UX/UI design bootcamp that was acquired by WeWork/Flatiron in 2018.
5/21/2021 • 15 minutes, 23 seconds
Developer side project gets first 80 customers, $6k in ARR, how'd he do it?
I'm an unstoppable learner; currently learning how to build software businesses. I've built 3 products in the past that made $0 and have all been shut down. Launched Chime Social in January 2021, a Twitter scheduling and analytics tool, and first profitable product.
5/20/2021 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
Deep Fake Tech Pivoted from $0 Last Year, $24m Raised, CEO teases new round
Gil is CEO & co-founder of D-ID, which he established in 2017 with his friends and fellow co-founders COO Sella Blondheim and CTO Eliran Kuta. He has broad experience as a manager and developer in corporate and start-up environments. Gil has commanding experience in a special forces unit of the Israeli Defense Forces. He holds a B.Sc. degree in Computer Science from Tel Aviv University, where he focused on computer vision and image processing.
5/19/2021 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
With 1 Exit Done, Can He Automate Diligence for Financial Firms Using RPA?
Vik Singh is currently the CEO and Co-Founder of a new enterprise AI startup. Vik was the CEO and Co-Founder of Infer, a company that provides a predictive platform for helping businesses win more customers. Infer was acquired by Ignite. Previously, Vik was an Entrepreneur in Residence at Sutter Hill Ventures (SHV). Before SHV, Vik helped create and architect Yahoo! BOSS, an open search platform that runs over 1 billion queries a month. He also worked at Google and Microsoft, helping ship Google Custom Search and Windows XP SP2 Wireless. At Microsoft Research, he worked under Turing Award winner Dr. Jim Gray. MIT’s Technology Review listed him as one of the Top 35 under 35 Innovators. Vik has been profiled in the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Forbes, Wired, Technology Review, Business Insider and CRM Magazine. He also occasionally writes for TechCrunch and VentureBeat. He's been a guest speaker at Stanford and Berkeley - as well as designs and teaches computer science and entrepreneurship classes at UC Berkeley. Vik has filed 13 patents in the areas of search, social networking, systems infrastructure and data modeling. He graduated with a Bachelor's in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.
5/18/2021 • 16 minutes, 28 seconds
Divvy Founder Sees Clear Path to $100m, 20k Customers, Most Revenue from CC fees, $1b+ in GMV
Alex is co-founder of DIvvy. He enjoys into Sports, Seattle, Salt Lake, Skiing, and Start-ups. He also enjoys building cutting edge fin-tech platform that will literally change the way businesses spend their money.
5/17/2021 • 25 minutes, 41 seconds
No Code Airtable Tool Breaks 10k Users, $10m Valuation
I'm an engineer turned into entrepreneur, a mother of two, love all things technology and products, obsessed about design and UX. Started my engineering career in my early-20s, was leading product & engineering teams in my late-20s, and now building Softr.io - the easiest no-code platform for building powerful web-apps and portals from Airtable, in 10 minutes. Softr's mission is to make software building accessible to everyone! Currently, customers build online communities, marketplaces, paid online courses, resources directories, client & employee portals and more.
5/16/2021 • 14 minutes, 3 seconds
He Just Hit $1k MRR for Review SaaS, Raised $1.1m on $5m Cap
I've been a product designer for the past 14 years, working as a consultant with startups and enterprise companies such as Uber to help them deliver amazing products.
5/15/2021 • 14 minutes, 3 seconds
He makes $5500/mo Personally at UI Agency, Now Launching MicroSaaS, commits to bootstrap!
⚡️I help solo founders and teams grow their product by coming closer to their users, through UX playbooks, tutorials and 1-1 coaching. In the meantime, I am also building my own SaaS product to democratize user testing.
5/14/2021 • 14 minutes, 31 seconds
$20m Fund for Amazon Sellers Using Private AI to Uncover Gold Mines
After careers in financial markets (Standard Chartered Bank) and academia (Professor of International Relations), Simon started to buy and build businesses and to date has an IRR of 27%. He built sustainable incomes in 8 countries and is now living in Virginia, USA, with his wife and daughter. Simon is English with dual US and British citizenships (ask him why one isn’t enough). He is an alumni of University College London (BA (Hons), MA), the University of Edinburgh (PGDip by Research), the University of Exeter (M.Ed) and the University of Cambridge and is a past recipient of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council‘s scholarship for Artificial Intelligence.
5/13/2021 • 15 minutes, 40 seconds
Virtual Leasing Tour SaaS Hits $5m Revenue, Sells 60% at $34m Valuation Bringing on New Strategic Partner
Matt Weirich is the Co-founder and CEO of Realync. Having founded Realync over 9 years ago, Matt is on a mission to make multifamily touring, leasing, and communication, real and transparent. With their video leasing solution, Realync has helped teams all across the United States increase their lead-to-lease conversion rates and decrease sales cycles. Realync is partnered with many of the nation's largest property owners and managers and is actively being used in over 220K units today. Realync is multifamily's leading virtual leasing and resident engagement platform enabling live video tours, live virtual open houses and DIY pre-recorded videos of properties.
5/12/2021 • 23 minutes, 53 seconds
Developers Side Project Lands First Customer from Reddit Community CloudyGamers
Sven is bootstrapping airgpu, a service to play the latest games on your laptop next to his day job as a software engineer. After working on multiple side projects over several years that either weren't released or generated zero revenue, he recently onboarded his first paying customer with airgpu.
5/11/2021 • 10 minutes, 29 seconds
DevOps Tool Copado Breaks $400m Valuation, as New CEO Ushers in 100% YoY Growth with Founders
Ted Elliott is a serial entrepreneur and Chief Executive Officer of Copado and serves on the company's Board of Directors. ... Ted sold Jobscience to Bullhorn, Inc in March 2018. Elliott has built sales, consulting, and engineering teams in cloud SAAS since 2007, with a focus on leveraging the Salesforce platform.
5/10/2021 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
How This 29 Year Old Bought a Micro-SaaS for $20k To Save Time
My formal education is in rabbinic studies. 4 years ago I decided to dive into the tech industry. I went to a boot camp, got a job and am now a Tech Lead at a company in Los Angeles (consumer rewards platform Prodege). I recently acquired a small Shopify app (via MicroAcquire) with the goal of growing it into a full reporting and notifications suite. I am treating the acquisition as my low cost MBA :)
5/9/2021 • 16 minutes, 24 seconds
Gainsight Paid Him $10k+ To Figure Out Sales in 2013, What He Recommends Now
Teaching reps how to earn the right to ask questions, which questions to ask, and when to do it is the primary driver behind Richard's N.E.A.T. Selling methodology. 20+ years experience. Clients include Gainsight, Google Cloud, Salesloft, Mattillion, and more. He brings a "liberal arts" degree in the school of life to sales. He's been Full Cycle AE, SDR, Sales Manager, Director of Sales, Director of Sales Operations, and VP of Sales.
5/8/2021 • 21 minutes, 14 seconds
How He Grew $5m Agency and Why He Exited for EBITDA Multiple Last Year
Founder, CEO and Brand Strategist of creative and digital agency One Shoe. Over 20 years comprehensive leadership and consultancy experience with multi-site multi-cultural global organizations including Pharmaceuticals, Consumer Healthcare, FMCG.
5/7/2021 • 17 minutes
Writers Make $100k/year on Content SaaS Marketplace Verblio, $9m Revenue
Steve Pockross brings more than 25 years of startup, Fortune 500, and nonprofit experience to his role at Verblio. Steve previously served as VP of Business Development and Strategy for Marketplace + SaaS pioneer LiveOps, as well as leadership roles at Tendril, Western Union, and HSBC. Steve received his MBA from Kellogg and his MA from Wesleyan University.
5/6/2021 • 16 minutes, 3 seconds
$2.4m in SaaS Revenues from Business and Apprentice Marketplace
Moe started his first landscaping business when he was 18. He sold that and started a residential design and build company that he grew to one of the largest in North America. After reaching the top of his industry he wanted a new challenge where his work could have a positive impact on the world. Moe then founded Acadium as a way to enable economic mobility to anyone with an internet connection.
5/5/2021 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
How To Bootstrap to $1m with VC Funded Competitors With Just 4 People
Philippe is an autodidact coder. He always had the firm belief he needed only time and consistency before success hit, he slowly built his life around his capacity to sustain himself for as long as possible on a low budget. Fast forward to today, he runs two successful online businesses each reaching $1M/year.
5/4/2021 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
Profitable UserZoom Hits $80m Run Rate, 1k Customers, $500m+ Valuation
Co-Founder & Co-CEO of UserZoom, the Experience Insights Management company that helps businesses design, measure and deliver the best digital experiences. F500 brands like Google, Amazon, AT&T, Walmart, or Intel power and automate the UX and CX research of their digital properties through UserZoom’s agile and scalable platform. I have 20-yrs experience in the fields of Marketing, Web Design and User Research.
5/3/2021 • 21 minutes, 26 seconds
She Doesn't Want Your VC Check, $10m+ In Dividends Paid Out for Time Tracking Tool
Corina Ludwig is an accomplished Senior Executive, Advisor, and Board Member with more than 30 years of success in Business Tech and advertising. For the past 21 years she’s lead FunctionFox –a global leader in time-tracking and project management. She also sits on the board for Women in Science and Tech and the Innovation, and the Advanced Technology and Entrepreneurship Council.
5/2/2021 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
Building in Public, He Sold Side Project for $10k, Then Launched Jolt, Now at CopyAI
Serial founder, sold my first small SaaS last year, started Jolt as a side hustle, and joined CopyAI as a full-time software engineer.
5/1/2021 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
$1m in Revenue and $15m Valuation, What GDPR Compliance Tool FixNix Is Building
🚀🏡The entrepreneur who sold his house ☠️Chief Nixer 💻Cyber Security Architect 💛Virtual CISO 🖋️Journalist 💂Speaker 📝Product Manager 🧘🏼♂️Yogi ✍️Author 🦋Hustler 🎉Passionpreneur 👨👧👦Dad 🕸️shanmugavel.com
4/30/2021 • 16 minutes, 50 seconds
What Do You Do After You Exit Your First SaaS For More than $9m?
Founder of @onboardio (onboard.io), a B2B SaaS to streamline onboarding for every customer. prev: founded, built, & sold @Ambassador investor, mentor, advisor and generally a huge fan of tech, sports & business.
4/29/2021 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
The Right Way to Build a Bootstrapped Community with WeekendClub
Originally I worked in ad agencies, but 4 years ago pivoted to tech, becoming a Product Manager then UX Researcher. On the side I started a popular London Indie Hackers meetup called IndieBeers (now part of Indie London), and from that evolved Weekend Club, the weekend co-working club for bootstrappers ($2,000 MRR).
4/28/2021 • 15 minutes, 16 seconds
Original On-Prem CRM GoldMine Still Does $3.6m in Maintenance Revenue, SaaS Play?
Former developer and Big 8 Consultant on selecting emerging technologies for use in sales and marketing for companies including McDonald's, Allied Van Lines, United Airlines, General Electric. Led enterprise sales teams at Delrina (WinFax) and Symantec (FormFlow). Now, General Manager of the GoldMine Business Unit of Ivanti, Inc.
4/27/2021 • 20 minutes, 36 seconds
Secret Dev Shop Top SaaS Founders Use Breaks $10m in Revenue
I am the founder and chief coder at Coditas. I believe coders are artists whose art is the code they write. I am a computer scientist from IIT Bombay and have been delivering quality software solutions for more than 16 years, but I believe my coding journey has just begun.
4/26/2021 • 19 minutes, 36 seconds
Copy his Playbook: His First $25k in MRR Came From Affiliates
Zachary Hedges exhibited a passion and proclivity for marketing from an early age. He started his first marketing communications company at age 16. By the time he was 25, Zach had leveraged his expertise to build a diverse client list that included the likes of The Hard Rock Hotel and Casino and Pfizer, to name a few. In 2014, Zach transitioned into the Saas arena and launched MDC DOT, an all-in-one CRM and marketing automation platform; through Zach's innovative work, he received two US patents. This lead Zach in 2018 to develop his most innovative and groundbreaking product to date. PreBuilt Marketing AI, the first-ever Social Media Marketing technology powered by (AI) that writes your content, builds campaigns for you and analyzes the results.
4/25/2021 • 19 minutes, 42 seconds
Camera Insurance as Beachhead to SaaS Play? 100 Customers Already.
Matt Sweetwood serial entrepreneur with over 30 years of experience and a tech start-up founder. He is an internationally known professional speaker, author, coach, and social media influencer. However, his greatest achievement is having raised five successful children to adulthood as a single dad. He is a frequent national TV and publication contributor.
4/24/2021 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
Oil SaaS! They Broke $7m, Can They Hit $10m This Year?
As Chief Customer Officer at Seven Lakes Technologies, Sowmya Murthy leads the go-to-market teams in bringing to market JOYN, a SaaS leader in modernizing oilfields. With a fluency in mission critical systems and galvanizing change-resistant organizations, she has served on CEO’s top council for 20+ years.
4/23/2021 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
They Did $210k Last Month Helping Eliminate Debt in Spain
4/22/2021 • 16 minutes, 18 seconds
Pay Dividends To Investors Before Startup Founder Gets Any Pay?
Alaric Ong has done 5 different businesses before, of which 3 of them were started with zero capital which went on to generate 6 figures within a few short months. One of them went on to generate 7 figures within 16 months. Currently, he is the founder of the largest Facebook Marketing Community in Singapore with over 1400+ paid students. He has also been featured in Fox, MarketWatch and Digital Journal for interviewing 6,7,8 and 9 figure entrepreneurs like Marcos Moura who runs Amada Franchise, a $120 million/year business, Grant Cardone (real estate tycoon), JT Foxx (world’s number 1 wealth coach) and George Ross (former right hand man of Donald Trump) Here's a quick background about him: www.AlaricOng.com Hundreds of testimonials: www.AlaricOng.com/p/testimonials.html Interviews: https://www.alaricong.com/p/interviews.html
4/21/2021 • 29 minutes, 7 seconds
Linkedin Automation Tool Breaks $5m, Grows 5x yoy, Bootstrapped with $1m in Profits
SaaS Entrepreneur | Forbes Council | Bootstrapped to €5M ARR in just 15 months | Founder of World's safest software for LinkedIn Automation | Expandi.io | Vegan | Father of a 4 year old son Steef | Netherlands 🇱🇺 https://foundershustle.substack.com/p/how-expandi-bootstrapped-to-4m-arr
4/20/2021 • 29 minutes, 26 seconds
How He Hit $2m in Revenue Cold Calling 20,000 PER WEEK
Andre founded 4 marketing companies in three countries. Hi is born entrepreneur, starting making money at age 7, at 14 he had his three income streams. His desire to help local-small-businesses created one of the world most advanced marketing automation today.
4/19/2021 • 24 minutes, 34 seconds
Developer Goes from Freelancer to SaaS Founder With Simple Playbook (Copy it!)
I'm a freelance software developer building profitable tools on the side. In 2020 I bootstrapped and eventually sold a TikTok marketing platform (influencegrid.com). Now working on Data Fetcher (datafetcher.io), a low-code Airtable app that lets you run API requests. Bootstrapped to $10k ARR over the last 4 months.
4/18/2021 • 15 minutes, 38 seconds
SaaS Helps 50 F500 Brands Unlock Tax Credits, Targeting $6m ARR This Year
Laurence is the CEO of Incentify. He is an accomplished high tech CEO with a track record of successfully managing high performing companies and teams. Most recently, Laurence was CEO and Founder of Hopscotch, a SaaS based, venture backed, mobile application development platform company in the sports and entertainment space.
4/17/2021 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
They Track $15m in Cloud Spend, Make $17k/mo. How they plan to scale.
4/16/2021 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
This Pre-Revenue SaaS Founder Surviving Based off Norway's Furlough Program
4/15/2021 • 13 minutes, 45 seconds
Granulate Breaking Records in Cloud Computing Savings Space, $30m Revenue Next?
Talpiot program alumni, Asaf continued his IDF service as a commander in the elite 8200 intelligence unit. He previously held positions as R&D Team Leader and Project Manager where he led 30+ researchers, engineers and analysts in large scale projects. Co-founding Granulate, he hopes to democratize performance and build a world without performance loss.
4/14/2021 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
Was Pomp Right about Bitcoin, Gold and Chinese Power?
4/13/2021 • 58 minutes, 7 seconds
Preston Pysh Bitcoin Predictions. Find Latka on Bitclout!
4/12/2021 • 1 hour, 22 minutes, 17 seconds
Lemlist CEO Guillaume Moubeche: Gives Employees this bonus when 5x revenue growth target hit
4/11/2021 • 28 minutes, 6 seconds
Factory SaaS Hits $2.2m Revenue, Raises $6m on $24m Valuation
Co-founder and CEO of OSS Ventures, a French start-up specialist for industrial companies. After working as an economist at the OECD and co-founding a start-up in Brazil, he founded OSS Ventures to help manufacturers digitalize their production sites. He published, with Michael Valentin, "OK Google, draw me a unicorn"
4/10/2021 • 19 minutes, 6 seconds
The First SaaS on BitClout will Replace Substack, Patreon
I'm the founder of Subclout, a SaaS platform that allows creators to monetize their premium content through BitClout. I work full time as a strategy consultant and was previously a software engineer for a health tech company. I love building products and talking business.
4/9/2021 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
Will $80M Mattress King Launch Subscription Next?
4/8/2021 • 26 minutes, 1 second
ConvertKit's Shocking Growth to $25m Revenue, Power of Creator Economy
4/7/2021 • 1 hour, 4 minutes, 48 seconds
The Secret Dataset CPG Gods Use
4/6/2021 • 1 hour, 16 minutes, 58 seconds
Billionaire Co-Founder of Square Joins Latka
4/5/2021 • 1 hour, 30 seconds
He Makes $4m Selling Other Peoples Software, Inside The Head of A Power Reseller
Len Reo is founder of Attivo Group, a team of people passionate about efficient business processes and the information systems and automation that support them. Experts in ERP such as SAP Business One and cloud hosting, Attivo Group is a national operation that is focused on manufacturing and distribution companies.
4/4/2021 • 17 minutes, 2 seconds
Team Communication App Breaks $122k/mo, Still Owns 100%
Dmytro Okunyev is the founder and owner of Chanty, a team communication platform. Dmytro started toying with the idea of a chat app back in 2017, he realized that team communication should be made easier, more flexible and powerful so that it encompasses chat, audio and video.
4/3/2021 • 17 minutes, 36 seconds
Mobile Paywall Testing Company Breaks 200 Customers, $500k Raised
Founder & CEO at Adapty 500 Startups alumnus
4/2/2021 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
The $30 Million Marketplace Out of India
Satya Prabhakar is an Indian/American entrepreneur, engineer, writer and the Founder & CEO of Sulekha, India’s leading tech-AI platform for expert services offering SME Service Providers (SPs) the best mobile-SaaS medium to grow their business through matched prospects and market intelligence. He grew Sulekha from 2 employees to over 1300 employees in 17 offices across India and in US. Originally from Machilipatnam, Andhra Pradesh, Prabhakar earned his Bachelor degree in Electronics and Communications from National institute of Technology (NIT REC), Trichy, India; Masters in Computer Science and an MBA in International Finance from University of Florida. He has nearly 20 years of professional experience in various technical, business development, strategy and general management roles at TCS India, Philips N.V., Honeywell and AT&T in the areas of databases, real-time operating systems, Interactive TV, Internet access, hosting and interactive services. He has written over 25 technical papers and articles in the areas of artificial intelligence, database design, optimization and integration. He won prestigious awards tor technical business leadership both at 880 and Honeywell.
4/1/2021 • 18 minutes, 50 seconds
How To Acquire A SaaS For $1.2m, Flip for $2.4m Quickly
I've spent the last 17 years working on digital assets with a distributed team of top-tier software architects, engineers and marketing specialists built from scratch. Projects have ranged from SaaS to the development of peer-to-peer platforms. I’ve done what feels like everything in that space - create, buy, develop, sell, consult, and operate.
3/31/2021 • 18 minutes, 34 seconds
Real Estate SaaS Did $2.2m Last Month, 140% Growth, Mostly Affiliate Sales
Co-founder of BatchProducts - 5 SAAS platforms that provide data and lead generation tools for users in various industries.
3/30/2021 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
Manufacturing Plant Software Breaks $100m Revenue, Just $38m Raised
Norman Crowley is a serial entrepreneur, who founded and sold three businesses for over three-quarters of a billion dollars before the age of forty. He is currently the founder of energy efficiency SaaS company Crowley Carbon and electric car company Electrifi.
3/29/2021 • 27 minutes, 25 seconds
He Quit His Fulltime Gig for $5k/mo Side Project, What He's Doing Now
Have always been fascinated with technology and interpersonal communications. Have been a multiple-time early-stage sales leader and now co-founded Ringpin with my good friend and business partner Brian Levine to help companies reach customers in more meaningful ways from more places. Live in sunny San Diego with wife and two young kids.
3/28/2021 • 16 minutes, 36 seconds
Worth $2.6b Today, What About 36 Months Ago?
Aleksandr Yampolskiy is a globally recognized cybersecurity innovator, leader, and expert. As cofounder and chief executive officer, Yampolsky has led the company since its beginnings in 2013 to become one of the world’s most trusted cybersecurity brands. His vision is to create a new language for cybersecurity by enabling people to work collaboratively across the enterprise and with external parties to build a more secure ecosystem. Prior to founding the company, Yampolskiy was a handson CTO at Cinchcast and BlogTalkRadio, the largest online talk radio and podcast hosting platform. Prior to that, he led security and compliance at Gilt Groupe, where he managed all aspects of IT infrastructure security, secure application development, and PCI compliance. Yampolskiy has a B.A. in mathematics and computer science from New York University and a Ph.D. in Cryptography from Yale University.
3/27/2021 • 19 minutes, 19 seconds
Looking Back: Listen to Founder 3 Years Before Exiting for $450 Million
3/26/2021 • 23 minutes, 23 seconds
Physna Raises $7m More for Geometric Deep Learning in 3d
Forbes 30 Under 30 winner. Successful serial entrepreneur in B2B technology development and SaaS companies. Law degree from University of Heidelberg in Germany. Member of National Small Business Association's Leadership Council
3/25/2021 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
Will He Go Public To Buy Up His Affiliates?
Serial entrepreneur who previously was a founder and CEO of two software companies Momentum Systems and Applied Development Corp who were in the fintech/internet communications and application development tool sectors. Subsequently CEO of one of Canada's largest Accelerators and CEO of Canada's largest funder of start-up companies and with a focus on those commercializing academic IP.
3/24/2021 • 14 minutes, 20 seconds
The Capital Efficient Founder: $2m in, $12m dividends out, Just Exited
Serial entrepreneur who has successfully bought, built and sold several companies with extreme capital efficiency. Most recently grew ATI revenue 400% (organically and through acquisition) with 37% EBITDA margins, with investors making 9x ROI. Previously built Silversky from startup to $60mm in revenue with $10mm in EBITDA. After recap with Goldman Sachs at $150mm, Silversky was later sold to BAE for $250mm.
3/23/2021 • 16 minutes, 13 seconds
Rokt Breaks $90m Gross Profit Coming out of Pandemic, 3 Revenue LInes, $500m+ Valuation?
Bruce Buchanan is the co-founder, CEO and Chairperson of Rokt. Founded in 2012, Rokt makes e-commerce smarter, faster and better. Rokt uses real time data and decisioning to deliver the next best action for each person in each Transaction Moment™. Rokt’s e-commerce partners experience up to 2x profitability while building customer loyalty and engagement. Prior to Rokt, Bruce was Group CEO of low fares airline Jetstar where he put together the original business case and then spent 10 years building what became the most successful low fares airline in Asia Pacific - growing the team to 7000+ and revenue to more than $3B. The seed idea for Rokt grew from Bruce’s time at Jetstar. He identified that taking a customer on a purchase journey with a personally relevant checkout experience presented a significant opportunity being underserved by the technology community, and so he set about building the solution. Bruce is currently busy expanding and enhancing the Rokt offering, growing the business to similar levels of success as Jetstar. Bruce lives in Brooklyn, NY with his wife and children and their rescue pup, Izzy.
3/22/2021 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
He Sold 0.7% For $50k With $100k ARR ($7m Valuation). Mistake?
🙏 - God First 👨👩👦👦- Husband and Father of twin boys 📈- Entrepreneurial business owner for 23 years 🤝 - 21 years of business networking 👨💻 - Franchise Social Media Specialist 💫 - Motivation, Education, Inspiration! Assisting people to make the most of their talents will benefit not only them, but your business too. There are no limits with the right motivation. https://ese.md/exihf
3/21/2021 • 16 minutes, 36 seconds
He Did $170k Last Year, Shared Profits with 6 person Team Using This Algorithm
Made in Italy but living in The Netherlands, I am founder of WP-OK.it - where we help small biz with their WordPress sites.
3/20/2021 • 15 minutes, 18 seconds
What a 440 Person Amazon Community Looks Like (and its $1m+ in Revenue)
Eugene Khayman founded his first brand, Eparé, in 2012 to share his joy of cooking & entertaining. As Eparé grew, Eugene became involved with an organization called Million Dollar Sellers (MDS), an elite community of over 400 entrepreneurs who, collectively, generate more than 4 Billion dollars annually on the Amazon platform. From being a founding member to pioneering MDS conferences, Eugene is now the organization's COO evangelizing successful MDS businesses while still growing Eparé & other e-commerce brands as a limited partner.
3/19/2021 • 20 minutes, 8 seconds
Marketing Personalization Tool Gets First 8 Customers, $1m ARR Shortly
Two-time founder. First exited in 2018. Dedicated to product-led growth and in love with the transition of B2B marketing to B2C experiences. Bostonian by way of GA, KY, AZ, SUI, CA, DC, Chicago.
3/18/2021 • 16 minutes, 14 seconds
1,000 Schools Pay them $2m for This Unique Tool
Tom is the President of Vived Learning. He brings a wealth of knowledge about 3D from healthcare, marketing, and technology industry. He loves learning and finding new ways to engage learners to improve learning outcomes.
3/17/2021 • 15 minutes, 8 seconds
Can He Convert Twitter Followers to Software Subscribers?
Mr. Future of Work is a founder, investor, and creator. He leads Guide, a new-age experience group and collective that owns two brands, Guide and Big Black Tea.
3/16/2021 • 15 minutes, 14 seconds
Premise Breaks $20m Revenue, $400m+ Valuation in Two Sided Marketplace Play for Consumer Data and Feedback
Maury Blackman has 20+ years experience leading mission-driven, high-growth tech companies that make an impact by connecting communities and providing a more transparent world. In 2016, EY named him Northern California’s Entrepreneur of the Year for his work as Accela’s Chairman & CEO. In 2018 Maury took the helm at Premise Data, a San Francisco company operating a software platform for empowering the world’s highest impact institutions and companies to track and comprehend ground truth.
3/15/2021 • 23 minutes, 55 seconds
They Refinanced $250m in Auto Loans Last Year, Make Money 3 Ways
Kevin Bennett is the CEO of MotoRefi, a mission-driven fintech startup revolutionizing consumers' financial relationships with their cars. An experienced CEO, Kevin has spent over 10 years launching and leading startups from early to late stage. He holds an MBA from the University of Virginia, a JD from Georgetown University, and a BA from Brown University.
3/14/2021 • 22 minutes, 49 seconds
1 Customer Pays $600k/yr, How Social Marketing Company Facelift Broke $25m ARR
Married father of 4, World Champion in Rowing, entrepreneur and philanthropist (art), focussing on product, marketing and processes, loves transparency through software platforms (e.g. Salesforce).
3/13/2021 • 18 minutes, 52 seconds
25m Wordpress Plugin Downloads, Now Raising $3m for SaaS Product
A technology and WordPress person turned into CEO. I envision AI automation making the efforts of web developers more effective and boosting business growth. Since childhood I loved studying science and math. Later it turned into being a professional researcher, an astrophysicist. But at some point in my life, I came back from academy to industry and then went deep into WordPress and web development. I enjoyed working with talented engineers building plugins and themes for WordPress, and helping not only in engineering but also in establishing teams and processes for the growth of engineers and a company as a whole. Seeing a great potential in automation of web development, I spent a few years developing AI website builder, a technology that can help millions of engineers and designers to focus on truly creative and important things and to leave routine and time-consuming tasks to the algorithms. Now being a CEO I care about a delicate balance between technology and people. I am passionate about building a company with a great culture which turns great ideas into powerful technological achievements while constantly empathizing with the community.
3/12/2021 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
Events.com Should Have Been Hopin, Can They Acquire Their Way Back To Top?
Co-Founder & CEO Events.com, Co-Founder: Active.com, Former Chairman & Owner: Triathlete Magazine, TEDx Producer, Chairman: La Jolla Foundation. Co-Founder of active.com (The Active Network). Co-Founder, CEO, ActiveEurope.com (Active Europe Network) Active went public before selling: Vista (1.05 billion), subsequently sold several divisions: Global Payments (1.2 billion) 22X Ironman triathlete.
3/11/2021 • 22 minutes
Epicor Targets $1b Run Rate, 50% Pure SaaS. $300m SaaS ARR Today.
Steve Murphy joined Epicor Software Corporation as Chief Executive Officer in October 2017, bringing over 20 years of technology industry executive management experience to the role. As CEO, Murphy is responsible for providing a long-term strategic vision for the company—with a focus on customer experience and delivering innovative products, services and support that drive business growth.
3/10/2021 • 21 minutes, 14 seconds
$1m Podcast Agency Launches Booking Software
Tony has grown over 10,000 small businesses and a dozen Fortune 500 companies, including ADP, Ford, and AutoNation and became the Google Partner of the Year. Later, Tony returned to his entrepreneurship roots to bring the strategy, tactics and resources normally reserved for large enterprises to small businesses. He now focused making podcast profitable for hosts and guests with Castocity.
3/9/2021 • 14 minutes, 41 seconds
Pet Land Riches! 60% Profit Margins on $100m SaaS Fintech Play
A 20 year veteran in the pet retail space and serial entrepreneur. I own 4 retail pet locations, a marketing company Social Network MD, a finance company Financing Your Way and a SaaS business FormPiper. I thrive on identifying the problem and solving it and helping retailers Drive Success in their businesses.
3/8/2021 • 15 minutes, 10 seconds
Resume Building Tool Hit $10m in Revenue, 100% YoY Growth after Acquired
Co-founder and exCEO at InterviewMe.pl, Zety.com (one of the biggest career advice websites), and Resumelab. Made an exit to BOL in 2019.
3/7/2021 • 18 minutes, 14 seconds
Clik.ai Raising $6m on $18m for Fintech Underwriting Tool
I am Parag Goswami, Co-Founder and CEO of Clik.ai. I began my tech career as a software engineer at iTrust Financial Advisors. I later founded HouseThat.in and Integrand Analytics. HouseThat.in was the first online property listing website that generated $10 million+ in property sales in two years. Integrand Analytics was a leading CRE focused knowledge processing outsourcing firm that supported $7 billion+ in loan and investment transactions across the globe between 2013-2018. After this, I founded Clik.ai.
3/6/2021 • 12 minutes, 59 seconds
Real Estate Tool Loses $3.6m During COVID, Now Recovered to $10m Run Rate
Jimmy Mackin is the CEO of Curaytor, a full-service digital marketing company focused on helping listing agents get more listings. In 7 years, Curaytor has grown to over $10 million in annual recurring revenue and has been featured in Forbes, Inc, The Huffington Post, USA Today, and American Express Open Forum. In 2019, Jimmy co-authored Exactly What to Say For Real Estate Agents, a bestselling book designed to help real estate agents with the most common, critical, and difficult questions they face. Jimmy is also the host of the hit podcast #WaterCooler. With over 115 episodes and 8.5 million minutes watched, the show is a go-to resource for anyone in the real estate industry looking to grow their business in today's digital landscape. Jimmy lives and works in Boston, MA.
3/5/2021 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
Is This The Creator of Bitcoin? Crypto Fund Thinks So.
Focus: Managing Partner at Unbounded Capital - investing in the Bitcoin (BSV) ecosystem. Unbounded envisions businesses leveraging Bitcoin playing a predominant role in shaping how people interact with and use the internet in the coming decades, and are working to help entrepreneurs achieve that vision. Founder of EasyPoint, Trumpet Player and Composer, Poker Enthusiast
He's Spent $200k+ on MVP, How He Plans To Get First Customers
Founder of 3 (1 angel/PFE backed, 2 bootstrapped). Retired financial advisor, turned FA coach (saving athletes from blowing their dough). After +20,000 R&D hours, I've developed a SaaS referral app (CPAs/Attorneys/FAs/Realtors-only). My virgin Saas launch. Scared AND PUMPED for advisor upside. linkedin.com/in/sbrianouellette
3/2/2021 • 16 minutes, 58 seconds
They Grew 60% YoY to $4.2m Revenue By Spending $300k on FB Ads
Steven Morell is a Growth Hacker, UX Designer, Coder, serial entrepreneur and silicon valley animal. He has founded startups around the world and won multiple awards from the Silicon Valley Forum, BBVA Open Talent and others. He joined AX Semantics back in 2016 and helped growing it the world leading Natural Language Generation Platform for ECommerce.
3/1/2021 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
He Sold $400k Business for $1.5m Then Reinvested Everything into New Business
Senior Market Insurance Distribution Leader. Top .01% producer for captive carrier, developed a successful team before starting retail agency on 6.1.08. Built over 12 years, sold for $1.5MM. Now product, service and consulting firm for producers and agencies. Marketing via IMOs as channel partners with direct sales force.
2/28/2021 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
Niche $2m Contractor Management SaaS Raising $7m on $30m Pre
2/27/2021 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
Bootstrapped Employee Performance SaaS hits $3.6m ARR, Up from $2.4m, Valued at $40m
Sri is a passionate entrepreneur and leader in building high performance organizations that care about their people. He has spent over 20 years in leading organizations in software development and consulting in the U.S. With a unique background in technology, people management, health IT and film writing, directing and production, Sri brings a diverse set of experiences across industries and specialities to build high performing, highly engaged organizations.
When Derek O'Carroll joined Brightpearl three years ago, he took on the biggest risk any CEO can take - a turnaround. Since taking the helm as CEO, Derek has led the retail operations platform from stagnant growth to more than $12 million in revenue, nearly 1,400 customers worldwide, and managing more than $3 billion in orders. Shortlisted for CEO of the Year at the Digital Masters Awards in 2018, the father-of-two is now recognized globally as a retail expert. In the 90s, Derek left his career in chemistry to found Ireland’s first online advertising agency and he never looked back. After some painful lessons learned during a market crash that took his business from $9 million in revenue to $900K almost overnight, he moved on to leading Symantec as Senior VP of Norton in EMEA. At Symantec, Derek was responsible $1.7 billion of revenues and 200+ employees globally. There, he learned about value-based management from Jack Welch’s protégé Steve Bennett. Derek has taken all of the leadership lessons and playbooks he’s learned to date to take Brightpearl to an unprecedented growth rate and an increase in average deal size by 500%. His specialties include building exceptional teams and creating winning environments, simple messaging, zero ambiguity, and training for excellence.
Sales Coach for B2B Tech Startups, Author, Speaker, Podcaster and Ultra-Marathoner. First head of sales @ Blend. 20 years in Silicon Valley with three B2B startups – one unicorn, one exit, one still going.
2/24/2021 • 20 minutes, 16 seconds
Raising $3m Right Now on Back of Slack App Exchange Growth
Entrepreneur building Aikon Labs, the startup behind Ariv.ai and iEngage.ai
2/23/2021 • 12 minutes, 57 seconds
How Measured.com Grew 250% TTM To Break $5m in Revenues Helping WIth Marketing Attribution
Trevor is the co-founder and CEO of Measured, an industry leader in cross-channel media incrementality measurement for portfolio investment decisions. Trevor has spent his 20-year career building and growing enterprise technology companies. He is a pioneer and expert in the cross-channel marketing measurement category, having spent the last 10 years working with advertisers to deploy and benefit from advanced cross-channel measurement technologies. He has worked with Fortune 500 companies and emerging brands across retail, eCommerce, telco, finance, auto and CPG in North America, Europe and Australia. Trevor earned an MBA from the University of Southern California and holds a degree in mechanical engineering from Santa Clara University.
2/22/2021 • 15 minutes, 4 seconds
SpringBig Raised $11.5m on $100m Valuation at $20m Revenue in Niche CRM Space
Jeffrey Harris is Founder and CEO of Springbig, a leading provider in cannabis CRM and loyalty marketing technology with over 25 million users across the United States and Canada. Jeffrey has over 15 years of marketing, sales management and client services experience in the incentive marketing and loyalty marketing fields.
2/21/2021 • 19 minutes, 38 seconds
Kountable GMV Decreased from $27m in 2017 to $7m Today. Why?
Chris Hale is Founder and CEO of Kountable, a San Francisco-based technology company actively solving the world’s distribution problem by building a trust network for global trade that integrates, digitzes and optimizes collaboration between qualified big and small players. Its cloud-based global trade platform delivers transparency, governance and efficiency in trade.
2/20/2021 • 10 minutes, 11 seconds
How He Raised $500k With No Product, No Revenue for NonProfit tool
Christopher Tufford is the Founder & CEO of Green Apple Pay. He left college after two years to start his first business and has success in a variety of unrelated markets from telecom to iGaming including the largest amateur poker league in Canada, the World Poker Tour Amateur Poker League.
2/19/2021 • 13 minutes, 33 seconds
He Can't Code, So How'd He Launch MVP With No Developers?
Harris Kenny is the Founder of Intro CRM, a simple CRM for self-employed and early stage founders. He has helped grow dozens of hardware, software, and service companies for over a decade. Harris also hosts the Pipeline Meeting and Hello Blink Show podcasts. He’s on Twitter @harriskenny.
2/18/2021 • 13 minutes, 3 seconds
Brand to Influencer Marketplace Hits $4m On Just $2m Raised
Tom Logan is the Co-Founder and CEO of NYC-based Cohley — the tech company that’s changing the way brands generate photos, videos and product reviews. Tom leads with a “people first” mentality, continuously moving Cohley up the ranks of “Best Places to work in NYC.” Under Tom’s leadership, Cohley has achieved triple digit year-over-year growth every year since the company’s inception in 2016, and Cohley now calls companies like Unilever, S.C. Johnson and CVS clients. Tom entered the tech world back in 2011 after fortuitously applying to a small startup called Wildfire Interactive — which was acquired by Google less than two years later.
2/17/2021 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
Secretive Austin SaaS Breaks $6m Bootstrapped Helping with ElasticSearch
Dru is the President of OMC, the company behind one of the leading SaaS+ search products in the market, Bonsai. Dru is classically trained in Business and Economics with a school-of-hard-knocks education in Software Development. Based in Austin, TX. Foodie and up at 4:30 everyday.
2/16/2021 • 13 minutes, 59 seconds
Raising $10m on $50m Valuation, 1500 Farmers Pay $2m/yr For This SaaS
Founder and COO of eAgronom. Worked in multiple startups, latest before eAgronom was Glia, which is series-B entity that has it's business in USA and development in Tartu. Vice President of Estonian Founders Society, the the-facto startup community in Estonia. Masters in software engineering and economics. One of the creators of Estonias first space satellite EstCube 1 ground station. Public speaker in many tech conferences around the world.
2/15/2021 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
Bootstrapped to $25m Revenue, Won't Sell for $250m to Manny Medina and Outreach
Software technologist turned sales geek.
2/14/2021 • 13 minutes, 59 seconds
Wild! He Presold $250k Of His SaaS Idea. Now wants to beat SEMRush
I quit my job to start a martech SaaS startup and then survived the covid recession, raised funds without selling any equity, went from 2 features to 11 within 4 months and raised enough funds to fund our future without the need of any investors.
2/13/2021 • 24 minutes, 35 seconds
He Exited for $600m, Started with 40%, Now Building YC and AngelList for Latin America
Bootstrapped online real estate startup in Latin America eventually raising $74m USD, merged with competitor and sold the company for ~$600m. Top Angel investor in Latin America with over 55 investments. Focused on helping build the next get generation of iconic companies in the region with Latitud.
2/12/2021 • 15 minutes, 50 seconds
Yac Is Audio Slack, Hits 10k Weekly Users, Raising $8m on $30m
Founder and CEO at Yac. I build products at SoFriendly.com and run Newton Mail now.
2/11/2021 • 21 minutes, 48 seconds
Why Acuant Sold to Private Equity, New CEO Vision for Identity Space Targets 50% yoy Growth
Product Manager with more than 25 years building Enterprise products for Digital Identities, detecting and preventing Financial Crime, Payment Security, Network Security and Application Security. Entrepreneur at heart.
2/10/2021 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
Rev.Team hits $50k MRR Helping Scale Sales Teams and RevOps, SaaS Next?
Scaling businesses since 1999. Helping B2B Founders grow from $50k to $1Million MRR by building high performing Revenue Teams (#LeadGen #Sales #Success #RevOps)
2/9/2021 • 13 minutes, 51 seconds
PostoPlan Hits $30k MRR, Raises $500k For Social Scheduling Tool in Spain, Mexico, and Argentina
Kate Sukhenko, CBDO/Founder 4 years experience of work in Europe and 3 years experience of work in China with corporate clients negotiating and signing agreements, piloting and analytics of marketing and investment projects.
2/8/2021 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
GetRoute Builds Cleaning Business to $10m in 2020, Now Launches Software
I am a Passionate Entrepreneur who is driven by empowering the Commercial cleaning industry. My purpose is to motivate and inspire my peers, family, colleagues with Positivity. Share my genius. I am the Ricky the cleaner that is innovating and building technology to help the pen and paper cleaning and field services industry. My motto is Stronger Together.
2/7/2021 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
How Loomly Hit 7k Customers, $4.2m SaaS Revenue Starting With An Agency
A self-taught programmer, Thibaud began building software to make Noemie’s job easier in 2015. Back then, the pair was managing a marketing agency and developed an in-house solution to streamline the process of creating and sharing editorial calendars with their clients. Encouraged by early feedback from their own customers and peers about their prototype, Thibaud and Noemie decided to make it available to other marketing teams: Loomly was born.
2/6/2021 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
How SurferSEO hit $3m Revenue Bootstrapped Using Chrome Extension, Affiliates
Digital marketer with love for SEO. Michał co-founded Surfer and has been evangelizing the product and data-driven approach to optimization ever since. He trained hundreds of SEOs, copywriters, and marketers on on-page SEO, writing, and content marketing strategies.
2/5/2021 • 20 minutes, 54 seconds
LightHousePE Hits $10k MRR Helping Brick and Mortar Keep Customers
Andrew Steele is the CEO of LighthousePE, a location-based mobile behavioral engagement platform. He previously co-founded and led 3 startups in healthcare and enterprise SaaS, and earlier led marketing, sales and business development for high growth businesses acquired by Comcast, Motorola and Microsoft.
2/4/2021 • 14 minutes, 35 seconds
MediaMash Raising $1.5m So You Can Own Your Audience
A digital strategist, Donna was fortunate to be part of the team who founded the hybrid video platform, MediaMash.tech as CEO. The platform is geared for brands and influencers with large audiences. It helps keep their audience in their universe, while fostering brand development and reducing reliance on social channels.
2/3/2021 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
FlaskData Software For Patient Trials Hits $350k ARR
I am a solid-state physicist by training, serious amateur musician and tech entrepreneur developing automated detection and response for virtual clinical trials.
2/2/2021 • 14 minutes, 9 seconds
How UseTopic Bootstrapped to $20k in MRR in 12 Months
Nikhil Aitharaju is an entrepreneur who started a multi-million dollar SaaS business in college using SEO and content marketing. After successfully selling the company in 2018 he is now working on a new product to help others achieve similar marketing success for their businesses.
2/1/2021 • 14 minutes, 17 seconds
eComVids Pivots to SaaS For DropShippers to Get Product Creatives
I came up. Then I hit hit rock bottom. But I found my way. Then I hit a depressive period. Decided to take control again and I'm prepared to make an exit by the end of 2021.
1/31/2021 • 16 minutes, 18 seconds
SaaS CEO Launches PPE Factory, $10m Sales of Surgical Masks, American Made
Lloyd is the Founder of Armbrust American, a U.S. manufacturer of surgical masks and PPE launched in May 2020 making over $10MM annually. In 2008, he founded OwnLocal, a Y Combinator-backed startup responsible for generating $300+ million in revenue for more than 3,000 local publications over the last decade. Lloyd currently lives in Austin, Texas with his wife and five children.
1/30/2021 • 19 minutes, 52 seconds
SalesPlaybook Did $320k in Sales Helping SaaS Founders Sell
Manuel built up https://thesalesplaybook.io/ bootstrapped from 0 to 100+ customers and 350k+ annual revenue in less than 2 years to help committed B2B entrepreneurs selling CHF 25’000-CHF 250’000 deals grow annual revenues by 100-400% by hitting product-market-fit and scaling up sales faster without hiring expensive sales reps.
1/29/2021 • 13 minutes, 41 seconds
SEO Secrets from Shopify, G2 Head of SEO Strategy
Kevin Indig leads SEO as Director @ Shopify and is the creator of the Growth Memo newsletter. Previously, he ran SEO @ G2 and Atlassian and worked with companies like eBay, Eventbrite, Samsung, Pinterest, and many others.
1/28/2021 • 22 minutes, 51 seconds
How Pepperi Hit $11m Revenue Bootstrapped, Rollup Next?
Ofer Yourvexel is the co-founder and CEO of Pepperi, the B2B sales platform for brands and wholesalers. Prior to founding Pepperi, Mr. Yourvexel spent over 20 years in executive leadership positions with enterprise technology companies including Amdocs, Jacada, Enigma, and Tefen
1/27/2021 • 15 minutes, 38 seconds
ScholarshipOwl Breaks $4m Revenue Helping 15k Students Get Loans
An engineer from a young age, previously CTO/R&D manager in a number of Israeli startups, ex-Googler turned entrepreneur and CEO, changing the US education financing. Running a successful all-remote company now for 5 years, and a strong believer in remote as a way of life.
1/26/2021 • 15 minutes, 46 seconds
Solar Panel Install Software Breaks $26k/mo, Raising $1.5m on $6m Valuation
Love solar & technology. Started The Solar Labs as a Senior in college. My vision is to help solar installers scale their businesses (and thereby bring more solar to the world) and install better engineering solar systems.
1/25/2021 • 14 minutes, 9 seconds
Modigie Gets You Accurate Prospect Cell Numbers, Hits $300k ARR, 29 Customers
Ken Hoppe is Founder and CEO of Modigie. Prior to Modigie Ken spent 18+ years in various tech leadership roles, experiencing firsthand the widespread shift to mobile-for-business communications. Realizing the significant hurdle in sales productivity due to lack of connection, Ken now strives to transform the B2B sales and marketing process with Modigie; the most effective, real-time mobile phone verification and enrichment platform for Salesforce.
1/24/2021 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
Proposify Hits $7m Revenue Driving Expansion Into 200 Enterprise Accounts with $10k+ ACV's
Kyle Racki is the co-founder and CEO of Proposify, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, which currently serves more than ten thousand customers worldwide. He started his first business, a web design company, at age twenty-four and sold it after five years. Kyle has blogged extensively about his journey through the ups and downs of entrepreneurship and is the author of Free Trials (and Tribulations): How To Build A Business While Getting Punched In The Mouth. He lives in Halifax and loves spending time with his wife, Christina, and his three sons, Micah, Ty, and Theo.
1/23/2021 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
Queen of Community Rosie Sherry Reveals Secrets of Engagement, Growth, Monetization
Rosie previously bootstrapped Ministry of Testing, a community for software testers, to 7 figures. Now she leads the community over at Indie Hackers and is building up Rosieland, a community for community builders, on the side.
1/22/2021 • 16 minutes, 22 seconds
Finimize Uses 1m Email List to Launch API SaaS, Grows to 30% of Total Revenue
Founder of Finimize, the world’s largest and most engaged finance community •Previously co-founded one of the largest ecommerce players in Switzerland, sold with 200 employees to the largest Swiss media house •Forbes 30 under 30 in 2016, mentor at Techstars
1/21/2021 • 26 minutes, 33 seconds
Collabogence Pivoting from $300k Agency, Raising $1.5m on $5m Pre?
Peter Smit has spent half his life on either side of the Atlantic. He has lived in 7 countries and speaks four languages Raised in the age of matrix management, running programs, initiatives, projects and business globally, he has long been a proponent of collaboration and the tools which enable it. He is the CEO and founder of Collabogence, a Toronto-based firm which used data to measure the changes in effectiveness and productivity of people and spaces.
1/20/2021 • 16 minutes, 32 seconds
FullFunnel.io Using 4k FB Community, Book to Grow B2B SaaS Business
Founder of Fullfunnel.io ( Full-Funnel B2B marketing for B2B Service-Based, Tech and SaaS companies) and ROIplan (marketing planning platform). I live and breathe B2B marketing since 2007. Author of ""LinkedIn Content Marketing: How to generate high-quality B2B leads on LinkedIn without cold messaging and ads"" book that was awarded as the best B2B marketing ebook and was included to 100 Best B2B Marketing Books of All Time by Bookauthority.
1/19/2021 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
SalesImpact Hits $1.5m ARR Training SaaS Sales Leaders
Paul is an entrepreneur with 18 years’ experience in founding and scaling global companies. Over the last 7 years, he has grown two international technology businesses from zero to $70M in combined sales as CRO and $500M + in value. Paul has also raised over $100M of investment across all stages.
Founder and CEO. Third venture, entrepreneur since 1997. Started first company with an investment of $1000 to make it a multi million dollar company across 5 continents. Pivoted to digital platform in 2017. Recipient of over 23 awards including Female Business Personality of the Year , entrepreneur of the year Asia
1/17/2021 • 14 minutes, 7 seconds
LennysNewsletter On Building 45k List, 2.5k Slack Group, Monetization Strategies and Substack Future
1/16/2021 • 26 minutes, 49 seconds
Lemon.io Did $2.73m Connecting Developers with Jobs, Keeps 25%
I founded Lemon.io (previous name Coding Ninjas) in 2015 with an idea to build an Uber for web development. You post a project, and the next available (pre-vetted) developer picks it up. Previously I had 2 failed attempts to build businesses: AdSense for images and local classified in Ukraine. Before that, I was the head of sales in a 100-person SEM agency.
1/15/2021 • 17 minutes, 44 seconds
FiveRings Is Outsourced SDR for SaaS, $360k in ARR
Starting my first venture at the age of 20 showed me incredible highs and crushing lows (eating PB&J for every meal). Gained a ton of skills doing door to door, cold calling, and managing a team of 30 commission only sales reps. After pursuing a few other ventures in this realm, I gained a lot of knowledge about growing sales, building teams and measuring success. Taking this knowledge, I co-founded FiveRings Marketing where we help SaaS companies grow their revenue by booking meetings with decision makers in their industry.
1/14/2021 • 13 minutes, 33 seconds
ConnectBooks Helps FBA Sellers with Quickbooks, $60k MRR
I started off as a car service driver and worked my way through school and started a SaaS company
1/13/2021 • 13 minutes, 57 seconds
GlobeChain Lists Waste Products, Does $1.6m in ARR in SaaS Enabled Marketplace Model
May is the founder of Globechain,a reuse marketplace that connects corporates to charities and smes to redistribute unneeded items, generating ESG data.Working in investment banking, May saw a need to digitise waste.Globechain has 10,000 members, operates in UK,Spain,NYC&UAE.Recognised as one of Forbes 100 top environmentalist 2020&top 100 Meaningful business 2020
1/12/2021 • 18 minutes, 10 seconds
FinHIre Founder Needs to Solve Marketplace Problem but Won't Quit Full Time Job
Antonis is a marketing professional with extensive experience within the e-commerce industry and a large presence in the Berlin startup scene. He has had the privilege of working for Fortune 500 companies and other top brands in the US and Europe. In 2020 he founded his second company, finhire.me.
1/11/2021 • 12 minutes, 10 seconds
Hipotecalo Does $15m in Home Buyer Loans, Charges 13% gives investors 7%, they make the spread
Seasoned executive with broad experience in all aspects related to Business Development, Turnarounds, Fund Raising, Corporate Finance & Strategic Advisory. Deeply experience in M&A, Private Equity, Venture Capital, Debt Restructuring and Chapter 11 processes. Experienced in leading the digital transformation and immersion process in a fintech company (B2P) in Argentina, leading the transformation of a business model for a home lending company (from P2P to B2P) in Uruguay and expanding the business regionally. In his activity as mentor at Ivy Executives he has empowered skills of several leading people around the world
1/10/2021 • 15 minutes, 34 seconds
Party.Space Makes $200k From One Customer, Hopin Challenger Next?
Ex-finance-bro. 4 years in VC/PE tech-focused investment firm CYFRD. Keen on hustle culture & b2b-sales.
1/9/2021 • 15 minutes, 8 seconds
Packy McCormick Not Boring Substack Hits $50k Revenue, 25k Subs
Packy is the founder of Not Boring, a weekly newsletter covering strategy and finance through the stories of companies big and small. After starting his career at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Packy spent six years as the NYC GM and VP, Experience at Breather.
Live and breathe business internationalization and entrepreneurship. Started out as consultant assisting Swedish companies abroad, founded and co-founded three start-ups between 2005-2011. Sold the first company in 2012, the second in 2019, and now I work with internationalization at Varbi as well as being COB. Married. Two kids.
1/7/2021 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
UnicornPlatform Bootstrapped, 500 customers, Doesn't Want "Scale at all costs"
CEO and founder of Unicorn Platform, the landing page builder for startups, creator of Broadwise.org, the startup community, DJ.
1/6/2021 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
WeTipi Raising $500k Pre-Launch for Matching Tenants with Homeowners
Entrepreneur with extensive knowledge of technology and product. Started my first company in school selling cheat sheets. Cofounded Foodo an online same day grocery delivery. Supported LEAD energy AG in moving R&D to Europe, both software and hardware. Built two custom ERP systems from scratch.
1/5/2021 • 11 minutes, 11 seconds
Amilia Makes $8m/yr From Event Organizers on 3 Revenue Streams
Founder and CEO of Amilia, one of Quebec’s fastest-growing tech companies. Providing the first activity-based eCommerce SaaS solution to organizations all over North America, he has made it his mission to help administrators streamline their day-to-day tasks to allow them to focus on growth and prosperity. A passionate entrepreneur and former venture capitalist, Francois has over 30 years of experience investing in early-stage software and internet companies. His expertise in evaluating investment opportunities, negotiating deals, and supporting companies in their development gives him a unique perspective and distinctive voice in the fast-paced Canadian startup community. Francois is also a tireless worker who is constantly looking to stay ahead of the software development curve and stand out as a visionary in the industry.
1/4/2021 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
LeadCrunch Hits $24m Revenue, $650k Revenue Per Employee, Raising $30m for 20% Of Business 2021?
1/3/2021 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
Billd Construction Fintech Lends $100m to Subcontractors, Makes 12%+ Spread
Christopher Doyle is an entrepreneur and business leader with extensive hands-on construction industry experience and a proven record of launching successful startups. He is the founder, president and CEO of Billd, a disruptive payment solution for the construction industry that helps contractors and suppliers grow their businesses with less hassle and risk. Recognizing cash flow hurdles contractors face when purchasing materials, Doyle launched Billd to make traditional Wall Street working capital accessible to these small business owners.
1/2/2021 • 29 minutes, 9 seconds
FlockFreight Grows 400% YoY, 500k Pallets Shipped, Still Shy of $1b Valuation
Logistics and innovation run through Oren’s veins. Following his parents’ footsteps, who created their own freight forwarder after years with Foreman’s van line, he founded his own 100-truck fleet at age 20, providing white-glove freight service throughout the U.S. and Canada. Next came SolSource, Oren’s first brokerage, which services major clients like Whole Foods and opened his eyes to the unnecessary complications and inefficiencies of LTL shipping. Now, after 20+ years in freight, Oren’s built the solution that’s revolutionizing the freight industry: Shared truckload.
1/1/2021 • 24 minutes, 21 seconds
LeagueApps Passes $1b in Event Revenue, Takes 4%
12/31/2020 • 16 minutes, 21 seconds
Jamespot Profits $40k/mo on $4m Revenue helping Teams Stay Connected
12/30/2020 • 14 minutes, 51 seconds
How Lately Hit $900k For Social Media Automation Tool Using AI, $7m valuation
Kate Bradley Chernis is the Founder & CEO of Lately, which uses AI to automatically transform longform content like blogs, podcasts and videos into dozens of ""smart"" social posts it learns will yield the highest engagement from your audience. As a former marketing agency owner, Kate initially created the idea for Lately out of spreadsheets for then-client, Walmart, and got them a 130% ROI, year-over-year for three years. Prior to founding Lately, Kate served 20 million listeners as Music Director and on-air host at Sirius/XM. She’s also an award-winning radio producer, engineer and voice talent with 25 years of national broadcast communications, brand-building, sales and marketing expertise.
12/29/2020 • 16 minutes, 56 seconds
Mode Grows 95% to $19m ARR, Turning Analysis Into Superhero's
Derek Steer is the CEO of Mode, a new startup enabling data scientists to share and discover work. With Mode, analysts are more productive and connected, both publicly within the data community and privately within organizations.Before co-founding Mode in 2013, Derek was an early member of Yammer’s Analytics team. There, he built tools to identify strong leads and customers at risk of attrition within a pool of freemium users. Derek has also worked in antitrust economics and on the Monetization Analytics team at Facebook.
12/28/2020 • 26 minutes, 17 seconds
NessLabs Hits 1,500 Members Paying $75k, Software Next?
Anne-Laure Le Cunff is the founder of Ness Labs, an online platform offering neuroscience-based content and coaching to thousands of entrepreneurs and knowledge workers. Prior to Ness Labs, she led marketing for digital health products at Google. She holds a MSc in applied neuroscience from King's College London.
12/27/2020 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
BossInsights 2x YoY to 5 Customers Helping Lenders Capture Data
Former banker & 2nd time founder, Keren Moynihan is the CEO/co-founder of Boss Insights. Boss Insights offers Business Data as a Service. Their single API enables easy access to hundreds of sources (Quickbooks, SalesForce, Stripe) bridging data gaps between banks and business customers in under 1 minute. Banks know where a business was, is and will be on demand. Keren has 15+ years' experience in financial services as a banker, advisor and is on the Commonwealth’s Women Invested Advisory Council. Under her leadership, Boss was awarded the 2020 Unicorn Challenge and 2019 Executive leader in lending, featured in Forbes, ABA and The Financial Brand for saying Banks must adopt APIs or Fintechs will win.
12/26/2020 • 19 minutes, 8 seconds
How GoSun Sold 50,000 Units, $4m Revenue, 250k Community, Software Next?
Patrick has worked with solar for over 20 years, and maintains a diverse background in design, social enterprise and manufacturing. Volunteering in developing countries has inspired Patrick to create solar solutions that meet essential needs like cooking, cooling and sanitation.
12/25/2020 • 21 minutes, 32 seconds
KPISense Raising $1.5m Now on $1.2m Revenues As Tech Enabled CFO For SaaS Founders
Will has over a decade of experience helping SaaS and software businesses solve their strategic financial challenges. During that timeframe, Will has led, operated, advised and/or invested in over 100 SaaS and software companies. In March 2019, Will founded KPI Sense to re-invent the concept of outsourced CFO and FP&A work for SaaS and Software businesses. Using tech-enabled automation and vertical market expertise within SaaS, KPI Sense offers a blended product and service solution that allows companies to tackle all of the financial needs, including financial modeling, analytics, forecasting, budgeting, fundraising and M&A.
12/24/2020 • 14 minutes, 17 seconds
Willco Breaks 10k Customers, $1m Revenue, $6m Valuation for End of Life Planning
Erin is an entrepreneur, speaker, startup advisor, and former technology journalist. She is co-founder and CEO at Willful, an online estate planning platform. She has appeared in publications including The New York Times, Forbes, and CNN, and she was named one of Marketing Magazine's top 30 Under 30 marketers.
12/23/2020 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
EasyGenerators Grows 100% YoY to $4.2m Revenue, 1200 Customers
Kasper has been an industry leader in the L&D space for over 25 years. He has made an impact on this ever-evolving field as CEO of the fast growing scale up Easygenerator and as an e-learning blogger (kasperspiro.com), author and speaker at various e-learning conferences around the world.
12/22/2020 • 14 minutes, 5 seconds
EssayJack Raising $2m on $8m Valuation, $250k in ARR
Dr. Lindy Ledohowski (B.A., B.Ed., M.A., Ph.D.) was a former English teacher and then English professor in Canada before becoming an EdTech CEO for academic writing software platform, EssayJack. She has won numerous awards for her teaching, research, and publications, and is now an award-winning entrepreneur. She has published both peer-reviewed scholarship and popular pieces on writing and offers keynote addresses on webinars on EdTech, leadership, and academic writing.
12/21/2020 • 21 minutes, 16 seconds
OnCallHealth Grows 150% to $3m Run Rate for Virtual Patient Care HealthTech
Nicholas Chepesiuk is the Founder & CEO of OnCall Health. Prior to starting OnCall in 2016, Nicholas was an early hire at education technology company Top Hat, and marketing technology company Turnstyle (acquired by Yelp).
12/20/2020 • 15 minutes, 56 seconds
WhatConverts Hits $2.1m Revenue, $300k Profits in Call Tracking Space
Started first business (online industrial directory) in 1999 in South Africa, and is still in operation today. Personally moved to UK in 2001 to have a more politically stable business base. Then moved to USA in 2006, as US based clients began to increase. Over the years we morphed from an industrial directory to a digital marketing agency. In 2014 co-founder and I began discussing how to solve lead tracking and reporting problem with marketing clients. We officially launched WhatConverts in March 2015. We've enjoyed the boot-strapped growth, and as a company it feels like we're still in the early stages of where we're going.
Alogpix is the only place to understand eCommerce market share, pricing, and promotions of your competitors and category in real-time . Powering Fortune 50 CPGs and Marketplaces, Algopix gives you a window into now, not weeks ago with 1P + 3P Coverage so you can adjust to current market conditions, boost sessions and conversions with more relevant merchandising and pricing.
12/18/2020 • 20 minutes, 16 seconds
WriterAccess Makes $9m This Year, Pays Freelancers $6.4m Helping 5,000 Brands With Content
12/17/2020 • 24 minutes, 31 seconds
WIldJar Call Tracking, a 5 person $2m Revenue Business, wow!
Co founder and CEO of WildJar First startup. Bootstrapped - started in 2016. Born in New Zealand, grew up in Australia and currently living in the Scotland 🐑🐑🐑
12/16/2020 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
AgentRisk Has $27m in AUM, Better Version of Family Office?
I am a serial Entrepreneur (my third Startup got acquired for a 17x return to investors by $SPLK) and I love making companies with a little bit of funding, tons of freedom and small teams. I am an active Angel Investor, organizer of many tech meetups in LA and I still write code (I have a super strong engineering background). I have been a speaker/lecturer to tons of events all over the world about Entrepreneurship and Startups and I love helping founders.
12/15/2020 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
Credo Hits $300k Revenue By Paying $2m to SEO Consultants
Credo was founded and is run by John Doherty. John has almost a decade of experience in SEO and online marketing. Before starting Credo, he ran marketing/growth for HotPads and Trulia Rentals, part of the Zillow Group family of real estate brands. Before that he was a consultant at Distilled, where he was the most senior consultant and a founding member of the New York City office. During his time there he consulted with everyone from small VC-backed startups (who closed rounds of funding because of his work) to large international hotel chains with multiple brands and brand needs. He lives in Denver, Colorado with his wife Courtney and their very large black labrador Butterbean.
12/14/2020 • 13 minutes, 1 second
Atrium Breaks $14m Doing AI Consulting
As CEO of Atrium, Chris leads a world-class team in empowering companies to embrace the next generation of tech through the power of AI. Chris brings more than 15 years of sales, professional services and marketing experience across solution areas including CRM, business intelligence, enterprise integration, and custom application development.
12/13/2020 • 13 minutes, 39 seconds
How Shipmonk CEO Kept $5m of $10m Series A Round, Breaking $80m In Revenue 2019
12/12/2020 • 13 minutes, 41 seconds
LeadGenius Hits $10m in Revenue, Growth Slow at 50% YoY Considering $25m Raised
Prayag is founder and Executive Chairman of LeadGenius. Before founding LeadGenius in 2011, Prayag worked at Finland’s top research institute as an expert in Ubiquitous Interaction and built mobile applications and embedded systems in Delhi’s startup scene. He is an author of several book chapters and papers on Human Computer Interaction, Computer Networks and Network Security. He has a M.S. in Information Science from U.C. Berkeley and a B.S. degree from Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology India. Connect via twitter @prayagn. He describes himself as, “a standup guy who loves history, poetry, startups and Scotch.”
12/11/2020 • 20 minutes, 8 seconds
FlumeWater Sells 10k Units at $200 With SaaS Upsell
Eric is a Central Oregon native, Cal Poly graduate and startup founder with a passion for entrepreneurship. Whether it be building a tech company from the ground up, investing in real estate or flipping cars on craigslist, a desire to construct his own success has inspired his actions.
12/10/2020 • 22 minutes, 4 seconds
FanDuel Co-Founder Launched New Relationship App Idea, $2m Raised
Lesley Eccles is the Founder and CEO of Relish, the first-ever relationship training app making it easier to build happy, healthy, more connected relationships. She was previously co-founder and former head of marketing at FanDuel, the billion dollar fantasy sports company. Lesley also served on FanDuel’s board of directors.
12/9/2020 • 22 minutes, 10 seconds
Vid.Camera Sells $20m in Tokens, Converting 100% to Fiat for New Facebook Where Creators Own Upside
Jag Singh, Vid.camera founder and CEO
12/8/2020 • 16 minutes, 32 seconds
Tenon Hits 2m Revenue In Automated Testing Space
Web accessibility testing has a problem: testing after the fact. Tenon seeks to solve that. Tenon is a one of a kind accessibility testing tool in that it is aimed at offering unprecedented flexibility in tooling for designers developers testers and content authors. Tenon achieves these goals via its API which can be seamlessly integrated into your existing toolset. It doesn't matter what IDE you use, what CMS you use, what automated build and deploy tool you use, or what you use for unit testing, acceptance testing, or issue tracking, Tenon can be added to these workflows. This ability to test early and often allows you to catch and fix accessibility issues before they happen, not after, and allows you to release accessible code from the beginning.
12/7/2020 • 20 minutes, 32 seconds
FundThrough Hits $240m in Invoices Advanced to 2k+ Founders
12/6/2020 • 26 minutes, 47 seconds
RedSeal Sold 50%+ For $60m This Year doing $50m in Revenues in CyberSecurity Space
Ray joined RedSeal as CEO in February 2014. Prior to RedSeal he was a general partner at Venrock, one of RedSeal’s founding investors. At Venrock he invested in 53 companies including over a dozen in cybersecurity including Vontu, PGP, P-Cube, Imperva, Cloudflare, CTERA, and Shape Security. He is on the board of Check Point Software Technology, Ltd. an original Venrock investment, and Team8, both Tel Aviv–based companies.
12/5/2020 • 20 minutes, 10 seconds
G2 Hits $50m in ARR (+$20m), and $450m Valuation
Entrepreneur delivering success to B2B tech buyers and vendors via G2.com marketplace...and supporting ThreeKit in building the world's most amazing 3D visual selling platform. Previously built cloud CPQ software pioneers BigMachines (acquired by Oracle) and SteelBrick (acquired by Salesforce). Following the conscious path to reach the PEAK in my work, personal, and family life.
12/4/2020 • 17 minutes, 40 seconds
She Hit $12m in Revenue, Raised $5m in VC, Then Just Bought Out Investors, How?!
Jessica Rovello is the CEO and co-founder of Arkadium, which provides interactive content to the world's most well-known brands and publishers, including CNN, Comcast, Microsoft, The Washington Post and USA Today. Jessica is the winner of the American Business Award for Executive of the Year, the Stevie Award for Entrepreneur of Year, was named one of SmartCEO's Future 50 and is a Crain's New York "40 Under 40" winner.
12/3/2020 • 22 minutes, 37 seconds
OrderDesk Does $60k Monthly, Profits $10k, Growing Via Shopify App Exchange
David Hollander is the founder of Order Desk, an app that helps merchants save time on their ecommerce order management. He started Order Desk as a side-project six years ago, and it’s now grown into a bootstrapped company employing six people and grossing $60K/month.
12/2/2020 • 20 minutes, 48 seconds
LetsChat Helping Outbound Sales Initiate Chat with Prospects Starting with Email
Ankesh, was born in India, educated in London, based in Silicon Valley. ATSystems, 0-$22m in 4 years. Sold to TMP/Monster. Personic, 0- $25m in 4 years. Raised $50m, Personic sold to Kronos. Sold patents to Google for "Sharing as a Page Ranking Mechanism," prior to Facebook's "Like button"
12/1/2020 • 14 minutes, 11 seconds
Perx Hits $27m Valuation
"I’ve had the privilege of experiencing the best of both worlds, 5 startups and 3 MNCs in the last 20 years in the enterprise software space solving mission critical business problems. After 12 years in San Francisco and working with some of the brightest entrepreneurs, engineers, VCs, and tech leaders, I transitioned what a 2 year contract to Asia has now turned into 10 years, having mostly based in Singapore and Japan. The excitement continues, especially now that I’m leading my own startup in Singapore and expanding rapidly across geographies. Currently, we are experiencing pent up demand for consumer engagement and loyalty solutions from SMEs to large enterprises, trying to meet their customers' rising digital expectations and also to solve their direct to consumer data play. Perx Technologies is addressing the B2B2C space where the business stakeholders are more pressured to deliver revenue than ever before. I’ve worked with traditional IT leaders and stakeholders for many years and now we see a trend where business stakeholders are driving more tech spend with new SaaS and agile plug n play data platforms to help transform revenue models to differentiate their journeys to become lifestyle and content rich companies, improve customer experience and real time engagements, measure marketing spend with real ROI, and can rapidly go-live with zero to little integration. Perx is regarded as Asia's first fully integrated AI enabled customer engagement & loyalty SaaS platform. Our configurable dashboard unifies real time customer data and interaction and empowers marketers to manage loyalty, campaigns and rewards in a much more dynamic and automated manner, producing rich analytics and real time insights on campaign performance. By gamifying the experience for end users and powered by the personalization engine that delivers smart products and offers to smart customers, businesses can see an immediate increase on conversion and retention rates. We have re-defined what next generation of loyalty means in the digital economy!
11/30/2020 • 19 minutes, 32 seconds
ToucanToco Raising Right Now $10m on $50m+ Pre with $5m in Revenue
I'm passionate about data, design and pedagogy. I started Toucan 5 years ago, Previously I cofounded tldr.io. I'm 32 years old and father of three.
11/29/2020 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
Front End As a Service, I Predict They'll Be $100m Within 3 Years
Matthew Hager began writing code at the age of 8. At 20 he started Poetic, one of Houston’s leading technology agencies. Now, as CEO of Clutch, he is working towards his lifelong passion of making building software faster and easier than ever before. When he’s offline, he spends time with his wife of 11 years, 4 kids, 17 chickens and 2 dogs.
11/28/2020 • 20 minutes, 52 seconds
Can Consumer App For Authenticated Videos Tied to Location Work in 2020?
11/27/2020 • 19 minutes, 52 seconds
Shift Sells $200m Worth of Cars, Makes $30m, $225m Equity Raised, IPO Next?
George Arison is the co-founder of Shift, an online marketplace disrupting the used car industry. An immigrant from Georgia and lifelong entrepreneur, he also co-founded the first on-demand mobile transportation booking technology Taxi Magic (now known as Curb), as well as working for Google and BCG.
11/26/2020 • 30 minutes, 18 seconds
Tootris Launches Daycare as a Service, 100 Customers
TOOTRiS is service provider that helps working parents’ access and secure affordable, quality Child Care in real-time. TOOTRiS is available online or by mobile app and provides search by location, schedule, budget and specific program distinctions, along with virtual tour capabilities, enrollment and pay-as-you-go payment processing.
Rafferty Pendery is an International Public Speaker and Tech Entrepreneur who owns several successful companies in the software and marketing space serving a wide range of businesses - from small businesses to Fortune 500’s.
11/24/2020 • 19 minutes, 26 seconds
$0 to $12m: The most successful SaaS Paid Ads Story of All Time?
Since 2009, Paris has founded and run Hop Online, which has pivoted in recent years to focus entirely on SaaS growth marketing. Services include SEO, content marketing, paid search, paid social, CRO, data analytics, and creative. From 2014-16, Paris was Country Manager for Google in Bulgaria. Today, Hop Online serves several high growth SaaS companies that are pursuing exponential scale ahead of or in response to investor financing.
11/23/2020 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
CoachMePlus raising $2m on $10m post money right now
Kevin Dawidowicz is the President and co-founder of CoachMePlus, built around a simple idea, helping coaches and athletes work together to achieve their fitness-related goals. We serve a range of fitness-minded professionals from personal trainers and gym owners to professional sports coaches and military human performance specialists.
11/22/2020 • 16 minutes, 56 seconds
Daisy intelligence on track for $10m in 2021
The former head of IBM Canada’s data mining and data warehousing practices, Gary is passionate about AI and its ability to transform how retailers grow their businesses and establish an edge in an increasingly challenging and competitive environment. Under Gary’s leadership, Daisy has established a track record of delivering verifiable financial outcomes for a rapidly growing list of global clients. Gary holds a B.A.Sc. and M.A.Sc. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Toronto.
11/21/2020 • 21 minutes, 46 seconds
SalesProcess Did $1m Last Month Helping Brands Drive Sales, 40% Net Profit
Highly influential, passionate executive Director and Co-Investor for high growing SaaS and Private Equity / Private Debt ecosystem. Invested in Fluid Fintec and SalesProcess.
11/20/2020 • 25 minutes, 11 seconds
InboxDone VC's Are Using This Company To Handle Their Inboxes
I strongly believe that technology should work towards improving human relationships instead of replacing them. The ability to bring communities together, and benefit all stakeholders is what drives us. I've been personally impacted by the lack of scholarships and with Almabase now, we're helping institutions make their education more accessible.
11/18/2020 • 21 minutes, 22 seconds
Fairmeadow Did 1500 Bins of Laundry Last Month, $240k in Revenue, 300 Customers
Kiss dirty laundry goodbye and reclaim your free time by letting us handle the chore of washing and folding your laundry. We don't have per pound fees. Our pricing is by the bin and our bins fit up to 25 pounds of laundry. Our service is easy to use, all of our process is automated and reliable. We operate on a weekly basis and guarantee next day delivery. FairMeadow's staff is made up of professionals with years of experience in home service management and hospitality. FairMeadow uses only eco-friendly, non-scented, hypo-allergenic detergents. We get great results without harming you or the environment. Quality laundry service for less. Our laundry service is up to 65% less than competitive wash and fold services. By using proprietary software for route and load optimization we are able to perform the same service for less, freeing you to do the things you really want to do with your time.
Ex Samsung R&D Developer and Team Manager. Almost Googler but reject the offer in the very last moment. Start my first start-up in 2012, still operating. From 2018 working on martech solution - Trustisto.
11/16/2020 • 16 minutes, 28 seconds
TeamSnap Cut 50% Workforce, Hiring Back Now As COVID Recovery Builds
As co-founder and CEO of TeamSnap, the household name in integrated sports management, Dave wears many hats – from being the boss to sweeping the floors, and everything in between. Since forming the company he has managed three successful investment rounds, secured strategic partnerships and overseen impressive growth. Nearly 20 million administrators, coaches, players and parents now rely on TeamSnap to manage their sports lives. He continues to focus on both day-to-day and long-term initiatives.
11/15/2020 • 17 minutes, 14 seconds
FeedSauce Helps Brands Get Top Notch Product Shots, Influencer Style
Founded Feedsauce in 2018 after running an agency to $600k ARR with 9 person team and then noticing that all our clients were always interested in content more than anything. We accidentally had built a 'speedy system' for creating product photos in our agency and used this model to pivot to Feedsauce and provide custom product photos for brands in 72 hours. Now we're building a marketplace to open the platform to all creators around the world.
11/14/2020 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
Img.ly is Image Editing SDK, $2m in Revenues, Bootstrapped, GitHub Growth Channel
Daniel is the co-founder of img.ly, where he strives to build platforms to make design more accessible for everyone. After graduating with a PhDs in electrical engineering in 2015, he held a few interim CTO positions in the local startup community. In 2017 he co-founded img.ly with Eray Basar.
11/13/2020 • 19 minutes, 38 seconds
MyWifiNetworks Turned Down $5.4m All Cash Offer Last Month, Despite Loosing 30% Due to COVID
Kevin Zicherman helps digital agencies and MSPs innovate to increase profitability by reselling guest WiFi marketing solutions. Kevin is the CEO of MyWiFi Networks, the leading white-label WiFi platform with social data capture, visitor metrics and marketing automation.
11/12/2020 • 22 minutes, 33 seconds
GetSpiffy Hits $20m Run Rate Cleaning 30,000 Cars Per Month, Oil Changes and More Next!
Scot is a 4-time entrepreneur based out of the Research Triangle Park region. Before Spiffy, he started ChannelAdvisor in 2001 and took it public in 2013. Now he's exploring the intersection of digital services and car care.
11/11/2020 • 28 minutes, 35 seconds
Hopin Raises $175m at $2b Valuation, $20m in ARR (Flashback 6 months)
11/10/2020 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
SafetyEvolution Smartly Uses Setup Fees For Instant CAC Recovery
Started in my first company at 22. Serial Entrepreneur with a passion for people and businesses. Started working in Occupational Health and Safety in 2012 and decided I needed to go back to school to learn more about business. Started Safety Evolution in 2016, graduated my MBA in 2017.
11/10/2020 • 14 minutes, 39 seconds
FullCast Hits $1.1m ARR, Pure SaaS From $1m Agency in Rev Ops Space
Life long learner who is looking to add value to every relationship I build. Co-founded fullcast.io with Bala in 2017 to transform how Go to market Operations are done based on prior experience scaling ops at Salesforce and Microsoft.
11/9/2020 • 17 minutes, 36 seconds
MySwimPro Hit 15k Customers, $1m in ARR Selling Swim Instructions
I started MySwimPro when I was 23, and since then it has grown to over 1 Million downloads, named App of the Year by Apple and the business has grown to 7-figures in revenue. We are a 100% remote company distributed across 10 time zones!
11/8/2020 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
York hits $1.5m Revenue Helping Founders Scale
Kyle York is co-founder, CEO and managing partner at York IE where he sets the company’s vision of building a hybrid strategic advisory, investment and operational growth firm. Kyle works closely with entrepreneurs and investors to help them realize their shared ambition to build good companies, create new jobs, grow generational wealth and impact the world. Investing in over 75 startups over the past decade, Kyle is also a co-founder and board member for 3rd generation family business, YORK Athletics MFG., an ecommerce footwear brand in Boston, and is a board member for Canvs, Assent Compliance, CloudApp and Forcivity.
11/7/2020 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
Limble is Maintenance Automation Software, hits $2m Revenue, Bootstrapped Using 5% Debt
I am a full stack developer with a passion for entrepreneurship. I am a father of 3 little boys ages 6, 4, and 4 and married to my lovely wife Yvette. When not working I love reading about various topics, but have a passion for everything Sci-fi/Fantasy.
11/6/2020 • 20 minutes, 28 seconds
CookieInformation Hits $2m Bootstrapped For Easy GDPR Copmliance
WE ARE A PRIVACY TECH COMPANY SPECIALIZED IN DEVELOPING CONSENT SOLUTIONS. WE HELP YOUR WEBSITE COMPLY WITH CURRENT PRIVACY REGULATIONS AND FRAMEWORKS.
11/5/2020 • 18 minutes
Penji Hits $4m Revenue Helping 1000 Customers With Unlimited Design Work
Johnathan Grzybowski, is the co-founder of Penji. A platform that gives you on-demand access to the top two percent of designers in the world. You can submit as many projects as you want, get your completed designs back in under 48 hours and only pay a flat monthly rate. His personal mission is to empower the next generation of entrepreneurs to challenge simple minded patterns that help elevate, execute, and produce more revenue for their business.
11/4/2020 • 34 minutes, 4 seconds
Raffle.ai Raises $3.4m for Customer Support Automation, 7 Enterprise Customers $35k ACV's
In 2018 I joined forces with Professor Ole Winther from DTU and founded raffle.ai. raffle deploys intelligent search tools for Customer Service, that gives instant, correct answers to your customers and employees, while picking up great insights on customer needs and employee satisfaction. raffle reduces calls, live chats and emails by 24% and unlocks a constant re-learning circle. At the same time employees save 80% of their internal search time and get up to speed with new knowledge quickly. raffle.ai has raised €3,5 mill within the first 24 months (by August 1, 2020) and aims for a Series A round late 2021.
11/3/2020 • 18 minutes, 20 seconds
Reamaze Breaks $3m ARR Helping ECommerce Brands with HelpDesk Tool
Serial SaaS Entrepreneur with experience in helping small businesses.
11/2/2020 • 21 minutes, 44 seconds
Cylynt Security SaaS To Break $10m Up From $6m Last Year, Bootstrapped
Ted is a co-founder and CEO of Cylynt, a cyber-security firm that provides SaaS based anti-piracy, license compliance and software monetization technology for the world’s leading software companies. Prior to Cylynt, Ted was a co-founder of the EDA company AWR Corporation, which was acquired by National Instruments in 2011. AWR, a leading high-frequency analog design company, has played an important role in the design of semiconductors used in wireless applications.
Amir Salihefendić has viewed life differently ever since his family fled war-torn Bosnia for Denmark and he began to see the world becoming borderless. That worldview influences his mission to shape the future of work as Founder and CEO of Doist, a fully distributed, bootstrapped company that creates productivity tools used by over 25 million people globally.
10/31/2020 • 26 minutes, 21 seconds
Supermetrics $40m Raise Included Secondary at $200m+ Valuation
Supermetrics founder & CEO
10/30/2020 • 22 minutes, 13 seconds
Flowster Hits $10k MRR After eCommerce Brand Hits $3.1m In Amazon Sales
Trent Dyrsmid is a serial entrepreneur, husband, and father. In addition to hosting the Bright Ideas eCommerce podcast, he is the Founder of Flowster.app; a business workflow management application used by thousands of eCommerce businesses around the globe. In 2019, his eCommerce business ranked 254th on the Inc 5000.
10/29/2020 • 26 minutes, 1 second
Appify Recruits Powerhouse CEO, Hits 45 Customers for No Code App Building Platform
Jen Grant has a passion for building companies from the ground-up and taking multiple companies to over a billion dollar valuation. She has been involved with companies such as Google and box. She lead the Google Apps EDU, Gmail, and Book Search marketing teams. She received Google's most prestigious award for her marketing leadership.
10/28/2020 • 17 minutes, 48 seconds
ClearView Is HootSuite for Lawyers, Hits $2.3m Revenue, Would Look at Exiting for $6m
Adrian Dayton is an internationally recognized speaker on social media and business development. At the end of 2013, Adrian launched ClearView Social, a saas software business. ClearView Social makes it easy to get professionals sharing to social media, and is currently in use by over 50,000 professionals worldwide.
10/27/2020 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
BillBee Dominated 1 Niche of DIYers, Bootstrapped, $2 Million Revenue
While always "making money online" since school, David started his professional career as a cooperative student at former 120k people HP with stops in Europe and California. Later on, he started as employee no 1 and took over the growth part to further bootstrap Billbee to a 7-(and more)-figure SaaS, now working as the MD for revenue and operations.
10/26/2020 • 12 minutes, 13 seconds
Ninety.io Used Community to Hit $2.8m Run Rate, Bootstrapped
Entrepreneur, CEO and coach with decades of experience across startups, early-stage, small and mid-size companies. Track record includes generating over $1 billion in gains for his investors. Dual passion is not just teaching visionary leadership teams how to build extraordinarily productive, humane and resilient companies but building every one of the cloud based tools needed to make the associated journey almost easy.
10/25/2020 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
Holded Grows 100% YoY to $4m ARR, Last Round Valuation $22 Million
Born and raised in Barcelona, Spain, I've been creating my own ventures over the last 13 years. At the age of 20 I founded a retail company and raised up to 100 employees and 14 stores across Spain. Later I co-founded Holded, a Business Operating System for small businesses to manage Sales, Finances, Operations & HR in one single beautiful platform.
10/24/2020 • 20 minutes, 16 seconds
Cocaine, Coding, and Cashflow, The Truth about Dan Martell
10/23/2020 • 50 minutes, 2 seconds
Nailted HR Tool Hits 4,000 Paid Seats, $122k ARR
Guiding companies to improve their culture @_nailted
10/22/2020 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
SanityDesk Gets Money From Founderpath, Hits $180k revenue Helping Digital Brands Scale
Samuel P.N. Cook is a former U.S. Army Officer and Russian History Teacher who founded SanityDesk to help experts, authors, and coaches to build their entire business online. He lives in Kiev, Ukraine with his tech team based in Poland and Ukraine.
10/21/2020 • 18 minutes, 14 seconds
Unstack CMS All In One Hits $10k MRR, Adding $2500/mo, 16k Uniques from ProductHunt Launch
Grant is a serial entrepreneur and the Founder/CEO of Unstack, the no-code content management platform designed for marketers to to build and scale digital businesses without developers. Prior to Unstack Grant was a Co-Founder and CPO/CEO of Grapevine, an influencer marketplace with 200,000+ creators which was acquired in 2018.
10/20/2020 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
Lift-Ai Spins Out of $10m Agency, Goes $0 to $1m Run Rate in 4 Months Bootstrapped
Don has pioneered the use of customer engagement to drive revenue for global brands for 3 decades. First in building inside sales operations, then leading in the use of live sales chat, and now he’s pioneering AI to score website visitors conversion potential to trigger optimal customer engagement.
10/19/2020 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
Synapse Breaking $1m Revenue, Using $500k Debt To Scale Productivity Tool
Ryan Austin is an entrepreneur who has spent over 10 years driving improvements in learning and development. In his current role as CEO at Synapse, Ryan is focused on developing innovative products to help learning teams increase productivity and create impactful training at scale. Prior to Synapse, Ryan served as Senior Vice President for World Trade Group, an organization that offers live events, online products, and training courses.
10/18/2020 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
UBIweb Makes $1.7m/year Helping Plumbers Launch Websites
Co-Founder of Ubiweb, 15+ years sales experience (15 in online marketing) - developed a turn-key all-in-one solution for SMBs for their online marketing - primarily targeting Canada currently. Started out of my basement with one partner and boostrapped our way (so far) to over 700+ clients and over 20+ colleagues
10/17/2020 • 24 minutes, 15 seconds
SpotMe Using COVID For $22m SaaS Event Platform Pivot, 300 Customers Paying!
Pierre joined SpotMe in 2001 as a software engineer. In 2004, after a research position on distributed algorithms at NTT Japan, he returned to SpotMe and led the pivot from proprietary hardware to SaaS, with SpotMe becoming the leading pure play event engagement platform. Pierre is a graduate from INSEAD and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology.
10/16/2020 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
Genially Breaks $3.6m ARR, About to Raise $10m, Competing with Canva
In Genially we provide a tool to create interactive communication experiences and more engaging content for more than 2 million users worldwide. I participate in tasks such as the business development strategy, funding processes, public relationships, etc.
10/15/2020 • 21 minutes, 15 seconds
Cognism Prospecting Tool Hits $10m Revenue, 40% Of Last Round Was Secondary
10/14/2020 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
Kontentino Social Media Management Tool Breaks $1.5m ARR, $20k/mo Profits
Bohumil studied Innovation Management and Marketing in Denmark and in the USA. After his studies, he was invited to launch a social media tool developed in a leading ad agency in Central Europe. In less than 4 years, he and his team built a tool with more than 4000 brands and agencies on board such as IKEA, BBDO or VML. Bohumil is in the Forbes 30 under 30 list and became Founder of a year in Slovakia (2019).
10/13/2020 • 14 minutes, 51 seconds
Trakto Hits $30k MRR With Canva Competitor. Can They Hit $1m ARR?
Designer with 10+ years of experience and founder of Trakto.io, a design software for non-designers with hundreds of clients all over the world.
10/12/2020 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
NthRound Hits $300k ARR Creating Liquidity for Employee Option Grants
As co-founder and CEO of Nth Round, Graham runs all aspects of Nth Round operations: from product development, to sales and marketing, to customer support. Before starting the company, Graham started in product design and development at Relay Network, after which he joined the quantitative investment firm AJO Partners.
Bryan Clayton is CEO and cofounder of GreenPal an online marketplace that connects homeowners with Local lawn care professionals. GreenPal has been called the “Uber for lawn care” by Entrepreneur magazine and has over 100,000 active users completing thousands of transactions per day. Before starting GreenPal Bryan Clayton founded Peachtree Inc. one of the largest landscaping companies in the state of Tennessee growing it to over $10 million a year in annual revenue before it was acquired by Lusa holdings in 2013. Bryan‘s interest and expertise are related to entrepreneurialism, small business growth, marketing and bootstrapping businesses from zero revenue to profitability and exit.
10/9/2020 • 22 minutes, 47 seconds
Clickup Close To $34m in Revenue, Competing in Project Management Space with 300,000 Paid Seats
Zeb Evans is a serial entrepreneur that's started several software companies with over $100 million in revenue. Currently, he's founder and CEO at ClickUp, a productivity platform where people plan their work.
10/8/2020 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
ZenBusiness Breaks 70k Side Hustle Customers, "Easy path" to $30m ARR Next 12 Months
10/7/2020 • 30 minutes, 34 seconds
Richter Hits $4.5m Fine Tuning Sales Process For F500 Brands
I’m the founder and CEO of Richter and companies. Started the company (bootstrapped) in 2008 at the beginning of the economic collapse. Currently own 6 companies. We’ve made the Inc 5000 list 5 consecutive years. Today, we work with many of the largest B2B companies in the world.
10/6/2020 • 25 minutes, 57 seconds
HumanProofDesigns Hit $2m Revenue Selling Starter Sites to New Entrepreneurs
10/5/2020 • 21 minutes, 52 seconds
SandHill Dev Sells $55k/mo Side Project for $1m+, Now Building 4 Other Products $3.6m Run Rate
My name is Pippin Williamson. I am a nature loving farm boy that somehow found his way into computers, Internet, and business. I run a company called Sandhills Development, LLC. We build eCommerce and membership software for websites.
10/4/2020 • 27 minutes, 7 seconds
QuickOrder Hits $4m In Under 18 Months Helping Restaurants Survive Pandemic
Mads Wedderkopp 24 year old CEO & founder of QuickOrder. Been leasing since the age of 17 where he lead a sales team of 8 people, at 18 he was in charge of 120 people. Founded QuickOrder age 18, and has since grown the Company from 5 co-founders to 40+ employees.
10/3/2020 • 17 minutes, 42 seconds
SendLane Hits $5m ARR Helping ECommerce Brands Do Email Marketing
Digital marketer turned tech founder, built a platform in 2013 to solve his own problems, which eventually turned into a business in 2015. Lives in Sunny San Diego, CA.
10/2/2020 • 25 minutes, 47 seconds
Flippa Gave Me $1.1m Valuation Based off $600m in Deal History Over 10 Years
10/1/2020 • 24 minutes, 53 seconds
PlusThis Does $85k in Profit Every Month Selling Marketing Tools to 3,000 SMB's
9/30/2020 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
OnFleet Flirting With $10m ARR Processing 3m Deliveries Per Month for 900 Customers
Khaled Naim is Co-Founder & CEO of Onfleet, the world’s fastest growing provider of last mile delivery management software. Since its launch in 2015, Onfleet has grown to power millions of deliveries per month for thousands of businesses around the world. Clients include Gap, Total Wine & More, Capsule, Imperfect Foods, and United Supermarkets. Onfleet handles route optimization, dispatching, real-time driver tracking, proof of delivery, analytics and customer communications. Onfleet was ranked #124 on the Inc 5000 list of America’s fastest growing companies in 2019 and #13 in San Francisco Business Times’ Fast100 list of the Bay Area’s 100 fastest growing companies. Khaled is a mentor at Startupbootcamp and Syria Digital Lab. He is based in San Francisco.
9/29/2020 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
Lemlist Gives Employees This Bonus When 5x Revenue Growth Target Hit
Guillaume is the Co-founder and CEO of lemlist, a platform that helps sales teams book more meetings and close more deals with their prospect. In less than two and a half years he and his team grew lemlist from 0 to 8000+ customers worldwide (more than $2,000,000 ARR) without any fundings. He is also the founder of the sales automation family, the coolest and biggest facebook community about sales automation!
9/28/2020 • 27 minutes, 29 seconds
Wemby Hits $100k Revenue Giving Your Team Therapy Sessions
Alberto Fantappie is the Founder and CEO of Wemby and has more than 10 years experience in the tech sector. Before founding Wemby he was at the International Committee of the Red Cross, in charge of HR and finance for multiple offices for 2 years, notably in Afghanistan and South Sudan. Previous to that, he led the South Europe marketing team at Zalando, managing a budget in excess of €70M. Before that, he bootstrapped a short-term property rentals app, reaching €60K in revenues in the first 10 months of operations, he also held roles in management consulting, investment bank and was an intern at Google. He holds Maters in Management from City University in London and the ESCP business school, and has a BA in Politics and human rights.
9/27/2020 • 17 minutes, 15 seconds
MyCroft Raises $5m to Ship Home Speaker Echo Competitor That Doesnt' Suck In Data
Michael Lewis is the founder of Stellar Semiconductor which was sold to Broadcom in 2000, then went on to found Cryptic Studios which was sold to Atari in 2008. For the past decade Michael has been deeply involved in charitable efforts through the Anspar Foundation (formerly The Lewis Charitable Foundation).
9/26/2020 • 27 minutes, 39 seconds
ChoreRelief Does $2m in Toilet Fixes Over Last 12 Months
I'm a Chicago-based entrepreneur, and my love for connecting people and solving problems led me to found ChoreRelief, a marketplace that transforms the experience property owners have when they need to hire help for maintenance. This venture is an outgrowth of my passion for building powerful and lasting relationships, and it's very rewarding. Typically, hiring someone to help with a property is confusing for landlords and messy or expensive for tradespeople and contractors. We've turned that on its head by making them — the property owner/manager and the repairperson — the stakeholders in the transaction while we facilitate in the background. They control the time and the price, and we provide the network and the infrastructure to connect them. We use artificial intelligence to automate our recruiting process for tradespeople (candidate sourcing, screening, and job matching), and we have thousands of vetted contractors in our system. I am dedicated to partnering with leaders to discover how we can benefit their businesses. If you're interested, I'm open to hearing from you. Since moving to Chicago years ago, I have been involved in the real estate, beauty, and manufacturing industries. Whatever the business sector, I have always been drawn to the concept of a true and open marketplace where both parties have all the control over their outcome of working together. That's what my team and I have built at ChoreRelief, and I'd be proud to tell you more. I have two cats and a dog, and when I'm not taking care of them, I like to read in my free time. If you've read something amazing lately, I'd appreciate your recommendation. To get in touch with me, email: tarik@chorerelief.com
9/25/2020 • 12 minutes, 53 seconds
Checkli Launches Enterprise Plan To Get Past $5k in MRR
2x founder with 2 successful exits. Head of Growth for SureSwift Capital. Moonlighting as the CEO of Checkli at night.
9/24/2020 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
Doka Image Editor SDK Sells $120k Licenses
Indie product developer living on a 2D plane people call The Netherlands. Dad of two. On a journey to support my family by building and selling highly interactive web components.
9/23/2020 • 15 minutes, 8 seconds
FlyPlugins Hits $500k/yr For Wordpress Addons
I worked in I.T. for 12 years before I got the entrepreneurial bug and jumped ship to run my WordPress plugin business full time. I'm happily married, with 3 boys and I love to serve in my church.
9/22/2020 • 15 minutes, 56 seconds
StockAlarm Secretly Used By Traders For Alerts
Stock Alarm was born out of our need for reliable stock alerts. Stock Alarm provides stock market alerts to thousands of traders every day through phone calls, text messages, push notifications, and emails. We package complex signals into an intuitive and easy to use UI.
9/21/2020 • 12 minutes, 31 seconds
XFusion Hits $20k/mo Helping You Scale Your Support Team
Jim and I decided to start a technical support agency after we realized how difficult it was to find & hire competent agents for our own businesses. Once we’ve “cracked the code”, we realized many SaaS founders & owners haven’t and we wanted to solve that problem for them.
9/20/2020 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
Castos Helps Podcasters Distribute Content, $480k in ARR
Am the founder of Castos. We are a fully remote team remaking how podcasters create great shows, grow their audiences, and further their brands.
9/19/2020 • 16 minutes
AdGreetz Hits $5.5m in Revenue Customizing Outbound Marketing For Enterprises
Eric Frankel is the CEO/Founder of AdGreetz, the industry’s leading video personalization tech platform that is disrupting the $628b advertising marketplace by empowering brands to easily revolutionize their marketing, build stronger relationships with customers and increase engagement 5X-7X and activation 2X-3X by producing and deploying thousands (or even millions) of hyper-personalized, relevant, data-driven, video and display ads and messages (versus a generic, much less-activating version), utilizing 10-plus data sources on 23 channels.
9/18/2020 • 18 minutes
Obie Growing on Slack marketplace, $25k MRR, Helps Teams Store Information Efficiently
Chris Buttenham is the founder and CEO of Obie, a company changing the way organizations access and manage their collective knowledge. Chris got into the startup space magically. No really, he performed magic professionally at a young age and gravitated towards digital marketing to promote himself. By the age of 15 Chris registered his first business, a digital agency that provided marketing and design services for other entertainers and small businesses. Chris is a self-proclaimed serial entrepreneur, host of two podcasts (The Art of the Fail and Accelerating Support), and was the youngest founder accepted into "Batch 20" of the prestigious 500 Startups accelerator program in California.
9/17/2020 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
Prentus Founder Spent $90k on Failed Project Before Launching New Recruiting Tool During COVID
Rod is Founder & CEO at Prentus where he matches startups with job-ready tech interns in as little as 7 days and runs a community with 165+ bootcamp graduates. He is also a part-time Data Science Mentor at Thinkful. Previously, he founded Dananza, an influencer marketplace for local businesses.
9/16/2020 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
VidLive.co Doubles from Covid, Livestreaming Tool, 1 man team
Shawn North, founder and creator of VidLive, a mico-saas that helps people auto-embed Facebook Live video on their web pages. In addition to working on VidLive, he also works full time as a developer for a major auto manufacturer.
9/15/2020 • 14 minutes, 54 seconds
RiteKit 431k Email List, Conversions Tough?
We started with RiteTag: hashtags from text and from images, and the first such tool that rides in any social media marketer's workflow by browser extension and mobile app. RiteKit now provides everything needed to grow an organic, unpaid social audience and soft-sell to them as you do it.
9/14/2020 • 32 minutes, 40 seconds
NightEye App Lands 2500 Customers Using Unique SEO Fiverr Writing Stratetgy
My name is Stanislav Dimitrov (Stan), and I’m one of the founders of Night Eye — the dark mode browser extension that works on nearly any website. I finished my Master's in Marketing in 2014 and headed back home to join the family business: a printing house. The family business was and still is a big part of my life, but tech, in general, has always fascinated me and I wanted to start a side venture. Luckily, a couple of months after I came home, I met the current co-founders of Night Eye. We were all around 25 years old and eager to build a tech company from the ground up.
9/13/2020 • 15 minutes, 58 seconds
VaporWare Charges $25k to Build SaaS MVP, $1.2m 2019 Revenue
9/12/2020 • 16 minutes, 50 seconds
8base is a next generation backend-as-a-service for powering SaaS and other go-to-market applications.
Albert Santalo is a computer scientist and Internet entrepreneur experienced in building high growth, venture-backed technology companies. He is the founder and CEO of 8base and formerly founded CareCloud and Avisena.
9/11/2020 • 26 minutes, 17 seconds
Trend.io Does $60k/mo Helping Brands Find MicroInfluencers
CEO and cofounder of trend.io born and raised in Puerto Rico living in Denver, CO.
9/10/2020 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
Jiga3d Connects Engineers to Manufacturers, 30 Transactions at $2k each so Far
Software engineer by trade, designer by heart and entrepreneur in soul. Founded and bootstrapped Spontix until it’s M&A, and served as a software R&D team leader in multiple positions.
9/9/2020 • 16 minutes, 24 seconds
KoalaRank Content Marketing System Has 5 Customers Paying $900/mo
Coming from the world of content writing, I've had many opportunities to write for interesting companies who didn't know how to strategize their content marketing efforts. That's when I decided to make the switch.
9/8/2020 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
Edusign Launches During COVID, Hits $10k MRR, 300 Customers for Signing Tool
Elliot Boucher is the co-founder of Edusign, a SaaS that makes attendance sheets management simple online and offine. He is also the founder of Ecommerce RTM, former Capgemini consultant and best seller of online courses on Udemy.
As an owner and principal of a PR agency for over a decade, Chris has thoroughly explored the intersection of PR and search engine strategy. Chris' newest venture, "Visably," is a new SaaS software the identifies a brand's footprint in search. Chris is passionate about helping brands reach their needle-in-the-haystack customer and evangelizing multi-channel search strategy.
9/6/2020 • 17 minutes, 54 seconds
RockContent 2x To $25m in Last 12 Months, Helping 2000 Customers Scale Content
Diego Gomes is Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Rock Content a SaaS Blogger/Researcher/Evangelist. Rock is the among the fastest-growing SaaS companies and a global leader in Content Marketing Solutions. Diego is also an Endeavor entrepreneur, Angel Investor and in his spare time he blogs at http://saasholic.com ;)
9/5/2020 • 23 minutes, 11 seconds
JazzHR Has Record 40k Applicant Month During Pandemic, $15m Revenue
Results oriented executive with a 25 year history of a strategic, metrics-driven approach to accelerated revenue. Focus on the global small business market with deep experience in B2B high velocity new customer acquisition. As CEO of JazzHR, Lamson is responsible for JazzHR’s strategic direction, company performance, day-to-day business operations, and serves as a support center for our revenue teams.
Madwire® is a technology company that provides business management and marketing software and services for SMBs and franchises. Madwire® was founded in 2009 with the mission of helping small businesses grow and their local communities glow.
Sabba Keynejad is the co-founder and CEO of VEED an [online video editing](http://veed.io/) platform. Together with his co-founder Tim, they bootstrapped VEED from 0-1M ARR in its the first 12 months of operating. VEED is a fully-fledged collaborative video editing used by many influencers, coaches and business for [adding subtitles](https://www.veed.io/add-subtitles-video), [captions](https://www.veed.io/add-captions-video), [text](https://www.veed.io/add-text-to-video), [merging videos](https://www.veed.io/tools/merge-videos-online), [making meme videos](https://www.veed.io/create/video-meme-maker) and much more.
9/2/2020 • 21 minutes, 12 seconds
Gong.io Adds $1.5B To Valuation, 1500 Customers, $45m+ in Revenue for Revenue Intelligence Sales Tool
Amit Bendov is the co-founder and CEO of Gong.io, the # 1 Revenue Intelligence platform for sales. He brings more than 20 years of leadership experience in hyper-growth enterprise software startups managing product, marketing, and sales for global corporations. Prior to founding Gong.io, Amit was CEO of SiSense and CMO of Panaya.
9/1/2020 • 25 minutes, 9 seconds
NoCSDegree used HackerNews and ProductHunt to Get 4500 Subs, $15k in Revenue
I'm a self-taught developer and entrepreneur from Scotland. I launched No CS Degree a year ago to inspire people to learn coding. It features 90 interviews with developers that taught themselves coding or learned at bootcamps. I also have a jobs board, a bootcamp index and an imposter syndrome book.
8/31/2020 • 19 minutes, 40 seconds
Directual Used $1k/mo Russian Talent to Build Low Code Tool MVP, Now 50 Customers, $1m Raised
Pavel is a serial entrepreneur from Moscow, Russia. Launched e-commerce projects, lifestyle app. Founded Directual in 2014, when there was no such terms as low-coding or no-coding. But there was an idea—to let people create complex digital products as easily as possible. Before Spring 2020 Directual worked with enterprise clients, but in April 2020 Directual went public and offered SaaS—the low-code platform for the mass market.
8/30/2020 • 13 minutes, 27 seconds
Ceptinel FinTech Founder Spent $700k, Now Has $6k in MRR, Whats Next?
Miguel Fuentes Buchholtz has 12 years of Software Engineering experience and 6 as Entrepreneur, founding Variacode (ITaaS), cofounding tuten.cl (an “uber” for last mile operation optimization SaaS for big companies) and Ceptinel, a SaaS RegTech that helps financial institution fight corruption, money laundering and fraud. Also working as advisor for local Chilean Startups OrionX (Cryptocurrency exchange), Nexoabogados.cl (attorney marketplace) and Banca.me (online financial services)
8/29/2020 • 19 minutes, 12 seconds
Djaodjin Gets Customers from Github, $6k in MRR, Raising $500k on $1m Valuation?
I started a video game studio, a micro-processor company, and built 2 SaaS businesses before DjaoDjin. If you believe a couple semiconductor patents I am quite an engineer though some people remember me as a group fitness instructor. Married with children, my ambition is to help people run sustainable micro-businesses.
Ben is a personal finance nerd turned software developer. He left his first job out of college after 6 months to launch Wingman, a trade tracker for options traders. Two years later, he is running it part-time and leads product as a co-founder at The TIE, a fintech data business.
8/27/2020 • 27 minutes, 1 second
WebHookRelay DevOps Tool Hits $120k Revenue, 1 person team, bootstrapped
Entrepreneur, full-stack engineer with extensive experience in compute infrastructure, networks, Kubernetes and developer tooling. Spent last five years working between infrastructure projects (networks, storage), building data science/ML platform and starting a new project for public transport sector.
8/26/2020 • 12 minutes, 59 seconds
WpBuffs Hits $100k in MRR Supporting Wordpress Sites Using Whitelabel Partners
Fallibilist 💯 Founder & CEO at @thewpbuffs 💪 Co-host at the WPMRR #WordPress podcast 🎙 @Everton TID ⚽
8/25/2020 • 23 minutes, 27 seconds
BrainTrust is Fiverr Owned by The Talent via Crypto Token
Adam Jackson is a software engineer turned tech entrepreneur and investor who started 4 VC-backed companies and an asset management company over the last 16 years. Adam seeks to create open, equitable marketplaces that use customer-focused technology to boost collaboration between users, without the costs and friction of conventional channels.
8/24/2020 • 40 minutes, 5 seconds
ButtonDown Email Is Niche Mailchimp, Hits $5k in MRR
I work at Stripe, making it easier for companies of all sizes to understand and improve their core operations. Before that, I was the first technical hire at a commercial real estate startup and an engineer at Amazon making it more fun for you to read books on your Kindle.
Adam Driscoll is a solo founder, Microsoft MVP and longer time open-source contributor. His software is used by hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. When not working, he's an outdoor enthusiast, long distance endurance athlete and beer lover.
8/22/2020 • 17 minutes, 30 seconds
Kovai $8.5m Revenue, India Bootstrapped, 3 Core SaaS Products
Founder and CEO of Kovai.co, a multi-product software company based out of London. Build and scaled 4 successful B2B and SaaS products with 1200+ enterprise customers. Document360 is the latest product in the portfolio, a knowledge base product born out of their frustration writing documentation for their other enterprise products.
8/21/2020 • 23 minutes, 49 seconds
HackerEarth 4.5m Developer Community Breaks $5m Run Rate, 100% Net Retention
Sachin is the founder/CEO at HackerEarth and has grown HackerEarth to a global SaaS platform with hundreds of customers and millions of users. Sachin leads the Marketing team, Sales and Operations team. He is also responsible for Product Management and Strategy.
8/20/2020 • 19 minutes, 46 seconds
How Wil Schroter Made Money at 22 years Old to Eventually Launch Startups.com
8/19/2020 • 1 hour, 32 minutes, 57 seconds
Wavve Hits 9k For Audio Video Tool, $70k Monthly Profits!
Baird is a tech entrepreneur that has co-founded multiple bootstrapped SaaS companies designed to help podcasters & video creators to get more reach & engagement on social media. As a founding partner in Lofi Ventures, he has co-founded Wavve, Zubtitle, & duplikit.
8/19/2020 • 30 minutes, 58 seconds
MonetizeMore Bootstrapped to $5m Run Rate in AdTech Space
MonetizeMore provides ad tech to huge AdSense publishers. The tech chooses the highest paying advertiser for each ad placement. This results in dramatically higher ad revenues for the publisher.
8/18/2020 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
SuperLemon Breaks 5k Leads From Shopify Monthly, $30k in MRR for Whatsapp Ecommerce Tool
Problem solver and entrepreneur from the heart, I am the chilled out guy at a party who will talk about living a good life and building a business.
8/17/2020 • 14 minutes, 54 seconds
SnapBar Looses $3m Photobooth Revenue COVID, Pivots in 8 Days, Makes $500k on New Idea, How?
Sam is the co-founder and CEO of SnapBar, an Inc. 500 company, that uses photo and video experiences to help planners, producers and marketers create better engagement at events. He also co-founded Keep Your City Smiling, a gifting company that supports small businesses struggling as a result of the pandemic.
8/16/2020 • 20 minutes, 54 seconds
NittioLead LMS Charges $13k/yr, Hits 15 Customers Using Linked Outreach
Corporate warrior for 17 years, did product management for Nokia, Infinera and Amazon before turning entrepreneur (in 2015). Pivoted NittioLearn from ed-tech to corporate learning in end of 2016. Convinced that just like CRMs, no one learning tool can fit all parts of the organization.
8/15/2020 • 14 minutes, 1 second
LogoPackage Sells $80k One Time To Fuel New SaaS Tool MVP
I began my journey to entrepreneurship with a BFA in Graphic Design from Western Michigan University. I made Chicago my home after graduation and worked for design agencies for 4 years before going freelance. When a major client went under, I started exploring product design and The Logo Package was born. Now it’s my full-time work and primary source of income.
8/14/2020 • 21 minutes
Artivatic Insurtech API $1m Revenue, Closing $500k Round Now
8/13/2020 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
LetSign Gives out Digital Certificates, 18 Customers, $2k MRR, Pandemic Helps?
A seasoned Data Scientist who has successfully built data products different verticles some are for the largest FMCG's and Retail, Banking, Telecom, Social, Government from scratch, and deployed it successfully. He has experience of developing products which are a combination of Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Neural networks, Collective Intelligence & Web Intelligence. Actively involved in building some of the state-of-art Open source Machine Learning Libraries. Also adjunct prof with some of the prestigious institutions.
8/12/2020 • 14 minutes, 35 seconds
HireClub: How 32k Member FB Group Fueled $25k MRR SaaS Business
I love helping people succeed in their careers and I turned a Facebook group into a startup that’s increased salaries by over $2m for clients.
Started digital agency at the age of 18 from Pune India. Launched Billbooks in 2011 with an aim to simplify invoicing with practical features and cost effective to freelancers and small businesses. I have always been facinated by computer software from the age of 10 and never imagined an alternate passion or career option. I pursued a corresponding degree in design and technology along with my core degree in business management. This fuelled my entrepreneurship skills before starting a global design agency, Billbooks, Framesbuy (an ecom for eyewear) and a few more businesses.
I’m a digital marketing enthusiast and career sales guy. From selling auto components to computer software my life has circled around customers. After having worked for 15 years in companies like IBM, PwC, TCS, I decided to venture on my own. SalesPanda is an effort to help companies leverage the digital reach of their sales teams and channel partners to grow the customer outreach by 20X
I grew up in the far-easter part of Siberia, studied Computer Science and Nuclear Physics, played in a band, got excited by the indie-games making and left uni to become a digital designer. For several years in the early 00’s, I’ve been working remotely, traveling and blogging extensively (before that became a popular mainstream thing) and ended up in New Zealand. Nowadays, I'm 'digital-nomading' (NZ -> Argentina -> Chile -> UK) and build Karma.
8/8/2020 • 20 minutes, 14 seconds
Param Solutions hits $35k MRR helping People Get Gov Developer Jobs
I am one of the partners at Param Solutions based out of Ashburn, VA. We specialize in Human Capital Solutions and are passionate about helping our clients save on recruiting costs. I have a bachelor's in engineering and a Master's in MIS. I have over 2 decades of experience in Recruiting/Staffing/Corporate/In-house Recruiting and enjoy every aspect of candidate acquisition. I am squarely responsible for strategy, implementation, growth and account management for all accounts at Param that fall under the purview of our Human Capital vertical. After 8 years of running Param's staffing division I have created a new business service called Recruiting As A Service in Novemeber of 2018 to help clients save significant amounts of time while recruiting for talent, decrease time to fill, increase quality fof hires and eliminate exhorbitant recruiting fees!
8/7/2020 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
ProfitBooks Hit $1m Revenue 2019, COVID Keeps Them Flat This Year
Founder at ProfitBooks. Worked with MNCs like HSBC and Barclays for over 9yrs and helped them implement banking solutions before I started my own company. Started ProfitBooks in 2012 and since then acquired 75,000+ users on the platform. It's India's most popular accounting software today. Currently building solutions to organise single-person-bookkeeper industry.
Hana Mohan is an entrepreneur, cyclist and an aspiring writer. She is a proud transgender woman (pronouns: she/her) and lives in Barcelona with her two cats.
8/5/2020 • 19 minutes, 16 seconds
Closet.Tools 1 Man Show, $250k Profits, $360k in Revenue, Wow!
Born and raised in rural western NY. Went to engineering school and worked as an electrical engineer for 7 years. Started Closet Tools as a way to pay down student loans, and transitioned to full-time founder when it made more than double what I made at my day job.
8/4/2020 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
SalesRoads: SaaS Companies Hire Him To Build SDR Team
David Kreiger is the Founder and President of SalesRoads, a business-to-business appointment setting, lead generation and SDR outsourcing company. He has been named as one of The Most Influential Leaders in Sales & Lead Management by the SLMA. David has led SalesRoads through significant growth and the company was twice listed on the Inc 5000 list of fastest growing privately held companies. SalesRoads has been David consulted by some of the largest and fastest growing companies to help their organizations accelerate their sales through proactive prospecting
8/3/2020 • 21 minutes, 49 seconds
Woven.com: Ex Facebook CIO Looking to Re-Invent How We Setup Meetings
As the former Chief Information Officer at Facebook, Tim Campos doubled overall productivity to $1.8 million per employee - making it the most productive company in the world. Now, as CEO of Woven, he is reimagining how people use their calendar, so they can spend time on what matters most.
8/2/2020 • 22 minutes, 41 seconds
NoteAffect MVP Cost $1.6m, Founder Bootstrapping Using Cash From Last Exit
I am an entrepreneur. I like to transform ideas into working business models with multiple revenue streams. NoteAffect is my new venture (7th company) that provides software technology for the Education, Corporate, and Government sectors. I recently exited my 6th company, Core-apps.
8/1/2020 • 21 minutes, 26 seconds
Big brands, manufacturers with raw material (oil plastic) where going factory to warehouse.
Adam Compain is the Founder & CEO of ClearMetal. Prior to ClearMetal, Adam spent 5 years at Google launching their geoCommerce technology and 19 years as the Executive Director of SEND, the nonprofit he founded. Adam holds five technology patents, two degrees from the University of Michigan, and an MBA from Stanford.
7/31/2020 • 24 minutes, 37 seconds
Qebot Raising $1.5m With $1.2m in ARR Helping 1500 SMB's Be More Productive
Matthew White is the CEO of Qebot. With a background in the digital marketing and mobile advertising sectors, Matthew and his partner Cornelius built Qebot to make businesses, franchises, and marketing agencies more productive by centralizing SaaS applications into a single platform.
7/30/2020 • 20 minutes, 16 seconds
PandaDoc Hits 14k Customers, $100+ ARPU, "Will Hit $19m in ARR in 2019"
7/29/2020 • 33 minutes, 14 seconds
"Vested.io HR Tech Company Placed 100 Candidates, Doing $400k/yr "
Akash Srivastava is Co-founder and CEO of Vested Technology, a recruiting automation platform. Vested Technology works alongside teams to identify, engage and hire passive candidates saving companies tons of money on additional headcount or agencies. Prior to founding Vested, Akash led finance at Handy and worked several roles on Wall Street. He took the scenic route to entrepreneurship; but he’s a huge believer of ‘better late than never’!
7/28/2020 • 14 minutes, 7 seconds
Advensure Launches, Hits 125 Customers in 4 Months Using 1 Big Channel
Founder at Advensure & Ekahal. Love solving problems. Scuba Diving Dive Master and hopeful Scuba Instructor. Amateur(ish) Photographer. Awaiting freedom of time to travel.
7/27/2020 • 13 minutes, 11 seconds
EngageRocket Targets $3m Raise on $15m Valuation For HR Tech Platform
CheeTung is the CEO of EngageRocket, a tech company using real-time analytics to help businesses improve talent retention and productivity. Columbia & Cambridge alum, economist by training. Generation T honoree for Asia Tatler, awarded to young leaders shaping the future of Asia.
7/26/2020 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
Utm.io Hits 100 Customers, $75k Invested From Agency Biz, Now SaaS Focus
UTM.io is the internet's most loved UTM link builder. UTM.io is widely used by the best companies and enables teams of all sizes to get better campaign tracking data.
7/25/2020 • 13 minutes, 33 seconds
GitLab Hits $2.7b Valuation is 20x+ Revenue Multiple, 160%+ in Net Revenue Retention, 10,000 Customers
Sid’s passionate about empowering open source, enabling great products, and evolving global processes. A self-taught Ruby developer, Sid commercialized GitLab with its creator in 2012 and graduated from Y-Combinator in 2015. Since then, GitLab has grown to 800+ remote team members across 55+ countries, and raised $188.2M in funding.
3 x SaaS founder with 2 exits + former COO at The Guardian. Dropped out of school at 16, started first company at 24. Currently building Churnly to help companies deeply understand their ICP, analyze online customer behavior and predict churn. Competitive mixed martial artist and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu brown belt. Lives in London.
7/23/2020 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
YetiCloud Does $280k in First Year Revenue Selling DevOp tool
Founder and CEO of YetiCloud, Tim is a software engineer who recently left Capital One’s Tech Fellow program to make IT service desks non-existent. Tim has over ten years of experience in large-scale operations, product, and open source communities. Before founding YetiCloud, he worked for Puppet, FINRA, and the US Navy.
7/22/2020 • 13 minutes, 13 seconds
QuestionPro Hits $20m Revenue, $5m Cash In Bank, Selling 60% Of Company For $50m Next?
I’m the founder of QuestionPro - a bootstrapped 20M run rate startup that helps companies measure and transform experiences. Born in India by way of Russia, Utah, Seattle, Bay Area - we are now in Austin - where I enjoy BBQ and briskets - we are on a mission to create a global, healthy, profitable SaaS company!
7/21/2020 • 20 minutes, 36 seconds
GetRocket Has $1.6m In Bank, $5m 2019 Revenues, 100 Customers They Recruit For
CEO & Co-founder of Rocket. Previously, CEO & Co-founder of Renzu (acquired by SurveyMonkey), VP @Zynga, PM @Amazon and Consultant @McKinsey. HBS and Princeton.
7/20/2020 • 19 minutes, 46 seconds
1Huddle Hits $3.5m in Revenue, 250 Customers, Can He Get $30m Valuation on $10m Series A?
7/19/2020 • 18 minutes, 34 seconds
JustCall Hits $2.5m ARR, 60% Profits, Bootstrapped Helping 1600 Teams Use Cloud Phone Systems
Founder & CEO, SaaS Labs Inc (maker of JustCall). Chemical engineer by education but love writing code. 4x entrepreneur, 2 exits, sold last business to New York Times. Active angel investor in SaaS businesses.
I am a patent entrepreneur that teaches and trains technology companies, and IP managers how to make a patent management process more efficient and transparent by using the IAMIP platform. My clients have thousands of patents in their patent portfolio and are struggling every day to keep track of their competition. The IAMIP platform have organized over 5 M patents and my clients have received of 100K automated monitoring’s. Inventor to over 17 patents in the space of power systems and co-founder of IamIP, the 3-time award winning patent software, recognized by the Swedish (Vinnova) and Norwegian (Forskningsrådet) innovation agency and trusted by multiple fortune 500 companies. Searching for patents manually and sharing information over email was 20 years ago. Now it's time to upgrade ourselves. Revolutionizing the IP industry is my passion and focus. As the voice of the patent management platforms that IamIP spearheads, I speak on stages around the world helping companies learn how 100.000 patents impacts them every week and what to do about it, to audiences of up to 1000. IamIP have developed a patent platform that gather all stakeholder in a company to capture and exchange information about patents that puts them one step ahead of competition.
7/17/2020 • 12 minutes, 55 seconds
FreshRelevance Founders Put Up $500k To Start, Now $5m Revenue, 500 Customers
Mike Austin is the co-founder and CEO at Fresh Relevance. A serial entrepreneur, Mike founded his first software business when he was 16 and has been developing software and software businesses for more than two decades. Having worked in digital marketing for the majority of his career, Mike is an expert in tying digital experiences with traditional marketing databases, with a deep understanding of data and how to leverage it.
7/16/2020 • 21 minutes
Freightos: Can they win the Shipping wars?
Zvi Schreiber (pronounced "tzvee shryber") is the Founder and CEO of Freightos, the digital backbone for the trillion dollar international freight industry. Previously Zvi was CEO of Lightech (acquired by GE), and Founder and CEO of Unicorn (acuqired by IBM) and Tradeum (acquired by VerticalNet) and G.ho.st a predecessor of dropbox which ended in a fire sale. Zvi has spoken widely and written many articles and patents. He has a PhD in computer science and is author of Fizz which tells the history of physics as a novel.
7/15/2020 • 22 minutes, 33 seconds
Workable Hits $30m Run Rate, Burning $10m, Series C Valuation "Less Than $250m"
Nikos is the CEO of Workable, makers of the popular recruiting software used by 20,000 companies in 100 countries. He led the company from its inception in 2012 to a fast-growing organization with 300 employees in the USA and Europe, raising $95m of venture financing from elite European and American investors. Nikos has appeared as a speaker at the Nantucket Conference, SaaStr and SaaStock, and has been interviewed in popular podcasts and media like Forbes and the New York Times. Nikos holds a Computer Science degree from Imperial College, London. He lives with his wife and two children in Boston, MA. His twitter handle is @moraitakis.
7/14/2020 • 19 minutes, 20 seconds
BounceX Breaks $100m in Revenue, 1000 Customers, Breakeven, 2020 IPO?
Ryan Urban is the Co-Founder and CEO of BounceX, a marketing technology solution that brings a “logged-in” experience to logged-out website visitors across devices. Under Ryan’s leadership, BounceX has been ranked #1 for employee retention and career development by ComputerWorld and named a best place to work by Crain’s and Fortune.
7/13/2020 • 31 minutes, 52 seconds
MediaFly To Acquire More, $20m in ARR, Burning $600k/mo, $28m Raised
Carson Conant is the CEO and Founder of Chicago-based sales enablement solution provider Mediafly. Under Carson’s leadership, Mediafly has been recognized as an Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Company for five consecutive years, one of Inc.’s Best Workplaces of 2018, and a Best Place to Work by Crain’s Chicago Business. Mediafly’s software is currently leveraged by top Fortune 500 companies including PepsiCo, MillerCoors, Disney, and Goldman Sachs.
7/12/2020 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
Infilect Looking to Raise $4m on $15m Pre With $1m in ARR, Bootstrapped in Retail AI Space
Anand has a strong research and product building experience for the past 15 years and is keen on building Intelligent systems that can disrupt retail industry and create several fold efficiency. Anand is currently working on helping global retail brands with deep visibility into retail reality. In the past, he has led large scale analytics products at Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs, USA (2009-2013) and at IBM Research, India (2013-2015). Anand has a PhD degree (2009) in Computer Science from Stony Brook University, NY, USA and a B.E degree from College of Engineering Guindy, Anna University, India.
After selling an agency to Disney, Scott ruined influencer marketing. He is now on a mission to change how we commerce is done. Word of mouth marketing will finally be measured.
7/10/2020 • 26 minutes, 39 seconds
Inkit Breaks 100 Customers, $1m in Revenue Helping Companies With Direct Mail Campaigns
Inkit’s direct mail solution tracks and automates personalized letters, marketing collateral, statements, policies, compliance notices, and other pieces of physical mail. Inkit integrates with CRMs digitizing companies’ offline points of contact with their customers - use cases include marketing campaigns, billing, and compliance notices. Inkit counts customers globally, including: P&G, Asana, and Bird.
7/9/2020 • 24 minutes, 19 seconds
Tyler Tringas: How Earnest Capital Hopes to Re-Invent Startup Investing
7/8/2020 • 1 hour, 42 minutes, 18 seconds
MailUpGroup Market Cap Is $65m, CEO Feels Undervalued
MailUp Group is a leading player in the field of cloud marketing technologies, offers a broad spectrum of solutions with a focus on data-driven omni-channel marketing automation, used by SME’s and large corporations to engage their customers. MailUp was founded in 2002, IPO in 2014 on the AIM Italia market.
7/8/2020 • 15 minutes, 36 seconds
FusionAuth is Burning $50k/mo on $25k Revenue in Identity Management Space
Brian Pontarelli is a successful technology entrepreneur currently focused on solving login, registration, and user management challenges. Brian works with startup to Fortune 500 organizations struggling to address the complexity of secure CIAM as their businesses requirements evolve and user base scales from a handful of users to millions.
7/7/2020 • 15 minutes, 51 seconds
Gus Chat Raising $5m on $15m Pre Right Now. Are The Worth That Much?
Pablo Estevez is the founder and CEO of Gus Chat, an AI company that helps companies improve their customer experience with AI and virtual agents. The company is based out of Mexico City with presence in Madrid, Bogota, Guatemala City and Buenos Aires. Gus Chat currently has over 60 clients like Office Depot, American Express and Walmart.
7/6/2020 • 15 minutes, 12 seconds
Dialpad CEO "We'll break $100m in 2020, comfortable burning $1m/mo, $45m in bank"
Craig has 20+ years of experience as an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, corporate executive, CEO and attorney. He was the first Entrepreneur in Residence at Google Ventures and CEO of Dialpad Communications before it become Yahoo! Voice. He also founded GrandCentral Communications, which was acquired by Google and became Google Voice.
7/5/2020 • 27 minutes, 7 seconds
HelloBox Hits 1500 Customers, $15k/mo Just 12 Months
Connecting people, has been always my greatest joy. In a world with endless automation possibilities, it's the human connections, we need to take care of.
7/4/2020 • 14 minutes, 27 seconds
Why Whiplash Exited With $1.3m Raised, 16% Margin Profile in Order Fullfillment SPace
Serial entrepreneur with multiple successful exits, focused on the intersection of design, music, and commerce.
7/3/2020 • 22 minutes, 53 seconds
Sqrl Spent $146k on MVP, Now Launching to Heads of HR for Employee Health
I’m a first generation immigrant, and second generation entrepreneur. I’ve studied, taught, and practiced design in 3 continents and 5 nations in the span of ten years. I’ve published over 10 patents and continued to innovate myself beyond the traditional archetype of a "designer."
7/2/2020 • 14 minutes, 17 seconds
PipelineEquity Looking to Raise $4m with $1m in Revenues Helping Bring Gender Equality to Workplaces
Katica Roy is a gender economist & CEO of Pipeline, an award-winning SaaS company that leverages artificial intelligence to improve financial performance through gender equity. Pipeline launched the first gender equity app on Salesforce's AppExchange. Katica is a thought-leader, in the first half of 2019, her articles garnered over 600MM impressions.
7/1/2020 • 16 minutes, 1 second
Video Platform Animoto up 20% YoY with $30m in Revenue, Will Canva Acquire For $300m?
Jason Hsiao is the Co-founder and Chief Video Officer of Animoto, an award-winning online video maker that makes it easy for anyone to create professional marketing videos. Animoto’s certified partnerships with Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, and the Small Business Administration give it unique insight into the changing social media and business landscape, which may be why more than 1 million businesses around the world have used Animoto to create marketing videos that stand out on social media and beyond. Prior to founding Animoto, Jason was a producer for MTV Networks and Comedy Central.
6/30/2020 • 25 minutes, 45 seconds
Reveleer Hits $8m ARR, New CEO Gets 10% to Reboot Company, $18m Raised, Raising New $10m Now
Jay is the President and CEO of Reveleer. In his role, he is responsible fostering product innovation, accelerating business growth and scaling operations to propel the Company’s impact for health plans. He is a seasoned software and services executive with over 25 years of experience in various leadership capacities.
6/29/2020 • 23 minutes, 1 second
Oil Drilling Software Breaks $1m in Revenue, but $6m+ raised?
Luther is an entrepreneur, data scientist, and engineer passionate about energy efficiency and democratizing AI From boardrooms, to oilfields, to data centers, Luther has been transforming data from a cost to an asset for over 20 years. In 2013 he founded OAG Analytics to build a cloud platform that makes AI easy and scalable for the oil & gas industry. Luther is an expert at simplifying complex software and optimizing assets with advanced analytics.
6/28/2020 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
RightMessage Hits $360k Revenue, Co-Founders Going All In
Brennan is the co-founder of RightMessage and the founder of DoubleYourFreelancing.com. He's also started and sold another SaaS company, Planscope.
6/27/2020 • 21 minutes, 24 seconds
ZigZag Hits $5m Revenue Helping Brands Like Gap Manage Returns
ZigZag Global is a software solution to help ecommerce retailers manage returns domestically and globally. The ZigZag platform connects major retailers to a global network of over 220 warehouses to over 100 carrier services and 50 marketplaces in over 130 countries - all from a single integration. ZigZag's mission is to help retailers become more sustainable whilst cutting costs by up to 57% and improving the speed of customer refunds by getting stock back in the supply chain more quickly. Clients include Topshop, GAP, Banana Republic, Superdry, DHL, Selfridges, Everlane, Seraphine and many more.
6/26/2020 • 23 minutes, 37 seconds
AI Company Ople $15m Raised, Just $500k Revenue, Overvalued?
I have been in the AI/ML industry for 18 years. Some of that time in academia and some in industry as a data scientist. I have seen the struggle that companies face when trying to get a return on investment with AI and decided to fix that by creating Ople.
6/25/2020 • 25 minutes, 57 seconds
Kontentino is Profitable Bootstrapped, Hit $1m Revenue Competing with Buffer, Hootsuite
Bohumil studied Innovation Management and Marketing in Denmark and in the USA. After his studies, he was invited to launch a social media tool developed in a leading ad agency in Central Europe to the market. In less than 4 years, he and his team built a tool with more than 4000 brands and agencies on board such as IKEA, BBDO or VML. Bohumil has recently got into the Forbes 30 under 30 list and became Founder of a year in Slovakia.
6/24/2020 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
Bootstrapped JivoChat Does $7.5m Revenue, $3m Cash Flow, Founders Get Rich
Tim Valishev is a tech-CEO who coded the first version of JivoChat together with his partner and bootstrapped the company from zero to $5M in ARR and 10% worldwide market share by installations. Now Tim runs the distributed team of 120 people from a dozen of countries that rebuilds JivoChat from scratch every 2 years in order to stay up-to-date. Tim is based in Moscow, Russia.
6/23/2020 • 12 minutes, 5 seconds
Can SlidesUp Actually Threaten CVent, Bizzabo?
Kunal Bhatia is a Product Designer from Boston, MA, now living in San Francisco, CA. He is the Co-founder and Design Lead at SlidesUp. He's an outdoor fitness enthusiast because of November Project and coaches at Uncommon Movement. Maybe you'll meet him at a free workout!
6/22/2020 • 15 minutes, 44 seconds
TrueFace Won't Sell Mass Surveillance System to China, Breaks $1m in Revenue
My journey to create Trueface began in 2012, leaving Merrill Lynch in Chicago and booking a one-way ticket to Casablanca, Morocco to pursue my entrepreneurial vision: make technology accessible, personal, and trustworthy.
6/21/2020 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
VisitorQueue Hits $270k Revenue, Powers Your Sales Team ABM
Nick Hollinger is the CEO and Co-founder of Visitor Queue, a B2B SaaS company that has partnered with Google Analytics to identify the companies visiting a website. Bootstrapped, VQ currently works with ~5000 companies across the globe. He is also the Game Day Director for one of Canada’s most successful Junior Hockey Teams.
Chris is the founder and CEO of Trainual, a SaaS platform for entrepreneurs and employees to get their business out of their brain by documenting and delegating the processes in their company.
6/19/2020 • 15 minutes, 14 seconds
SellerSEO Gets Booted From Stripe, Now Rebounding and Bootstrapped
Andy has been an entrepreneur since the age of 19. He’s started and run multiple 7 figure businesses. SellerSEO, his current venture is a suite of SaaS tools dedicated to hel
6/18/2020 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
Albert Wenger on Work After Capital
6/17/2020 • 57 minutes, 50 seconds
Masterworks: SaaS Wealth Going Into Picasso Paintings, 20x Returns?
Scott Lynn is the Founder and CEO of Masterworks, the first company to allow investors to buy shares representing ownership of great masterpieces by artists like Warhol, Monet, and Banksy. Scott has been an active collector of contemporary art for more than fifteen years and has built an internationally-recognized collection of Abstract Expressionism that has included works by Clyfford Still, Barnett Newman, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, and more. In addition to Masterworks, Scott serves on the board of v2 ventures (Adparlor, Giant Media, Reachmobi, Amply, and Sellozo), Payability, and the Brooklyn Rail (a non-profit publication in the art industry).
6/17/2020 • 19 minutes, 46 seconds
From $22m Diamond Candles to $30k MRR Support SaaS
Justin is the co-founder and CEO of Boostopia, a SaaS platform that allows you to manage your newly work from home customer support team with the worlds first support department operations platform. Previously, he was the CEO of diamond candles, he went to Liberity University.
6/16/2020 • 18 minutes, 32 seconds
GeoSpiza First 3 Customers at $160k ACV For Climate Risk Software, How?
Co-Founder and CEO, Sarah Tuneberg, founded Geospiza after more than a decade in emergency management and public health in order to transform the way climate risk decisions are made. She leads Geospiza’s interdisciplinary team on developing data-driven, evidence-based solutions, models, and processes that reduce risk and enhance resilience.
6/15/2020 • 18 minutes, 4 seconds
RJMetrics Founder $4m+ ARR Explains How They Lost To Looker
Bob Moore is the CEO and Co-Founder of Crossbeam, a collaborative data platform that helps companies build more valuable partnerships. He previously co-founded RJMetrics (acquired by Magento) and Stitch Data (acquired by Talend).
6/14/2020 • 21 minutes, 32 seconds
"He Hit $1m in Revenue Helping SaaS Founders Build MVP's "
Coding since I was a teenager. Had a career in IT before I went to law school, and decided that what I really wanted to be was the CEO of a SaaS company. Series Code is founded upon my passion for coding. Married, two kids, cashed in two WSOP events.
6/13/2020 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
Trust and Will Company Passes 5k Customers, $1m in ARR Digital Way to Do Estate Planning
Cody Barbo is an entrepreneur and two-time founder from San Diego, CA. Cody currently serves as Founder/CEO of Trust & Will, a modern estate planning software startup. Cody also serves on the San Diego State University Alumni Board of Advisors as VP of Partnerships. At his last startup, Cody served as Founder/CEO of Industry, a ‘LinkedIn’ for the service and hospitality industry. Cody is happily married, a dog dad, and a soon-to-be father of a baby girl.
6/12/2020 • 25 minutes, 27 seconds
Festival Version of ClassPass Targeting $500k Seed, 1000's of Consumers, 100's of Events
I’m an entrepreneur with over twenty years of business, technology, and management experience having founded and exited several companies in that time including helping to launch film festivals in multiple locations and creating the concept for a Maxim branded hotel in the Caribbean. Form head of data at Movie Pass.
6/11/2020 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
Einar Volsett on How TinySeed Works
6/10/2020 • 1 hour, 28 minutes, 38 seconds
153 Brands Use Them To Report Sales Volume to Shopping Malls, $20k in MRR, $1.5m Raised
CEO of ShoppinPal. Previously, as a Product Manager and grew $40B payment volume products at eBay/PayPal, 1st non founding engineer at Trustgenix (acquired by HP). Recently featured in Leaders of Tomorrow (India's version of the Shark Tank) and selected twice by Invest Stockholm as one of the most promising ventures identified to expand business in Sweden. Passionate about helping SMEs, creating top notch enterprise software from the ground up, identifying raw talent and creating the right opportunities for the team to grow into world class engineers, and contributing to the growth of the startup ecosystem, especially in India. UC Berkeley MBA, Carnegie Mellon MS.
Phil Strazzulla is a finance nerd turned entrepreneur. Phil started investing in the stock market when he was 12, but set his sights on starting a company after an internship at a two person company during college. After graduating from NYU, Phil began his career working in venture capital at Bessemer Venture Partners before getting his MBA at Harvard Business School. He's a self taught programmer who has started two bootstrapped technology companies. He now spends most of his time working on SelectSoftware, a site dedicated to providing in depth and unbiased reviews of business software. Outside of work, Phil is working on his yoga poses, meditation practice, sous vide skills, and golf swing. When not enjoying the many benefits of working from home, you can find him traveling around the world to escape his arch nemesis, the dreaded Boston weather.
Rosterfy is widely regarded as the most comprehensive volunteer management solution in the market, providing end to end technology for workforce programs throughout the world. Our scalable technology streamlines the previously manual process of workforce management for organisations all shapes and sizes from the Super Bowl to tin rattlers for local charities. As a business our mission is connecting communities to events and causes they are passionate about.
6/8/2020 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
They Spent $100k on MVP, Now Have Customers Expanding $100/mo to $1000/mo in First year, How!?
Business strategy and execution professional with 15+ years experience of delivering high growth projects for SMBs and large enterprises -MBA INSEAD - MS Virginia Tech - B.Tech, Delhi College of Engineering - IFC (World Bank Group), IL&FS, Carollo Engineers
6/7/2020 • 17 minutes, 6 seconds
"He Raised $900k And Sold For $1.8m... Why? "
15 years of startup experience as founder/CEO/CTO. Founder & CEO ProLeads, acquired by OutboundWorks in a seven figures cash deal plus stock. 500 Startups and The Alchemist Accelerator alumni & mentor. CTO at Arrivalguides.com (acquired by Lonely Planet). Founder & CEO Tablefinder (acquired by Visit). DJ as @desertpillar
6/6/2020 • 24 minutes, 33 seconds
Mela.Work Raising $1-2m Right Now With $200k in Revenue, Fair Valuation?
Mela.Work is an app that simplifies management of field construction teams both online and offline. Founder Francesco Putignano lived in 7 countries and speaks 5 languages. He became a nuclear engineer before getting an MBA and working at a fast growing ticketing marketplace. Founded Mela Works with two of his best friends, with the objective of changing the way work is executed in heavy industry.
6/5/2020 • 14 minutes, 23 seconds
Get More People to Take Your Online Course w/ Gamification, Solo Founder, $100k in ARR
BLUErabbit is a gamified engagement platform originally designed for the improvement of classroom environments but has now evolved to generate engagement in any space that requires interaction between players and organizers We received the Outstanding Gamification Software award in Nov 2017 from Gamification Europe and went from 25k gross profit to 150k in one year.
6/4/2020 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
11 SaaS Companies, Dane Takes Paperless Pipeline to $2m Revenues, Launches Start From Zero Framework
This man has a method that can create bootstrapped profitable SaaS products from scratch. He was Fired from Ernst & Young. Failed at 11 businesses. Figured out what worked. Taught the patterns. Helped create 15 millionaires. Loves building SaaS products. Loves to sing and released his third musical album last year.
6/3/2020 • 27 minutes, 15 seconds
TrustMary: Transition from $2m Agency to $200k SaaS
Always curious to learn new things, share them with my wife and two boys, customers and business partners. Hooked with so many hobbies that 48h per day wouldn't be enough so need to limit it to a few top ones including golf, ice hockey, fishing and every now and then to other ball games.
6/2/2020 • 21 minutes, 30 seconds
DesignPickle: Bootstrapped, $10m Revenue, Helping 3,000 Brands Get Design Work Done
Russ Perry is the Founder and CEO of Design Pickle, the world’s most successful flat-rate creative service. Russ leads a global team as they rethink and deliver a remarkable new way to find the perfect creative.
6/1/2020 • 24 minutes, 17 seconds
LivingSecurity.com: Guess What Multiple They're Raising $5m Series A At
Ashely Rose is the CEO of Living Security, where she helps companies reduce risk by making security awareness engaging and quantifiable. If you enjoy this episode, it'd help me out if you left a review. This helps me get hard to reach guests. For more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE then visit GetLatka.com
5/31/2020 • 20 minutes, 56 seconds
BoomTime.com: Hit $2.8m in Revenues, First 100 Customers From Linkedin
His name is Bill Bice, serial entrepreneur since age 14. He is passionate about enabling smaller businesses to more successfully compete with their larger competitors through effective marketing. Through the years, Bill has built and invested in over 25 companies but kept finding the same flaws in marketing strategies so, a programmer at heart, he founded Boomtime, a company that tackles marketing as a technology problem If you enjoy this episode, it'd help me out if you left a review. This helps me get hard to reach guests. For more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE then visit GetLatka.com
5/30/2020 • 18 minutes, 14 seconds
Refersion.com: Bootstrapped SaaS Doing $1.5m in Cash Flow
Shibo Xu is the co-founder of Refersion and grew the company from the two co-founders to a leading SaaS platform serving over 7000 merchants across two offices. Before Refersion, Shibo was a technology consultant partnering with Fortune 500 enterprises to concept and build digital products. If you enjoy this episode, it'd help me out if you left a review. This helps me get hard to reach guests. For more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE then visit GetLatka.com
5/29/2020 • 27 minutes, 50 seconds
How to Acquire a $180k Revenue SaaS Company for $3k With Ryan Kulp
Ryan Kulp is a marketer and self-taught developer, best known as founder of Fomo.com. He and his wife buy and grow small companies together at their Micro PE fund, Fork Equity (forkequity.com). Ryan has been traveling full-time for 2 years and writes a data-driven travel blog at rickshawlabs.com. On this episode we discuss how he finds companies to buy, why he's ok not getting huge, and how he ensures profitability. If you enjoy this episode, it'd help me out if you left a review. This helps me get hard to reach guests. For more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE then visit GetLatka.com
5/28/2020 • 32 minutes, 16 seconds
PushPress.com Hits 1,000 Gym Customers Paying $140 Each
Dan Uyemura is the CEO of PushPress.com, a tool that helps boutique gyms grow. Dan shares why he took a $500k loan from the SBA to start the company. Why why he spent $100k in 2010 to open his own gym. How he grew to $1.6m in revenue run rate, up 63% from 2019. If you enjoy todays content, please leave a review. It helps me get hard-to-reach guests! To get more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE and visit GetLatka.com
5/27/2020 • 11 minutes, 34 seconds
RunBolt.com: $800k Revenue, Construction Scheduling Tool
RunBolt founder Sam Knight joins me today and talks about he he spun a construction scheduling tool out of it’s parent company. We talk about cap table structure, his first sales hire and setting $30,000 quota. How does Sam get 50% of new customers to pay annually up front? How’d he get his first 50 customers? What’s his plan to reduce churn? We discuss each of these items. To get more SaaS content, SUBSCRIBE and visit GetLatka.com
5/26/2020 • 14 minutes, 39 seconds
1766 $700k Cash In Bank, $2m ARR, 100% YoY Growth, They're Hot!
Smartlook records users on websites and in iOS & Android apps. With features that allow you to find useful information even in thousands of recordings in no time.
5/25/2020 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
1765 "How He Doubled ARR to $2m Via Acquisition "
Matt Dion CEO of Mintent, is a technology industry veteran with 24 years of experience ushering early stage companies through the tricky early adopter and early majority market phases.
5/24/2020 • 16 minutes, 31 seconds
1764 "CoronaVirus Driving Massive Growth At This $2.5m ARR Virtual Event SaaS Company "
Internet business executive with over 12 years of experience in managing small to mid-size organizations, product development, business operations, and strategy. Have conceptualized and grown multiple businesses from zero to multi-million dollars in North America and in the Middle East.
5/23/2020 • 16 minutes, 20 seconds
1763 $4m ARR Company Burned $1.7m Last Year, Good or Bad?
Maciej Zawadziński – CEO of Piwik PRO and Clearcode; analytics and advertising technology expert; entrepreneur and startup founder. Maciej is an expert in analytics and advertising technology and founder of several successful companies. He has led Clearcode to its position as a leading software house building custom advertising and marketing technology and in 2013 founded Piwik PRO, a privacy-compliant analytics platform. He advocates for better data privacy rights as a supporting expert at the Panoptykon Foundation.
5/22/2020 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
1762 How Convertri Used Affiliates To Hit $1m ARR, $700k Profit
Andy Fletcher is a serial entrepreneur now working on his 3rd company. He has a background in development and a Masters degree in Computer Science but fell in love with digital marketing about a decade ago. This makes martech SaaS pretty much the perfect place for him to be.
5/21/2020 • 21 minutes, 16 seconds
1761 Changelog Software Hits $650k Revenue, Bootstrapped From Spain
Started career in banking. Now 3x SaaS founder for Beamer, Hibox and Joincube. Love running hyper lean bootstrapped B2B SaaS companies outside of SF. Have been based in Spain and Chile. Moving to Boulder shortly.
5/20/2020 • 17 minutes, 53 seconds
Scott Santens on UBI vs Stimulus Checks
5/20/2020 • 1 hour, 15 minutes, 27 seconds
1760 $20m To Build MVP: Does Carbonite Founder Have Another Billion Dollar Idea?
David Friend is the co-founder and CEO of Wasabi, the hot cloud storage company that delivers fast, low-cost, and reliable cloud storage. Prior to Wasabi, David co-founded Carbonite, one of the world’s leading cloud backup companies. He has been a successful tech entrepreneur for more than 30 years.
5/19/2020 • 25 minutes, 17 seconds
1759 Founder Hit $1.3m ARR During COVID Getting Customers on 3 Year Contracts, How?!
Karnell is a serial entrepreneur and has founded 4 companies, including one which he scaled to more than $100M in gross revenue. He has significant business expertise in operating and scaling digital platforms and has helped run significant operations in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Singapore. Presently, Karnell is the President and COO of Truelytics.
5/18/2020 • 22 minutes, 27 seconds
Jonathan Herzog: His Plan To Get 30k Votes to Beat Jerry Nadler for NY Congressional Seat, YangGang Strategy and Freedom Dividend
5/18/2020 • 1 hour, 16 minutes, 45 seconds
1758 Funnel Analysis: Online Events Platform $0 to $1.8m in Revenue In 2 Months
Founder and CEO of Hopin, the online events platform. Hopin has grown from 1 person to a 40 person remote company in 5 months and grew in revenue from 0 to $1m+ ARR in three weeks.
5/17/2020 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
1757 How Wistia Hit $18m Revenues, Used $17m Debt from ACCEL KKR To Buy Out $1.4m Seed Investors With Tender Offer
Chris Savage is the co-founder and CEO of Wistia, a web-based software solution that helps marketers turn viewers into brand advocates to grow their businesses. After graduating from Brown University, Chris and his co-founder Brendan Schwartz, started Wistia in Brendan’s living room in 2006. They founded the company with the goal of helping businesses effectively market their products or services more creatively through video. Recently, Savage and Schwartz turned down an offer to sell Wistia and took on $17.3M in debt instead, which allowed them to buy out their investors, gain full control of Wistia, and take the path less traveled in the tech industry. Now, more than 500,000 businesses across 50 countries depend on Wistia's products to build their brands and their businesses, including HubSpot, MailChimp, Sephora, Starbucks, and Tiffany & Co.
Clay is the CEO at Ripl, a marketing software company used by millions of small business and independent marketers worldwide. Clay has spent most of his career at the intersection of software, marketing, and emerging media. He lives in Seattle and rides his bike in the rain.
5/15/2020 • 24 minutes, 28 seconds
1755 How He Got 7,500 Registered For Virtual Event During Lock Down
Vasil is a growth marketing and startup event entrepreneur, who has produced over 500 in-person and virtual events, as well as built a 90K+ network of tech entrepreneurs and marketers. He’s the founder of Growth Marketing Conference, one of the leading growth marketing events in the industry, and he’s the CEO of startup professional network Startup Socials (as seen in Forbes). He’s worked with big brands like IBM, Adobe, Microsoft, and Delta Airlines, high growth startups such as Intercom, Pantheon, Gainsights, Instapage, and Zendesk, and digital marketing thought leaders like Neil Patel, Rand Fishkin, and Larry Kim to help them produce high-quality, successful events.
5/14/2020 • 18 minutes, 55 seconds
1754 Parker Conrad Gave Rippling CTO 40%, Kept 60%, 2,000 Customers "$36m ARR Not Far Off"
Prasanna Sankar is the co-founder and CTO of Rippling, where he's scaling the engineering team across two continents. Previously he was Director of Engineering at Zenefits, and co-founder and CTO of LikeALittle, a social media app that attracted two million users in six weeks. Prasanna is a former competitive programmer and was ranked #1 in India on TopCoder. Today he codes for fun, and lives in the Bay Area with his wife and son.
5/13/2020 • 24 minutes, 52 seconds
1753 "IoT AgTech Device Hits $1m Software Run Rate and $1.2m in Hardware Sales. Can He Get $60m Valuation? "
Naeem is a serial entrepreneur and the founder & CEO of TeleSense. Naeem is 7X startup entrepreneur and 5X CEO with successful exists. He is deeply ingrained in the Silicon Valley ecosystem and frequently speaks about innovation and entrepreneurship. Naeem has authored five books on entrepreneurship and he teaches entrepreneurship at UC Berkeley and Northeastern University. He has a graduate degree in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota. More about him at www.NaeemZafar.com
5/12/2020 • 22 minutes, 46 seconds
1752 How $4m ARR CEO Uses $2m in Revenue Based Debt to Scale
Co-founding CTO, now CEO of MarketMuse. Former VC Associate at OpenView Partners, Big Data focus. Associate, Analytics practice within Diamond Management & Technology Consultants (now PWC Diamond Advisory). Michigan Ross BBA '07. Computer Science, Washtenaw Community College '03. Born in Debrecen, Hungary.
5/11/2020 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
1751 SendBird Messaging SDK Sitting on $100m Cash, $20m in ARR
John S. Kim is the Cofounder and CEO of SendBird (Y Combinator W16), a B2B startup providing a messaging solution for enterprises. The platform currently serves tens of millions of monthly active users and many of the best-known logos around the world, like Yahoo! Sports, GO-JEK, Hinge and one of the most active websites in the world. John is a serial entrepreneur and an expert in the messaging space. Little known about John is that he was Korea's no.1 pro-gamer for Unreal Tournament.
5/10/2020 • 24 minutes, 17 seconds
1750 With $12m in ARR Yoast CEO Says Wordpress Couldn't Afford to Acquire
Joost de Valk is a web developer, SEO and open source fanatic from The Netherlands. He is the founder and CEO of Yoast, which provides software and training for website optimization i.e. SEO. Yoast SEO, Yoast’s main software product, currently runs on over 10 million WordPress websites.
5/9/2020 • 19 minutes, 22 seconds
1749 How He Hit $9m Revenues Paying Resellers 24% Kickbacks
A successful entrepreneur with a 20+ year track record, Yuryi was previously CEO and founder of YMF, a leading financial software company with 300 employees that was later sold to TOTVS. A well respected authority in the Brazilian technology sector, Yuryi is often called upon to advise firms and individuals on IT best practice and solutions. Before founding YMF, Yuryi spent 8 years in the Investment Bank GARANTIA as a Trader and Portfolio Manager.
5/8/2020 • 12 minutes, 21 seconds
1748 "Wouldn't Be Surprise If We Hit $50M This Year" says 3d Home Modeling CEO
A.J. Altman is founder & CEO of HOVER, a mobile app that is transforming homeownership by creating 3D home models from smartphone photos. Prior to founding HOVER, A.J. was an engineer at Intel Corporation and served as an infantry officer in the United States Marine Corps.
5/7/2020 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
1747 How Subsidary Hit $420k MRR helping Subscription Companies Scale
Kurt has served as CEO of Ubersmith since 2014 and Venture Partner at NextGen Venture Partners since 2017. Previously, he helped build and scale three startups - Parallels, Worklight (acquired by IBM) and MongoDB (IPO) - into companies worth $6 billion. Earlier, Kurt was a Lead Product Manager at Microsoft.
5/6/2020 • 13 minutes, 4 seconds
1746 Infusionsoft Employee #8 Launches New Venture, Passes $175k in MRR, 2500 SMB Customers
Dave Lee is a marketing automation pioneer, entrepreneur, and best-selling author. He’s the CEO of PlusThis, the #1 campaign toolkit for marketing automation users. Dave has been featured on NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox television affiliates speaking on marketing automation and small business success. Outside of work, he’s usually skiing, kitesurfing, wakesurfing or creating amazing experiences with his wife and three boys.
5/5/2020 • 15 minutes, 19 seconds
1745 I wouldn't sell for 3x, CEO passes $1m in ARR
Hates to go to, and to go home from parties. Loves skiing and the beer that comes with it. Love travelling with my family and friends. Background in small tech companies, advertising companies, and leadership training. Spiritual but not religious. Optimist and self-critical. Co-founded Learnifier but change how learning happens. Product guy with a passion for aesthetics and ease-of-use.
5/4/2020 • 13 minutes, 45 seconds
1744 Zuora for Brazil Hits $5m ARR, Raising $2.5m on $25m Pre Money
CEO of Vindi. SaaS & Fintech entrepreneur focused in payments industry in Brazil. Former executive at Itau (major Brazilian bank), angel investor of 5 companies.
5/3/2020 • 16 minutes, 31 seconds
1743 Zapier Hits 100k Customers, $50m in ARR, Eye on Doubling YoY with New Partnerships
Wade Foster is the CEO and co-founder of Zapier, a workflow automation tool used by over three million people to connect the work apps they use every day. Prior to Zapier, Wade worked as a customer development lead for The Idea Works, Inc. in Missouri. He is an alumnus of Y Combinator and has degrees in industrial engineering and business administration from the University of Missouri-Columbia.
5/2/2020 • 24 minutes, 36 seconds
1742 How Elastic.io Sold, Got Earnout and Hit $6m ARR in PaaS Space
CEO and co-founder elastic.io, before Talend, DHL and Nokia, geek, father of 3
5/1/2020 • 22 minutes, 13 seconds
When Will Poor Revolt Against Rich? Is Unemployment Good? Currency Pegged To Bitcoin with Jeff Booth
4/30/2020 • 1 hour, 16 minutes, 59 seconds
1741 CodeAcademy for Blockchain Developers Hits $4k MRR
I am a software engineer and entrepreneur who is currently down the blockchain rabbit hole. I have worked in various industries such as Travel and Sports. I started my company Zastrin last year to teach developers blockchain programming through real world projects. I love my family, food and travel.
4/30/2020 • 10 minutes, 46 seconds
1740 $5m Raised and $600k ARR When Fiverr Acquired, Did Common Holders See Any Cash?
Leif is the co-founder, CEO of AND CO. The #1 freelancing software in the world, which was acquired by Fiverr in 2018. He is also a Parter at Prehype, a venture development firm in New York and investor in companies like Ro Health. He also co-founded Pay with a Tweet, which was acquired by the German company builder Hanse Ventures in 2013. Served as Director of Product for West Studios in San Francisco, where he worked with start ups like Rdio and Venmo. He also worked as Creative Director at R/GA. Leif was named one of the "Top Minds in Digital" by AdWeek and earned numerous awards including two Cannes Lion Grand Prix and a MTV OMusic Award. He's also an advisor to Venture Capital firm Urban.Us and a number of early stage companies.
I just hate wasting time or doing unnecessary tasks, doing things over because the first job was not good enough is event better. This happens again and again in construction projects. As a Computer Engineer, born and raises in the construction industry, I saw that I could solve this. It’s not done until it is CHECKD!
4/28/2020 • 12 minutes, 22 seconds
1738 How He Got First Enterprise Customers to Pay $120k ACV's
Sonny Patel is the Founder & CEO at Insurmi, a white-labeled conversational A.I. platform that enables carriers to generate new business online, streamline claims, and provide excellent A.I. driven customer service. He is also a proud #YESPHX business leader who is passionate about helping other founders make their entrepreneurial dreams a reality!
4/27/2020 • 15 minutes, 19 seconds
1737 He Wants Enterprise Customer to Churn to Tackle Massive Technical Debt Issue
>15 yrs software developer. In 2016 I quit my job with Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, to found CodeLingo and tackle the Technical Debt crisis head on. In a 40hr work week, a developer spends over 17hrs on Tech Debt (https://bit.ly/2MSQr7b). I've become obsessed with fixing this and unlocking the true potential of development teams. CodeLingo does this by transforming the whole software stack into a big data problem, detects anti-patterns and then automates common development tasks, such as code reviews, bug fixes and generating contributor guidelines - to name a few. As developers, we're good at scaling up anything except ourselves. CodeLingo unlocks code quality at scale.
4/26/2020 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
1736 He'll Never Win Unless He Shuts Down Agency
Scott Weiss is the Founder of Referagig and President of Makena Partners, a technology recruiting firm. Both companies are based in Seattle, Washington.
4/25/2020 • 23 minutes, 1 second
1735 Smarter to Buy vs Build, He bought Company for $10m, Now doing $20m in ARR 3 years later
Awareness Technologies, Inc. (ATI) provides endpoint security solutions for both home and business. With over 50 employees and offices in Westport, CT and Bristol, UK, ATI both develops and acquires market leading solutions trusted by millions of parents and thousands of businesses.
4/24/2020 • 22 minutes, 22 seconds
1734 How He Hit $3.5m in ARR Selling HR Interview Tool
Originally a software engineer, and now serial entrepreneur, I love applying technology to solve real world problems, and like the best of ideas, Shine is an idea borne of frustration and real world experience of the recruitment process.
4/23/2020 • 13 minutes, 15 seconds
Preston Pysh on Bitcoin $200,000, QE at the top, UBI at bottom, $10t+ Fed Balance Sheet?
4/22/2020 • 1 hour, 22 minutes, 35 seconds
1733 They're Raising $5m Right Now on $3.6m in ARR
Franz Riedl, co-founder of Styla, an agile Content Management System. Styla automates design and unifies content and e-commerce to create seamless inspiration and shopping experiences. Today, Styla works with more than 100 brands and retailers such as Footlocker, Otto Group, Thomas Sabo or OBI. Prior to Styla, Franz cofounded several gaming companies and worked as a consultant in strategy and innovation - supporting enterprises in tackling the challenges of digital transformation.
4/22/2020 • 18 minutes, 25 seconds
1732 Why Is He "Waiting" To Drive Sales?
David spent 25 years in global equity research in both senior banking and asset management roles. He has watched the world’s best presenters in action and designed a solution to enhance presentation impact while capturing all interaction details.
4/21/2020 • 16 minutes, 54 seconds
1731 How He Raised $10m From PE To Buy Out 80% Cofounders
Working with our brilliant team. Leading the commercialisation and growth of our award-winning global employee leave tracking / absence management solution. Leading from start-up phase to our current market leading position, and securing Private Equity backing to further accelerate growth.
4/20/2020 • 20 minutes, 37 seconds
1730 Burning $45k/mo With $80k in ARR, Why Is He Raising? Product is not proven!
Entrepreneurial leader and team motivator with ability to proactively identify business opportunities and solve challenging business problems. Passion for and proven track record of successfully developing breakthrough business and product strategies, managing product implementation, streamlining business operations, and establishing strategic partnerships that drive business growth. Demonstrated success in start-ups, midsize and Fortune 100 companies. Keen sense of market needs, employee motivation, time-to-market and the bottom-line.
4/19/2020 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1729 "Kentucky CEO Doubles ARR and Consulting Helping Banks Find Ways to Support Non-Profit Initiatives "
findCRA makes Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) compliance easy for banks through powerful, data-driven software that cuts out countless hours of complicated, manual research and delivers actionable insights in seconds. As co-founder and CEO of findCRA, Ben leads the company’s overall product vision and design as well as business strategy.
4/18/2020 • 12 minutes, 44 seconds
1728 They Expect 120% Growth This Year, $30m Raised, No Virus Impact, Selling to Banks
Rob Heiser is the co-founder and a Vice Chairman of Segmint Inc, an innovative financial technology company based in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio. Rob was awarded Crain’s Cleveland 40 under 40 and currently serves on the Advisory Board of Kent State University’s LaunchNET entrepreneurship program. Rob has been awarded 10 U.S. and international patents for Segmint.
4/17/2020 • 12 minutes, 36 seconds
1727 He Spent $100k on MVP, Can He Scale During Virus?
Dmitriy Pavlov is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Stitched Insights. Dmitriy has over a decade of nose-to-tail experience creating consistent category growth through data with prior leadership roles at large corporations like ADP and enterprise startups like Duda & Conduit.
4/16/2020 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
1726 HealthTech Company Expects To Hit $1m in ARR As Critical Tech During COVID
MedStack's CEO Balaji is an educator and thought leader in platform and software product strategy, is passionately driven by the role of technology in addressing societal problems. MedStack supports many digital health companies in protecting patient, and has been awarded accolades by the Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance and Techcrunch.
4/15/2020 • 15 minutes, 1 second
New podcast: Jason Yanowitz on Consequences of Fed Stimulus, Socialism Next, Bitcoin Halving
4/15/2020 • 1 hour, 2 minutes, 11 seconds
1725 SEMRush Broke $100m in Revenues in 2019
Eugene was one of the first investors to spot SEMrush. After joining the company as a Chief Strategy Officer he helped to more than quadruple company revenue and raised over $40m from Tier 1 investors. Before SEMrush, Eugene was a partner at Target Global, pan-european venture fund that invests in consumer Internet space. There Eugene was in charge of late stage pipeline and worked on number of notable transactions including Lyft and Delivery Hero. Eugene started his VC career as Senior Associate and then Partner at Foresight Ventures. Foresight Ventures was focused on early stage US technology companies and was ranked top 10 Russian VC Firm by Forbes In 2013.
4/14/2020 • 30 minutes, 54 seconds
New podcast: Anthony Pompliano on Price of Bitcoin, Gold, Chinese Power, Corporate Bailouts and 3 Places He's Investing
4/13/2020 • 57 minutes, 6 seconds
1724 He's Raising $100m Now Despite COVID, $20m in Revenues, 101% YoY Growth Serving Online Retailers
Through Exponea, Peter spread his personalized, customer-focused experiences to over a billion consumers. Under his leadership, Exponea has become one of the fastest growing European SAAS companies. Exponea's product vision was fuelled by his CEO experience from Slevomat which became number one daily deal site in 6 countries, with revenues of over €100 mil in less than 4 years. Peter's philosophy is to help his employees to become future business leaders and founders, while instilling them with strong personal and business ethics.
4/13/2020 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
1723 Flat at $2.5m/Year And Totally Happy Helping MidMarket Companies With Their CRM
I started in the Internet Marketing space in 2000, when I co-founded one of the world's first email service providers, CoolerEmail. As a pioneer in responsible email marketing, we grew CoolerEmail into a global software company specializing in marketing communication with over 1,500 clients. In 2010, after spending several years designing and implementing a more comprehensive way to meet the needs of small and mid-sized businesses, I launched GreenRope, a cloud-based platform that simplifies and consolidates a company's sales, marketing, and operations. GreenRope currently provides technology solutions to over 3,000 companies worldwide. In 2017, I had the opportunity to write and publish, CRM For Dummies, part of the globally acclaimed "For Dummies" series of books. In the book, I cover strategies and tactics that help businesses design and implement a successful CRM strategy.
Knak is the first email creation platform built for enterprise teams. We empower marketers, writers, and designers to collaborate and create beautiful, responsive, on-brand emails quickly - no coding required. Knak integrates with the most popular marketing automation platforms, including Marketo, Eloqua, and Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
4/11/2020 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
1721 How SaaS CEO Plans To Cut $500,000 Burn Amid Virus To Hit $8m Revenues This Year
Rocket scientist with 25 yrs experience helping enterprises make 100s millions in net income gains using AI. My mission is to reduce poverty as companies invest these gains to lowering prices which lowers cost of living for you and I.
4/10/2020 • 14 minutes, 36 seconds
1720 Bombora CEO Hits $30m ARR, Applies for PPP, Finds Virus Patterns Among B2B Brands
Erik Matlick guides vision and corporate strategy at Bombora, bringing over 15 years in founding, board and executive management experience. Prior to Bombora, Erik was the founder and CEO of several advertising technology companies including Madison Logic. He also founded IndustryBrains and MediaBrains. Erik began his career in ad sales at Ziff-Davis and divides his time between Miami and New York.
4/9/2020 • 20 minutes, 39 seconds
1719 He's Expecting $500k PPP Stimulus Check for Virus, At $6m ARR Today, Whats next?
Steve Pockross brings 20+ years of startup, Fortune 500, and nonprofit experience to his role as CEO Verblio. He has also served in leadership roles at LiveOps, Tendril, Western Union, Marketing Technologies Group, and HSBC. Steve received his MBA from Kellogg School of Business and his MA from Wesleyan University.
4/8/2020 • 17 minutes, 8 seconds
1718 CyberSecurity CEO: US Election Interference Happening Right Now, Virus Plans and more from RedSeal
Ray joined RedSeal as CEO in February 2014. Prior to RedSeal he was a general partner at Venrock, one of RedSeal’s founding investors. At Venrock he invested in 53 companies including over a dozen in cybersecurity including Vontu, PGP, P-Cube, Imperva, Cloudflare, CTERA, and Shape Security. He is on the board of Check Point Software Technology, Ltd. an original Venrock investment, and Team8, both Tel Aviv–based companies.
4/7/2020 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
1717 3 Genius Ways To Conserve SaaS Cash To Survive Virus From Eloqua Founder Who Survived 9/11
Mark Organ is a serial creator of multi billion dollar software categories and companies. He coaches CEOs on how to discover, develop and dominate their categories. He is also creating the largest global community of category creating leaders, the Categorynauts. Mark is currently the Chairman and was previously founder and CEO of Influitive, the creator of the the advocate marketing and community category. Influitive creates communities of customer advocates, mobilizing advocates to produce massive increases in referral leads, reference calls, social media participation and more. Mark first revolutionized B2B marketing as the founding CEO of Eloqua (ELOQ), the world leader in marketing automation software, which was recently acquired for $871M. In between, he was a go-to-market consultant for SaaS companies in North America and Asia. Mark has also helped over a dozen software companies successfully go to market in asymmetrical or disruptive ways as a consultant and entrepreneur. With an M.S. in Neuroscience from Northwestern University and a passion for understanding human psychology, Mark is a dynamic speaker with a unique vision centered not only in business success and technological innovation, but also how and why people think, act and interact the way they do. Mark enjoys sharing his observations, regularly writing and speaking on entrepreneurship, marketing and advocacy. He has energized professional audiences at a number of recent events, including DemandCon, Influence HR Summit, The Globe and Mail Small Business Summit, InsideSales Virtual Summit and many more. Please see testimonials and video samples here: http://influitive.com/founder-and-ceo
4/6/2020 • 24 minutes, 44 seconds
1716 $60k/mo Live Event SaaS Company Virus Survival Plans
Matt Ford launched his first Music Tech startup - spotlight.fm - while attending the University of Wisconsin in 2011. Spotlight.fm was a marketing platform for major festivals, record labels, promoters, and music brands including Ableton, Electric Daisy Carnival, and Frank Productions. After growing the userbase to over 250k, Matt successfully exiting the company and started Solstice in 2014. Solstice started as a hybrid concert management platform and concert promoter. While putting on thousands of events around Austin including an annual festival (Solstice Festival), Matt began working on technology to connect venues and artists with a tech partner Adrian Tavares. Through this process, the ubiquitous problem venues, agents and promoters face operationally became abundantly clear. Prism.fm emerged in 2018 with Matt as the CEO. In just 2 short years since inception, Prism is working with hundreds of partners around the world booking thousands of venues.
4/5/2020 • 18 minutes, 50 seconds
1715 CEO Fine Burning $700k/mo During Virus With Just $6m Revenue Helping Enterprises Manage Data
Derek Wang is the CEO and co-founder of Stratifyd, Inc. Wang grew up in Beijing and received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Along with two other co-founders –began conducting government-funded research on the ways AI could be used to ingest, analyze, and visualize unstructured data.
4/4/2020 • 20 minutes, 47 seconds
1714 Do This Today: How Much You Get $349b PPP Stimulus for SaaS Founders
4/3/2020 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
1713 Is this a better way for schools to fundraise?
Mark Abbott shares a passion for farms, food and community wellness with his wife and two school-aged kids. He is founding team member for AmeriCorps and past Director of the Poverty program at the C. S. Mott Foundation. Mark has a PhD in economic anthropology from the University of Pittsburgh and start-ups in the non-profit and for-profit sectors. Mark is the founder and CEO for FarmRaiser, a platform and service for healthy product fundraising.
4/2/2020 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1712 Investors put in $10m, He Left, Bought Back Company for Pennies on Dollar, How?
As a serial entrepreneur, I live and breathe franchising. He has started several local and national successful businesses in the technology, rental, service, e-commerce and retail markets which have generated hundreds of millions in sales. Steve identifies the creation of Bpro as the main contributing factor to his success in franchising his businesses.
4/1/2020 • 20 minutes, 35 seconds
1711 3500 LatAm Salons Pay Him $3.2m in ARR for Customers
Experienced Founder with a demonstrated history of working in the health wellness and fitness industry. Skilled in Negotiation, Business Planning, Sales, Entrepreneurship, and Public Speaking. Strong business development professional with a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) focused in International Business.
3/31/2020 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
1710 Crop Optimization Software Hits $2.4m in ARR, $12m Raised
Krishna Kumar, Founder and CEO of CropIn Technology Solutions, has made it possible to enable data-driven farming by connecting all the stakeholders in the agri ecosystem. CropIn is a leading global full-stack ag-tech organization that provides SaaS solutions thus enabling businesses to utilize technology to effectively drive their initiatives around Digitization, Predictability, Risk Management, Compliance, Sustainability and Traceability. With robust solutions that are crop and region agnostic, CropIn has so far digitized nearly 3.2 million acres of farmland, enriching the lives of nearly 2.1 million farmers in addition to creating a footprint in 29 countries globally. Krishna is also a 'BusinessWorld 40 Under 40 Achiever 2018'.
3/30/2020 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
1709 This Dentist Built Software, Now $40k/mo
Dr Brian Harris is one of the nation’s leading experts in cosmetic dentistry. His creation of the Smile Virtual software platform allows cosmetic dentists to connect with patients from around the world via video consults. This software streamlines the smile makeover process and transforms lives by increasing self confidence.
3/29/2020 • 13 minutes, 15 seconds
1708 You're telling me your MRR is $7.5m with 35 Employees?
John Corrigan, Co-Founder, CEO of SummitSync is most interesting man in the world you have never met or heard about. A native of Chicago now living in NYC, John spent a decent portion of his 20's having an unimpressive career in digital ad sales and corporate development selling a couple billion dollars of ads to the world's largest brands. Through boredom, randomness, and a strong desire to avoid graduate school in his late 20's John founded TravelsOfJohn an online newsletter that interviewed global thought leaders across politics, business, sports, and science. At its height achieving a readership of over 100,000 people per month. Having been raised by a civically focused mother, in 2012 John became the largest fundraiser under 30 for President Obama's re-election campaign, sitting on the President's National Finance Committee. Today in his 30's John and has found maturity with purpose as both founder and CEO of SummitSync. John has lead SummitSync to be one of the fastest growing enterprise SaaS companies in the US today. SummitSync provides sales enablement and marketing intelligence to drive more meetings for it's thousands of clients at the conferences and trade shows they attend. Outside of capital and political pursuits John is known to travel extensively, spend way to much time on his Instagram photo's, fly planes, ski, and read any book he can find on history and foreign policy.
3/28/2020 • 21 minutes, 51 seconds
1707 How He Cheated Growth With $5k Acquisition on Day 1
I am a multi time founder and currently running Castos podcast hosting and analytics. We provide podcast hosting alongside our Seriously Simple Podcasting WordPress plugin to thousands of podcasters. Our goal is to make podcasting easy to understand and accessible to all.
3/27/2020 • 15 minutes, 6 seconds
1706 The Early Days: How He Got His First 8 Customers
Deepak has 20 years of experience in product and marketing roles at storage, application and networking companies. He has served in leadership positions at Druva, Riverbed, Sun, AOL and at Netscape where he launched several products. Deepak has an MBA from UC, Berkeley and an MS in Computer Science from Cornell University.
3/26/2020 • 14 minutes
1705 Would You Ever Put $1m Of Your Own Money In Before Turning on Revenue?
Scott grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia and studied business at PSU. After working as a 3D VFX Artist, Scott ventured into manufacturing, wholesale and distribution of electronic novelties. During the recession Scott realized that business had changed forever and in order to compete businesses were going to need a whole new set of tools. This gave rise to Sellution.
3/25/2020 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1704 Virus Hits, He's Burning $80k/mo With Just $300k Left in Bank, $3m in ARR, What Should He Do?
Serial entrepreneur with a wide experience in IT domain from software development to services and software/solution sales. +20 years in enterprise service management. Excellent track record of building and leading winning teams. Personal goal: help business leaders to see information technology as an organic and critical part of their businesses, not just hard-to-understand-expensive-techie-driven-cost center.
3/24/2020 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
1703 Virus Will Drive Major Growth at This SaaS Company as Restaurants Move Delivery "In House", $20m+ Revenue
Dhruv serves LogiNext as the CEO and has been recognized as one of the youngest and fastest growing SaaS CEOs in the US. He has previously worked with Deloitte leading consulting assignments for some of the Fortune 500 clients and has extensive experience in advising enterprises and governments on how to rebuild their transportation stack to match the expectations of the new age customer. Under his leadership, LogiNext, has quickly become a household name for companies trying to deliver goods to their customers in a faster, cheaper and better way with the use of AI and enterprise maps. LogiNext currently serves more than 100 large enterprises and has been growing 200% YoY. LogiNext is valued at more than $100mn by marquee investors like Tiger Global Management, Steadview Capital and Alibaba.
3/23/2020 • 9 minutes, 49 seconds
1702 She's About to Pass $1m in ARR in AI Text Analytics Feedback
Dr. Narjès Boufaden is a pioneer and thought leader in the Natural Language Processing field who transitioned from the academic world to run her company. She founded Keatext in 2010 for professional services in AI, then pivoted into a product company in 2015. Narjes is also a contributor at Forbes and a dedicated mentor at Techstar AI.
3/22/2020 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
1701 How He Turned 50k Free Users into $12k in MRR
Vaibhav Domkundwar is an entrepreneur & seed investor with dual bases in Silicon Valley and India. Vaibhav runs Better (the parent company of PicBackMan) which is a micro venture firm that builds & invests in category-defining businesses at the seed stage. Prior to Better, Vaibhav cofounded mobile roaming platform leader Roamware, which was acquired by Audax. Vaibhav is a graduate of University of California at Berkeley and runs marathons to put health & fitness as high up as his work & family.
3/21/2020 • 18 minutes
1700 How A Bootstrapped $3m Revenue CEO Plans to Handle Virus, Potential Cashflow Issues
Steve is the founder and CEO of Badger Maps. After receiving his MBA from Stanford, Steve was Google Enterprise's Top Sales Executive in 2009. In 2012, Steve founded Badger Maps, a software company that helps Field Sales People optimize their routes and schedules to save time and be on time so they can sell more. Steve is also the host of the Outside Sales Talk podcast where he interviews industry experts on their top sales tips.
3/20/2020 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
1699 UserTesting Grabs $100m Series D w/ $84m in Revenues While Rest Of World Virus Panics, How Will CEO Spend Money?
Andy brings 20 years of enterprise SaaS experience to UserTesting. As a former product executive at Oracle and Salesforce, he saw the critical role that customer centricity plays in creating great experiences. By helping companies become more customer-centric, he has grown multiple enterprise SaaS businesses to hundreds of millions of dollars.
3/19/2020 • 20 minutes, 36 seconds
1698 Shift Sells $200m Worth of Cars, Makes $30m, $225m Equity Raised, IPO Next?
George Arison is the co-founder of Shift, an online marketplace disrupting the used car industry. An immigrant from Georgia and lifelong entrepreneur, he also co-founded the first on-demand mobile transportation booking technology Taxi Magic (now known as Curb), as well as working for Google and BCG.
3/18/2020 • 29 minutes, 16 seconds
1697 Opensource Version of Hubspot Moves from Enterprise Service to SMB SaaS
I'm a social entrepreneur and the Co-Founder and CEO of erxes Inc, an open source growth marketing platform. Marketing, sales, and customer service platform designed to help your business attract more engaged customers. I'm passionate about social entrepreneurship and possesses a strong desire to create new solutions to social problems and then implement them on a large scale to change society for the better.
3/17/2020 • 13 minutes, 56 seconds
1696 He Used FB Groups to Get First $3k in MRR
Mike is a jazz musician, smart entrepreneur and maker. He runs a portfolio of software companies including angage.net, scrapebook.net and fbradar.com which are bootstrapped and profitable from day 1. Additionally, Mike runs multiple digital marketing agencies that focus on helping businesses in different niche markets, currently managing more than 100,000 people on different social channels for clients.
3/16/2020 • 13 minutes, 45 seconds
1695 How He Used Video Ads To Get First 450 Customers, $1k in MRR
3/15/2020 • 15 minutes, 49 seconds
1694 How This 28 yo CEO Hit $70k in MRR with Patreon Partnership
Sai Hossain is the CEO of Crowdcast, a live-streaming & webinar platform for professional creators. Born in a small village in Bangladesh, Sai immigrated to the country at a young age and slowly made his way to silicon valley. There he teamed up with some great thinkers to design and build a new way for people to share ideas at scale.
3/14/2020 • 12 minutes, 26 seconds
1693 He Gives Founders a CC, No Personal Gauruntee, Will Pass $1B GMV in 30 Day Period by 2020.
Henrique Dubugras is Co-Founder & CEO of Brex — the first corporate card for startups. A Brazilian entrepreneur, Henrique built payments company Pagar.me — the Stripe of Brazil — when he was 16. In three years, Pagar.me grew to $1.5 billion in volume of transactions processed. Prior to Pagar.me, Henrique built a number of online businesses in Brazil including an education company and a dating application.
3/13/2020 • 15 minutes, 59 seconds
1692 How he Went From Soldier in Afgahnistan to Suriving 2 Failures To Help Non Profits Fundraise
Johns Hopkins. Army Ranger. 27 mo in Afghanistan. UNC MBA. Founder of Stop Soldier Suicide & GoodUnited. Husband & father of two.
3/12/2020 • 11 minutes, 21 seconds
1691 Why This Company Rebranded with $950k Raised Helping Clients Customize Proposals
As ClientPoint’s President & CEO, Andy is a seasoned venture-backed high growth leader, with extensive board and operational experience. He has led the growth of large-scale digital media, SaaS, IoT, mobile and app businesses in the B2C and B2B sectors. Andy began his business career at NBC/GE after completing a successful career as a professional basketball player in Europe.
3/11/2020 • 19 minutes, 20 seconds
1690 How He's Pivoting from $1m ARR SaaS To Consumer Data Play
Blake Smith is founder and CEO of Cladwell, a digital closet manager. Cladwell's goal is to manage the world's closets, by helping people do more with less. Cladwell resides at the intersection between math and art - much like Blake - who used his background in computational mathematics as a hedge fund analyst before joining the founding team of an agency that produced movies for Walmart, P&G, and many other Fortune 500 brands. In addition to Cladwell, Blake and his wife Chandler raise and homeschool 4 kids.
3/10/2020 • 14 minutes, 59 seconds
1689 Why he Left MINDBODY To Build This Data Visualization Tech for SMB's
Andres is the CEO and Founder of iKizmet that delivers business analytics and insights to boutique fitness studio owners. With over 500,000 business in the fitness and wellness space iKizmet is making valuable data analysis tools affordable for small business owners to help them make data driven decisions faster without the complexity while helping to grow their businesses. Andres has been in the fitness and wellness space for over 15 years and was a founding member at MINDBODY helping build a world class sales and business development organization.
3/9/2020 • 13 minutes, 41 seconds
1688 How He Leases Computing Power to Rendering Studios
Technical background, started as software developer. Co-founded my first business in 2001, entrepreneur since then. Went from startup owner to executive in a multi-national company, then back to startup founder. Now CEO of RenderStreet, backed by advanced tech and dedicated to reducing the stress levels of 3D artists and studios worldwide.
3/8/2020 • 10 minutes, 2 seconds
1687 When Programmatic Bidding Reaches OTTs Like Sling, Roku, He Makes Money
I am the Founder and Product leader at Brandzooka. I develop and scale web services that disrupt and delight. I build teams and create the space for people to deliver extraordinary results and develop Market Product Fit. I write for publications such as AdAge and DowJones and speak regularly on subjects ranging from Entrepreneurship and Ad Tech, to Agile and Product development practices for organizations such as Stanford GSB and IDEO.
3/7/2020 • 17 minutes, 39 seconds
1686 How He Sold His First $1m ARR Company
Dropped out of college to start the worlds largest answering service, left after 12 years to start an accounting software company, sold that and is now helping marketing agencies close more leads to customers through automation. Live in Eugene, Oregon, married with a 6-year old son.
3/6/2020 • 10 minutes, 39 seconds
1685 Why Data CEO Turned Down $35M Offer, Would Never Work for Facebook
Mayukh has been working in the Technology industry, specifically cyber security, Identity and Access Management, and data security for the past decade and a half. He has been part of multiple successful startups as an early employee before he ventured out on his own. He has also consulted for Fortune 500 companies such as TD Bank, RBC, ING, and IBM.
3/5/2020 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
1684 With $60M in ARR, How Braze Drives Serious Expansion Revenue on Old Cohorts
As CEO and Cofounder of Braze (formerly Appboy), Bill is humanizing connections between brands and customers at a global scale. By streamlining customers’ past, present, and future data in an interactive feedback loop, Braze allows brands to take immediate actions on insights – creating personalized messaging experiences.
3/4/2020 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
1683 Why He Used Affiliates To Get First $20k in MRR
Justin Burns is a serial entrepreneur who with just a few hundred dollars and no college degree when he got started and launched his second SAAS platform Miestro- An online course platform that allows for course creators to get their course up fast.
3/3/2020 • 14 minutes, 13 seconds
1682 How He Helps Small Instagram Influencers Make Big Bucks from Major Brands
Born and raised in Puerto Rico previous owner of SociallyRich took up to $50k MRR moved to Austin. SociallyRich got shut down by Facebook and built Trend.io within the same year.
3/2/2020 • 15 minutes, 24 seconds
1681 Why This $5m Legal Compliance Software is Looking for a $5m Bridge Round
Jaideep is the CEO of Legasis, a market leader in Legal & Compliance Solutions. He is an executive program graduate from Stanford University & repatriated to India in 2012. Jaideep has 21 years of experience & has held leadership positions with organizations like Thomson Reuters. He holds a patent in AI & is a hobby macro-economist.
3/1/2020 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
1680 Why Even After Raising $1.4M, $180k MRR CEO Having Trouble Hiring Developers in Finland
Serial entrepreneur with a wide experience in IT domain from software development to services and software/solution sales. +15 years in service management. Excellent track record of building and leading winning teams. Personal goal: help business leaders to see Information Technology as an organic and critical part of their businesses, not just hard-to-understand-expensive-techie-driven-cost center.
2/29/2020 • 17 minutes, 8 seconds
1679 Why He's Ok Burning $7k/mo In The Early Days
We launched ipgeolocation.io in June 2018 and have 100 paid customers and 3000+ developers actively using us. We handle more than 100 million requests every month.
2/28/2020 • 12 minutes, 49 seconds
1678 How He Helps 1000 Companiees Measure Straetgy, Bootstrapped, $450k in MRR
After seeing first-hand how bad most organizations are at taking their strategy from PowerPoint to reality, I wanted to see if we could build an affordable technology solution to solve the problem.
2/27/2020 • 12 minutes, 4 seconds
1677 50% Of The UK Police Force Use This Recruiting Tool, $13m ARR
Jeanette Maister is Managing Director and Head of Americas at Oleeo. At Oleeo, Maister drives growth, influences the product and helps customers leverage technology to transform their recruiting efforts. Prior to Oleeo, Jeanette spent most of her career as a recruiting practitioner holding leadership roles at Credit Suisse, Lehman Brothers, IBM, and Gartner. A graduate of Washington University in St. Louis with an MBA in Management from Columbia Business School, Jeanette was recognized as a 2018 IT Women of the Year finalist. She also received the Stevie silver 2017 Female Executive of the Year and the 2017 SmartCEO Brava Award.
2/26/2020 • 18 minutes, 52 seconds
1676 Why 850 Farmers Pay Him $127k/mo To Manage Livestock Feeding
Dane is a PLA co-founder who brings a breadth of experience and vision to Performance Livestock Analytics. Dane currently owns a progressive agricultural enterprise that consists of row crops and livestock based in Northern Iowa. With the Agricultural experience, Dane brings visionary insights to PLA with his prior experience in precision ag software. Dane most recently leads Iteris as the Sales Director for the agricultural division of ClearAg. Prior to ClearAg, Dane led the business development efforts in the midwest as the Regional Sales Manager at The Climate Corporation, formerly WeatherBill, assisting in scaling the team and sales from a 27 person start up company to a 700 employee company that was acquired by Monsanto for 930 million. Dane has participated in many Agtech venues such as Agstar Technolodge, Global Ag Investment Conference, Ag Innovation Showcase, InfoAg, World Agritech Conference, Agri Innovation Forum.
2/25/2020 • 17 minutes, 16 seconds
1675 Doesn't The CEO Have to Be The First Salesperson?
Founder, CEO, Marketer, and Architect of Thapos - sports management platform. I have over 18 years of experience in IT industry as a technology startup founder, software architect, product manager, marketer, and software engineer. I have experienced in all aspects of software development life cycle. I have designed and developed marketing management applications, financial applications, and web-based consumer applications. As a leader or team member, I love to work with teams. I truly believe in teamwork. I am an extremely energetic and highly motivated individual with excellent analytical, organizational and adaptive skills with a passion, to get things done. I enjoy playing and watching sports, working with kids, history, internet, and some television. As an entrepreneur, my first startup was a failure, which only made me stronger. I learned a lot of valuable lessons in this failure. Thapos is my second startup which is going strong. My current team really functions like a team. At Thapos, we all are determined to make it happen and take it to the next level and I am loving every minute of this exciting journey.
2/24/2020 • 15 minutes, 1 second
1674 The Weird FB Ad Headline He Uses to Sell his Rental Management Software
Alexander is co-founder and CEO of Syncbnb. Since 1995 he has worked as a web designer, web developer, project manager and team leader, SEO/SEM specialist and social media manager before moving on to C level positions in large tech corporations in Greece. He recently left a Managing Partner position in the largest online services group in Greece to start Syncbnb with his co-founder Petros.
2/23/2020 • 9 minutes, 57 seconds
1673 How He Sells $600/mo Software to Museums
Brendan Ciecko is the founder and CEO of Cuseum, a platform that helps museums and cultural organizations engage their visitors, members, and patrons. Ciecko has been building technology since the age of 11 and has been recognized by Inc. Magazine as being one of America’s top entrepreneurs under 30. Ciecko has been featured in The New York Times, WIRED, Fast Company, Entrepreneur, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, and PC Magazine for his work in design, technology, and business. https://brendanciecko.com/about/
2/22/2020 • 15 minutes, 21 seconds
1672 How This Lawyer Pivoted from IP Protection to CAD Editing with NASA
Forbes 30 Under 30 winner. Successful serial entrepreneur in B2B technology development and SaaS companies. Law degree from University of Heidelberg in Germany. Member of National Small Business Association's Leadership Council
2/21/2020 • 17 minutes, 20 seconds
1671 Why He's Planning to Raise $500k When He's Profitable, 10% EBITDA Margin
Retail Guru that has helped many retailers achieve a 360 degree view of the Customer in an Omni Channel world. Specialist in leveraging data and analytics to increase profitable sales. Implement Strategies and Tactics to compete with Amazon and on-line market places.
2/20/2020 • 11 minutes, 59 seconds
1670 How This 24 Year Old Built a $12M ARR Company on $4m Raised in Influencer Marketing Attribution Space
Jesse is the founder of NeoReach. Jesse is a mentor to the Alchemist Accelerator, a Thiel Fellow, and a frequent guest lecturer at Stanford and USC. NeoReach has generated $10’s of Millions in revenue from customers like Walmart, Amazon and NBC
2/19/2020 • 15 minutes, 8 seconds
1669 Weird Way He Gets Customers, $1m in ARR for Data Pipeline Visibility
Paul Lappas is the CEO and Co-Founder of intermix.io. He holds multiple patents for cloud computing and performance analytics. In 2007 he co-founded GoGrid, one of the early cloud computing companies, which he grew from to over $50M in ARR.
2/18/2020 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
1668 How He Got His First $1k in MRR Using Linkedin Sales Navigator
Went from identifying as a basketball player to graduating as a nuclear engineer. Worked in the nuclear industry, got an MBA, joined a fast-growing tech company and lived in 7 countries while doing so. I love art and experimenting with food, and founded Mela with two of my best friends.
2/17/2020 • 13 minutes, 3 seconds
1667 Top Tech Journalist Predicts We'll All Be Unemployed, Blockchain Takeover, Less Taxes!
Michael S. Malone was the world's first daily high-tech reporter, and he remains one of Silicon Valley's best-known journalists. He is the author or coauthor of nearly thirty books, including The Virtual Corporation with William Davidow.
2/16/2020 • 30 minutes, 10 seconds
1666 How He Got 200 E-Retailers to Pay $300/mo For One Click Management of Amazon, Etsy, Other Channels
Alan has over seventeen years of experience in building technology for a number of high growth start-ups in finance and shopping television. As CTO Alan has successfully built the technology of four start-ups involved in the first meeting to fund raising/turnover in excess of GBP 10 million and been involved in other successful start-ups. Systems designed by Alan are used in major corporations including Deutsche Bank and process millions of transactions annually.
2/15/2020 • 13 minutes, 55 seconds
1665 How He's Using Government Loans to Build $50k MRR Visual Communication Tool for Construction Teams
Wherever he worked and whatever he worked with, his goal has always been to make things easier, faster and better. Some might call this lazy, Tom-Erik uses the title «Simplifying Evangelist". Now that smartphones are approaching a penetration of 90% in Norway and most other developed countries, it is time to use them for something smart! He also has a wife, two kids, a cat and an electric car... Do you know how to make your work faster, easier and better? Call me and let us find it out!
2/14/2020 • 16 minutes, 36 seconds
1664 Travel Expense App Hits 6500 Customers, but ARPU data makes no sense
MBA ESSEC (France). Started his career in 2000 in the Consulting Industry (Strategy & Management). Moved to the corporate travel industry in 2005 (heading the consulting departments of CarlsonWagonlitTravel and then American Express GBT). Hired by Sodexo in 2015 to create a new business line targeting the Mobility services. Created and launched Rydoo in June 2018.
2/13/2020 • 21 minutes, 58 seconds
1663 Why He Thinks Push Notifications Are Future with $35k in MRR, 376 Customers
I'm ambitious and tenacious. I like working and connecting with people and I enjoy the fact that the simple interactions we have with one another can have a big impact. I try to keep that in mind as I go through my day. I've had the privilege of enjoying some terrific success through many of my endeavors but I've also experienced some spectacular failures. Success is my preferred outcome however, in my experience, failure seem to be part of the foundation of success- much to my chagrin.
2/12/2020 • 9 minutes, 6 seconds
1662 How He Turns Your team Into Referral Machine with $65k in MRR
I'm ambitious and tenacious. I like working and connecting with people and I enjoy the fact that the simple interactions we have with one another can have a big impact. I try to keep that in mind as I go through my day. I've had the privilege of enjoying some terrific success through many of my endeavors but I've also experienced some spectacular failures. Success is my preferred outcome however, in my experience, failure seem to be part of the foundation of success- much to my chagrin.
2/11/2020 • 10 minutes, 37 seconds
1661 How Palo Alto Software Broke $14m in ARR Serving SMB's
Sabrina Parsons is CEO of Palo Alto Software, the company behind the best-selling business management software, LivePlan. Palo Alto Software is dedicated to serving the needs of entrepreneurs and small-business owners, and offers an entire suite of software and tools to help startups plan, manage, market, and grow their business. Sabrina has overseen the transformation of Palo Alto Software from a desktop software company to a cloud-based software company.
2/10/2020 • 22 minutes, 10 seconds
1660 Has She Cracked The Code to Selling To Governments?
Catherine is CEO and Co-Founder of CityGrows, the first self-service operating platform for local government, and has extensive experience in startups, digital marketing and civic technology. She created a social impact marketing agency, co-founded Hack for LA, and served as Commissioner for Innovation for Los Angeles.
2/9/2020 • 7 minutes, 51 seconds
1659 How Brazilian SaaS CEO Hit $70k MRR in 12 Months
12 years working in brazilian software industry, first as a marketing professional, and as entrepreneur since 2012. Its CEO and cofounder from Ramper, a B2B prospecting automation software and one of the more fast growing brazillian startup that started in 2016 and today has more than 700 customers.
2/8/2020 • 9 minutes, 39 seconds
1658 Why 142 Production Teams Pay Him $142k/mo For Quicker File Management
Paul has worked with video and big data files for three decades and he understands the complexities of sharing those files. His experience in the broadcasting and cable industry and the contacts he nurtured through the years helped him to establish latakoo inside some of the biggest broadcasting companies. Paul has won numerous awards, including Emmys, for investigative journalism. He has a Bachelor of Journalism from the University of Texas and an MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School with a focus on entrepreneurship.
2/7/2020 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1657 How He Grew $10M ARR on Just $500k Raised
David Hood, CEO of VanillaSoft, is a successful software entrepreneur with extensive international experience in finance, business development, sales, and marketing. Under his leadership, VanillaSoft has grown over the past decade from a small start-up to a leader in the sales engagement market.
2/6/2020 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
1656 With $40m in ARR, He's Helping Office Owners Manage Rooms and Scheduling
Paul Statham, CEO & Founder of Condeco Software, has established several successful and innovative businesses, including two exited companies. He has helped to shape the relationship between real estate and technology, establishing Condeco as one of the foremost providers of workspace management technology.
2/5/2020 • 19 minutes, 16 seconds
1655 How He Got Enterprises To Pay Him $1m in ARR For Snapchat Story Creation
2/4/2020 • 15 minutes, 28 seconds
1654 How He Build Astrology API SaaS To $45k in MRR
I am a technopreneur with 8+ years of experience in Product Development and Software Architect. In past, worked with MNCs on embedded and e-learning products. Built an Astrology website when in college and created AstrologyAPI.com in 2016. My areas of expertise include NodeJS, Core JS, Java, Android, PHP, AWS & Machine Learning and now Growth and Sales My interests are in Tech, Philosophy, History, and Astrology.
2/3/2020 • 11 minutes, 14 seconds
1653 Can He Stay Nimble With Deloitte As #1 Investor?
With 17 years leadership experience under his belt and a Ted Rogers MBA specialized in management of technology and innovation (gold medal 2014), Pete is currently CEO of Auvenir, a Deloitte venture that is assisting small to medium audit firms leverage technology to enhance the capabilities of CPAs in the financial audit industry. He is passionate about driving exponential change to for the betterment of all society. He has built and grown a number of businesses globally from launching the first car-sharing operation in Western Australia to steering international growth of a Newfoundland (Canada) natural health product company.
2/2/2020 • 11 minutes, 1 second
1652 Should You Stop $360k Agency to Go All In On New SaaS Product?
Kimia is the Co-founder and CEO of Ghostit (winner of top 10 companies to watch for 2018), speaker, and host of Content and Coffee.
2/1/2020 • 9 minutes, 1 second
1651 Is This a Smart Way to Get First $3k in MRR?
I started my professional life as a venture analyst in an angel investment network. Then, I co-founded a startup studio helping entrepreneurs from ideation to web development with my current partner. Nowadays, I am responsible for the growth and sales of UserGuiding.
1/31/2020 • 10 minutes, 32 seconds
1650 How He Kept Leverage in $15m Raise Despite ARR Being Less Than $25m Raised To Date
Heath Wells is the CEO and Co-Founder of NuORDER, a B2B eCommerce platform that is revolutionizing the wholesale industry. Heath is an entrepreneur at heart, starting his first Internet-based business at the age of 15 in Adelaide, Australia. From 2004-2008, Heath served as the Managing Director at Furst Media in Australia, where he and partner Olivia Skuza led the company to great success across publishing, creative, and digital commerce. Today NuORDER is the leading B2B eCommerce platform. Headquartered in Los Angeles, and with offices in New York and London, NuORDER helps 800+ brands & 260k retailers transact over $2B in GMV annually. Heath’s passion, spirit for positive change, and unrelenting drive have been key factors in NuORDER’s current success, while his natural tendency for big thinking continues to propel the company’s creative innovation and shape the industry.
1/30/2020 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
1649 How He's Making Push Notifications Smarters, $75k in MRR, 35 Enterprise Customers
David is CEO of OpenBack, the mobile engagement platform which uses edge computing and machine learning to make push notifications smarter. David also co-founded www.ding.com, the $500m business that enables millions online and from 600k+ stores top-up the family of a loved one back home in over 120 countries.
1/29/2020 • 13 minutes, 35 seconds
1648 How He Spun $4m ARR Influencer Marketing SaaS Out of Agency
1/28/2020 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
1647 How He Plans to Beat Basecamp and Monday
Ravikiran Annaswamy is Founder and CEO of Innohabit Technologies. He is incubating various innovative products using analytics and deep learning. His current business focus is on bringing Electric Mobility to Indian market and has launched various technology products like Fulcharge.com in this space. He works closely with global programs like Founders Institute (Fi.Co) and Unreasonable Institute as Mentor and Coach for early stage startups. He is on the global team of IEEE 5G and is responsible for vision & strategy for future applications and services like Tactile/Haptic Internet, IOT, AR, VR Applications. He has over 23 years of business experience as Entrepreneur and as Business Leader at Nokia Siemens Networks and Siemens AG. He was Business Head for Indian market, led Global Product Management and was General Manager for BSS Solutions. He championed Intrapreneurship by working as Innovation head for Bangalore site of Nokia Siemens Networks. He is a thought leader and speaker at various prestigious international business conferences. He has done his MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore and has graduated from UVCE Bangalore.
1/27/2020 • 10 minutes, 39 seconds
1646 Why 900 SaaS CEO's Put $200m in ARR Through Him Every Year
Christian Owens is the founder and CEO of Paddle. Prior to Paddle, Christian created his first software business from his bedroom at the age of 14. Having grown the business to over $1m in revenue he decided to quit school at 16 to focus on building startups, and founded Paddle when he turned 18.
1/26/2020 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
1645 How This $50k MRR Company Tells You Who's Sharing Your Links on Whatsapp Private Messages
João Romão, 30, is the founder of GetSocial.io a content & social analytics platform that helps companies like Adobe, AT&T, Sky News and MTV to better understand how audiences share their content. João is a member of the World Economic Forum (Global Shaper) and a board advisor at CIONET.
1/25/2020 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
1644 How He Hit Cash Flow Positive, 35 Customers, and $2M in ARR
Maarten is founder and CEO of Limecraft, dedicated to giving media professionals the best possible solution to manage their digital workflows. Prior to this, as a programme manager for the R&D department of VRT (the Belgian public service broadcaster), he introduced several innovative technologies in the business, including Artificial Intelligence for computer assisted manufacturing and automatic indexing of audiovisual media. These experiences eventually led to the incorporation of Limecraft and its unique selling proposition. Author of several distinguished publications and often invited as a speaker to conferences, Maarten is an acknowledged subject matter expert on a range of topics including multimedia techniques, semantic technologies and media production infrastructure. Relying on his critical appreciation of current and future trends, and capitalising on his extensive experience as a systems architect, he strives to move media technology beyond the state of the art.
1/24/2020 • 15 minutes, 38 seconds
1643 How His Fathers Death Helped Him Grow $0 to $50k in MRR in 8 Months
Recovering lawyer (degrees from Universidad Francisco Marroquin in Guatemala and Duke in the US, accredited to practice in Guatemala and NY). Investpreneur (investor and entrepreneur). Co-Founder at Nahual Ventures, ExeBoard, Edoo, and SoyFri. Dreamer. Guatemalan born and living in New York. I serve as Board Member in my family's business since 2015, as well as in the Guatemalan Stock Exchange, two startups, and Fundegua, a Foundation I co-founded aimed at promoting culturally and research driven aid in education and health in Guatemala and as a Trustee at Universidad Francisco Marroquin. This experiences gave me the insights and understanding to co-found ExeBoard.
1/23/2020 • 14 minutes, 21 seconds
1642 How He Spent $150k To Buy Struggling SaaS Copmany, Now At $5M in ARR
Business leader and entrepreneur building motivated team in high energy business. Owner of SHE Software Ltd, fast growing SaaS solution to health and safety challenges. Leader in UK, entering US - home in Scotland and Chicago. Previously CEO and consultant (McKinsey), member of Prime Minister's policy team. MBA from INSEAD and BA from Oxford.
1/22/2020 • 11 minutes, 55 seconds
1641 How He Helps Medical Devices Get To Market Faster, 0-$1m in ARR in 12 Months
Jared Seehafer is the CEO and Cofounder of Enzyme, a software company that automates life science regulatory approval and compliance. He is a 12 year veteran of the medical device and biopharma industries, having worked or consulted at organizations ranging from Amgen, Abbott and Medtronic to seed-stage startups.
1/21/2020 • 15 minutes, 8 seconds
1640 How He's Scaled to $200k in MRR off $200/mo Plans
Marc Rutzen is the CoFounder and CEO of Enodo, an automated underwriting platform for multifamily real estate. Enodo helps users analyze more deals in less time and make better investment decisions backed by data science. Utilizing machine learning, the platform collects, cleans and analyzes real-time multifamily rent and availability data from over two million properties nationwide. Marc oversees Enodo’s data science, engineering and business teams to continually develop and release industry changing features. Marc is a Licensed Managing Broker in the State of Illinois and earned his Master of Science in Real Estate Development from Columbia University.
1/20/2020 • 12 minutes, 5 seconds
1639 How This Company Hit $10M Valuation Serving Real Estate Value Investors
Marc Rutzen is the CoFounder and CEO of Enodo, an automated underwriting platform for multifamily real estate. Enodo helps users analyze more deals in less time and make better investment decisions backed by data science. Utilizing machine learning, the platform collects, cleans and analyzes real-time multifamily rent and availability data from over two million properties nationwide. Marc oversees Enodo’s data science, engineering and business teams to continually develop and release industry changing features. Marc is a Licensed Managing Broker in the State of Illinois and earned his Master of Science in Real Estate Development from Columbia University.
1/19/2020 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
1638 How He Makes Universities More Money By Keeping Students From Flunking
Ethan Keiser is the CEO and founder of StudyTree, an app leveraging artificial intelligence to provide students with a mobile academic assistant. He received his B.S from Drexel University in Computer Science before founding StudyTree. Ethan has won various business plan competitions including the Microsoft Imagine Cup and Dell Innovation Award, and regularly speaks about artificial intelligence at top education conferences. When not working on StudyTree, he spends time weightlifting and hiking. He is fluent in 7 languages: English and six computer languages.
1/18/2020 • 11 minutes, 28 seconds
1637 The Art of Shifting $60M in 1991 Revenue to Pure SaaS
Robert Alves - Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO of Advanced Solutions International (ASI) – is a dynamic, entrepreneurial leader who has grown the company from its beginnings in 1991 to become the leading and largest supplier worldwide of software to non-profit organizations. With offices on three continents, and more than 4,000 clients served, Alves has kept ASI in the forefront by consistently making innovative solution-oriented decisions on behalf of its clients.
1/17/2020 • 15 minutes, 21 seconds
1636 How 3 Month Old Harvestr Is Thinkng About Its First Paywall
I am the cofounder and CEO of Harvestr, a product management platform for customer-driven teams. I have a double background in business and engineering and I have worked in various industries : smartphones, environmental services and even in the French public administration. I am also a soccer player and DJ.
1/16/2020 • 9 minutes, 49 seconds
1635 How He Plans to Get Churn Under 30% Annually in Event SaaS Space
Aaron Lifshin is the CEO and founder of MeetingPulse. He has a 20-year track record creating and managing award-winning technical teams in the US and the UK. Successful exit: XLN Telecom, as CTO. Aaron is passionate about genuine human communication in all forms. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College.
1/15/2020 • 18 minutes, 43 seconds
1634 Why This Founder Knows He Has To be 100% Owner (And Thats Not a Bad Thing)
Built two profitable startups and then sold them (one e-commerce national, and one international). The last startup I've got VC investment without meeting the investors, I've incorporated in Ireland without ever going to Ireland, I've run an 8 people team all remote, became profitable and sold it in 2017. I like going from 0 to 1. I've been in two accelerators.
1/14/2020 • 12 minutes, 53 seconds
1633 Why He's Going $100k+ ACV From Day 1 in Recruiting Diversity Space
Scot is co-founder and CEO at TalVista. He brings more than 25 years of business management and leadership experience from fast paced startup companies. Previously, Scot ran his own consultancy focusing on marketing strategy serving fast paced startups in the HCM space. Prior to that, Scot was senior director at HireVue. Scot is a serial entrepreneur having started several businesses over his diverse career. Scot is most passionate about helping people and seeing them succeed and realizing even more than they thought possible.
1/13/2020 • 14 minutes, 49 seconds
1632 How He Got 1000 Customers from 42,000 Free Users, $150k in MRR
Lionel Roux, Engineer + MBA graduate, my career started in Japan working for Total (oil). Then, I created Nutec (racing fuels) in Southern California that I sold three years later. After graduation, I worked as a strategy consultant. In 2011, I created Wimi which makes teamwork fun and efficient.
1/12/2020 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
1631 His Argument For Moving from SaaS to On Prem
Startup Founder, Digital Entrepreneur, and Product Executive, Zoltan hails from Hungary where he began his career in marketing and business development working for major brands such as T-Mobile, HBO, and Google (eventually as their initial Country Manager). After having worked 4 years in beautiful Barcelona, Zoltan now is co-founder & CEO of Gitential, a software development analytics platform.
1/11/2020 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
1630 How He Used Linkedin To Close First 15 Customers, $45k in MRR for Debt Collection SaaS
Intrepid entrepreneur, explorer and video-gamer, Pedro has been in the startup world for 10 years having co-founded 4 projects and 2 successful exits mostly in the B2B space. His passion for collective sports and traveling has given him a broad perspective of the world, which he uses to daily guide his business towards, success...hopefully
1/10/2020 • 12 minutes, 25 seconds
1629 Will a Rebrand Help this $500k MRR Company Break 30% YoY Growth?
1628 How He Used Singularity University To Get 17 Customers, $1M in ARR In 5 Months
Sean Hinton is Founder and CEO of SkyHive (www.skyhive.io), a Canadian technology company that applies machine/deep learning to discovering revolutionary efficiencies in the movement of human capital. Sean is a future of work thought leader, and passionate about applying SkyHive’s technology to support the workforce’s most at-risk populations.
1/8/2020 • 14 minutes, 16 seconds
1627 How He Spent $200k/mo To Build $9M ARR Workflow Automation Software
Suresh Sambandam is the Founder & CEO of OrangeScape, makers of KiSSFLOW, a disruptive, SaaS-based enterprise-level work automation and collaboration platform with more than 10,000 customers across 160 countries. He is an expert and renowned entrepreneur on a mission to democratize automation and create immersive work experience for enterprises of all sizes.
1/7/2020 • 12 minutes, 57 seconds
1626 How He's Making $5m in ARR off $35M in GMV From B2C ECommerce Brands
Ciaran steers the ship at Kooomo HQ, has spent over 20 years growing and developing internationally focused online media and digital commerce businesses. Since taking the helm in 2016, Kooomo has made it into the Gartner Magic Quadrant for digital commerce 2017 and is now positioned to service clients in the B2C market as well as cater to the explosive growth in the B2B eCommerce space.
1/6/2020 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1625 How $31M ARR CEO Profits $500k/mo and Cracked SMB Net Retention of 110%
Founder & CEO of Odoo.
1/5/2020 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
1624 Why This Founder is Totally Happy Running 2 Businesses At Once
Jack of some trades, master of a couple. I'm a builder by instinct, manager by heart, and a marketer by necessity. I love writing code, assembling teams, and measuring growth. I built Parrot QA to scratch an itch - functional testing is a headache, and customers hate bugs. There has to be a better way!
1/4/2020 • 17 minutes, 18 seconds
1623 How He Plans to Beat Facebook at Work with $90k From Friends and Family
Sean is the CEO and co-founder of Unaty. Having worked as a web designer, developer, and enterprise software consultant, he now spends his days helping community leaders inspire action and members find and follow their passion. He's always excited to talk to people passionate about building a better future!
1/3/2020 • 14 minutes, 34 seconds
1622 Can You Help This Devleoper Figure Out Distribution in Recruiting Software Space?
Adrian Russo is a talent acquisition professional, who leverages his software development background to help organizations find talent. He is a Co-founder and Developer of RecruitLocator, a SaaS-based open-web, resume search tool. Adrian led technical recruiting at various organizations including National Institutes of Health, Discovery Communications, and Department of Defense. Adrian is featured in the upcoming Amazon Prime docufilm, “the Art of Recruiting.”
1/2/2020 • 18 minutes, 20 seconds
1621 The Unique Way He Plans to Go from $312 Million to $1 Billion
Serial entrepreneur and author Brian Scudamore pioneered the industry of professional junk removal with 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, turning a chore people avoid into an exceptional customer service experience. Then he scaled that success into three more brands, WOW 1 DAY PAINTING, You Move Me, and Shack Shine.
1/1/2020 • 20 minutes, 28 seconds
1620 How He's Managing 15% Monthly Churn, $250k in MRR
Dave Kearney is the founder of www.fluidui.com, a software prototyping tool that has helped over a quarter of a million product managers, entrepreneurs and product visionaries to create and communicate their ideas. He cares most about great usability, efficient product development processes and socially responsible companies.
12/31/2019 • 13 minutes, 33 seconds
1619 How He Got first 120 Customers, $10k in MRR Selling Into Industry You Wouldn't Expect
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeljasonprince/ With WalletCard occupational health & safety records are easily & automatically updated to reduce the administrative burden of training management. With a collaborative digital safety record at its core: the technology eliminates manual tracking of fragmented paper records by consolidating all documentation into one cloud solution to prove due diligence. The Platform is a lost-cost solution leveraging platform-mediated growth between users as 3rd party training providers issue Verified digital occupational H&S records inviting new companies to utilize the platform by cross integrating with existing systems (HR/ERP)- reducing administration of onboarding data.
12/30/2019 • 10 minutes, 34 seconds
1618 He's Build a $500k ARR Company Serving As POS For Latin American Owned Restaurants
Sabor POS is the premier restaurant software on the Windows Store, #1 most downloaded Restaurant POS for Windows 10. Sabor POS provides all the features you need to fully automate your ordering and accept customer payments
12/29/2019 • 12 minutes, 19 seconds
1617 How He Closed 50,000 Seat Deals on Day 1
James Sturges has a strong software engineering and product design background, having led several teams in building enterprise software. He is Co-Founder and VP of Product at Audseb, focusing on building better knowledge management and support tools for employees. James is an avid golfer, adventurous traveler, and passionate problem solver.
12/28/2019 • 19 minutes, 49 seconds
1616 Why Navy Vet Joined 7 Year Old SaaS Company With No Revenue
Royal Naval Officer for 10 yrs - mission critical leadership in submarine service & gulf war. Lead operational component of transformation of FFastFill from marketcap £1.7m ISV to £106 SAAS vendor. Led EMEA transformation of Datawatch from desktop monarch vendor to full suite analytics offering. Now developing AI powered offering to transform the business users interact with IT.
12/27/2019 • 12 minutes, 16 seconds
1615 Secrets to Cold Traffic to Demo to Sales Funnel with $1.8m ARR SalesProcess CEO
Nick Kozmin B.Sc. Engineering Physics Founder of Salesprocess.io ($0-$1.8M run rate. Bootstrapped. 1 Commission-based employee) Helping 250 SaaS and high-ticket service companies scale up. Banked first milly by 27 YO from scratch.
12/26/2019 • 15 minutes, 7 seconds
1614 Why 100 Enterprises Pay Him $3m ARR So Employees Can Record Training Videos
Sebastian Walker is the CEO of SlidePresenter, a digital knowledge transfer software. Sebastian studied business economy and worked at major consultancies. Looking to revolutionize the internal knowledge flow for corporations globally, he founded SlidePresenter in 2011, an intuitive solution that empowers any employee to create training videos within minutes.
12/25/2019 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
1613 Can He Build a $100M Company Selling $100k ACV Plans to So Few Customers?
Eric is the CEO of streamdata.io. He was a founding team member at Internet Way (French B2B ISP, sold to UUnet) then Radianz (Global Finance Cloud, sold to BT). He is a High Frequency Trading infrastructure expert, passionate about Fintech, IoT and Cleantech. Eric looks after 3 bozons and has worked in San Francisco, NYC, Mexico and now Paris.
12/24/2019 • 15 minutes, 29 seconds
1612 How He Used SEO To Scale To $150k MRR In Team Time Management Space
Co-founder of Resource Guru - an online team calendar that's changing the way teams manage their time. Follower of all things digital. Part-time eco-warrior.
12/23/2019 • 16 minutes, 14 seconds
1611 The Mobile Testing App Starbucks Uses Passes $6m in ARR, Bootstrapped
I have been working in enterprise IT for more than two decades. For the last 10 years I moved to entrepreneurial side and brought a talented team together to build Netmera to revolutionalize mobile app engagement, campaigning and communications. We are still working hard to expand Netmera into other regions and reach many apps while we currently touch more than 150 million app users monthly.
12/22/2019 • 13 minutes, 7 seconds
1610 How This Founding Team of 2 Peacefully Removed 3rd CoFounder
During college: 24 hackathons, 200 job applications, 0 callbacks - made a recruiting "hack". VC firm awarded grant + we raised preseed. 1.5 years, no traction, pivoted to video interviewing platform from pilot feedback. Closed paying clients + won grant w/ angel match within 2 months, focused on getting to 10k MRR ASAP.
12/21/2019 • 14 minutes, 9 seconds
1609 How This MarTech Tool Got First 8 Customers , $40k in Monthly Revenue
Founder and CEO Tal Zohar has successful experience in developing 4 tech businesses, with +$100M exit, one unicorn IPO in NYSE. He also established the AI division at a FTSE250 Fintech enterprise, valued $300M by Barclays, and was member of management and led digital transformation at the London Stock exchange.
12/20/2019 • 14 minutes, 2 seconds
1608 How He's Raising $1.5m on $6m Pre With $16k in MRR
Launched in 2016, Rheaply Asset Exchange Manager is the easiest way that professionals share resources with anyone in their industry. By connecting leading research institutions, Fortune 500 companies, startups, school systems, nonprofits, and organizations in between, Rheaply is creating a shared economy for innovation.
12/19/2019 • 12 minutes, 21 seconds
1607 Why She Said No To Vista Equity Despite $10m in ARR
Lauren is Founder of iVvy, a multi-award winning Technology company providing enterprise software to the Events industry. Since its 2009 launch, Lauren has overseen iVvy’s continued growth and global expansion to APAC, Europe and North America, offering the world’s first real-time marketplace with live availability for function space and suppliers.
12/18/2019 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
1606 The Right Way To Use Venture Debt to Hit $320k in MRR
With 25 plus years of experience in building, designing and implementing strategic marketing programs I am a firm believer in asking “why” and challenging industry norms. Throughout my career, I have been fortunate to have worked with several great companies in the technology, consumer product, automotive, hospitality and entertainment sectors each with a unique set of demands and needs. I have taken this collective experience into my role as CEO with AislePlanner, where my focus has been on creating a solid corporate foundation, developing our brand DNA and delivering the highest quality customer experience through best in class product.
12/17/2019 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
1605 How He Gets Movers, Trash Companies, Internet Providers To Pay Him Referral Fees on 13,000+ New Home Owners
Venkatesh is the founder of MoveEasy. He founded MoveEasy as a result of his own moving experience 5 years ago. Prior to that, he was a consultant with A.T.Kearney, a management consulting firm in Chicago. He is a proud Buckeye and lives in Columbus, Ohio with his wife.
12/16/2019 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1604 Would You Sell "One Time For Life" Plans If You're Trying to Build an Enduring SaaS Company?
Founder, CEO at Plutio.com
12/15/2019 • 16 minutes, 56 seconds
1603 How She Used a Tracking Watch To Get Her First 1000 Customers, $20k MRR
Karen Cantwell is a born innovator. In 2014 she launched TicTocTrack® - the first GPS smart watch globally for children, following up with a bespoke software-monitoring platform. That platform now hosts multiple GPS devices providing one platform for the safety of all the family. Karen hold’s a MBA from QUT.
12/14/2019 • 12 minutes, 6 seconds
1602 How He Used Dev Shop Agency to Launch ECommerce AI Tool and Get 36 First Customers
Frank is an Entrepreneur and a Technologist. Frank has launched 100s of sites, 50+ apps, 10s of digital products, launched 9 businesses (4 for himself), delivered a line of high-end beverages to market, and consulted in the finance and technology industries.
12/13/2019 • 14 minutes, 6 seconds
1601 If All Content Becomes 3d With AR, VR, This CEO Will Be At The Center Of It
Sai Krishna is often described as an accidental entrepreneur. As an engineering undergrad, Sai built his first startup in the education technology space to power thousands of students to better use tablet PCs. Since then, he's founded, invested and mentored startups all through, particularly in the technology space. He is also an alumnus of stanford university graduate school of business, and the founder of scapic, a cloud based virtual and augmented reality content platform helping businesses and users generate AR/VR experiences without coding. Scapic was a part of Y combinator startup school, and was recently recognized by Facebook as one of India's top VR/AR startups, in their school of innovation program.
12/12/2019 • 16 minutes, 59 seconds
1600 He Makes His Team Only Work 4 Days A Week Even If You Think Its Wrong
Benjamin Ellis has worked with companies including Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks during their fastest periods of growth. He is a technologist and serial entrepreneur who has worked at the cutting edge of technology over three decades and is passionate about what technology can achieve, particularly at the intersection of people, data and software.
12/11/2019 • 17 minutes, 16 seconds
1599 How to Spin a Company Out and Run It Yourself, Even if You Have No Control To Start
Bohumil studied Innovation and Operation Management in Copenhagen. He went on to work at West Virginia University Innovation center, where he was in charge of their marketing strategy. In March 2016, he returned to Slovakia, where he got an offer to join the team at Triad Advertising and take over their internal software Kontentino. After just 2 years, he and his team were able to get Kontentino into more than 800 agencies and brands around the world--Today, the software is used by famous brands, such as ASAHI beer and Volvo, as well as advertising agencies like BBDO, Ogilvy, or VML.
12/10/2019 • 8 minutes, 34 seconds
1598 Mom of 2 Transitions $250k Agency to $23k/mo SaaS for Consumer Video Reviews
Bernadette Butler has 20 years experience in advertising working with some of the greatest brands of our time. With 2 ads on the world’s funniest reel, Bernadette is the CEO and co-founder of StoryTap, a DIY video platform for marketers to direct, own, and micro-influence authentic video stories at scale.
12/9/2019 • 11 minutes, 33 seconds
1597 How He Used a Search Fund To Build $7m ARR Company, Low Risk
Will Bressman is the CEO of RIA in a Box and a former manager of business development at LX.TV, a digital media content provider acquired by NBC Universal in 2008, where he brokered distribution and content partnerships. Prior to LX.TV, Bressman worked on strategy and analytics projects at Good Morning America. Bressman holds an MBA from the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University and is a graduate of Harvard College magna cum laude with a degree in History.
12/8/2019 • 18 minutes, 44 seconds
1596 How He Got His First 700 Customers at $2/seat for Scrum Slack Bot
Since 16 I earn money online, at 34 haven’t worked for anyone. In 2014 I moved to the south of Russia to open a co-working space by the sea. Later, it became a school of robotics for children. In 2016 I co-founded Standuply, one of the most popular Slack bots.
12/7/2019 • 10 minutes, 12 seconds
1595 Chegg Founder's New SaaS Company Breaks $7m ARR To Help CNBC Communicate
Osman Rashid, winner of the prestigious Ernst & Young California Entrepreneur of the Year (2009), was the co-founder and CEO of online textbook rental and student hub Chegg ($chgg), remaining involved in it until early 2010 after dramatically growing the company from its inception in 2005. Currently, he is the CEO of Convo Corp, an enterprise software company that focuses on In-Context collaboration that replaces email as the conversation tool at work.
12/6/2019 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
1594 The Main Reason He Took $1.5m Government Loan at 4% Instead of VC
SaaS Founder with a passion for Employee Engagement. Ex-Google Sales Manager focused to make feedback better for everyone. Living in Amsterdam, father of two daughters.
12/5/2019 • 17 minutes, 11 seconds
1593 Why His SMB Churn is 6% When Everyone Elses is 12% doing $12m in ARR across 5000 Salon Owners
Co-founder of Demonware (Matchmaking service used in Call of Duty) that was acquired in 2007. Then founded Phorest on Evergreen principles - building company to last for generations. Over 70 of the 150 employees are ordinary share holders (not options). Phorest is now serving over 5,000 salons and is the leading salon software platform in Europe.
12/4/2019 • 17 minutes, 40 seconds
1592 Why This $12m ARR Company Had To Pivot Away From Just Live Chat, Rely on $100k+ ACV American Customers
Nicolas de Rosen, CEO of iAdvize North America
12/3/2019 • 19 minutes, 2 seconds
1591 How She Started as An Employee, Then Moved to Owner
Business Developer graduated in International Relations and Masters in Political Sciences, I’m a digital nomad, yogi and supporter of a plant-based life. Brazilian, 28 y/o, living in the Netherlands. The freedom of managing Switch.cm from home is unique, a gift from the founder and former owner of Switch.
12/2/2019 • 15 minutes, 29 seconds
1590 Why Farmes Are Buying This $1000 IoT Device to Increase Crop Yield
I’m an ambitious tech entrepreneur passionate about building projects which can create a real impact in our days, on a global scale and I firmly believe that I am leading one of those projects... At the professional level and because of my current job, I like to define myself as a specialist in generalities that love to find synergies between the complementary areas of a startup and to be surrounded by people smarter than me.
12/1/2019 • 16 minutes, 47 seconds
1589 How This Pilot Using Freemium To Get First 300 Drone Software Customers
Tom is founder and CEO of IDRONECT. He is 44 years old, entrepreneur and active airline pilot and has a Master in Aviation Science. With IDRONECT he wants to unlock the huge potential the drone industry has by making it easy to fly safe, legal and fun.
11/30/2019 • 15 minutes, 18 seconds
1588 Why 450 Enterprises Pay Him $45M+ in ARR To Help With Employee Volunteering and Donation Programs
As founder and CEO of Benevity, the global leader in CSR and employee engagement software, Bryan helps Fortune 1000 clients reinvent corporate giving programs in a way that provides better social and business returns, while simultaneously tackling the biggest struggles in the social impact landscape.
11/29/2019 • 22 minutes, 29 seconds
1587 Why Banks Pay Him $2k/year To Help Serve Lower Income Community Members
11/28/2019 • 15 minutes, 3 seconds
1586 How He Built a $30M ARR Company With Just $1M Raised in PaaS Space
Entrepeneur and founder of Servoy. Engineering background with experience in building great software companies.
11/27/2019 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
1585 Why This $6M ARR CEO Deploys Physical Data Teams To Each New Customer
Andy leads the company in its mission to deliver practical, powerful AI to consumer brands. A designer by training and lifelong software engineer, Andy is responsible for Faraday’s product strategy, data science organization, recruiting efforts, and corporate matters. Previously, Andy founded the celebrated sustainability startup Brighter Planet and worked in politics.
11/26/2019 • 13 minutes, 27 seconds
1584 Why 600 Companies Pay Him $150/mo To Help With VC Updates
Mike Preuss is the CEO & Co-founder of Visible. He's from the Midwest and lives in Chicago. He attended Indiana University and also an alumni of the Orr Fellowship. He was previously the head of Business Development for Formspring based in San Francisco.
11/25/2019 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
1583 How They Went from $0 to $100k MRR Selling Ordering Software to 1000 Restaurants
Ordermark simplifies online ordering to help restaurants increase profits and lower expenses. Through its technology platform and professional services, the company enables restaurants to easily add and manage multiple third-party online ordering services to maximize their online ordering potential. Customers include hundreds of restaurant brands and many of the world's top restaurant chains. Visit us at ordermark.com for more information
11/24/2019 • 14 minutes, 58 seconds
1582 Blockchain CEO Says Could Go To Zero, Here's Why
Kevin is a technology founder, recognized leader in the blockchain ecosystem, and currently the CEO of Etherparty and Vanbex Group. As an early entrant into cryptocurrency and blockchain technology, Kevin is a veteran of the industry, and has led the group of companies into becoming one of the largest blockchain solutions providers in Vancouver.
11/23/2019 • 14 minutes, 15 seconds
1581 How This FinTech CEO Hit $10M ARR With No Expansion Revenue
Andrew Patrick White is the Founder & CEO of FundApps, a RegTech company which provides compliance monitoring services to investment managers. FundApps currently services 3 of the world’s 10 largest hedge funds and monitors over 6 Trillion USD of assets every day. FundApps was founded in a spare bedroom above a pub and has never taken a penny of funding.
11/22/2019 • 18 minutes, 2 seconds
1580 Why ReviewPro CEO Sold 80% For $28M in 2016 and How He Grew to $15M in ARR Today
RJ Friedlander is an entrepreneur and investor based in Barcelona. He is the Founder & CEO of ReviewPro, the world leader in Guest Intelligence for the hotel industry. Focusing on hotel tech, the guest experience or entrepreneurship, RJ has spoken at more than 100 events worldwide, from prominent industry conferences to annual strategy meetings of renowned hotel brands. An enthusiastic and natural storyteller, his compelling presentations explore the latest trends and technical innovations impacting reputation and enabling savvy hoteliers to gain a competitive advantage.
11/21/2019 • 24 minutes, 19 seconds
1579 Growth Marketing Conf SF Dec 10th Breaks $1.5m in Revenues
Vasil is a growth marketing and startup event entrepreneur, who has produced over 500 in-person and virtual events, as well as built a 100K+ network of tech entrepreneurs and marketers. He’s the founder of Growth Marketing Conference, one of the leading growth marketing events in the industry, and he’s the CEO of startup professional network Startup Socials (as seen in Forbes). He’s worked with big brands like IBM, Adobe, Microsoft, and Delta Airlines, high growth startups such as Intercom, Autopilot, Instapage, Sendgrid, and many more.
11/20/2019 • 20 minutes, 44 seconds
1578 Why This CEO Only Has One Pricing Axis Despite Knowing Expansion Revenue Critical
Jeremy is the CEO and Co-Founder of Indicative. Indicative aims to put behavioral analytics in the hands of product managers, empowering them to map, analyze, and optimize the customer journey across every customer touchpoint. With up to a billion free events, Indicative removes the barriers from becoming data-driven, empowering anyone to perform sophisticated analysis. He was previously the CTO and Co-founder of MeetMoi a pioneering location-based dating service for mobile acquired by Match.com. He also Co-founded Xtify, served on its board as well as was its first CTO. Xtify provided secure, multi-channel mobile messaging platform suitable for enterprise-class marketers. Based on the technology he developed at Xtify he was awarded a patent for creating a Location-based services platform. Xtify was acquired by IBM in October of 2008.
11/19/2019 • 21 minutes, 18 seconds
1577 Why He Sold His $3.1m ARR Company For 3x ARR 2 Months Ago
Jeff Cope, Founder and CEO of InspectionXpert, has a passion for helping precision manufacturers transform inefficient, paper procedures into efficient, standardized, fully traceable and secure digital processes. Having made the transition from a manufacturing engineer to mechanical design engineer earlier in his career, Jeff was uniquely placed to quickly grasp the challenges facing precision manufacturers in their day-to-day operations. Jeff identified a glaring gap in the market for a quality inspection software which would help precision manufacturers eliminate paper in the manufacturing and quality inspection process. Teaching himself how to code, Jeff wrote the first InspectionXpert programme in 2004 which simplified quality checking processes and ensured a greater accountability over the QA chain. InspectionXpert was born, and today the company counts the likes of Pratt & Whitney, Kohler, Boeing, Airbus, NASA and Virgin Galactica as part of its 1,000 strong, global client base.
11/18/2019 • 17 minutes, 40 seconds
1576 How To Transition From $1m Agency Revenue to Pure Play SaaS
Michael Azzopardi is co-founder and CEO of employee development and eLearning company, Seb Azzo. Since being set up in 2013, Seb Azzo's software products helped develop upwards of 500,000 employees across 97 countries. Michael is currently focussing his attention on the company's latest product: Innform – a staff training tool for hospitality teams.
11/17/2019 • 12 minutes, 51 seconds
1575 Why This $1.4M ARR CEO Wants to Double CAC Even Though You Think Thats Bad
Ex-RAF pilot who entered the IT sector 25 years ago. Worked through the ranks to serve in senior executive roles in Compaq, HP and Sony across EMEA before founding his own SaaS company, expanding to the US and exiting in 2016. He has served on the boards of many other startups since 2005 and currently runs two ecommerce SaaS companies, a consultancy practice for startups and a Harley-Davidson dealership whilst holding the chairmanship of a mobile ticketing software startup.
11/16/2019 • 16 minutes, 2 seconds
1574 Why This CIO Believe Indonesia Next Growth Opportunity for Team Insurance and Benefits
Nathan Kamstra is the CIO of Urbanhire. He has more than 17 years of experience in health based IT and business delivery, proven track record of accomplishments ranging from hands on development to IT management. Strong experience in the global community providing world class solutions to health markets. Self-starter with a passion for quality service and excellent analytical, organizational, and creative skills. A detail-oriented and versatile professional with a strong grasp of IT finance and client management.
11/15/2019 • 17 minutes, 18 seconds
1573 How Activtrak Hit $4.5M ARR With No Outside Capital
35 y.o. Married with 2 kids. Live in Dallas, Texas. I'm building SaaS B2B products since 2003. My first startup in this area grew from 1 to 110 employees and $0 to $2M/year in 4 years. My second from 2 co-founders to a team of 27 and $0 to $4.6M ARR in six years. My ares of expertise are: product, marketing, UI/UX, building teams, early stages of startups.
11/14/2019 • 19 minutes, 24 seconds
1572 How This CEO Plans to be IPO Ready in 2 Years
ThousandEyes empowers businesses to see, understand and improve connected experiences everywhere. The ThousandEyes cloud platform offers unmatched vantage points throughout the global Internet and provides immediate visibility into experience for every user and application over any network, so companies can deliver superior digital experiences, modernize their enterprise WAN and successfully migrate to the cloud. ThousandEyes is central to the global operations of the world's largest and fastest growing brands, including Comcast, eBay, HP, 100+ of the Global 2000, 60+ of the Fortune 500, five of the six top US banks and 20 of the 25 top SaaS companies. For more information, visit www.ThousandEyes.com or follow us on Twitter at @ThousandEyes.
11/13/2019 • 23 minutes, 37 seconds
1571 Can You Figure Out Why He Won't Pay $30 to Get A $60/mo Customer?
Founder and CEO of SoMeCentral. 53 tech founder of SoMeCentral. SoMeCentral is the first SoMe tool of its kind, and we help companies to work closely together with employees for the purpose of boosting marketing, sales or employee branding.
11/12/2019 • 12 minutes, 18 seconds
1570 How This $2m ARR CEO Gives Enterprises Their Own Version of Facebook
Lifelong tech entrepreneur. Adrenaline adventurer who's deep technical knowledge and strategic business acumen helped in the acquisition of his previous SaaS business to Adobe in 2009. Expert in building high performing teams, technology and Marketplaces. Adam and his team loves to solve hard problems along side Enterprise and SMB clients alike.
11/11/2019 • 20 minutes, 20 seconds
1569 Why 1000+ Boarddecks Get Manged Using This $7m ARR Tool
I am passionate about building collaboration software that inspires and enables teams. We are building the best Board Meeting experience through our OnBoard product and the most versatile Employee Collaboration Experience through our Employee Portal solution called OnSemble. Our teams are uniquely focused towards customers success and meaningful innovation. We are based out of Lafayette(In), Indianapolis(In), London (UK) and Toronto(Canada). I live in Chicago.
11/10/2019 • 16 minutes, 14 seconds
1568 Why This Medical Tech CEO Is Considering 50% Sale of His Company for $3m
Andre D. Etherly is the Founder of eMedicalFusion, LLC. He holds a Masters of Science, Information Systems Technology, from George Washington University. Seeing the unmet needs of Direct-pay medical practices, he founded eMedicalFusion to design and build solutions that enable Direct-pay practices to succeed and excel both clinically and financially.
11/9/2019 • 13 minutes, 9 seconds
1567 How New Employee Feedback Tool Plans to Monetize
11/8/2019 • 15 minutes, 46 seconds
1566 How This Thumbtack Competitor Hopes to Win with $50k in GMV Last 12 Months
The team is led by CEO & Founder, Tarik Khribech. Tarik is supported by Director, Consultant, Terri Friel and various mentors at 1871, Chicago's Premier Incubator. Tarik is a serial Entrepreneur, with expertise and passion that sits at the nexus of technology, innovation, lifestyle and social innovation. He built l’Or d’Afrique, a line of beauty products currently in 400 outlets and eCommerce. Tarik built the ChoreRelief platform.
11/7/2019 • 17 minutes, 50 seconds
1565 Why CloudSponge CEO Thinks Killing Agency for SaaS Is Actually Bad
Jay is the Founder and CEO of a B2B SaaS company called CloudSponge which sells an Address Book Widget and Contacts API that companies like Airbnb, Nextdoor, Yelp, GoFundMe and Stitch Fix use to grow their customer bases virally.
11/6/2019 • 13 minutes, 9 seconds
1564 How He Makes $180k/mo Selling Drone Tech to Mining Sites and OEM's
Ravi Sahu is a founder and CEO of Strayos. Before founding Strayos, he spent more than 12 years working globally with Fortune 500 companies like AT&T, Verizon and British Telecom in various roles, from product management to the building of teams for large digital transformation projects. His area of expertise is in Artificial intelligence and data analytics. He holds an MBA from Washington University in St. Louis and Computer Science engineering degree from India.
11/5/2019 • 14 minutes, 18 seconds
1563 Why $28M+ ARR Wrike Tests New Channels at 24 Month Payback, Then Stabilizes at 12 Month Payback Over Time
Andrew Filev is the founder and CEO of Wrike, a SaaS-based work management platform that helps teams achieve operational excellence. Founded in 2006, Wrike now serves more than 15,000 customers in 130 countries, and employees 600 people across 5 offices. The company has raised north of of $26 million from Bain Capital Ventures, Scale Venture Partners, DCM Ventures and TMT.
11/4/2019 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
1562 Why $40m ARR Algolia CEO Believe Developers Should Do 1 Day of Support Per Month
Nicolas Dessaigne is co-founder and CEO of Algolia, the leading Search & Discovery API for websites and mobile apps. Launched in 2012, Algolia is now used by over 5,800 companies around the world. Prior to Algolia, Nicolas spent over 12 years working on information retrieval at Exalead and Thales.
11/3/2019 • 16 minutes, 37 seconds
1561 How To Get 5 Team Members Paying Personally Onto One Team Account with $5m ARR MixMax
Olof Mathé is the CEO and a co-founder of Mixmax, a company that is “bringing the power of the Web to email” by creating richer email experiences with embeddable Slack-style commands to trigger polls, video, calendar invites, and more without leaving the message. Mixmax was founded in 2014 and received a $1.5 million seed investment round from a number of individual investors in April 2015.After finishing his engineering degree in France, Olof previously worked at Skype and McKinsey. He also helped grow Inkling Habitat, a cloud-based authoring environment for writers and publishers.
11/2/2019 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
1560 Why 15k Members Pay $300/mo For This Special Card (Not AMEX)
Carlo Cisco is a serial entrepreneur who has founded multiple successful companies and helped grow category-defining brands. Carlo is currently the Founder & CEO of SELECT, which has been heralded as "AMEX for the Next Generation" and "The Black Card for Millennials". Carlo is also a member of YEC and has been featured in 100+ stories across numerous media outlets including Entrepreneur, Forbes, and Huffington Post.
11/1/2019 • 20 minutes, 57 seconds
1559 Why This $50k ARR Company Banking on Upwork Partnership To Drive Job Growth in Undeveloped Countries
Originally from Guatemala, moved to madrid to build a virtual workplace that enhances productivity for remote work; I genuinely believe it can be done. With this, there'll be no limits for undeveloped countries, which have so many people with an unmeasurable desire for success but lacks education, and decent, fair job offers.
10/31/2019 • 0
1558 Why This Event Management CEO Believes 25% Of Her $2.5m In Revenue Should Be Professional Services
Allie Magyar, Hubb CEO, is a skilled entrepreneur and technology maven with over 15 years of experience driving successful technology enabled service companies. Allie has been named a 2017 Portland Business Journal’s 40 Under 40, a 2017 Top Woman Entrepreneur by Smart Meetings Magazine and, in 2018 was an EY Pacific NW Entrepreneur of the Year finalist.
10/30/2019 • 15 minutes, 21 seconds
Shutting podcast down today (nasty attack)
nathanlatka.com/youtube
10/29/2019 • 2 minutes, 12 seconds
1556 How'd He Raised $350k Without Giving Up Equity? Not Venture Debt, note either.
Full stack developer, co-founder of Digicoop, the company behind Kantree.
10/28/2019 • 10 minutes, 55 seconds
1555 This Rome Based Company Helps You Build Business Apps Fast, $25k in MRR, $1.3m Raised
Master degree in Electronic Engineering in 1992, worked initially in the aerospace industry in Italy, England and the Netherlands. Founded his first company in 1995 (system integrator still active with 20+ employees), then a FHOSTER in 2008 (raised €1.2M from private investors and a VC fund), recently a company in the IoT industry.
10/27/2019 • 8 minutes, 23 seconds
1554 $130M ARR Vista Owned Company Made These 2 Moves Right After Acquisition
Husband to Irene. Father to Abbey and Mike. Studied Statistics at Michigan. Play sports, especially golf and paddle tennis. Love to use data to analyze things. Professionally that means using data to help CPG companies make better decisions. Personally, that means a love for poker and wagering.
10/26/2019 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
1553 This $10k MRR Search Tool Helps Increase Your Website Conversions
Sujoy is Cofounder and CEO at Airim. It was founded in April 2017. Airim is a virtual assistant that reduces the huge time and effort users spend in trying to find relevant information for them while exploring a website or a web app. Currently, it is used 2 million times a day in websites of businesses of all sizes across four continents.
10/25/2019 • 10 minutes, 46 seconds
1552 $1.5M Email Marketing Tool Considering a Strategic Sale
I help companies to maximize their email channel ROI by providing the tools and knowledge to achieve just that. I play an active role in overseeing all product development, international marketing initiatives, and channel development. I believe people that I work with appreciate my creative & innovative thinking. I’m not all work, I love extreme water sports.
10/24/2019 • 14 minutes, 41 seconds
1551 Another CRM Hits 2500 Customers, $180k MRR
French internet pionnier. PhD in theoretical physics. Co-founded Weborama in 1998, survived the internet bubble crash, got listed on the french stock market in 2006. Founded Yoolink in 2008, pivoted to noCRM 4 years ago. Now more than 2 500 customers worldwide using our SaaS software to close more deals.
10/23/2019 • 15 minutes, 11 seconds
1550 He Helps 30 Non-Profits Report to Donors, $4k MRR, $80k Raised
Nonprofits struggle to identify the right KPIs that enable them to evaluate whether the projects they do are truly making a lasting impact. Makerble suggests KPIs to nonprofits and provides them with a database, survey tool and analytics platform which lets them track their impact in real-time and share that data with their funders and donors.
10/22/2019 • 9 minutes, 18 seconds
1549 Why Did He Leave a $60m Revenue "Unicorn"?
Serial entrepreneur, working online since 1998. Investing.com is on its way to becoming a privately funded unicorn - offices across the globe over 300 employees and 60m in revenue. Oitchau is a time an attendance solution which started in Brazil to Solve the problem of 3m annual labor law related lawsuits in the country.
10/21/2019 • 22 minutes, 29 seconds
1548 When Will He Stop Consulting And Go All In on $13k MRR SaaS Product?
Tom Cameron abandoned a Structural Engineering career in 1997 to pursue Internet technologies. He has founded multiple small businesses and 2 Internet SaaS businesses. He currently lives in Brisbane Australia where he co-manages a coworking space, manages todo.vu and still has a hand in a web consulting business he founded 18 years ago.
10/20/2019 • 11 minutes, 43 seconds
1547 Mexico Based SMB Point of Sales Solution Hits 5k Customers, $64k MRR
I worked during 12 years in Pepsico Mexico and Latin America in several positions, started as Senior Financial Planning, and finished as Finance Director for IT & Innovation Area for Latam.
10/19/2019 • 13 minutes, 17 seconds
1546 $4.8M ARR, Bootstrapped, Major Media Brands and Games Use This To Optimzie App Store Apps
Dave Bell is an entrepreneur and recognized pioneer in the fields of mobile entertainment and digital content distribution. He has been featured in and is a frequent contributor to Inc. Magazine, Newsweek, VentureBeat, Website Magazine, Mobile Marketer, Mobile Retailer and numerous other publications. Dave is currently the Co-Founder & CEO of Gummicube - the leading global provider of data, technology, and services for App Store Optimization.
10/18/2019 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
1545 Radius CEO on 3 Pricing Axis, 100 Customers, 150%+ Net Revenue Retention, $100m ARR by 2020?
Joel Carusone is the CEO of Radius, the first B2B enterprise customer data platform. Joel holds a wealth of knowledge on, and passion for, the CDP space, and was one of the original architects of Radius Unify, the first ever, fully-flexible B2B CDP, bringing the new solution to market.
10/17/2019 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
1544 1 Day After $1.4B Exit He Launches LifeOmic to Tackle Precision Health Using AI and Machine Learning
Dr. Don Brown’s first company was acquired by EDS in 1986. He founded Software Artistry in 1988 which became the first software company in Indiana to IPO. Don then founded and served as CEO of Interactive Intelligence which went public in 1999 and was acquired in 2016 for $1.4 billion. He started LifeOmic in late 2016. Don received a BS in physics, a MS in computer science, and an MD from Indiana University. He also received a MS in biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University in 2017.
10/16/2019 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
1543 They'll Help You Manufacture Your Product for 1/4th the Cost as Other Brokers, $100k in MRR, 20 Customers
Rich’s passion for inventing and tinkering was ignited at an early age, when he attached some wires to a battery and a lightbulb and lit up his childhood bedroom for the first time. It also happened to be around the time he saw the movie Flubber, so it’s safe to say his fate was sealed. Rich has a patent related to the military space and has experienced how difficult it is to get the products he’d spent years developing and prototyping actually made- this led to the creation of Inventaprint with his twin brother, Roland. Rich has worked on numerous critical global supply chain initiatives across various multi-billion dollar industrial companies in the Aviation, Oil & Gas, Locomotive, and Renewable Energy sectors. He advises on hardware-related inventions and can be found doodling designs for new product ideas in his (non-existent) free time.
10/15/2019 • 15 minutes, 53 seconds
1542 She Spends $300k/mo on Sponsored Instagram Posts
inCast is a leading influencer marketing platform focused on Instagram. inCast works with top Instagram celebrities and micro-influencers on marketing campaigns in Brazil and United States. inCast is a member of Startup Farm Incubator program based at Google Campus Sao Paulo.
Founder/CEO of Motiva AI, Partner at venture studio The Data Guild, David is a serial entrepreneur. Previously he founded Social Kinetics (sold to RedBrick Health) and Proximal Labs (sold to Jive Software). He served as Chief Social Scientist at Jive and part of the team that took Jive to an IPO in 2011. He began his career as Program Manager for DARPA's CALO, the largest machine learning project funded by the US Government. Today he's an active early stage investor and advisor.
10/13/2019 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
1540 Versace Gets Nordstrom Sell Through Data From Him, Passes $8m ARR and 500 Customers
Jay Hakami is the Founder, President, and CEO of Sky IT Group an 18-year-old SaaS solutions provider, headquartered in NYC. Mr. Hakami’s 30+ years of successful executive leadership roles have always focused on in depth understanding of business challenges and solving them with deployment of creative and practical IT solutions. Prior to founding Sky IT Group, for a period of 10 years, Mr. Hakami served as Senior VP at large system integrator with overall responsibility of operations, marketing, sales, and services delivery of an ERP and business intelligence solutions to the apparel manufacturing and distribution industries. In 2000 Mr. Hakami has founded Sky IT Group. During the first few years the business focus was around business intelligence and data warehouse projects specifically within the fashion industry. The industry and technology expertise offered by Sky IT Group have helped create one of the most successful industry focused technology company in the US. In 2007, recognizing the need to improve the communication between the brands/suppliers and retailers with timely, accurate product sales performance trends and insights, Mr. Hakami - with the help of data scientists and industry experts – launched the development of a SaaS platforms; SKYPAD for Wholesalers focuses on sell-through data collection, cleansing and insights for suppliers across all their sales channels and SKYPAD for Retailers that provides large multi-vendor retailers with a platform to accurately and securely distribute their sell-through data to their brands/suppliers. SKYPAD is considered today to be the most comprehensive, scalable, and secure SaaS B2B platform for product sales trends and insights for both retailers and their suppliers/brands. SKYPAD collects sell-through data from 170+ retailers globally across 4 continents, servicing 500+ mostly luxury and beauty brands and being utilized daily by 1400+ users to make business decisions based on facts.
10/12/2019 • 13 minutes, 55 seconds
1539 How Venga Hit 2000 locations, $3.6m ARR on $2.7m Raised Helping Restaurants, Fitness Centers with Customer Experience
Sam Pollaro is the CEO of Venga, a Washington, DC-based technology company that uses big data to help restaurants and fitness companies better understand and engage with their guests. Before co-founding Venga, Sam was the founder of Petals for the People, a business that revolutionized the sale and distribution of fresh cut flowers. Mr. Pollaro holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.
10/11/2019 • 16 minutes, 15 seconds
1538 Instagram Stories for B2B Sales Passes $10k in MRR
Clipr is a solution to create and publish mobile webpages inspired by stories format (insta & snap). Since companies struggle to convert on mobile, we make them achieve their objectives (sales lead loyalty) & monetize attention.
10/10/2019 • 11 minutes, 44 seconds
1537 Bulgarian Company Protects Online Action Using Blockchain, 20 Customers $4k MRR
Founder and CEO of LogSentinel. Senior software engineer and architect with experience in big companies like Ericsson and TomTom. Former IT advisor to the deputy prime minister of Bulgaria. Regular speaker on IT conferences and technical blogger. Member of the jury of the International linguistics olympiad. Author of algorithmic music composer.
10/9/2019 • 8 minutes, 58 seconds
1536 Manufacturing Sales Platform Hits $5m ARR With New $250k ACV Plans
With over 20 years of experience in the technology industry, Marc is helping to revolutionize manufacturing sales enablement technology as part of the global Industry 4.0 movement. Atlatl Software offers a portfolio of disruptive software solutions that are the most efficient way to transform sales prospects and opportunities into customers while driving revenue in a matter of minutes.
10/8/2019 • 16 minutes
1535 Nathan, I listen to the show, here's all my data!
Benjamin Dell is the founder and CEO at Missinglettr (a social marketing automation company that automatically creates 12 months worth of social content for each blog post you publish). He previously owned a web agency for over 10 years (acquired). During this time he also launched a number of SaaS startups (two of which were acquired). Benjamin is passionate about empowering businesses and brands with tools that help them succeed.
10/7/2019 • 13 minutes, 50 seconds
1534 With $10m in ARR, He Left Amazon to Help F100 Brands Sell More on Amazon
Guru founded Boomerang Commerce with a vision to power intelligent commerce. Formerly a leader at Amazon, Guru worked in the inceptive stages of Amazon’s supply chain and merchandising organizations. He co-founded one of Amazon’s cloud businesses, established Amazon’s first B2B marketing channel and invented Amazon’s Selling Coach to help brands and sellers to be successful with Amazon. At eBay, as the GM of Marketplace Experience, he led the global team that launched eBay’s fast shipping program. Guru earned his MS in Computer Engineering (a focus on Machine Learning) from the University of Texas at Austin, and his MBA from the Wharton School. Boomerang‘s CommerceIQ powers Growth Automation on Amazon for Kellogg’s, Kimberly Clark, Logitech and numerous other top tier brands.
10/6/2019 • 20 minutes, 59 seconds
1533 How Greenrope CRM Bootstrapped to $2.7M in ARR
I started in the Internet Marketing space in 2000, when I co-founded one of the world's first email service providers, CoolerEmail. As a pioneer in responsible email marketing, we grew CoolerEmail into a global software company specializing in marketing communication with over 1,500 clients. In 2010, after spending several years designing and implementing a more comprehensive way to meet the needs of small and mid-sized businesses, I launched GreenRope, a cloud-based platform that simplifies and consolidates a company's sales, marketing, and operations. GreenRope currently provides technology solutions to over 3,000 companies worldwide.
10/5/2019 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
1532 His Hardware + Software Will Reduce Grain Spoilage by 30-50%
Naeem Zafar is a Professor of the Practice at Brown University and teaches at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a serial entrepreneur and the founder/CEO of TeleSense, an AgTech startup company. His last startup, Bitzer Mobile, was acquired by Oracle. Naeem has authored five books on entrepreneurship www.NaeemZafar.com.
10/4/2019 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
1531 The Mailchimp of Europe Hits $20M in ARR, 30,000 SMB Customers
Armand Thiberge, founded SendinBlue in 2012 with the goal of making effective marketing tools available to small and medium-sized businesses at a price they can afford. In September 2017, SendinBlue raised 30 million euros to accelerate product development and continue growing their team of 150 employees spread across 3 global offices located in Paris, Delhi, and Seattle. The company now services +60,000 SMBs in 160 countries.
10/3/2019 • 15 minutes, 29 seconds
1530 How Monday.com Competitor Hit $3m in ARR Using Resellers
Yash did his Mechanical Engineering and then worked as an Investment Banker before founding Gridle. He is a CNBC TV 18 Young Turk, Kairos fellow and MITx bootcamper. Currently, he serves as Co-founder & Chief Executive at Gridle where he looks after Finance, Resource Mgmt & Business Strategy.
10/2/2019 • 13 minutes, 43 seconds
1529 Will This Company Ever Scale Past $6k/mo?
I build things. Began playing with computers at age 13. At VSH Solutions we've launched many successful software applications and businesses alongside them which has grown our business as well. Throughout my life I've been focused on exploring new technologies and creating meaningful and enjoyable products with them. Now most of my time via VSH Solutions is concentrated on working with companies to continue exploring this passion.
10/1/2019 • 17 minutes, 9 seconds
1528 How 6 Month Old Orgo Got First 25 Customers, $7.5k in MRR
Following my studies at KCL in London and my first experience of scaling a Rocket Internet company all the way to IPO, I initially worked as a Consultant for a boutique consultancy which focusses on procurement and restructuring, where I was also involved in HR and reorganisation projects. Two years later, I moved to help scale an InsureTech organisation from 15 to 160+ employees within 3 years, supporting their internationalisation strategy. It was during this experience that I discovered a gap in the market for a one-stop tool to scale companies and digitise HR (everything from recruitment to off-boarding), whilst really focussing on the needs of the employees. A few colleagues and I decided to start our own company, OrgOS, which is now just over a year old. We are a fast-growing HR software as a service (SaaS) start-up with over 15 employees and a diverse range of clients – from prominent brands to other developing start-ups.
9/30/2019 • 12 minutes, 39 seconds
1527 Supply Chain Risk Company Hits $7m in ARR, 130 Customers
Co-Founder & Managing Director Heiko Schwarz is Founder and Managing Director of riskmethods. Heiko is an expert in both software and strategic purchasing, and has spent 20 years successfully helping supply chain and procurement organizations implement solutions to increase performance, reduce cost and minimize risk. He has been honored with the Pro To Know award from Supply & Demand Chain Executive for his forward-thinking approach to the topic of supply chain risk management.
9/29/2019 • 21 minutes, 35 seconds
1526 With $60m in ARR, 1400 Employers, 18m Employees Use JellyVision for Understanding Employee Benefits
Amanda Lannert is CEO of Jellyvision, one of Chicago’s fastest growing tech companies that serves 1400 customers with ALEX, the most helpful employee decision support platform on the planet. Jellyvision’s been recognized as the Best Software Company and Best Culture by the Moxies, the Lighthouse winner by the ITA, and a top place to work in Chicago by The Chicago Tribune and Crain’s.
9/28/2019 • 19 minutes, 6 seconds
1525 With $240k in MRR, Raising $5m on a $20m Pre
Serial software entrepreneur. I've founded 5 software companies and made 3 exits so far. In 2002 I founded Solinor (Software development company) which was acquired by Gofore in 2018. In 2004 I founded Snoobi (Web analytics SaaS company) which was acquired by Fonecta 2012. In 2011 I founded Payment Highway (Payment gateway SaaS company) and that was acquired by Osuuspankki in 2017. Currently, I'm Founder and CEO at Leadfeeder (Lead generation SaaS company).
9/27/2019 • 12 minutes, 9 seconds
1524 He Helps High School Coaches Manage Workout Plans, $1m in ARR
Having worked in sales and marketing for three software startups for years, Hewitt decided to launch a software company with his college roomate with the decision to bootstrap without any outside capital. With a strong passion for sales and athletic performance, the company has grown to nearly 10 employees and over $1mm in ARR.
9/26/2019 • 13 minutes, 47 seconds
1523 Will This Pre-Revenue New Workspace Prioritization Tool Take Off?
Emna is the CEO and co-founder of Veamly. Prior to Veamly, Emna helped launching several companies as a global director of the Founder Institute and built several products as part of her previous company. Emna has a dream to change the way people communicate and kill the world of assumptions.
9/25/2019 • 14 minutes, 7 seconds
1522 Can You Analyze Customer Feedback Emotions and Drive Real Value From Them?
Product leader on a mission to use technology to understand each other better. Over a decade of nose-to-tail experience in the Silicon Valley has enabled Dmitriy to hone a distinct data-driven vision and cultivate an aptitude for creating dramatic category growth. Prior leadership roles at ADP, Duda, Conduit, Wellsphere and TiraWireless.
9/24/2019 • 14 minutes, 50 seconds
1521 iPaaS Company DBSync Passes $2.1m ARR Bootstrapped
Rajeev Gupta has an extensive experience with application architecture and on-demand computing, and over 16 years starting and growing tech companies. In 2002, Rajeev co-founded Avankia which was one of the first companies incubated by Salesforce.com. This enterprise gave raise to DBSync, a Data Management Platform that provides a wide range of functionalities, including integration, backup, archiving, etc.
9/23/2019 • 11 minutes, 56 seconds
1520 BlueSnap Wants to Help Merchants Compete with Amazon
A 25 year payments veteran, Ralph Dangelmaier brings a wealth of knowledge leading strategy, marketing, sales, and product development as BlueSnap’s CEO, thought leader, conference speaker, Top 50 SaaS CEOs (The SaaS Report), Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist, and Inc. 5000’s Fastest-Growing Private Companies.
9/22/2019 • 15 minutes
1519 Health Records Company Hits $23m ARR Serving 6000 Health Customers
Michael believes that technology can make healthcare more efficient, more personalized, and help provide healthcare to more people. Michael co-founded DrChrono with Daniel Kivatinos in January 2009 and built the first-ever native iPad EHR app. Before DrChrono, Michael worked at Bloomberg LP where he architected components of the Bloomberg Terminal used by customers worldwide. Michael has a B.E. in Computer Engineering & Computer Science from Stony Brook University has been named to Stony Brook University's 40 under 40 outstanding alumni award in 2014, 2015, and 2016.
9/21/2019 • 15 minutes, 34 seconds
1518 Bynder Hits $48m ARR, Another Acquisition On The Way?
Chris Hall, the CEO of Bynder has grown his company to over 350 employees with seven international offices in just 4 years. He first conceptualized Bynder in 2010, while working to establish a web development company, Label A (still in business). In 2012, the Bynder was incorporated and by early 2013 had a license for business. Chris is an entrepreneur at heart, has successfully setup and scaled multiple SaaS companies, Bynder being most notable to date. He is a mentor and coach for young professionals interested in tech and entrepreneurship.
9/20/2019 • 16 minutes, 6 seconds
1517 How $165M ARR DiscoverOrg Sales Operation Works
Co-Founder & CEO. Bootstrapped the company to $25M in ARR. Now 3 Acquisitions later backed by The Carlyle Group and TA Associates at $165MM ARR.
9/19/2019 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
1516 With $150k in MRR, He's Helping 40k Event Organizers Market
Founder and CEO of Evvnt, a platform looking to change an industry through creating an affordable service where one simply did not exist before. Love challenging the norm and trying to change the world one event at a time.
9/18/2019 • 13 minutes, 38 seconds
1515 TrueAccord Passes $10m in Revenue Helping Banks Recover $40m+ in Defaulted Payments Over last 12 months
CEO @TrueAccord . Risk @Klarna. Co-founder @SIGNIFYD and @Analyzd (acq by @Klarna). @PayPal New Ventures. Analytics at FraudSciences (acq by @PayPal).
9/17/2019 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
1514 They Gamify Price Negotiations for Consumers, $100m in Sales, They Take 2-6%
Stephen is a business and civic entrepreneur. A former U.S. Navy Reserve Officer, U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer, Stanford-educated attorney, and NCAA Division I fencer, Stephen is also co-founder of PriceWaiter, Delegator, ProDiligence, Smart Furniture, Chattanooga Renaissance Funds I & II, and the non-profit ventures Causeway and CF Smackdown.
9/16/2019 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
1513 KeeperSecurity is Profitable, Churning 8-10% of Revenue Annually
Darren Guccione is the CEO and co-founder of Keeper Security, Inc., the creator of Keeper, the world’s most popular password manager and secure digital vault and KeeperChat, the world’s most secure messaging app for all your devices. Keeper software is used globally by millions of people and thousands of businesses.
9/15/2019 • 21 minutes, 59 seconds
1512 He'll Help You Build Your Own Company App Exchange
Founded digital-agency Vuzum in 2008, after CS graduation. Doing work for US Navy, H&M and Four-Seasons we stumbled upon the pain of code reusability across projects (by anyone, without technical skills). We built an MVP back in 2015, closed the agency a year later and doubled down on Widgetic.
9/14/2019 • 15 minutes, 53 seconds
1511 Moscow Based Video Conference Software Hits $5m in Revenue, Bootstrapped, 170 employees
Lev Yakupov is a Chief Marketing Director at TrueConf. Lev witnessed the emergence of the modern video conferencing market and directly participated in the development and launch of a number of new software video collaboration solutions.
9/13/2019 • 16 minutes, 37 seconds
1510 Would You Compete In a Super Fragmented Space like Checklists Apps?
I’m the former CEO of a top digital marketing agency in Chicago, and founder of MySiteAuditor, a SaaS startup I grew to over 20 languages around the world. Both were successfully acquired. Currently, I'm the Chief Checklist Maker at Checkli.com, a new and simple way to make and share checklist.
9/12/2019 • 25 minutes, 26 seconds
1509 How mParticle Hit $36m ARR, 150% Net Revenue Retention Helping F500 Brands Manage User Records
Michael Katz is a Co-founder and CEO of mParticle. He is responsible for creating and overseeing the execution of mParticle's vision of becoming the premier multi-screen data solution. Mr. Katz previously served as Vice President of Optimization & Analytics at Yahoo where he came via the acquisition of interclick, the company he also founded.
9/11/2019 • 19 minutes, 39 seconds
1508 With $1.2m in MRR, They're Making Truck Fleets More Efficient
Dhruvil Sanghvi has played a pivotal role in revolutionizing logistics with the use of data sciences and machine learning. He has been felicitated by Forbes as one of the top 30 under 30 achievers, 2017. He was also recognized as Achiever of the Year 2017 by Business World in its 40 under 40 List. After graduating from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA and actively advising some of the Fortune 500 companies on technology and data analytics, Dhruvil, along with Manisha Raisinghani, started LogiNext in 2014. Within 3 years, LogiNext has gained authority in the space of Logistics and field service optimization, has on-boarded prominent investors like Paytm and Alibaba. He has been a regular and sought-after speaker at industry conferences and panel discussion across the globe. Dhruvil is keen on contributing as a thought leader and mentor to the booming ecosystem of startups. With his immense experience and insights in business growth and product success, Dhruvil has helped multiple entrepreneurs realize their dream, guiding them over hurdles and directing to early product-market fit. Dhruvil also serves as an early stage investor and has initiated incubation for some ambitious startups.
Amiad Soto is the co-founder and CEO of Guesty, a cloud-based SaaS platform established in 2013 designed to simplify the short-term property management process. With Guesty’s all-in-one solution, property managers can operate listings across multiple accounts, including Airbnb, Booking.com and others, from one centralized dashboard.
9/9/2019 • 25 minutes, 7 seconds
1506 Gainsight: We'll Hit $100m Revenue in 2020, $60m+ Now
Nick Mehta is CEO of Gainsight, the Customer Success Company. He’s a big believer in the Golden Rule and tries to apply it as much as he can to bring more compassion to his interactions with others. Under Nick's leadership, Gainsight was named the second fastest growing private software company in 2015 by Inc. Magazine. On top of that, Forbes ranked Gainsight as the Best Enterprise Software Company to Work For based on Glassdoor ratings. As Nick likes to say (a little too fast and a little too often), that's awesome. Previously, Nick worked as an Entrepreneur in Residence with Accel Partners developing opportunities in the enterprise applications and infrastructure markets. He was also CEO of LiveOffice, where he led the company’s profitable growth to $25 million in revenue and through its successful sale to Symantec in 2012 for $115 million. LiveOffice was recognized as a Visionary by Gartner, as an Inc. 5000 company, and as an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist. Before joining LiveOffice, Nick was a Vice President at VERITAS Software (acquired by Symantec). Don't get him started on theoretical physics or Steelers football—he'll talk your ear off!
9/8/2019 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
1505 Rare 30% EBITDA, $100m ARR Company Bootstrapped Helping Enterprise Clients Onboard to Google Ad Tools
Clint Tasset is the founder and CEO of Adswerve, a premier Google Partner that empowers data-driven marketers to achieve more success by using media and analytics technology – together.
9/7/2019 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
1504 Outreach Breaks $10m in New Bookings Per Quarter, Targeting $17m by Q4 2019
Manny Medina is CEO of Outreach, the leading sales engagement platform. Medina joined Amazon’s AWS team as an early employee, and helped Microsoft drive the mobile division from launch to $50 million in annual revenue. He has an MBA from Harvard Business School and a computer science masters from University of Pennsylvania.
9/6/2019 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
1503 "How Xactly Plans To Hit $500m in ARR, Acquire and Cross Sell "
Chris Cabrera founded Xactly in 2005 and has since led Xactly from startup to IPO and private equity. Previously, Cabrera was SVP of operations for Callidus, acquiring 100+ customers and leading a successful IPO. He holds a B.S. and M.A. from USC and Santa Clara University.
9/5/2019 • 12 minutes, 33 seconds
1502 Branch.io Raised $129m To Cover 18 Months Burn (-$7m/mo) For Deep Linking Play
Mada leads marketing as a co-founder of Branch, the industry-leading mobile measurement and deep linking platform, trusted by the most top ranking apps to increase efficiency and revenue. Born and raised in Romania, Mada came to the US to study Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University, and then earned her Masters of Engineering and MBA from Stanford. Mada enjoys playing the latest viral mobile game, binge-watching the hottest sci-fi show, and photographing Branch events. She regularly speaks about mobile growth at top tech events like Web Summit and Saastr, and she was included in Linkedin’s Next Wave, 150 top professionals in 15 industries all under 35.
9/4/2019 • 19 minutes, 43 seconds
1501 247.ai Passes $300m ARR, 10% EBITDA, No $6B Vista Sale
P.V. Kannan is the co-founder and chief executive officer of [24]7.ai, a global leader in intent-driven customer engagement. He holds more than 30 patents (issued and pending), and has been featured in several books as CX thought leader. His new book “The Age of Intent:,” is now available on Amazon.
9/3/2019 • 16 minutes, 8 seconds
1500 BullHorn Sold 60% Early On, Now $200m in ARR, E50+
Art Papas is the Founder and CEO of Bullhorn, Inc, the global leader in software for the staffing & recruitment industry. Art was the original architect of Bullhorn’s flagship Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, which now helps more than 10,000 companies around the world run their businesses. Art is the Chairman of the Board at Career Collaborative, an organization that teaches unemployed and underemployed adults how to build careers that change lives and strengthen families. In 2014, Ernst & Young named Art an EY Entrepreneur of the Year Award Winner in New England.
9/2/2019 • 23 minutes, 31 seconds
1499 Why She Chose VC over Private Equity
Eva is an investor at Vertex Ventures, an early-stage venture fund focused on enterprise technology. She has over a decade of experience in helping to build, scale and advise growing technology companies. Most recently, Eva led operations for Luxe Valet, a venture-backed on-demand startup. Prior to Luxe, Eva was an investment banker at Goldman Sachs.
9/1/2019 • 12 minutes, 22 seconds
1498 Why He Took $1.6M in Venture Debt From Lighter Capital
Marc Aubin is CEO of AppBuddy, creators of GridBuddy and AppBuddy Cloud. We've helped thousands of companies do what is not natively possible in Salesforce and SAP -- easily take data from hard to reach places and put it into consolidated, actionable workspaces. So now instead of having to create business processes from the ground up, admins, developers and even end users can leverage what they already have and quickly evolve their operational processes in response to changing customer needs.
8/31/2019 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1497 He Grew Hubspot Partner Program, Now $91k in MRR at DataBox
Peter Caputa is the CEO of Databox. He helps companies grow by implementing sales and marketing excellence. He's worked with 100s of businesses directly as well as helped 100s of agencies and media companies grow by helping their clients achieve predictable, measurable and improvable ROI from the marketing and advertising services they provide.
8/30/2019 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
1496 Employee Engagement Platform in Brazil Passes $1.8M ARR, Raising $3m on $10m Pre
Alessandro Garcia, CEO from Solides, a startup that provide a HR Behavioral Management Software to improve performance and reduce turn-over costs. A SaaS company with 100 employees and more than 1,000 cutomers in Brazil. Statistician from UFMG, courses at Stanford and Berkeley.
8/29/2019 • 15 minutes, 43 seconds
1495 Mom of Newborn Passes $1m Run Rate Helping Businesses Text Customers
Adi is co-founder & CEO of IMpower Solutions, which provides businesses with tools to text with their customers. Adi started IMpower in 2011, after realizing how much consumers hate calling businesses and businesses have low response rates when they call customers. Texting is a win-win solution for both sides.
8/28/2019 • 14 minutes, 29 seconds
1494 Real Time Amazon Ad Bidding Will Do $120m Volume This Year, $2.5m in revenues
"Started in finance in 98, switched to internet and mobile in 2000 and launched Bidmanagement in 2010 by using AI-based trading software for stocks to automate and optimize media buying on Google Ads. We are now active on all relevant ecommerce marketing platforms such as Amazon, Google Ads, Bing Ads, Yandex as well as >50 programmatic platforms. Our USP: outperform everyone to maximize profits for our customers."
8/27/2019 • 12 minutes, 46 seconds
1493 How Podast Hosting Company Buzzsprout Passed $15k in MRR, 1000 Customers, Bootstrapped
Tom Rossi is one of the cofounders of the product development company Higher Pixels. He has been leading the company since 1996 and has seen it shift from a client-services company to a product company. Higher Pixels currently has four products: Buzzsprout, StreamCare, Tick, and Donor Tools. Each product has been built with Ruby on Rails and continue to be actively developed.
Vinay is CEO and co-founder of Altizon Systems. He has 15+ years of varied experience across sales, marketing, engineering and product management. Prior to Altizon he was VP Sales at Persistent Systems. He led Persistent Systems sales activities in the U.S. North East and also set up the APAC sales team. Vinay began his career in engineering and rose up the engineering ladder to be a center head for a US based captive. He holds 4 US patents on work related USB, wireless and code security. Vinay holds a Masters degree in Computer Science from University of Southern California, LA and a Bachelors degree in Computer Engineering from University of Pune. He is a Charter Member of TiE Pune.
8/25/2019 • 15 minutes, 28 seconds
1491 $1k/mo Scheduling Tool Turns Down $5m Offer, would you do the same?
After 20 years working in restaurants, Cory started ShedWool to solve the pain point of scheduling making every day working in restaurants suck.
8/24/2019 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
1490 His $3m ARR Tool Lost Instagram API Access, What Now?
Product-driven entrepreneur. Continuously improving products and services through hustling and data analysis. First built and sold Quel, an online marketplace for buyers and suppliers of custom-made parts. Currently building a SaaS portfolio company. First stop: Preppr, an Instagram scheduling and publishing solution powered by AI. Next stop: Informed.plus, building the world's largest library of medical animations to empower patients.
8/23/2019 • 14 minutes, 51 seconds
1489 Getting your First 20 Customers and $1k/mo in Revenue
Entrepreneur, CEO, M&A lawyer and twin-girl-dad. Graduated law school with highest point grade avg., tried out “traditional” law for 7 years, quit to disrupt legal business processes and now co-founder and CEO of a 27-person company of lawyers, data scientists and developers on a quest to remove manual document handling.
8/22/2019 • 15 minutes, 10 seconds
1488 ECommerce Solution Hits $8m in ARR and $8m in Services, Raising $20m on $60m pre?
Suchit Bachalli is the CEO of Unilog, a global technology company which specializes in eCommerce solutions and enriched product data for the B2B marketplace. Under his leadership, the company is now a multi-million dollar business with 800 global employees and hundreds of customers across diverse industries
8/21/2019 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
1487 MIT Spinout Passes $120k in MRR Helping With Customer Analytics and Upselling
Abhi is CEO at Zylotech, a technology entrepreneur and customer analytics expert. He has experience of many stages of the lifecycle: startup/boot-strap, venture funding, M&A experience. As an early Customer 360 category pioneer, he’s worked with numerous enterprise brands across the retail, technology and financial industries over the last decade. He is an engineer who holds an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management.
8/20/2019 • 15 minutes, 2 seconds
1486 Digital Signage Management Passes $4.2M in ARR, Bootstrapped
I have been an entrepreneur my entire working life. Upon leaving school in 1987 I focused on creating information management systems that lead to the development of financial trading applications and a health record management product. In 1992 we entered into a partnership with Reuters to create digital signage for trading floors which was globally distributed by them. In the following years brokerages and banks began to turn their attention to retail and what was our inwardly facing displays were now being turned outwards to face the public. From there, we went on to be the first in our industry to embrace software as a service, the first to adopt HTML over proprietary formats, and open source many of our applications. We were also the first to adopt a freemium model. Today we are the largest provider of LED Ticker systems in North America and our digital signage software as a service is used in over 128 countries. Our displays are used in almost every setting imaginable but our content focuses primarily on Secondary and Postsecondary Education environments and financial trading labs.
8/19/2019 • 15 minutes, 19 seconds
1485 Social Media Management For Banks Raising $1.5m on $8m Pre (4x ARR)
Doug Wilber is the CEO of Gremlin Social where he leads the creation, development and execution of the Company’s long-term vision and strategy. A financial services veteran, Doug previously served as President, North America for Assembly Payments where he oversaw all sales, marketing, and operational efforts for the region. Prior to that, Doug was Chief Revenue Officer for PYMNTS.com where he oversaw all business development, financial forecasting, operations, and marketing functions. Doug has additionally held numerous product and partnership development roles at Discover Financial Services and was a consultant at Market Platform Dynamics, a leading macro-economic advisory for financial services firms. Outside of Gremlin Social, Doug mentors numerous early-stage companies via his role at the SixThirty FinTech accelerator in St Louis. He holds a BS in Marketing and International Business and an MBA with a focus on product development and brand strategy from Penn State University.
8/18/2019 • 18 minutes, 3 seconds
1484 Content Marketing at Scale Passes $3m ARR, 500 Customers
Doug Breaker serves as CEO of Scripted.com, a marketplace of freelance copywriters and provider of strategic content marketing services. Prior to running Scripted, Doug led Earth Class Mail and HomeFinder.com as CEO. Doug began his career as a software developer before jumping into product management and holding successively more senior product roles at Orbitz.com and HomeFinder.
8/17/2019 • 17 minutes, 40 seconds
1483 How to Bootstrap to $1M in ARR
Thomas is the founder of Tapfiliate, a company that builds world-class tools for tracking, managing and growing affiliate programs and referral campaigns. In previous lives he has created an ad-supported free printing service for students and a social network for startups. Thomas loves ad-tech, vinyl records and (needless to say) cats.
8/16/2019 • 19 minutes, 52 seconds
1482 He's Raising $6m on a $40m Pre For B2B FinTech Tool
A serial entrepreneur with a 20+ year track record, Yuryi was previously CEO and founder of YMF, a leading financial software company with 300 employees that was later sold to a big tech company. A well respected authority in the Brazilian technology sector, Yuryi is often called upon to advise firms and individuals on IT best practice and solutions. Before founding YMF, Yuryi spent 8 years in the Investment Bank GARANTIA as a Trader and Portfolio Manager.
8/15/2019 • 14 minutes, 47 seconds
1481 Don't lie to yourself. "Free Users" are not "Customers"
Christian Schmidt has been CEO of CleverReach® since summer 2015. Together with Jens Klibingat and Konrad Frerichs, he manages the international email marketing company with more than 200,000 customers in 152 countries. Schmidt graduated in New Media Design and Communication at the Mediadesign Hochschule Düsseldorf. He began his professional career at the ZEFA picture agency, which was later taken over by Corbis. Further professional stations include Image Source in London and the Masterfile European Headquarters in Düsseldorf. Schmidt most recently worked as Managing Director at Friesland Versand GmbH.
8/14/2019 • 22 minutes, 37 seconds
1480 Social Listening Tool Raising $6m on $22M Pre Money (10x Valuation)
Serial entrepreneur and startup evangelist with expertise in Internet and social media. Since 2012, Co-Founder and CEO of SentiOne: AI-powered Social Listening and Engagement Platform. Kamil has successfully led SentiOne from a local startup to company providing services to over 750 brands across 30 international markets. SentiOne's customer list include such brands as: Procter&Gamble, Beiersdorf, Samsung, Unilever, Saatchi & Saatchi, Allianz and many more. Privately Kamil is a big fan of snowboarding, Italian coffee and travelling.
8/13/2019 • 17 minutes, 36 seconds
1479 Are they actually better than WebMD w $500k+ in Revenue?
Tal is CEO & Co-Founder of Medivizor (http://medivizor.com) - leading a revolution in how health information should be presented - by making it personal. What's Medivizor? When people cope with serious or chronic illness, someone often becomes what I call a "chronic web researcher" - looking for everything and anything that can help. However, despite endless amount of health information, finding the cutting-edge information that is current, trustworthy, and relevant to the specific situation is nearly impossible. Medivizor is trying to make the world better by personalizing health information and solving for this important and unmet need. Before Medivizor Tal helped bring to life DarioHealth's all-in-one blood glucose system - stylish and compact hardware/software combination. More broadly: Tal has over 25 years of technologies and software development experience, and has held management positions in R&D and Product Management at Amdocs, XACCT, DarioHealth and other companies. As Amdocs’ Chief Scientist, Tal led all innovation activities across Amdocs (a public $3B company with over 20,000 employees), including a variety of innovation and incubation programs. Tal has over 30 patents to his credit, and is recognized for his passion for, and expertise in innovation by frequently being asked to speak at major industry events such as TeleManagement World, Mobile World Congress, CTIA and Billing & OSS World. He has been actively in industry consortiums including IETF, ATIS and TM Forum, serving on various committees and boards.
8/12/2019 • 24 minutes, 21 seconds
1478 The Art of the Start: First $1k in MRR and How He Did It
Karl has helped build a few start-up software SaaS Apps and info products, eCom related SaaS, a Membership software and more. Currently, Karl is building two software and training programs. SegMateApp.com a chatbot and messenger marketing platform and Impulsely.com an eCom Funnel building application.
8/11/2019 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
1477 $0 to $50k MRR in 70 Days for New Recruiting Tool Backed by AI
8/10/2019 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
1476 He wants to replace your CFO, 500 Customers $4.5m Funding, $2m ARR
8/9/2019 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
1475 If Clearbit and Hubspot Had a Baby...
Wart Fransen is the CEO of an Amsterdam based company called LeadBoxer and oversees general operations & business. He also is the product owner and planning the roadmap for LeadBoxers future. Prior to LeadBoxer, Wart was co-founder and CTO for Opentracker, a web analytics company specialised in tracking individuals and behaviour.
8/8/2019 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
1474 Advantages of IoT+SaaS with $2.5m Revenue CEO of Senorberg
Michael von Roeder works both as entrepreneur and corporate executive. Currently he serves as CEO of Sensorberg, a SaaS IoT company. As the founder and investor of various start-ups in the areas of Mobile, Energy and FinTech, he is firmly anchored in Berlin and the international founding scene. Prior to his involvement with Sensorberg, he gained his industrial and management experience at Vattenfall and Vodafone. At Vodafone he led the global user experience function in London, Tokyo and Düsseldorf. Before he worked at Accenture. He holds degrees in Business Administration
8/7/2019 • 17 minutes, 16 seconds
1473 How to Raise $500k From Early Channel Partners To Break $20k/mo in MRR
Brennan Dunn is the founder of Double Your Freelancing and helps teach over 50,000 freelancers and agencies how to earn more money and work with better clients. He’s also the co-founder of RightMessage, a software company that helps bring on-site personalization to the masses.
8/6/2019 • 15 minutes, 43 seconds
1472 How She Raised Her Own $90m Fund at 29 Years Old
Lu Zhang is the Founder and Managing Partner of Fusion Fund. In 2017, Lu was awarded the Forbes 30 Under 30 as a Featured Honoree in the VC category. In the same year, she was selected as Town & Country 50 New Modern Swans. Recently, Lu was awarded as the Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum, Davos. Prior to starting Fusion Fund, Lu was the Founder and CEO of a medical device company for the early diagnosis of Type II diabetes (acq 2012). She is an advisor and mentor to several innovative programs and incubators in Silicon Valley. She also serves as a youth member of a council of the Future Award. Lu received her M.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from Stanford University.
8/5/2019 • 16 minutes, 24 seconds
1471 How to Use a $750K "Affiliate Launch Model" To Juice Your SaaS Offering
Andy Fletcher is a serial entrepreneur now working on his 3rd company. He has a background in development and a Masters degree in Computer Science but fell in love with digital marketing about a decade ago. This makes martech SaaS pretty much the perfect place for him to be.
8/4/2019 • 18 minutes, 12 seconds
1470 He Went from $0 to $8k MRR in 6 Months for Employee Management Tool
I'm graduated in information technology management and I've been working with product development in the last 12 years. In the last four years I was focused to improve management and leadership skills where I found the gap of tools to help managers and HR being more efficient and do a better job.
8/3/2019 • 11 minutes, 27 seconds
1469 How He's Bootstrapped to $7.2M in ARR with Less Than 5 Sales and Marketing People
Jeremy Greenberg is the founder and CEO of SellerCloud. His vision has guided SellerCloud to the forefront of the competitive ecommerce management playing field.
8/2/2019 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
1468 How Moat Picked $100k ACV, Grew to $50M+ ARR, Exited to Oracle for "$850M"
Jonah Goodhart is Senior Vice President, Oracle Data Cloud. Jonah was the Co-Founder and CEO of Moat, which was acquired by Oracle in April 2017. Jonah was the Founding Investor and Board Member of Right Media (acquired by Yahoo!), Founding Partner of WGI Group, and Co-Founder of Billions.org. Ernst & Young named him Entrepreneur Of The Year 2017 New York in the category of Digital Media. Jonah was also a member of Mayor Bloomberg's Council on Technology and Innovation.
8/1/2019 • 27 minutes, 57 seconds
1467 Olark Founded 2007, $14.4M+ in ARR, So Why Did New Live Chat Players Get All The Love?
Ben Congleton is CEO and Cofounder of Olark Live Chat. Olark is Bootstrapped, Profitable, and Proud, and helps over 12,000 businesses grow by communicating with the right customer at the right time. Ben is passionate about building strong work cultures where teams bring their whole-selves to work.
7/31/2019 • 23 minutes, 17 seconds
1466 Sales Demo Tool Passes $3m in ARR, Transitions To Enterprise
Garin Hess is a serial entrepreneur who has founded multiple software companies, industry conferences, and a non-profit organization. He is currently the founder and CEO of Consensus, a B2B demo automation platform. He enjoys reading history, mountain biking, choir conducting, and spending time with his wife and three children.
7/30/2019 • 22 minutes, 43 seconds
1465 She Helps Teams Plan Social Media Content, $3.5k in MRR
Born in a family of hustlers, Xenia never had the chance to escape the fate of being an entrepreneur. So at only 20 y.o. she started her first company, a digital marketing agency. She was shocked that in a world transformed by social media technology, brands and agencies were still working like in the MadMen era - buried in meetings, excels, powerpoints and endless email threads. In 2016 she and her co-founders started Planable to help people behind brands work together in a better way. Today, more than 3,000 teams globally use Planable for marketing collaboration.Xenia was born in Moldova, an Eastern European country and former Soviet republic, where tech entrepreneurship is rather new. So she overcame her country’s limitation and communist history with hard work becoming the first Moldovan to be invited to attend Tim Draper’s prestigious academy in Silicon Valley. Planable is the first and only Moldovan team to be accelerated and receive an investment from Techstars. Now, the product is being used by brands such as KFC, Virgin Mobile, Wendy’s and the company has offices both in London and in Eastern Europe.
7/29/2019 • 16 minutes, 11 seconds
1464 GDPR Compliant Analytics Hits $3.6M in ARR, Raising Soon
Maciej is a technically skilled leader, technology enthusiast and entrepreneur. CEO at Piwik PRO - GDPR compliant analytics and marketing platform for enterprises and Clearcode - world's leading software house specializing in building custom advertising and marketing technology (AdTech/MarTech).
CEO and co-founder of Segmint, an innovative financial technology company that empowers financial institutions and financial technology providers to easily understand and leverage data, interact with customers and measure results. Rob has been awarded 7 U.S. and international patents for Segmint. Rob is also the founder of WiredViews, a digital marketing agency.
7/27/2019 • 22 minutes, 12 seconds
1462 With $10m in TTM Revenues, Are You Missing Out on Opt-In Advertising?
Joe is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Opt-Intelligence. Since co-founding Opt-Intelligence in 2003 Joe has served as a thought leader and expert in the opt-in advertising space. Prior to Opt-Intelligence Joe served as Vice President of Online Services at Cross Media Marketing. He got his start in 1998 as co-founder and President of CouponSoup, a company dedicated to putting coupons for local businesses online. Joe received a BA in Psychology from Boston College.
7/26/2019 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
1461 Does Your CS Team Carry a Quota? $8M in ARR on $2.5M Raised Roadmunk CEO Explains
Latif Nanji is the co-founder and CEO of Roadmunk, a product roadmapping platform that enables clients such as The Coca-Cola Company, Citibank, MasterCard and Adobe to visualize and collaborate on strategic plans. Latif’s entrepreneurial chops extend beyond Roadmunk. He co-founded Pragmatic CEO, a Toronto meetup for tech entrepreneurs, and Pokerspace.com, an online social network for poker players. Latif’s background spans all things startup: from leadership and sales to product management and design. In his off-time, Latif is an avid reader, rock climber and skier.
7/25/2019 • 22 minutes, 37 seconds
1460 Social Listening Tool Breaks $22M in ARR Responding to RFP's
CEO of Linkfluence, a SaaS platform that turns social data into valuable insights for global brands, using AI and the human expertise from 100+ data scientists and analysts. Co-founder & CEO of Scoop.it, a web content monitoring SaaS platform acquired by Linkfluence. Entrepreneur since 2000: Musiwave (first mobile music platform, acquired by Microsoft), Goojet (pre-iPhone mobile widget platform). Startup advisor and investor: Tedemis (email retargeting, acquired by Criteo), The Refiners, Impact (cross-border accelerators in San Francisco).
7/24/2019 • 19 minutes, 26 seconds
1459 He Left Growth At Buffer to Launch Amazon Retargeting Tool PixelMe, $10k in MRR
I am the CEO & co-founder of PixelMe at night and Product Manager Growth at Buffer during the day! We started PixelMe as a side project with Tom and Jeremy in Sept 2017. We're at $6K MRR and more than $120k in revenue thanks to an incredible Appsumo promotion.
7/23/2019 • 15 minutes, 18 seconds
1458 Why He's Aiming for 20% FCF+Growth As $30M ARR Private Equity Owned Company
With more than 20 years of technology leadership experience, Steven is the CEO of Logi Analytics. Prior to this role, Steven served as both COO and CPO at Logi, where he led the sales, product, engineering, marketing, and customer success teams. Prior to Logi, he was a founding partner of OnDemandIQ, a Hosted Business Intelligence solution, and a practice manager at leading web technology company Proxicom.
7/22/2019 • 29 minutes, 36 seconds
1457 eLearning Company For Internal Teams in Kentucky Hits 1000 Customers, $600k MRR
Don Weobong is founder and president of Telania, a technology software-as-a-service company based in Louisville, Kentucky. Telania specializes in helping organizations solve tough challenges through e-learning technology, leaves of absence management solutions, and sales channel management. Premier products include eLeaP, CaptureLeave, PRMDeals, and Azimio.
7/21/2019 • 17 minutes, 38 seconds
1456 Hyper Secure CRM Tool Passes $10M in ARR
Jody has been CEO of Introhive since it was founded 7 years ago. Jody is a frequent blogger and speaker on topics of sales acceleration, especially among enterprises.
7/20/2019 • 22 minutes, 47 seconds
1455 How Groove Scaled To 400 Customers, $5M in ARR on $3.8M Raised
Chris Rothstein is the CEO and co-founder of Groove.co, a sales engagement platform. Prior to Groove.co, Chris built, scaled and managed enterprise sales teams at Google.
7/19/2019 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
1454 How This Intercom, Drift Competitor Is Winning in India
Gaurav is founder and CEO of Verloop.io, a conversational sales and marketing automation platform. Gaurav started coding when he was 11 and has built 2 businesses before. One of them was acquired while the other was unsuccessful.
7/18/2019 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
1453 How This Event App Bootstrapped to $1M in ARR
Co-founder and CEO of MeetApp. Started out as an Accenture consultant, went on to be a CIO in the Nordics at the media/tech company Cision. Quit 2012 to start MeetApp and other business full time. Since 2015 100% focus on MeetApp
One of North America’s preeminent authorities on artificial intelligence, Gary has over 25 years’ experience working with leading global corporations to deliver revenue and profit growth. He founded Daisy Intelligence in 2003 bringing autonomous machine intelligence to clients in retail, insurance and healthcare. Daisy Intelligence, headquartered in the Greater Toronto Area operates an applied artificial intelligence (A.I.) software-as-a-service (SaaS) business delivering operational corporate decisions that are too complex for humans to make, resulting in efficiencies and profitability gains. Currently, Daisy is revolutionizing optimization of merchandise planning for high volume retailers and fraud detection/risk management for insurance and banking. Using proprietary mathematical solutions and Daisy’s reinforcement learning A.I.-based simulation platform, Daisy analyzes trillions of the tradeoffs inherent in any complex business question and provides timely, actionable decision recommendations to help corporate clients grow total sales, improve margins and reduce fraud. Gary is the former head of IBM Canada’s data mining and data warehousing practices. He was also at the helm of Loyalty Consulting Group, providing analytical services for one of the world’s most successful coalition loyalty programs, the AIR MILES® Reward Program. Gary holds both a B.A.Sc. and M.A.Sc. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Toronto.
7/16/2019 • 17 minutes, 38 seconds
1451 Spanish Speaking Verticalized ChatBot Company Closing $10k/mo+ Deals
Pablo lived in the United States for 10 years before returning to Mexico City to pursue a bachelor's in economics. Before founding Gus, Pablo participated in the management of a B2B sales team that was responsible for acquiring more than USD 2 million in ARR. In 2015 Pablo Co-founded Gus, an AI company that works with clients like Santander, Amercian Express, Cabify and 30 others to automate customer service and improve customer experience. Gus has been selected as the Diamond prize winner of MassChallenge and is part of the Endeavor National Panel for Mexico.
7/15/2019 • 16 minutes, 54 seconds
1450 20k Customers and $1m in ARR Event Management Company Started as Wife Project
Seth lives in Southern Utah, where he has been hard-wired to the web design and development industry since 2001. In 2009, Seth launched his first WordPress plugin, then in 2011, he quit his full-time job to focus on building a business around the plugin, which now powers over 60,000 ticketing websites.
7/14/2019 • 18 minutes, 16 seconds
1449 How Dad of 3 Manages Life and $600K ARR Business
Ryan O’Donnell lives at the top of the funnel ever since he landed at Yahoo via acquisition in 2007. Ryan co-founded Replyify.com to automate cold emails and follow-ups because other solutions on the market were either glorified 'mail merge' apps or too cumbersome to work with.
7/13/2019 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
1448 He's Selling $1.4m ARR Company For How Much?
A 25-year advertiser sales and online media veteran. Starting in B2B in 1992 in NYC. In 1998 launch Lawyers.com for Lexis Nexus/Martindale Hubble. Recruited by InfoUSA to be President of IDEXEC with sales offices in New York and London. Promoted by the parent company to become the SVP of Sale Op’s for InfoUSA with 125 sales reps and close to $1 billion in gross revenue. Hired by Kinder Hook, a NYC based VC to build and sell CPC Associates a New Mover data compiler. With a dramatic growth in just 18 months the company which was purchased for $14 million was sold to Epsilon for $72 million. He co-founded BlueLink Marketing in April of 2010, later sold his interest in the company. He co-founded Pubvantage in 2015
7/12/2019 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
1447 $30m ARR Company Is POS For 4000 SMB's
I'm an entrepreneur by nature and an executive in practice. I founded ECRS in my early 20s, in 1989, with the simple vision that the microprocessor and software would transform retail, allowing local and regional retailers to not only compete, but win against their national competitors. I believe great companies are built one idea, one customer and one employee at a time. Like a great oak tree, it takes time to build a company that last, with deep cultural roots and consistent driving purpose and I’ve dedicated my career to building such a company.
7/11/2019 • 20 minutes, 44 seconds
1446 Why Doesn't He Shut Down $2500/mo, 20+ year old business?
Born and raised in New Jersey, a graduate of Amherst College - I am the Founder and former CEO of People Productions - a digital marketing agency located in Boulder , Colorado. In 1999, I spun off a related SAAS business called UpSync to help our clients distribute, track and control the digital content we were creating for them. I sold People Productions in 2017 and am now solely focused on running UpSync, a mobile sales enablement platform.
7/10/2019 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
1445 Enterprise Teams Use Her to Scale Employee Engagement, $3.5m ARR, $10m Raised
Susan Hunt Stevens is the Founder/CEO of WeSpire. She is a recognized expert in the use of social and game mechanics to drive positive behavior change and was named an EY Entrepreneur of the Year in 2015. Previously she was GM/SVP at the New York Times Company, leading a large regional digital media division.
7/9/2019 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
1444 Retarget Based Off Who Called Your Company, $1.5m in ARR, 45 Customers
Dorin Rosenshine is the founder & CEO of Outleads, a Microsoft Accelerator company. Outleads enables brands to engage customers with online advertising and relevant content based on offsite and offline data. Dorin has over a decade of experience in optimizing the digital presence for firms in a variety of industries, from consumer electronics to home improvement. Her work ranged from business identity to web application development, online ad budget management, and landing page optimization. A self-taught developer, designer, and copywriter, she has served as head of marketing as well as IT. Dorin lives in New York City and loves everything about it, particularly Central Park.
7/8/2019 • 24 minutes, 7 seconds
1443 Bootstrapped and Making Pop-ups Sexier, Passes $1.4m in ARR
I'm the CEO and Co-founder of Sleeknote. I live in Denmark with my wife and three kids. Besides running Sleeknote I'm also an international keynote speaker.
7/7/2019 • 14 minutes, 15 seconds
1442 Webinar Platform Breaks $2.5m in ARR, But Churn Too High
Casey Zeman is the founder of EasyWebinar. Casey has consulted such companies as Harper Collins, Estee Lauder and Dell on video/webinar strategies and has built his own multi-million dollar software business. His mission is to help a million experts spread their message, sell their program and leverage their time through automation and engagement using his tools.
7/6/2019 • 23 minutes, 37 seconds
1441 He Helps Event Organizers Sell 7m Tickets $130M In Gross Sales
7/5/2019 • 14 minutes, 23 seconds
1440 He's Flat at $25k/mo So He's Making This 1 Big Change
7/4/2019 • 16 minutes, 50 seconds
1439 Does sending physical gifts increase LTV of customers?
7/3/2019 • 21 minutes
1438 Why He Went Public With $6m in Revenue
Nazzareno Gorni is the CEO of MailUp Group (https://mailupgroup.com/en/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:45 – How MailUp has been built as a business messaging company 1:45 – Why they are doing more than €35M in ARR right now 2:05 – How they are growing 35% year over year 2:30 – Why their ideal customers are marketers and developers 3:40 – How MailUp has grown to serve 20k customers 4:20 – Why they have started to move upmarket 5:10 – How he launched the company in 2002 5:30 – Why they launched with just €15k in self-funding 5:48 – How they raised €3M when they IPO'd 6:40 – Why they went public to fund acquisitions 8:30 – How their team has grown to 170 employees in Italy, Spain, Denmark, and the U.S. 9:15 – How they optimize for payback within 6 to 7 months 9:50 – Why they created BEEfree.io out of an accident 10:40 – How 3k companies are using BEEfree for over $1M in ARR 12:00 – The Famous Five
7/2/2019 • 15 minutes, 37 seconds
1437 Social Listening Tool Hits $4.8m in ARR Selling to Governments
Yoa Pridor is the CEO of Buzzilla (https://www.buzzilla.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:40 – How Buzzilla has been built as a social listening tool 1:20 – Why they offer both SaaS and professional services 1:40 – How 60% of their revenue comes from SaaS today 2:45 – Why people are paying $500 per seat, each month on average 3:15 – How they''ve grown to serve small enterprises 4:15 – Why the average customer is between three and ten seats 4:25 – How they launched the business in 2010 with $1.6M in total funding 4:55 – Why they've grown 40% in the last 12 months 5:30 – How Buzzilla landed almost 300 total companies 6:00 – Why they are doing around $400k in MRR right now 6:25 – How growth has come mostly from new customers thus far 8:45 – Why they've expanded to help governments monitor senitment 9:20 – How they are at 110% net revenue retention annually 10:15 – Why they are landing new customers through word of mouth and online marketing 10:45 – How their team has grown to 25 full-time employees in Israel 11:10 – Why they assume a lifetime value of around $65k over 42 months 12:00 – How their SaaS margins are around 80% with 40% margins on their professional services 12:25 – Why they aren't interested in raising additional capital at this point in time 13:10 – "Would you sell for $20M right now?" 13:35 – The Famous Five
7/1/2019 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
1436 How He Used Partnerships To Grow 10x YoY to $6m in ARR
Zee Aganovic is CEO of HiConversion (https://www.hiconversion.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How HiConversion helps improve the buying experience on eCommerce sites 1:30 – Why the average customer pays them $5k per month 2:30 – How they launched the current version of the company in 2014 3:15 – Why they self-funded before raising $10M from institutional investors 4:15 – How their last round of $3.5M came last year 5:15 – Why several hundred customers are using their platform right now 5:45 – How HiConversion has built numerous strategic partnerships 6:45 – Why 100 companies are paying to use their platform today 7:40 – How they've grown 10x in the last twelve months 9:05 – Why they've scaled to 27 full-time employees 11:10 – Why they are aiming for payback within one month 13:00 – How they've hit 10% gross revenue churn per year 13:45 – The Famous Five
6/30/2019 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
1435 Live Chat For Business Passes $5m in ARR, 31,000 Customers, Bootstrapped
Tim Valishev is the CEO of JivoChat (https://www.jivochat.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:30 – How they help customers better convert using chatbots 1:00 – Why they are north of $5M in ARR right now 2:55 – How their growth has accelerated in emerging markets 2:00 – Why they have grown to serve 230k websites worldwide 2:30 – How the average customer pays JivoChat around $13 per month 3:00 – Why they are different from Drift and Intercom 4:00 – How they have incorporated the calling-in feature 5:20 – Why they launched the company in January 2012 6:50 – How he landed his first 10 customers through existing relationships 8:10 – Why they are exhibiting 45% logo churn annually 9:45 – How they've scaled to 32k paying customers 10:15 – Why they are landing 20k new sign-ups per month 11:15 – How JivoChat is growing via word of mouth 14:00 – Why they spent $300k to break into the Brazilian market 16:00 – How their team of 120 is remotely distributed 16:45 – Why he wants to remain bootstrapped 17:40 – The Famous Five
6/29/2019 • 21 minutes, 42 seconds
1434 She Saved a Pre Revenue $60m Raised Company, Then Launched Own Passing $6m in ARR for Team Alignment Tool
Deidre Paknad is the CEO and co-founder of Workboard (https://www.workboard.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How Workboard has been built to help companies acheive their stragtegic priorities faster 1:20 – Why the average customer is around $125k annually 1:45 – How they launched the company in 2014 2:45 – Why they've raised $12M in total capital thus far 4:45 – How they've landed 50 enterprise customers 5:15 – How they are doing around $520k in MRR today 6:30 – Why they decided to upsell based on number of seats 7:30 – How they are aiming for a 6 month payback period going forward 8:45 – Why they are hitting 140% net revenue retention 11:0 – How they are professional services and coaching to drive stickiness 12:20 – Why they are landing deals for around $17k with payback right away 13:35 – How their team of 55 is based in the Bay Area 14:15 – Why they aren't looking to raised until April 2019 15:00 – How she would view a $100M acquisition right now 15:50 – Why they are looking for a four month ramp period on their sales team 16:50 – The Famous Five
6/28/2019 • 22 minutes, 21 seconds
1433 Can You Run 2 $1.5m ARR Companies At Same Time?
Michael Kamleitner is the CEO of Walls.io (https://walls.io/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:40 – How he runs two companies of roughly the same size 1:00 – Why they've built Walls.io as a social media marketing tool 1:45 – How the average customer pays around $225 today 2:20 – Why they launched the company in 2014 and bootstrapped thus far 2:40 – How 500 customers are using their product today 3:50 – Why they are doing around $110k in MRR 4:05 – How they've grown 70% from around $70k in MRR twelve months ago 4:45 – Why churn is naturally high 6:55 – How he made the decision to run two companies in parallel 8:55 – Why their other product is an enterprise social media scheduling tool 9:15 – "Would you sell for $3M today?" 9:45 – How he is interested in spliting the company and raising capital 10:25 – Why they are having success in content marketing and paid advertising 11:45 – How they are paying around 100 euros to land a new customer 12:20 – Why they aren't spending more money on paid acquisition 12:55 – How their team is headquartered in Vienna 13:30 – The Famous Five
6/27/2019 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
1432 $100M/Day In AirBnB Bookings, He Makes $375k/mo Selling The Data
Scott Shatford is the CEO of AirDNA (https://www.airdna.co/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:30 – How Scott built AirDNA to fill his own need 1:10 – Why they are pulling in data from property managers and individual users 2:05 – How Scott used corporate leases to his advantage 3:15 – Why he launched AirDNA in 2014 3:50 – How he makes the decision to purchase or lease 5:20 – Why he factors in regulation risk and seasonality demand when making decisions 7:00 – How AirBnB is maximizing experiences for customers 8:00 – Why the average customer pays $50 per month 8:10 – How he founded the company with his dad 8:20 – Why their team of 34 is spread between Denver and Barcelona 9:00 – How they've bootstrapped the company to 5k active paid subscribers 9:30 – Why they are doing around $375k in MRR right now 10:00 – How they've more than doubled year over year 10:40 – Why they've struggled with retention to date 11:20 – How they are churning 20% of logos each month 12:45 – Why they don't spend anything on customer acquisition 14:10 – How to get smarter around pricing your property 15:10 – Why they are scraping 10M properties every single day 16:10 – How AirBnB is approaching $100M in transcation volume per day 16:30 – The Famous Five
6/26/2019 • 20 minutes, 48 seconds
1431 CRM for Speakers Passes $30k in MRR
JP Narowski is the CEO of KarmaCRM (https://www.karmacrm.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How KarmaCRM has been built as a niche CRM for professional speakers 0:45 – Why the average customer pays around $50 per month 1:20 – How he launched the company in 2011 1:30 – Why they are doing around $30k in MRR right now 1:45 – How they've grown 50% year over year 1:55 – Why they've grown with just $100k in outside funding 3:20 – How they've scaled to a team of 4 full-time employees 4:00 – Why they landed their first customers through organic channels 4:40 – How they target a CAC of $300 with payback in 6 months 5:30 – Why speakers love their pre-populated email templates and language within the product 6:15 – How they've gotten to 5% gross logo churn per month 7:10 – Why they assume an LTV of $1k over 20 months 7:35 – How they are looking to scale their business with partnerships 9:15 – Why they are looking to publish more content around the speaking niche 9:55 – How he views the future of the company 10:40 – Why he is using his free time to run a family eCommerce business 11:20 – How he would view a $500k acquisition offer 11:55 – The Famous 5
6/25/2019 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
1430 Can You Do 50% Consulting, 50% SaaS On Top of Open Source CRM Framework?
Greg Soper is the CEO of SalesAgility (https://www.salesagility.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:30 – Why IT is heavily constrained with delivering value 2:00 – How competitive businesses leverage open source software 3:15 – Why some companies don't have enough capital to optimize out of the box software 3:55 – How they have built their business on top of an open source CRM 4:30 – Why they've had 1M downloads in the last 5 years 5:00 – How they make money doing consulting for their open source platform 5:45 – Why SalesAgility charges for hosting and usage 7:00 – How they are enabling businesses to own their data 7:30 – Why they are providing an alternative to cloud solutions 8:25 – How consulting is a large part of their business 9:50 – Why the average customer is paying them $10-15 per seat monthly 11:50 – How they are planning to launch a new SaaS product soon 12:30 – Why their SaaS product is subsidizing development 13:00 – How they've grown to serve 100 companies today 13:20 – Why they don't make their SaaS offering free 14:30 – How they are doing $5M in annual revenue overall 14:45 – Why their team of 40 full-time employees are based in Scotland 15:30 – How they've grown to scale by bootstrapping 16:00 – Why they are focusing on both SaaS and consulting 19:00 – The Famous 5
6/24/2019 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
1429 Enterprise Collect Customer Data With This $11m ARR Tool
Richard Jones is the CEO of The Wayin Platform (https://www.wayin.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How Wayin helps 150+ enterprise customers create interactice experiences 1:20 – Why they collect explicitly shared data 2:40 – How they provide many different mechanisms for engagement 5:25 – Why they don't own or share the data they collect 5:45 – How the average customer pays them $65k annually 7:10 – Why they are doing $10M+ in ARR right now 7:30 – How he launched the company in 2011 8:20 – Why he still has meaningful equity after merging and becoming CEO 8:55 – How they've grown to 72 full-time employees internationally and in the U.S. 9:25 – Why they are growing 62% year over year 9:50 – How their growth is coming from both new customers and expansion 10:30 – Why they are driving 125% net revenue retention annually 12:45 – How they are spending 2% of their revenue on marketing
6/23/2019 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
1428 Bootstrapped and $12m in ARR. My kinda CEO!
Max Israel is Founder & CEO of Customerville (https://www.customerville.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:30 – Why Max founded the company 15 years ago to scratch his own itch 1:30 – How he grew the business without venture capital 2:20 – Why they made the decision to pivot eight years ago 3:05 – How the average customer pays them $250k annually 4:05 – Why they decided to maintain bootstrapped 4:30 – How they funded the business with a small retail chain 5:30 – Why they serve more than 50 customers globally 6:00 – How they are doing around $1M in MRR right now 7:30 – Why they are growing 50%+ year over year 8:50 – How they've kept gross logo churn below 10% annually 10:00 – Why they are focusing on driving expansion revenue with new features going forward 10:15 – How their team has grown to around 40 full-time employees 10:45 – Why they spent up to $400k on Google AdWords in the past 12:10 – How they are evaluating new plans for growing their sales team 13:00 – Why they aren't in acquisition talks right now 14:00 – The Famous Five
6/22/2019 • 18 minutes, 14 seconds
1427 Tool Helps You Drive Expansion Revenue, Passes 30 Customers $700k in ARR
Alex Raymond is the co-founder and CEO of Kapta (https://kapta.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How Kapta helps account management teams get increase visibility 1:20 – Why companies pay them between $25k and $100k annually 2:05 – How they launched the company in 2016 as an employee engagement platform 3:35 – Why 30 customers are using Kapta right now 4:45 – How they are connecting directly into CRMs and financial systems 5:20 – Why they are doing north of $60k in MRR 6:10 – How they've more than doubled revenue year over year 7:20 – Why they've raised $1.5M in total capital 8:00 – How they've gotten to 110% net revenue retention annually 9:30 – Why they are starting to get annual payment upfront 10:00 – How they are spending less than $10k to land a new deal 10:50 – Why Kapta has scaled to three full-time employees in Boulder 11:45 – How they would look to raise $3-5M in a Series A in 2019 13:15 – The Famous Five
6/21/2019 • 17 minutes, 16 seconds
1426 Adtech DSP Passes $30m in Revenue With Addition of New Data Product
Michael Beebe is CEO of Dstillery (https://dstillery.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 00:20 – Why they help unlock brand's growth potential through data science and insights 01:20 – How they are fueling their offering with top advertising performers 02:10 – Why they are creating unique audiences based on limited information 03:20 – How they have created a competitive advantage with behavioral data 04:30 – Why they are still selling a data product on a CPM basis 05:20 – How they spend on revenue share or CPM model 06:00 – Why they are charging 20% regardless of the advertising platform 08:45 – How they have raised $60M with the most round coming in 2018 10:00 – Why they are building a pure-play SaaS product right now 10:45 – How starting out on a consulting basis can have a massive impact on launching a SaaS business 11:50 – Why they are taking up to 50% for every dollar spent on their platform 12:30 – How they have process $50M+ in transaction volume this year 12:50 – The Famous Five
6/20/2019 • 17 minutes, 23 seconds
1425 He Pivoted From IBM Reseller to SaaS in 1998, Now $5m in ARR
Mickey Patton is President and CEO of Clear C2 (https://www.clearc2.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:30 – How they launched the company as an electronic rolodex 0:55 – Why they are built as a CRM for manufacturers 1:35 – How they average customer pays them $60 per seat monthly 2:20 – Why Mickey joined the company to launch the software division 3:00 – How they've scaled to 50 full-time employees 3:40 – Why they are working with 450 total customers today 4:30 – How they are serving around 100,00 total seats 5:20 – Why they put their sales teams on annual quotas 6:15 – How they exhibiting less than 10% gross logo churn annually 7:25 – Why they are transitioning to a more user-friendly model 8:55 – How they are paying around $10k to land a new customer right now 11:25 – How they are doing more than $3M in ARR 12:30 – Why they are growing 60% year over year 13:00 – Why they are past $5M in ARR 13:20 – The Famous Five
6/19/2019 • 17 minutes, 23 seconds
1424 He Launched CRM in 2003, Bootstrapped, now $3.5m in ARR
Craig is the founder and CEO of SalesNexus (https://salesnexus.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:40 – Why he transitioned to SaaS 1:00 – How SalesNexus has grown to scale by bootstrapping 1:15 – Why the average customer pays them $150-$200 each month 1:30 – How he launched the company back in 2003 as a side-hustle 2:30 – Why they have grown to serve 5,000 total customers today 3:00 – How they manage implementation in-house to drive customer success 3:50 – Why SalesNexus is doing $3.5M in ARR 5:20 – How they added marketing automation features to increase pricing 5:55 – Why they have scaled from $3.25M in ARR 12 months ago 6:20 – How the average customer stays with them for 5 years 7:35 – Why driving customization leads to stickiness for SalesNexus 8:20 – How they are landing new customers via online advertising 9:15 – Why they are spending $300 in CAC right now 10:20 – How their team has grown to 20 full-time employees in Houston 11:10 – Why they are cash flow positive today 11:30 – How Craig still seems room for growth today 13:50 – The Famous Five
6/18/2019 • 17 minutes, 40 seconds
1423 How He Moved from Design Agency to SaaS Launch First $14k in MRR
Alexander Hoogewijs is the CEO of SiteManager (https://www.sitemanager.io/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:40 – Why SiteManager has found a niche serving freelance web designers and small agencies 1:40 – How the typical customer pays them $105 each month 2:35 – How they serve 138 customers with 350 total users 3:10 – Why SiteManager is doing $14k in MRR right now 3:30 – How they are landing customers via outbound sales 4:20 – Why most of their team is based in Belgium and remote 4:45 – How their gross monthly revenue churn is around 1% today 5:30 – Why they raised more than $850k in outside funding 7:20 – How they are shooting for $60k in MRR within the next year 8:00 – Why they are paying $1,400 in CAC today 8:55 – Why they are spending most of their cash on their sales teams and onboarding 9:30 – The Famous Five
6/17/2019 • 14 minutes, 40 seconds
1422 How He Drove $300k Expansion on $1m ARR Cohort in 12 Months
1422 Nicolas Vandenberghe How He Drove $300k Expansion on $1m ARR Cohort in 12 Months Nicolas Vandenberghe is the CEO of Chili Piper (https://www.chilipiper.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:35 – Why they help businesses close more sales 2:10 – How the average customer pays them around $10k annually 3:55 – Why customers are pairing this technology with SDR's 5:05 – How they launched the company in January of 2016 5:20 – Why more than 200 customers are using their software today 6:10 – How they are at $2M in ARR right now 6:30 – Why they have hit net negative revenue churn annually 8:10 – How a majority of their growth has come from driving expansion revenue 8:35 – Why they have decided to bootstrap up to this point 9:35 – How they recieve payback 10:20 – Why the Chili Piper team has grown to 14 full-time employees 11:00 – How they are receiving payback within one month 14:40 – Why he would look to raise $5M at a pre-money valuation of $40M 15:35 – The Famous Five
6/16/2019 • 21 minutes, 6 seconds
1421 How He IPO'd $2m ARR Company on Polish Exchange
1421 Michal Sadowski How He IPO'd $2m ARR Company on Polish Exchange Michal Sadowski is the Founder & CEO of Brand24 (https://brand24.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 00:24 – Why Brand24 now serve 2k customers each month 03:35 – How their average customer pays them $100 monthly 04:35 – Why they are doing $2.4M in ARR 05:05 – How they launched the company back in 2011 05:15 – Why their team of 65 full-time employees is based in Poland 05:45 – How they've grown to scale with just $300k in venture capital 08:40 – Why they are up from $1.8M in ARR twelve months ago 12:20 – How Brand24 is exhibiting 5% to 7% gross logo churn per month 13:21 – Why they are landing new customers for $280 in CAC 13:45 – How they assume an LTV of $1,500 over 15 months 14:00 – The Famous Five
6/15/2019 • 20 minutes, 11 seconds
1420 He Went Zero to $1m in ARR in 6 Months, Bootstrapped
1420 Joshua Keller He Went Zero to $1m in ARR in 6 Months, Bootstrapped Joshua Keller is the Founder and CEO of Maximus (https://maximus.live/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 01:30 – Why their customers pay them $1k per month 02:55 – How they launched the company in 2017 04:00 – Why they have grown to scale by bootstrapping thus far 04:20 – How they have landed 25 total customers 04:50 – Why Maximus is doing $75k in MRR right now 07:00 – How their gross churn is between 2-3% monthly 08:05 – Why their team of 20 full-time employees is based in New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Austin, Ukraine, and India 09:20 – The Famous Five
6/14/2019 • 13 minutes, 9 seconds
1419 "I Don't Know What Logo Churn Means", I Predict They'll Be Dead in Under 12 Months
1419 Bill Kahlert "I Don't Know What Logo Churn Means", I Predict They'll Be Dead in Bill Kahlert is the Co-founder of INBOX25 (https://www.inbox25.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 00:15 – Why INBOX25 provides marketing automation and customization 00:35 – How they charge their average customer $300-$400 per month 00:55 – Why he launched the business in 2007 01:40 – How they have grown to serve 4k user and 2k paid customers 03:30 – Why their pricing scales based on the size of your database 04:45 – How they are retaining more than 95% of their customers annually 06:10 – Why their customers typically stay with them for years on end 06:45 – How INBOX25 thinks about lifetime value and CAC 07:40 – Why they are aiming for payback within 6 months 08:10 – How their team has less than 50 employees
6/13/2019 • 11 minutes, 3 seconds
1418 $2.4M ARR Marketing Automation Company CEO Would Sell for $10M Today
1418 $1m on $10m pre would raise. Would sell for $10m today. Sean Leonard $2.4M ARR Marketing Automation Company CEO Would Sell for $10M Today Sean Leonard is the CEO and co-founder of ActiveDEMAND (https://www.activedemand.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:35 – How ActiveDEMAND functions as a marketing automation platform 1:15 – Why they've decided to feature professional services 1:50 – How the average customer pays them $400 monthly 3:20 – Why he launched the company in 2014 out of an agency 4:40 – How they've scaled to serve 500 agencies 5:00 – Why they are doing between $200k and $300k in MRR 6:00 – How ActiveDEMAND is growing 30% year over year 6:50 – Why they are growing through a land and expand model 7:30 – How they are landing agencies through partner webinars and content marketing 9:40 – Why they spend $800 to land a new customer 11:10 – How they've grown to less than 50 full-time employees in Alberta 11:40 – Why they are planning on raising capital 13:00 – How he would be happy with a $10M pre-money valuation 14:00 – "Would you sell for $10M today?" 15:00 – The Famous Five
6/12/2019 • 18 minutes, 36 seconds
1417 CloudHealth CEO On $500M VMWare Exit, 70% yoy Growth, $50m+ in ARR
1417 Tom Axbey CloudHealth CEO On $500M VMWare Exit, 70% yoy Growth, $50m+ in ARR Tom Axbey is the President and CEO of CloudHealth Technologies (https://www.cloudhealthtech.com/) 🕒 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 0:25 – How CloudHealth helps businesses manage visibility, cost management, security, and governance of their cloud infrastructure 1:40 – Why the average customer pays them between $50k and $1M annually 2:10 – How they launched the company in 2012 3:20 – Why they've raised $86M in total capital thus far 4:15 – How CloudHealth has grown to serve 3,500 total customers 4:50 – Why they are doing between $50M and $100M in ARR today 6:30 – How they are growing 70% year over year 6:50 – Why they are at 104% net revenue retention at this point in time 7:45 – How they are targetting a payback period of 6 months 9:40 – The Famous Five
6/11/2019 • 12 minutes, 55 seconds
1416 They'd like to Raised $1m on $6m Pre For Google Drive for RSS Feeds Concept Doing $35k in MRR
Addicted to mobile products and services after more than 15yrs in different executive roles in media&entertainment, product development for leading publishers and brands with his agency clapp, started tchop as MVP project 3 years ago.
6/10/2019 • 14 minutes, 26 seconds
1415 Professor Acquires Company to Teach Students Entrepreneurship
Kermit Kuehn is a Professor of Management at the University of Arkansas – Fort Smith, where he teaches strategy, international business and entrepreneurship. He operates Silvrback.com, a subscription blogging platform for writers seeking a less mainstream alternative in their blogging experience, as well as blogplatformsreview.com.
6/9/2019 • 14 minutes, 30 seconds
1414 $6m in ARR, 3x YoY Growth Knotch Helps Enterprise Brands Measure Their Marketing
Anda Gansca is the CEO and Co-Founder of Knotch, the leading, independent provider of real-time intelligence for marketers. Founded in 2013, Knotch has been recognized as one of the most innovative marketing technologies in the world, as it seeks to change the way global brands engage and understand their audiences. Amongst Knotch's clients are GE, JP Morgan Chase, Unilever, Prudential and HPE. A regular thought leadership contributor to the trade media and industry at-large, Anda has been named to both Forbes’ and Inc.’s annual 30-Under-30 lists, AdWeek's Young Influential List and AdWeek's Top 100 Creatives, to name a few.
6/8/2019 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
1413 With $4m in ARR, This Cannabis POS System Is Market Leader Growing 3x YoY
Kyle Sherman is the Founder and CEO of Flowhub and serves on the board of directors as Chairman. A legalization advocate and entrepreneur, Kyle is finding ways to use technology to help drive cannabis legalization forward responsibly in the United States. In 2014, Kyle began lobbying the Colorado Department of Revenue to build an API to Metrc, the State's cannabis tracking system, so that third parties like Flowhub could send data directly to the database instead of manual entry. This Metrc API is now the standard in more than 7 states. Kyle continually defines Flowhub's vision, strategy, and growth as Flowhub innovates the way cannabis businesses manage complex compliance mandates, supply chain data, sales transactions, and reporting. His goal is to simplify business operations, keep companies and government transparent, keep cannabis products off of the black market, and build a robust scalable industry that is approachable for all adults and medical patients. This inherent motivation keeps Kyle and the Flowhub team passionate about providing fanatical customer service, and building delightful products and user experiences.
6/7/2019 • 18 minutes, 3 seconds
1412 Passed $12m in ARR, Banks Use This API To Decrease Currency Risk
Darren M. Jer CEO and Co-Founder Darren co-founded MarketFactory in 2008 with a vision of providing clean, fast code to the FX market, and is currently CEO. Prior to founding MarketFactory, Darren led sales and operations in the financial services markets for over a decade. Darren was head of new business sales Americas for EBS / ICAP. Prior to that, he was sales executive for IBM wall street accounts. Darren earned a BA in English and political science from Duke University. Outside of MarketFactory, Darren is an active member of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York and All Souls Langham Place in London. When necessary, Darren can hurt a lot of people’s ears at karaoke.
6/6/2019 • 22 minutes, 6 seconds
1411 This Tool is Flat, Bootstrapped, Why Won't Founder Get The Hell out and Sell?
Former consultant to MIcrosoft, GE, GM, American Express and others. Founder of Spokal.
Pierce started his career at Cognos, which went on to be acquired by IBM. Pierce then joined two start-ups that both went on to have successful exits where he led and implemented Marketo. He then founded Revenue Pulse, a Marketo consultancy and Knak, a SaaS application for enterprise email creation.
6/4/2019 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1409 $1.5B Freshworks To IPO: Growing 40% YoY, Passes $100M in ARR, $250M Raised, 150,000 Companies Using
Girish Mathrubootham is the founder and CEO of Freshworks, one of the world’s fastest-growing SaaS product company, winning the Economic Times Startup of the Year in 2016, and the Business Standard Startup of the Year in 2017. Freshworks now has a suite of products for businesses worldwide - Freshdesk, Freshservice, Freshsales, Freshcaller, Freshteam, Freshchat and Freshmarketer. Girish is part of the Product Council for NASSCOM, the trade association of Indian software companies, and actively works to promote and nurture software product companies. He has invested in several early-stage startups and is passionate about building a global product company. Having set the vision and direction for the company since inception, his focus on Freshworks’ values and its culture have been instrumental in taking the organization to where it is today.
6/3/2019 • 25 minutes, 33 seconds
1408 Quickly Launch Video Creatives With Automatic Tool Lumen5, $100k in MRR
Michael founded Sniply, a link sharing tool, in 2014 and grew the userbase to over 200K within 3 years. Responding to the decline of links and growth of video, Michael's team launched Lumen5, a video automation platform, in 2017 and passed $1 million in ARR within 10 months of launch.
6/2/2019 • 19 minutes, 22 seconds
1407 Ex Facebook Now Happily Bootstrapping in UX Research Tool Space Past $125k in MRR
Nate Bolt is the Founder of Ethnio, a 5-person SaaS. Former research manager at Facebook and Instagram, CEO of Bolt | Peters, and faculty at the SVA iXD program. Co-author of Remote Research and once droned the NYPL. Based in LA with wife, son, and two dogs.
6/1/2019 • 17 minutes, 5 seconds
1406 How Continuous Improvement Platform 15Five Hit $10m ARR using Land and Expand
David Hassell is a serial entrepreneur and the co-founder and CEO of 15Five. David’s foray into entrepreneurship begun nearly 20 years ago, co-founding three companies in ad tech, kite surfing adventure travel, and leadership coaching before starting 15Five, where he sees the opportunity to help organizations and everyone in them reach their highest potential. David formerly served as the President of the San Francisco chapter of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization and was later named by Forbes “The Most Connected Man You Don’t Know in Silicon Valley.” He’s been featured in The New York Times, Entrepreneur, Fast Company, and Inc.
5/31/2019 • 21 minutes, 59 seconds
1405 How ClickDimensions is using Microsoft Ecosytem To Drive to $40m in ARR
Chief Executive Officer of ClickDimensions, the leading marketing automation solution for Microsoft Dynamics 365. Mike joined ClickDimensions from PGi, a global provider of web conferencing software and collaboration technology, where he served as Executive Vice President of Strategy and Business Development. In that role, he developed partnerships with some of the biggest players in the technology industry, including Microsoft. Prior to that, he started PGi’s Global Collaboration Services division, growing it from $86 million to $240 million in revenue and serving as a trusted advisor to some of the most recognized brands around the globe.
5/30/2019 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
1404 He was fired then went all in, now $30k/mo
John is the founder of GetCredo.com. They take a high touch approach to matching businesses with the right SEO and marketing agencies. John has a decade in SEO, primarily on the largest sites on the internet. He lives in Denver with his wife and their black labrador Butterbean.
5/29/2019 • 18 minutes, 51 seconds
1403 This Direct Mailing SaaS Company Went From $0 to $135k in MRR Using Hubspot Partner Ecosystem
Dennis Kelly is CEO of Postalytics, the leading direct mail marketing automation tool. is a 6 time entrepreneur, primarily focused on software & technology. He's been involved in founding, investing and senior management roles in startups such as Genesis Business System, AnyDay.com, Palm Inc., Adjoin Solutions, Computer Associates and others.
5/28/2019 • 20 minutes, 30 seconds
1402 100% Female Owned, Bootstrapped, Marketing Automation Company for SMB's Passes $85k in MRR
Kim is the founder and President of Genoo. Genoo’s products and services over deliver what entrepreneurs, Small, and midsize businesses need to attract leads and grow new customers. Through a comprehensive software-as-a-service offering and “right-sized” professional service offerings, our customers compete and win.
5/27/2019 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
1401 UserTesting CEO "We're at $65m in ARR Now, Hoping to Break $80m by EOY" across 3000 paying customers
Andy MacMillan is CEO of UserTesting, the leading Human Insights company. Prior to UserTesting he was CEO of Act-On Software and COO, Products at Salesforce. Andy is from the Detroit area and has a B.A. from Michigan State University and an MBA from the University of Edinburgh (Scotland).
5/26/2019 • 23 minutes, 42 seconds
1400 How he Plans to Reach Profitability in CRM space by EOY
Tim's background in software has spanned technical, sales, marketing, and general management in the US, UK, and Japan. Tim started at IBM and went on to a number of successful startups including Illustra ($400M acq), Interwoven ($1B IPO) and BoardVantage ($250M acq). Other experience includes Sybase, Sakkam and Genesys Telecommunications.
5/25/2019 • 23 minutes, 16 seconds
1399 Isralei Defense CEO Passes $250k MRR for Real Time Visitor Segmentation
I am an Israeli entrepreneur with a specialty in data science; after building several e-commerce sites, I recognized the tremendous need for personalization and the opportunity to fill a niche in the market, and so eventually I arrived at a venture that serves one of my chief passions, utilizing AI and digital automation to create an internet that is more personal and efficient. Since 2008, we at Personyze have been honing and perfecting the tools we use to accomplish that goal, and today I am happy to say we have created one of the most versatile and powerful personalization solutions on the market.
5/24/2019 • 12 minutes, 5 seconds
1398 How Limelight Is Shifting to More SaaS Revenue, $5m Currently
Recognizing the early trend for insurtech innovation in 2013, Jason co-founded Limelight Health to deliver better data integration and sales efficiency for insurance carriers, PEO’s, brokers and others in the employee benefits ecosystem. Limelight's award-winning technology, QuotePad™, aims to transform the way health insurance and employee benefits are quoted, sold and renewed. Jason is a serial entrepreneur advising numerous Silicon Valley startups, also volunteering in the industry/community.
5/23/2019 • 15 minutes, 25 seconds
1397 How He Plans to Solve 12% Churn
Neil Napier is a charismatic leader of people. He empowers people to spread their wings and develop their super-powers. Neil cares about his customers like nobody else and is available for them more than his wife would prefer. He loves to teach and goes the extra mile to enable success.
5/22/2019 • 18 minutes, 35 seconds
1396 Percolate Flirts with $40m in ARR, 600 Brands Using as Their Ultimate Content Machine
Randy Wootton is the CEO of Percolate. Randy has been a leader and strategic innovator in the marketing technology industry for over 20 years. Prior to Percolate, he served as CEO of leading predictive marketing platform Rocket Fuel, where he re-positioned the company and led its sale to Sizmek. During his career, Randy has held senior positions at Microsoft and Salesforce. He serves on the Board of Directors at Guidant Financial and Rally Point Networks and is a graduate of Harvard Business School, St. John’s College and the U.S. Naval Academy.
5/21/2019 • 23 minutes, 49 seconds
1395 Kahuna Helps Marketplaces Keep Buyers and Sellers Engaged, Way more than $3m in ARR
00:30 – How Kahuna focuses on customer engagement 03:05 – Why they price based on volume and usage 03:50 – How he made the decision to join Kahuna after they approached him 04:50 – Why both of Kahuna's founders are still involved in the company 05:10 – Their team of 40 full-time employees is based in Redwood City 05:40 – Why they've scaled to serve 100 total customers internationally 06:40 – How they have more than doubled revenue year over year 07:00 – Why they've raised close to $50M in outside capital 07:40 – How they are managing churn across 08:30 – Why Kahuna's net revenue retention is well north of 100% 10:30 – How they aim for payback on customer acquisition within 12 months 12:00 – Why computing power is their main expense 13:00 – How their margins are still well within the average SaaS range 13:30 – Why they did an inside round in Q4 2017 and not looking to raise at present 14:00 – How they are still burning cash today 14:15 – Why they are north of $3M in ARR and targeting 100% growth YoY again this year 15:15 – The Famous Five
5/20/2019 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
1394 How he used affiliates to go from Zero to $50k in MRR in 16 Months
0:55 – How SaaS PayKickstart launched inside agency 1:25 – Why their average customer pays $99 per month 2:10 – How they've hit $50k in MRR today 2:40 – How $0 to $10k/mo in under 12 months 3:40 – Why they've bootstrapped to this point 4:15 – Tactic used to hit 20% gross revenue churn 9:40 – How they are landing customers through affiliates and cold outreach 10:50 – Why 10-15% of their revenue is coming from affiliate deals
5/19/2019 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
1393 Agency Spin Out Launches, Gets First $9k/mo in Revenue
Time Stamped Show Notes: 0:55 – Why he spun the company out of his agency one year ago 3:45 – Average customer pays them $3,500 annually 4:15 – How they've scaled to 250 paying customers 4:35 – Did $9k in MRR last month 5:20 – Less than 1% gross revenue churn monthly 6:05 – They are raising $1m right now on $2.5m pre money value 7:10 – How they've scaled with just two full-time employees 8:00 – Why they are paying under $100 to acquire a new customer
5/18/2019 • 12 minutes, 10 seconds
1392 $104m in ARR and Bootstrapped?!?! How?!
Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:00 – Nathan's introduction to today's show 00:25 – Why Kellogg was named top CEO by Glassdoor 00:45 – How Madwire has grown to 600 employees 01:25 – Why they operate on a hybrid SaaS and professional service model 02:30 – How they view revenue per employee and prioritize it 03:15 – Why they are doing $175k in revenue per employee today 03:30 – How Madwire is doing $105M in ARR right now 04:00 – Why they help small businesses with marketing at scale 04:50 – How they are serving 10k active customers at this point in time 05:05 – Why their average new account is paying around $1,500 each month 05:45 – How Madwire has scaled with $7.5M in outside funding 06:15 – Why they are cash flow positive 06:35 – How they are still growing 40% year over year 07:45 – Why they track churn in two unique ways 10:00 – How they receive payback within 3 months on a $3k CAC 11:10 – Why they are landing customers entirely through digital channels 12:10 – How he started the company with his father in 2009 13:45 – Why they've set aside stock and equity for top performing employees 14:40 – How they are targeting an IPO in the next few years 15:30 – Why they would look to IPO in two years 16:30 – The Famous Five JB Kellogg is the co-founder of SMB marketing platform, Madwire and Marketing 360. JB was named the Top CEO in the country by Glassdoor in 2016. Company website: https://www.madwire.com/ SaaS Metrics: Founded: 2009 Customers: 10,000 ARPU: $875 (monthly) Annual recurring revenue: $104 million Founded: 2009 Funding: $7.5m Team: 600
5/17/2019 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
1391 Can they Become B2B Version of LastPass?
French, 24yo. I have lived in the US, Cambodia, South Korea, and Switzerland. I launched my first company 4 years ago doing smartphone repairs for students in campuses. And 18 months ago, I started Ease.space with 3 other people.
5/16/2019 • 16 minutes, 28 seconds
1390 With $3m+ in ARR and 300+ Customers, He's Making Digital Advertising Easier for Publishers
Christopher Reid is the founder and CEO of Sortable, a Waterloo Region startup on a mission to Empower Publishers. With an engineering background from the University of Waterloo, he is a serial entrepreneur on his fifth venture and has led tech ventures in industries ranging from educational technology to the consumer web and B2B SaaS. He is the driving force behind Sortable (formerly Snapsort Media), which uses machine learning to help online publishers automate ad operations. Previously a web publishing company, Snapsort Media was acquired in 2011 and bought back in 2014 to relaunch to Sortable’s current day business.
5/15/2019 • 24 minutes, 26 seconds
1389 With $10m in ARR, He's Helping Publishers Better Monetize Social Traffic
Distinguished track record in technology, with a 20-plus year career spanning the development, marketing, and sale of technology. Spent the past 10 years on the cutting edge of social media, helping media companies and marketers more effectively use technologies such as artificial intelligence and blockchain to power their social media efforts.
5/14/2019 • 24 minutes, 33 seconds
1388 Does he really have $95k in MRR? You decide.
Valentin Radu is a serial entrepreneur from Bucharest, Romania. He has founded four companies and had one important exit and one useful failure. Currently, he is the Founder & CEO of Omniconvert, a growth marketing platform for websites looking to become customer-centric.
5/13/2019 • 18 minutes, 38 seconds
1387 He's Paid $15m+ to Freelance Writers in Past 12 Months
Byron White is one of the original content marketing revolutionaries, and founder of WriterAccess. He’s started several other businesses including Freelance Access, LifeTips, ideaLaunch and more. Byron is the Chair and Founder of Content Marketing Conference, an event featuring 65 speakers and 20 keynotes in 2018. He has authored four books on content marketing topics, is a popular speaker at dozens of conferences, and hosts a Webinar and Podcast series.
5/12/2019 • 29 minutes, 38 seconds
1386 AdTech Platform Acquired by GTCR Doing "Well North of $30m in ARR"
Frost Prioleau is the Co-Founder and CEO of Simpli.fi. An experienced online advertising executive specializing in targeting, optimization, and technology, Prioleau focuses on corporate strategy, driving Simpli.fi’s growth, and ensuring customer satisfaction. Prior to Simpli.fi, Prioleau was the CEO and Founder of Personifi, a contextual and behavioral targeting company. The firm was acquired by Collective Media in 2008. While at Collective, Prioleau served as General Manager of the Technology Solutions Group. A thought leader in online advertising, Prioleau often speaks on the topic at industry trade shows and in the press. Prioleau is a graduate of Princeton University, where he earned a Bachelor’s of Science in Engineering Management Systems.
5/11/2019 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
1385 Atlassian Passes $1B ARR Run Rate, Thinking About Acquisitions of "System of Record" companies
Jay is responsible for all revenue-generating activities of Atlassian, including customer success and retention, operations and marketing. Jay joined Atlassian in 2008 as vice president of sales and marketing to lead Atlassian’s pioneering efforts to develop a high-velocity, low-touch sales model. He’s overseen the company’s global expansion, introduction of its Starter License program (a disruptive approach to “freemium” where the company donates all proceeds to a charitable cause), and its growing worldwide customer community and programs. In 2011 Atlassian introduced its cloud-based offering Atlassian On-Demand, an evolution of its fast-growing SaaS platform. Jay has more than 18 years of experience in the software industry. He began his career at Plumtree Software where he held a variety of senior marketing and sales roles. Significantly, Jay oversaw the company’s expansion throughout Europe and Asia Pacific. When Plumtree was acquired by BEA Systems in 2005, Jay became vice president of marketing for BEA Systems, which was later acquired by Oracle in 2008. Jay holds a bachelor’s degree in political and environmental science from the University of Washington.
Carbon Black solutions enable customers to defend against the most advanced cyber threats, including malware, ransomware, and non-malware attacks.
5/9/2019 • 20 minutes
1383 Treehouse Moves from $24m ARR B2C SaaS to B2B Helping Companies Scale Dev Teams
Ryan Carson is the CEO & Founder of Treehouse, an online technology school with more than 80,000 enrolled students and 850,000 students taught in the past 8 years. Treehouse takes people from zero experience to job-ready in as little as six months. He also founded Carsonified and DropSend.
5/8/2019 • 23 minutes, 39 seconds
1382 Bot Controversies Killing this Twitter Growth Company, $12k in MRR, Can't Sell
Kevin is the founder and CEO of TribeBoost, the first company to offer Twitter audience growth as a service. He is a serial entrepreneur and has also founded ThoughtFlame, MoSquatch, and others. Early in his career Kevin one of the first employees of USinternetworking – maybe the first SaaS business ever.
5/7/2019 • 11 minutes, 14 seconds
1381 When should you shut your agency down to go all in on SaaS?
Jon Wuebben is the CEO and Founder of Content Launch. He's also the author of 3 marketing books, including "Future Marketing: Winning in the Prosumer Age"
5/6/2019 • 17 minutes, 5 seconds
1380 SaaS Company in Floripa Launches, Passes $5k/mo Helping Websites Scale with CDN Solutions
Entrepreneur, journalist, developer and passionate about innovation. More than 8 years building software in Brazil and deep learning how to deliver value to customers through IT. Today I advocate a safer, faster and more scalable internet through entrepreneurship. Have you met Netzei yet?
5/5/2019 • 15 minutes, 58 seconds
1379 Live Video for Consumer Brands like Pottery Barn Passes $3m in ARR
Internet strategist and entrepreneur Fritz Brumder is the founder and COO of Brandlive, a SaaS live video platform used by brands and retailers to create highly engaging live content for marketing, training and commerce events. Fritz has been developing digital media solutions for the world’s best brands for over 10 years.
5/4/2019 • 21 minutes, 13 seconds
1378 250 Content Producers Pay Him $6k/yr For Storytelling Drag and Drop Platform
Ricky is CEO at Shorthand, maker of the visual storytelling platform trusted by the BBC, Business Insider, Refinery29, Honda UK, Save The Children, Cambridge University and hundreds of other publishers, brands, non-profits and universities. We make it simple for storytelling teams to create memorable stories that audiences want to share.
5/3/2019 • 24 minutes, 11 seconds
1377 Moving To Enterprise Reduced Revenue Churn by 50% in Under 12 Months
In 2009 I pulled a life 180, quit my sales job, taught myself how to code and launched a profitable SaaS in exactly one year. Seattle native, Texas Hill Country transplant. Working with an entirely remote team across three countries.
5/2/2019 • 16 minutes, 10 seconds
1376 SMB Marketing space CEO: We're about to close $5m on a $36m valuation
Ricardo Lasa – Co-Founder, Chief Executive Officer Ricardo and Don Berndt co-founded SiteWit to bring the power of digital marketing to small business owners. Ricardo is product owner for SiteWit and has a deep understanding of website builder platforms, ecommerce platforms, predictive analytics, digital marketing, and SMB SaasS solutions.
Matt is the Founder & CEO of Stackify. He has been a developer/hacker for over 15 years and loves solving hard problems with code. While working in IT management he realized how much of his time was wasted trying to put out production fires without the right tools.
4/30/2019 • 18 minutes, 13 seconds
1374 Your Dish Network Repair Man Probably Uses This $1m+ ARR Tool For Communication
Stacey has extensive experience in generating demand, fueling growth, and building brand name global recognition for technology companies. She brings two decades of cloud, social, and mobile enterprise technology experience to her role as CEO of Zinc. Prior to Zinc, Stacey was Chief Marketing Officer at ServiceMax where she helped fuel 5 consecutive years of triple-digit growth leading to a $1b acquisition by GE in 2017. Before ServiceMax, Stacey was the Vice President of Global Marketing Communications at SuccessFactors. Stacey pioneered the marketing function at SuccessFactors in 2005, and was instrumental in the company’s successful IPO in 2007, which led to a $3.4B acquisition by SAP in 2010. Prior to SuccessFactors, Stacey held leadership roles at Oracle, Clarify, and ServiceSource. Stacey holds a BA in English from Emory University, where she was a four time first team all-conference soccer player. She loves deep steep powder, chasing around her two young daughters, and cheering loudly as her husband coaches basketball. She frequently writes on leadership, innovation, and women in business for Inc, Fast Company, and BizJournals, which can be found at staceyepstein.com.
4/29/2019 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
1373 300 Companies Use Him to Ship, $8m in ARR, $12.5m Raised
Jeremy Bodenhamer is the Co-founder and CEO of ShipHawk, a Smart Transportation Management System. He is a leading expert at the intersection of shipping and commerce, and has been featured in TechCrunch, AOL, WSJ, Fortune, Internet Retailer, Inc. and Entrepreneur, and is a frequent speaker on innovation and technology.
4/28/2019 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
1372 How He Took Net Revenue Churn from 57% to 10% in 12 Months
4/27/2019 • 15 minutes, 55 seconds
1371 Gmail Helpdesk About to Close $4m Round on $20m Pre with $1.4m in ARR
I started Hiver in late 2011, and over the last 7 years, have virtually bootstrapped it to $1.5 million in ARR. Our MRR grew 60% in the last 5 months, and we're now growing 10% mom. Announcing Series A soon.
4/26/2019 • 12 minutes, 8 seconds
1370 He Does $1m/yr Producing 1 Minute Explainer Videos at Scale
I founded Wyzowl, one of the world's leading explainer video production agencies & publi.sh, a marketing content creation agency. We create exceptional marketing content for our customers through both brands. I share my knowledge online with regular marketing strategy videos and through a weekly podcast called the "Marketing Strategies Podcast".
4/25/2019 • 13 minutes, 39 seconds
1369 He Makes $30k/mo from Youtube While Building his App to 85,000 MAU
I started an exotic car rental company out of my dorm room at Georgia Tech. I was Director of Sales at Lamborghini Atlanta for 6 years. In 2016, I founded VINwiki with a team of developer friends as a way to crowd source vehicle history & empower stakeholders. I also hold the Cannonball Run World Record.
4/24/2019 • 14 minutes, 47 seconds
1368 "Better Than Hootsuite" Tool Passes $250k in MRR on just $300k Raised
An entrepreneurial executive, Gilad enjoys visioning and creating innovative solutions for cloud, mobile and web technologies. Gilad to co-founded eClincher, a platform to manage and analyze social media and online presence. Previously, Gilad held senior management positions at Ultratech, Bloom Energy, Verigy, KLA-Tencor, and Applied Materials. Gilad has proven track record in Business Management, Product Management, Engineering Management, New Product Introduction (NPI), and Manufacturing and Support.
4/23/2019 • 18 minutes, 14 seconds
1367 CloudBeds Passes $10m in ARR, Launches AirBnB Partnership
Adam Harris is the Co-founder and CEO of Cloudbeds. Together with Co-founder Richard Castle, Adam has led Cloudbeds from a small startup to an award-winning company that powers tens of thousands of hospitality properties in over 135 countries. Adam started his career as an investment banker until his love of entrepreneurship and travel pulled him from Wall Street to some of the most remote corners of the planet. He has many years of experience in consulting, has built and sold multiple companies, and has traveled to more than 51 countries over the course of his career. Adam believes that travel and food are the keys to understanding the world and that, in particular, unique properties give travelers the best opportunity to explore and experience local culture.
4/22/2019 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
1366 ACT! and SalesLogix Founders New Company Hits $1m in ARR
Pat Sullivan has been building software for over 30 years. Along the way, he was named one of the “80 Most Influential People in Sales and Marketing History” along side Henry Ford, Walt Disney, Jack Welch and Bill Gates by Sales and Marketing Management. He was also twice named Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” for both ACT! and SalesLogix software.
4/21/2019 • 17 minutes, 45 seconds
1365 He's Paid $250k to Travel Influencers on Behalf of Brands
Roger Wu is co-founder of Cooperatize, a marketplace connecting brands with bloggers. Prior, he had started e-commerce site, Giftfinder.com, and interactive video software, Klickable.tv. Roger was on the founding team of Bloomberg Law and started his career on Wall Street. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's Management and Technology Program.
4/20/2019 • 16 minutes, 56 seconds
1364 Are you being acquired? "No comment"
Adam Saven, Co-Founder & CEO of PeopleGrove Adam is the co-founder of PeopleGrove and has served as its Chief Executive Officer since inception. He previously worked at Google as a Business Analyst from 2013 to 2014, performing data analysis as well as informing strategic decisions for the Online Partnerships Group (OPG). Prior to Google, he served as an Investment Banking Analyst in the Global Technology Group of Credit Suisse.He holds a B.S. in Economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. The impetus for starting PeopleGrove came from a realization of how powerful mentors and the Penn alumni network had been in helping Adam to explore various career paths and access great opportunities. While at Google, Adam embarked on an after-work side project that would eventually become PeopleGrove. PeopleGrove has grown to reimagine mentoring for today's college students and professionals at over 120 colleges and organizations across the country.
4/19/2019 • 17 minutes, 30 seconds
1363 Test IO CEO: We'll Pass $10m in ARR Soon
Philip Soffer has been the CEO of test IO since May of 2016, splitting his time between Berlin and the SF Bay Area. Prior to test IO, he held senior leadership roles in product, development, and marketing at Plumtree Software, Lithium Technologies, and Piazza.
4/18/2019 • 22 minutes, 59 seconds
1362 How Troops AI Became #1 Slack Integration, $1m+ in ARR, $17m Raised
Dan Reich is the Co-Founder and CEO of Troops, a venture-backed technology company that is building artificial intelligence for work. Troops is working with hundreds of companies and has raised about $17 million in venture capital. He is also the Co-Founder and President of TULA, a health and beauty business that has created the world's first probiotic-based line of skincare products. He has been involved with companies that have raised over $100 million in venture capital and have exited for over $1 billion in mergers and acquisitions. Prior to Troops, Dan started a software company called Spinback which he sold to Buddy Media, and then to Salesforce.com for about $850mm. He has a B.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is a contributing writer for Forbes and has been named Silicon Alley Top 100 by Business Insider.
4/17/2019 • 22 minutes, 21 seconds
1361 Adthena Passes $7m in ARR, 80% YoY Growth
Ian has been involved in technology businesses and start-ups for over 22 years and has built businesses in Australia, Taiwan, Silicon Valley and the UK. Ian has grown Adthena since 2012 to its current position as the premier global provider of competitive intelligence. While Adthena itself has won many major industry awards, Ian’s entrepreneurial determination has also been recognized with the Developing Entrepreneur Award at the WCIT Enterprise Awards – commonly regarded as the ‘Oscars for technology entrepreneurs’.
4/16/2019 • 19 minutes, 54 seconds
1360 How He's Shifting Doodle Meeting Tool 200m MAU's to SaaS
Gabriele joined Doodle in 2016 to transform it into a SaaS business. After studying physics, he went into consulting, got an MBA at London Business School and joined Doodle’s mother company Tamedia. Swiss and Italian, Gabriele is a polyglot and loves the Mediterranean, the Swiss Alps, seafood and Swiss cheese.
4/15/2019 • 24 minutes, 7 seconds
1359 Will This Quiz Based Lead Capture Platform Grow Into It's Valuation?
As Riddle’s co-founder, I'm a Californian who fell in love with living abroad in Europe over a decade ago. Since then, I’ve helped a string of start-ups and European companies (gaming companies Kabam and Marvelous AQL, Monster, and restaurant finder app CityHawk). I wear many hats - our quiz maker makes it easy for brands like the BBC and the NFL to engage their audience and collect leads with their own Buzzfeed-style quizzes, polls, and more.
4/14/2019 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
1358 He's Put in $450k Before Turning on Paywall, Smart or Not?
In 2010, Drew Sheahan started a GPS Fleet Tracking Business from his up-stairs bedroom that would eventually rank #126 on the 2014 INC500 List. He sold that company in 2016 to pursue solving the #1 issue he encountered while scaling a business that generates website leads. That business became BirdSeed.io
4/13/2019 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
1357 How He's Betting on the Future of AI
Alex Bates is an angel investor and a Member of Peter Diamandis’s Abundance 360 Network. He has spent the last decade bringing artificial intelligence and machine learning to the forefront of the industrial market. From leading DARPA funded research in neural networks, to applying analytics for the world’s largest data warehouses at Teradata, to creating Mtell, a machine learning company acquired by Aspentech (NASDAQ: AZPN), he believes the coming wave of human-centered Al has the potential to make us superhuman and create a world of abundance.
4/12/2019 • 15 minutes, 36 seconds
1356 Early Employee Who Wants to Sell A Few Shares? Plaza Ventures New Model Is What You Need.
Matthew is a seasoned growth-stage technology investor and career VC, having originated, managed and completed dozens of transactions. As General Partner at Plaza Ventures, Matt specializes in deal flow, investment transaction processing, ecosystem development and investor relations. He sits on the board of numerous companies, as well as various accelerators and charities.
4/11/2019 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
1355 QASymphony Tricentis Merged Entity $80-100 ARR Going After DevOps Pie
Software veteran Dave Keil brings a growth-oriented leadership approach to his job as CEO of QASymphony. For more than 25 years Dave has built a strong track record of business success. Prior to QASymphony, Dave was CEO of Digistrive, a provider of e-commerce solutions to large membership based organizations. He grew and eventually sold that business to a large private company. Before joining Digistrive, Dave was CEO of Integrated Broadband Services (IBBS), a software and services company. During his tenure, the company doubled in size, completed two strategic acquisitions and established a market leadership position in the "Tier Two" broadband space. Earlier in his career, Dave served as Chief Strategy Officer and later as Senior President and General Manager at ChoicePoint, a NYSE listed global information services provider (acquired by Lexis Nexis in 2008). Dave has also held senior executive roles at Novient, and Robinson Humphrey (now part of SunTrust). He received a MBA from The Wharton School and a BS in Applied Mathematics and Economics from Brown University. He lives in Atlanta with his wife and two kids.
4/10/2019 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
1354 Mortgage Lending Software Passes $2m in ARR, Bootstrapped
LBA Ware™ CEO Lori Brewer is an accomplished entrepreneur and technology leader. Following the conclusion of her service in the U.S. Air Force, Brewer has dedicated her talents to improving the mortgage industry. She founded LBA Ware in 2008 to deliver business process optimization through LBA Ware’s flagship products CompenSafe™ and LOS Talker™.
4/9/2019 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1353 How To Bootstrap to $200k in MRR
Payman Taei is an avid technologist who loves new trends and tries to keep up with the ever-evolving internet. Taei’s background in Biology led him to truly believe in the art of evolution: everything changes in time and you either follow or create new trends or are left behind. Taei founded HindSite Interactive, a digital agency, in 2001 and out of that in 2014 incubated Visme, one of the leading presentation and infographic tools online. Visme empowers more than a million businesses, non-profits and individuals from over 90 countries, including NASA, IBM, and SONY, by improving the way ideas are visualized into engaging presentations, infographics and other forms of visual content.
4/8/2019 • 27 minutes, 34 seconds
1352 B2B Version of Venmo About to Pass $5m in ARR
Jeremy has spent the last 15 years in the tech-industry as a serial entrepreneur, startup adviser, and occasional investor. Jeremy has helped dozens of B2B companies drive adoption of digital commerce, and is still an active board member at a number of fintech companies. He started his career in technology as an engineer at nanotech startup Digital Instruments, which was acquired by Veeco (NASDAQ: VECO). Jeremy holds a BS in Computer Engineering from the University of California and a Masters in Business from the University of Massachusetts.
4/7/2019 • 17 minutes, 43 seconds
1351 Why OwnLocal CEO Turned Down $17m Offer to Keep Helping Newspapers Digitize
After working inside newspapers for 10+ years, Lloyd started OwnLocal to fix the business of news. With initial seed investment from Y Combinator, OwnLocal has grown to work with 276,000 SMBs through 3,500 newspaper partners all over the world. Today, OwnLocal is profitable and growing with 8-figure revenues.
4/6/2019 • 20 minutes, 57 seconds
1350 1b API Calls Per Day, $6m in ARR Helping TicketMaster Make Recommendations
James is the founder and CEO of Adzerk, an API company that powers native ads, promotions, and sponsored listings for companies like Ticketmaster, Wattpad, imgur, and many others. Prior to Adzerk, James co-founded TekPub which was acquired by PluralSight.
4/5/2019 • 11 minutes, 54 seconds
1349 Blogger Mentions Tool, Now $100k in ARR and CEO Doubling Down
Web entrepreneur with an IT background working on his second startup.
4/4/2019 • 16 minutes, 57 seconds
1348 His BlockChain Wallet Will be on 100m Phones by EOY 2018, Does He Make Money?
Worked in Telecom for much of my carrier. Starting as EIR at IDT Telecom. Then worked as director of mobile apps for PCS wireless. It's there that I saw the market opportunity. I left PCS, sold my home and launched UpChannel.
4/3/2019 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
1347 "Our minimum is $500m" Says Ecommerce Tool CEO
Chad Rubin (Ecommerce Renegade) builds e-commerce businesses. Fresh out of college and Wall Street, he took his family vacuum business online and built his own direct to consumer e-commerce business called Crucial Vacuum. He grew it from 0 a $20 million dollar valuation in just 7 years. He happens to be a top 250 Amazon seller. He co-founded Skubana with DJ Kunovac and built one of e-commerce's hottest operational softwares.
4/2/2019 • 18 minutes, 38 seconds
1346 How CommercialTribe Broke 125% Net Revenue Retention Annually
For the first 18 years of my career, I built and scaled sales organizations at both Gartner and CEB. The corporate cultures instilled a sales rigor and discipline that has helped me to appreciate the complexities of sales management, operations, as well as the development of reps and their managers.
4/1/2019 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
1345 With $1m in ARR This MarTech Company Raising $3.5m in $12m Pre Money Valuation
Serial Entrepreneur (1 Acquisition & 2 disastrous failures prior to this venture) and Online Advertising expert with more than 8 years of experience in advertising for retail brands and their retail locations.
3/31/2019 • 14 minutes, 38 seconds
1344 9000 Building Owners Use This To Track Temp, Seating, Usage, $200k in MRR, $6m Raised
Deb Noller is the dynamic CEO and co-founder of Switch Automation, a smart building software company specializing in building performance optimization. With 20+ years of experience in real estate, technology and sustainability, she is passionate about helping enterprises leverage next-generation facilities management technology to execute more efficient business operations.
3/30/2019 • 14 minutes, 7 seconds
1343 Data Cleaning and Analytics Tool Passes $7m ARR, Raising $20m on $80m Pre
Chris started Versium six years ago with the vision of helping marketers to utilize data and data technologies to improve their marketing and ROI. He lives and breathes technology innovation. Being involved in several early-stage technology ventures, his success spans enterprises in the Internet, mobile, and SaaS spaces.
3/29/2019 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
1342 With $500k in MRR, He's raising $5m on $20m Pre to Help Enterprises with AI
Angam Parashar is a founder of ParallelDots. He is a graduate of Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur. After his graduation and before starting ParallelDots, he worked as a consultant at Opera Solution, a niche big data consulting firm.
3/28/2019 • 11 minutes, 17 seconds
1341 Reverse merger on australia stock exhange
Lover of dogs, people, uncontrollable laughter, and of course water fountains
3/27/2019 • 22 minutes, 16 seconds
1340 She Helps Raytheon with Procurement, Passes $1m in ARR with eye on $5m
Nicole Verkindt is the Founder & CEO of Canadian technology company, OMX (theomx.com). Previously, she led a high tech manufacturing business selling to Governments around the world. Nicole is on the Board of the Canadian Crown Corporation, CCC (Canadian Commercial Corporation) that performs government to government contracts between Canada and other countries around the world. She is also on the Advisory Board of the Peter Munk School of Global Affairs, known for their Munk Debates. She is a commentator on CBC and columnist for Vanguard magazine focusing on technology and business news and a “Dragon” on CBC’s Next Gen Dragon’s Den, which is dedicated to early stage technology businesses. She was named Canada’s national woman entrepreneur of the year in 2017. She joined Gimlet media’s show “The Pitch” as the 4th investor for the 2018 season.
3/26/2019 • 16 minutes, 23 seconds
1339 $3m ARR Org Chart Company CEO Uses "Touch Zero" Operating Model to Manage Cash
CEO & founder of Pingboard, which provides live org charts & planning software to thousands of companies. Prior to Pingboard, Bill was CTO & co-founder of Webmail, the largest B2B email provider before Gmail. After Webmail was acquired by Rackspace, Bill co-founded Capital Factory, which helps entrepreneurs in Austin build great companies
3/25/2019 • 21 minutes, 25 seconds
1338 How He Converted 50 out of 800 Users to Paid
'm currently 25 years old and is the co-founder and CEO of two software startups. I started coding at the age of 13. Started my first software business at the age of 18. I founded a web called Cloudfoyo in 2015, which was a web development agency. In 2017, I started Engagespot as a side project which is currently one of the leading push notification platforms, that sends around 400M notifications a month.
3/24/2019 • 10 minutes, 55 seconds
1337 How RedisLabs Scaled to $60m+ in ARR More Efficiently than MongoDB
Ofer is a serial entrepreneur who has founded and led several companies in the areas of data communications, telecommunications, Internet, homeland security and medical devices. Ofer was founder & CEO of RIT Technologies (NASDAQ: RITT), a provider of sophisticated telecommunications and data communications systems to major world carriers. He began his career as an aerospace engineer in the Israeli Air Force and then built his own aerospace engineering consulting firm. As a hobby, he has also invented, developed and licensed toy concepts to companies such as Milton Bradley, Hasbro and Tomy. Ofer holds a Bachelor of Science (cum laude) in aerospace engineering from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology.
3/23/2019 • 22 minutes, 41 seconds
1336 HelpScout Passes 9000 Customers, $14.4m in ARR
Nick Francis is Co-founder and CEO of Help Scout, where he is on a mission to make every customer service interaction a more human one. His two passions — technology and entrepreneurship — led him to start a web consultancy soon after college where he learned how to craft user experiences with his partners, Denny Swindle and Jared McDaniel. In 2010, the trio founded Help Scout and left their hometown of Nashville to join the TechStars accelerator program in Boston. That program, along with the Boston startup ecosystem, helped transform Help Scout into something real — a successful, remote company now serving more than 8,000 customer support teams around the globe. Nick lives and breathes product design, customer experience, and building a thoughtful, thriving company. He feels lucky to wake up every day and work alongside people who challenge him to grow and do great work.
3/22/2019 • 13 minutes, 47 seconds
1335 Real Estate Tech Goes from $400k to $4m in ARR in Under 6 Months, Bootstrapped
Mike Land is the Founder and CEO of Rela (www.RelaHQ.com), a cloud based digital marketing platform for real estate agents and brokers. Rela allows real estate professional to create amazing digital experiences that promote their listings, enhance their online presence, and drive new business. Prior to Rela, Mike was the founder and President of a digital marketing and software development agency in Newport Beach, CA.
3/21/2019 • 19 minutes, 16 seconds
1334 This $600k+ ARR SaaS Helps Oil and Gas Companies Predict Oil Well Production
CEO – Luther Birdzell Luther is an entrepreneur, data scientist and engineer passionate about energy efficiency, AI and self-service machine learning. From boardrooms, to oilfields, to data centers, Luther has been building tools that transform data from a cost to an asset for over 20 years. He founded OAG Analytics in 2013 to build an AI and self-service machine learning platform for the oil & gas industry.
3/20/2019 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
1333 Dealing With Professional Services Temptations with Cliently CEO
At 23 Spencer accepted his first Sales Director role and a year later was promoted to VP of sales for an e-commerce doing $5M+ in revenue. Spencer went on to begin is own company then found himself working at PandaDoc, a hot Silicon Valley startup before founding Cliently.
3/19/2019 • 12 minutes, 15 seconds
1332 We almost missed payroll 3 months ago as we reset 5 year old business
I’m a founder and CEO of Qlicket. We help enterprises and midsize businesses reduce turnover by giving frontline employees a voice. Before Qlicket, I worked at Blackstone in New York, and as a management consultant at Katzenbach Partners. I graduated from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
3/18/2019 • 16 minutes, 40 seconds
1331 How CloudFlare Broke $100m in ARR Securing The Internet, No $2.5B Amazon Acquisition
Matthew Prince is co-founder and CEO of Cloudflare. Cloudflare’s mission is to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world's largest networks: powering more than 10 trillion requests per month, nearly 10% of all Internet requests, for more than 2.5 billion people worldwide. Matthew is a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, winner of the 2011 Tech Fellow Award, and serves on the Board of Advisors for the Center for Information Technology and Privacy Law. Matthew holds an MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a George F. Baker Scholar and awarded the Dubliner Prize for Entrepreneurship. He is a member of the Illinois Bar, and earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago and B.A. in English Literature and Computer Science from Trinity College. He’s also the co-creator of Project Honey Pot, the largest community of webmasters tracking online fraud and abuse.
3/17/2019 • 30 minutes, 38 seconds
1330 This Professor Quit Higher Ed For Learning Management Platform, $24m in ARR
Mr. Claudio Erba is the Founder of Docebo S.p.A and has been its Chief Executive Officer since March 2005. He serves as a Director at Docebo S.p.A. Mr. Erba served as a Board Vice President of RYSTO srl from July 2013 to December 2014. He served as Project leader of MHP Srl from October 1999 to June 2001 and Product Manager of Selpress from 1996 to 1997. Mr. Erba is also engages in diving into the topics of AI, learning automation, and the future of online learning at DoceboInspire. Mr. Erba lectured at the University of Florence, before founding Docebo S.p.A in Milan in 2005. He regularly appears on thought leadership and "movers and shakers" lists in the learning technology industry. Mr. Erba was a Guest Lecturer - Content Management System at University of Florence from March 2001 to July 2005. He studied Laurea in Economy and Marketing at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore from 1995 to 2001.
3/16/2019 • 16 minutes, 2 seconds
1329 His Product? A Daily Email, 172k Milennial Subscribers and $100k+ in Revenue
Case is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of PRSUIT - a top daily email focused exclusively on self development content. Named a top email newsletter by Entrepreneur Mag and features in Inc, Forbes, Chicago Tribune and more. 152K daily email subscribers and growing. Case is also the host of the New Mindset, Who Dis podcast, an iTunes top 50 podcast focused on real and no BS self development content.
3/15/2019 • 16 minutes, 45 seconds
1328 Can AppDirect with $245m in Funding Actually Go Public?
Dan is president and co-CEO of AppDirect, the only end-to-end cloud commerce platform for succeeding in the digital economy, which he co-founded in 2009 with Nicolas Desmarais. He and his co-founder dreamed to someday build a business worthy of the Inc. 500 list. Since starting his entrepreneurial journey, Dan and his co-founder officially launched their company in 2011, raised over $245 million in venture financing and reached a company valuation of more than $1B. The AppDirect ecosystem now powers millions of cloud subscriptions worldwide and connects channels, developers and customers to simplify the digital supply chain by enabling the onboarding and sale of products with third-party services, for any channel, on any device, with support.
3/14/2019 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
1327 Prague Based Translation Tool Passes $5m in ARR, Bootstrapped
David Canek is the founder and CEO of Memsource, a software company providing cloud-based translation technology headquartered in Prague, Czech Republic. David, a graduate in Translation and Comparative Studies, received his education at Charles University in Prague, Humboldt University in Berlin as well as University of Vienna.
3/13/2019 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
1326 Can He Combine Mailchimp, Hubspot, Zenefits at $99/mo Price Point and Win SMB's Over?
Geoff Roberts is Co-founder of Outseta, a software platform that gives SaaS companies all the tools they need to launch and scale a subscription business.
3/12/2019 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
1325 Secrets Old Media Brands are using to compete with Facebook
Elizabeth specializes in strategy, market and product development for media companies and brands navigating a changing media landscape. As head of revenue for LAKANA she oversees platform strategy, business development and go to market for a leading content management platform powering 150 + million unique users a month across 60 % of local markets. Her firm The Osder Group has worked with brands including AOL, Univision, Associated Press, Kimpton Hotels, Ogilvy Mather and Group M on critical strategies for related to digital transformation.
3/11/2019 • 21 minutes, 8 seconds
1324 How He Bootstrapped to $6m in ARR
David Naffziger is CEO and co-founder of BrandVerity, a provider of enterprise technology solutions that combat online trademark abuse and help advertisers ensure compliant marketing programs. BrandVerity's services enable clients to identify abuse and efficiently take action to resolve the issues discovered. David received his BS from MIT.
3/10/2019 • 16 minutes, 52 seconds
1323 How FinTech Company Wave Is Deploying $100m in Capital, $25m+ in ARR
Kirk is a serial entrepreneur and co-founder and CEO of Wave, which he has led to nearly 3.5 million small businesses registered, with $100 million in funding raised from investors around the world. Kirk believes in giving back to the tech community, as a mentor and angel investor.
3/9/2019 • 23 minutes, 23 seconds
1322 How to Move from Service Business to Pure SaaS
Conor Lee is the founder and CEO of HipLead. The company helps leading B2B companies scale their outbound sales with high quality lead generation outbound campaigns. Before founding HipLead, Conor founded several other companies including TellFi which was in the Y Combinator, Winter 2011 batch. Prior to that, he worked as a lobbyist in statewide political campaigns.
3/8/2019 • 16 minutes, 38 seconds
1321 How he got his first $10k in MRR competing with Wistia
Patrick is a high school drop out turned serial entrepreneur. He’s started 8 companies and has been the CEO of a public one. He’s sold several million with video online but was frustrated with the existing video platforms; so he founded Vidaytics.com. Which is the highest converting video platform for online marketers. He also wakes up to Eye of the Tiger everyday. ;)
3/7/2019 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
1320 $14m in ARR on $2.9m Raised Inventing New Visual Way to Code Service 3000 Freelancers
Vlad is the CEO of Webflow, which he co-founded with his brother and a close friend. While studying 3D animation (with dreams of working for Pixar) in art school, he fell in love with the power of programming. He lives near San Francisco with his wife and two daughters.
3/6/2019 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
Capitalistbook.com: My SaaS book LIVE today ($6.5m Error)
Capitalistbook.com: My new SaaS book on buying and selling companies, locking up distribution channels, launching with $5k side hustle
3/5/2019 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
Fast Trick: How Your Competitors Are Getting Customers
Capitalistbook.com: My new SaaS book on buying and selling companies, locking up distribution channels, launching with $5k side hustle
3/4/2019 • 15 minutes, 12 seconds
1318 He's flat, cash flow positive, moving freemium, will his tests turn the ship?
Founder and CEO of Slidebean. TEDx Speaker. Graphic designer transformed into growth hacker. Frequent flyer miles hoarder.
3/4/2019 • 29 minutes, 25 seconds
1317 He Left Eventbrite to Launch This, Growing Via API Partnerships
Founder/CEO at Join It -- a platform that helps nonprofits and organizations manage their memberships. Previously at Eventbrite for 6 years, where I worked on the API and Developer platform.
3/3/2019 • 14 minutes, 2 seconds
Why You Should Buy and Sell SaaS Companies
Capitalistbook.com: My new SaaS book on buying and selling companies, locking up distribution channels, launching with $5k side hustle
3/2/2019 • 21 minutes, 1 second
1316 3000 Hotels Pay Him $4.3m in ARR to Help With Website Bookings
3rd time entrepreneur, now on my first Saas. Spaniard between Barcelona and San Francisco. Trained in business, always worked with technology.
3/2/2019 • 16 minutes, 36 seconds
1315 Her Best Friend Died From Terminal Cancer, She Launches MedTech SaaS Raising $2.5m on $10m Pre
Kim started her 3rd company, Trials.ai after her best friend was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given five months to live. What began as a passion project has turned into a mission-driven, venture-backed startup that is turning the clinical trials ecosystem on its head.
3/1/2019 • 15 minutes, 7 seconds
Launching $5k SaaS Side Hustle
Capitalistbook.com: My new SaaS book on buying and selling companies, locking up distribution channels, launching with $5k side hustle
2/28/2019 • 13 minutes, 9 seconds
1314 Niche Specific Drift Competitor Passes $15k in MRR, Bootstrapped
I am Ish, founder of Tars. I have been working on startups/products for the last 5 years now. Have seen both B2B and B2C. Very bullish about the future of SaaS and how you can build profitable bootstrapped companies.
2/28/2019 • 11 minutes
1313 He Runs $1b Buyout Fund Think3 Giving Founders Free Time for Second Shot on Goal
CEO of Ruby on Rails Full Stack and DevOps
2/27/2019 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
1312 How Consent.io Got Its First $15k in MRR
Studied Marketing & Mass Comm in the US. Transferred to Int. Business in NL. Started in biz dev on market intelligence products. Transitioned into management consulting. Later and for the longest in political consulting. Interest of social processes and information dissemination led to consent.io startup. 2 failed starts, bad timing, not right team. Now third time lucky and going strong for 2 years.
2/26/2019 • 14 minutes, 24 seconds
1311 Should he Raise Capital to Compete with Monday?
The CEO and co-founder of Float.com, the resource scheduling app helping agencies, studios and firms keep track of who's working on what and when. Float.com is bootstrapped, profitable and 100% remote, with Glenn currently based in Melbourne, Australia, where he has ready access to a good flat white.
2/25/2019 • 12 minutes, 28 seconds
1310 After GoDaddy Acquisition, He Built Support Version of Intercom, Now $1.5m in ARR, 100% yoy growth
Studied Computer Science at UCLA and Stanford. Founded Ronin (roninapp.com) in 2008, sold to GoDaddy in 2013 (since reacquired). Founded Reamaze in 2012.
2/24/2019 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
1309 Are you nervous about raising on a $10m valuation with no revenue?
Co-founder/CEO of Freshdeal, and previously Fruitspot, leading Agtech start-ups focused on the Produce Industry. He has built and led digital businesses worth +$2 billion for leading brands like P&G, Google, Nike, Coke, and Diageo. Jose has +15 years of experience in business strategy, digital, and marketing. As Director of Strategy at Hugeinc.com, and while developing through the ranks at P&G and Booz&Co., Jose has led business worth +$2B for brands like Procter & Gamble, Google, Nike, Coke, and Diageo.
2/23/2019 • 14 minutes, 15 seconds
1308 Salesforce for Lawyers Passes $3m in ARR, Basically Bootstrapped
Michael Chasin is the co-founder and CEO of the legal tech company, Lexicata, the world's #1 client intake and CRM software for lawyers. With thousands of law firms on the platform across 20+ countries, Lexicata helps bridge the technology gap many law firms face as more and more professional services move online to the cloud. Prior to Lexicata, Chasin founded LawKick in 2012, a leading online marketplace for seamlessly connecting clients to the perfect lawyer for their needs. After running LawKick for several years, Chasin became intimately familiar with the fact that lawyers often struggle to manage their leads effectively. As such, Lexicata was born in 2014 and has been helping law firms grow ever since. Before running two successful businesses, Michael attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, earning his dual degrees in Entrepreneurship and Economics, before moving onto Loyola Marymount University and Loyola Law School to earn his M.B.A. and J.D., respectively. Michael currently resides in Los Angeles, CA where he spends his free time surfing and playing golf and basketball
2/22/2019 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
1307 Insurance ChatBot Increases Quote Close Rate, $20k MRR
Jake Diner is an innovation and technology expert with two decades of experience in product management. He graduated from MSU with a degree in computer science. After working for over a decade in corporate leadership roles, including positions at Belkin and Dell, Jake decided to use his experience to build start-ups with a focus on those serving the insurance industry. After exiting from his first InsureTech venture-backed startup he co-founded seven years ago, he currently serves as CEO of Elafris, a San Francisco-based company that has built artificial intelligence-powered chatbot technology designed to help insurers meet the engagement expectations of today’s consumer.
2/21/2019 • 13 minutes, 37 seconds
1306 Weird Way He's Using Shopify To Grow MRR Past $50k Helping Non Techies Launch Mobile Apps
Atul Poharkar is the Founder and CEO of Plobal.ai. In 2016, Atul realised that even though mobile apps were the default future, the technology was limited to just the bigger players. That's when Plobal was born. He and his team built a platform for developing mobile apps and setting up the mobile commerce success journey for businesses without compromising on any tech abilities. Today, Plobal powers mobile commerce for hundreds of fast growing Shopify and Shopify Plus stores and has partnered with some of the biggest tech companies, including Google (Instant Apps), to bring the most cutting edge tech to their businesses. The team is building towards putting m-commerce on autopilot viz. autonomous commerce. Atul's future plans include roaming around the globe, gaining new experiences while serving as a bartender at local watering holes.
2/20/2019 • 12 minutes, 23 seconds
1305 He Built AWS, Now Raised $9m at $30m Post for IoT Solution, $300k MRR
Robert Frederick, founder and CEO of Sirqul, has been focused on connected communities of devices, people, and businesses since 1993. He was inspired by the boundless future potential of smart connected devices and leveraged this passion to attend MIT, to work on projects in the MIT Media Lab, and to join one of the first startups focused on standards that would later be called BlueTooth in the late nineties. The startup’s licensed product, DeviceTalk.com, was a central server running Intelligent Agents that used event-based logic to complete actions on behalf of its users via simple commands and conditional triggers. Identity and Presence were important then and still tends to be important now. Amazon acquired the company in 1999, and Robert led the internal team, Amazon Anywhere, that focused on making it possible to interact with Amazon Anywhere, Anytime, on Any device. After becoming the technical co-founder of Amazon Web Services and setting the stage for Amazon to become profitable leveraging the Cloud, Rob started Sirqul to create an Intelligence of Things (IoT) ecosystem on top of the cloud that also works at the edge. Sirqul has numerous partners that span Retail, Smart Buildings, Autonomous Vehicles, and Robotics.
2/19/2019 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
1304 Raising $10m on $30m Pre Right Now for Video Feedback Platform, $5m ARR
Dave is an entrepreneur specializing in high-growth tech businesses, and a video insight evangelist with global ambitions for growth and adventure. As CEO at Voxpopme, he has redefined the possibilities of video for market research and customer feedback. The solution Voxpopme has built provides an end-to-end software solution for video research, enabling researchers to capture video feedback at speed, analyze it at scale and share it with ease. With Voxpopme, video is now truly agile.
2/18/2019 • 22 minutes, 8 seconds
1303 Ebay to Amazon Dropshipping Arbitrage CEO Makes $5.4M
Max Kolysh is a serial entrepeneur and investor. After graduating early from MIT with a degree in Computer Science, Max started Zinc.io (YC W14), a 20 person startup in SF which now powers tens of thousands of ecommerce companies around the world.
2/17/2019 • 21 minutes
1302 Property Data API Using Cash Cow to Fuel SaaS Growth
An early fascination with Google Adwords and analytics at the age of 18, lead me to start Data Nerds in early 2014. We have dabbled in digital marketing and optimization in several domains albeit real estate had us hooked. Our first product was a Carfax for Homes which landed us in the prestigious Techstars Boulder 2017 program. Fast forward less than a year and we are now backed by Foundry Group and Techstars Ventures. We are primarily focused on bringing transparency, accuracy, and education to the vast and segmented real estate industry.
2/16/2019 • 17 minutes
1301 He Helps Pepsi Get Distribution in India, $7m+ in ARR, 100% yoy Growth
Lalit is an enterprise mobility veteran with 17 years of experience building over 150 products. He invented hybrid mobile programming and has a patent in visual merchandising using image recognition. His 6+ years of sales force automation experience with FMCG market leaders has resulted in Bizom being at the forefront of digital sales transformation in India, helping over 250 enterprises achieve data driven transformation via automation and analytics!
2/15/2019 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
1300 AdTech Makes $70m in $700m in AdSpend, how?
John Nardone is the CEO of Flashtalking. A first-generation ad tech pioneer, Nardone served as a founding board member of the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB). Throughout his career he earned recognition within the advertising community for his ground-breaking work at Pepsi, Modem Media and Marketing Management Analytics (MMA), culminating in his receiving the Ad:Tech Industry Achievement Award in 2012.
2/14/2019 • 13 minutes, 32 seconds
1299 After 4 years with no salary, is he making the right choice in launching a Hubspot "for the rest of us"?
Entrepreneurial leader and team motivator with the ability to proactively identify market opportunities and solve challenging business problems. Keen sense of time-to-market and the bottom-line. Passion for new product/service innovation, startups, helping entrepreneurs, driving business acceleration and business execution. Experienced in Business Development, Product Management, Marketing, and Business Mgt & Operations in ecommerce and Marketing Systems, Mobile, Print-on-Demand, IPTV, 3D Printing and Automotive Telematics.
Matthew Schiltz is an experienced senior executive with a proven track record in building successful, high growth technology and cloud companies ranging from private startups to public companies. Matthew is CEO at Conga, directing the company's growth strategy, which includes financing, driving global sales and expanding product offerings. Matthew's extensive executive management and leadership experience is driving strong company growth which has resulted in several Inc 500, Fast 50 and Top 100 Places to Work awards. Past CEO successes include Insightful Corporation, CourtLink, DocuSign, Tier 3 and Blue Box Group. Matthew has received several industry accolades in recognition of his past successes and is considered an expert on software, technology, and cloud business practices.
2/12/2019 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
1297 His Mandarin Allowed Him To Scale Software for Real Estate Developers, $1m+ in ARR
Simeon has lived in 6 countries and 11 cities. Having helped sell real estate all over the globe, he now runs Spark, a software platform for new development projects with a team of 20 based out of Vancouver. His goal is to change the way new real estate is sold and marketed.
2/11/2019 • 14 minutes, 53 seconds
1296 3 Metrics 30m MAU Quizlet Tracks As They Pass 1m Paying Customers
Matthew Glotzbach is the CEO of Quizlet. He joined Quizlet from 12 years at Google, where he was most recently VP Product Management at YouTube. Prior to YouTube, he was on the founding team of Google Apps. Matthew studied mechanical engineering at Cornell and grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
2/10/2019 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
1295 They Passed $700k in MRR Heling Developers Launch API's Faster
Abhinav Ansthana started Postman a side-project in 2012 to simplify API development. Postman has grown to become an industry standard API Development Environment with more than 5 million users and is used in every country and every industry sector, bringing API developer collaboration to enterprises and individuals alike.
1293 How Plivo Broke $20m in ARR on Only $2m Raised Helping 70,000 Businesses with Communication Integrations
Venky Balasubramanian is the co-founder and CEO of Plivo, a cloud-based communications platform that simplifies how businesses integrate communications into their applications. Today Plivo has grown to over 200 employees across 3 offices globally and has been profitable since 2015. Plivo has expanded exponentially over the last few years serving over 70,000 customers and now handles billions of voice calls and SMS every year from businesses around the world. Prior to founding Plivo, Venky has had a number of years of telecom industry experience working in technical capacities with global telecom giants like Huawei Technologies.
2/7/2019 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1292 How Cvent Hit $500m Bookings with Eyes on $1B in Meeting and Event Space
Reggie Aggarwal is the CEO and Founder of Cvent, the leader in meetings, events and hospitality software. A lawyer by trade, Aggarwal founded Cvent in 1999 as a two-person startup, with the goal of making meeting planning easier for his peers in the business community.
2/6/2019 • 30 minutes, 54 seconds
1291 This Podcast Hosting Company Just Broke $300k in MRR
Sharon Taylor is the Chief Executive Officer of Omny Studio – an advanced audio-on-demand platform built for enterprise audio publishers. With over a decade of leadership experience in the technology industry, at Omny Studio she drives awareness of podcasting around the globe - working with radio networks and podcasters to navigate and excel in the space.
2/5/2019 • 16 minutes, 37 seconds
1290 How New CEO Rightsized Brightpearl, passed $12m in ARR
Derek O’Carroll is CEO of Brightpearl, a cloud-based ERP built solely for retailers and wholesalers. Co-author of the Omnichannel Survival Guide, Derek is recognised as a leading retail expert leading BP that trades $1.8bn of business globally each year, cementing its position as an invaluable asset for mid-sized merchants seeking a competitive edge.
2/4/2019 • 21 minutes, 49 seconds
1289 Virtual Event Management Business Passes $2m in ARR Selling $30k ACV's
Internet executive with over 10 years of experience, including general management of small to mid-size organizations, product development, business operations, and strategy. Have conceptualized and grown multiple businesses from zero to multi-million dollars in North America and in the Middle East.
2/3/2019 • 15 minutes, 6 seconds
1288 $6m in ARR and Net Negative 20% Revenue Churn, How?!
Emilie Cushman is the Founder and CEO of Kira Talent. Cushman founded the company in 2012, and since launching Kira she has been named the HSBC Woman Leader of Tomorrow and one of Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women.
2/2/2019 • 17 minutes, 47 seconds
1287 Why He Left Salesforce After $50m+ Acquisition to Build Kustomer.com
Brad has been building Customer Support companies for more than 20 years. Previously he was the Co-founder of Assistly, which was acquired by Salesforce and became Desk.com. Prior to that he was CTO for Talisma and Co‑founder & CTO of eShare Technologies.
2/1/2019 • 22 minutes, 22 seconds
1286 RippleMatch Giving Employers 1000's of High Quality Student Talent Per Month, $125k in MRR
Originally from Denver, Andrew studied history and was Phi Beta Kappa at Yale before dropping out his senior year to pursue RippleMatch. He listens to clients, runs sales, and is obsessed with helping students and companies find the right match.
1/31/2019 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
1285 Bootstrapped Mumbai Based Social Listening Tool Breaks $1.2m in ARR, Up 100% YoY
I am the founder and chief software architect at Konnect Insights - a SaaS product that is widely used by many top brands and agencies. My core strengths are technology, marketing and sales. I started my career back in 2004 as a software programmer and when I started my company in 2012 I started donning many caps such as strategy, marketing, sales and legal. I have experience of working on financial domain and today I am a digital analytics expert.
1/30/2019 • 14 minutes, 39 seconds
1284 How He Uses Lifetstyle Business To Fund SaaS Startup
From Slovenia/Europe. B.S. Electrical Engineering. 31 years old. This is our third startup. First failed miserably. Second became lifestyle business. Love sports and creativity. I'll produce a movie by 2025.
1/29/2019 • 18 minutes, 41 seconds
1283 $100m Exit Was $45m Cash Upfront, Using To Launch New $10/mo Website Builder with 3250 Customers
Born in USSR, got a war there, was refugee, moved to Ukraine, co-founded TemplateMonster.com. Grew it to 100M company and then sold out to PE. Started Weblium to build a McDonalds in Web Design Industry. Married, four kids, two wife’s, three dogs, five homes, 10 700 phonebook contacts, 100 conferences a year, military business and lots of fun. When the war started in Ukraine, founded the largest crowdfunding platform Peoplesproject.com to help wounded souldiers, became an advisor to the Minister of Defense, civil activist. Recently started to join a blockchain world first as an advisor and planning to complete some government projects based on a blockchain.
1/28/2019 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
1282 With $12m in ARR, ConvertKit Makes Major Change Removing CC Trial, Will it work?
In previous careers Nathan has been a designer, author, and blogger. After learning the power of email marketing he gave up a successful blogging career to build ConvertKit. Outside of work Nathan spends his time playing soccer, woodworking, and chasing after his two little boys.
1/27/2019 • 25 minutes, 29 seconds
1281 Contently Pays Creators $30m Annually, Passes $20m in ARR 40% yoy growth
Joe is a lifelong entrepreneur and founded two successful internet companies before Contently. In 2012, Joe and his co-founders were named to Inc.’s 30 Under 30 list.
1/26/2019 • 29 minutes, 9 seconds
1280 Will she be able to raise $1m on $3.5m Pre Money with This MRR?
CloudKPI is entrepreneur Maeve Kneafsey’s ( pron; May-V Kneef-Sea) fourth start up. Her latest venture addresses the frustrations involved in setting up and maintaining cross-business metrics for SaaS businesses, a segment growing to a multi-billion dollar value. CloudKPI, which is raising a seed round, has completed programs at Plug & Play Tech and Womens’ Start-Up Lab. Maeve previously founded Amas, Ireland’s first digital marketing and analytics agency (exit 2003), digital marketing agency Elucidate (exit 2015) and Fintech SaaS benchmarking solution MarketFinder. A graduate of Trinity College, Dublin she now splits her time between offices in Dublin, Ireland and San Francisco, USA.
1/25/2019 • 14 minutes, 46 seconds
1279 He Does $6m in Event Revenue Annually, now SaaS
Dale Beaumont is an Award-Winning Technology Entrepreneur, International Speaker and the Author of 16 Best-Selling books. Dale started his first business at 19 and has been building companies ever since. One of those companies is now a multimillion dollar enterprise, which has enabled Dale to become an Investor, Philanthropist and to step foot in more than 80 countries. Today Dale is the founder and CEO of Bizversity – a revolutionary product, which gives you direct access to ‘The World’s Best Business Training. Anywhere, Anytime.
1/24/2019 • 19 minutes, 19 seconds
1278 How This Brazilian SaaS Pricing Tool Went From $40k to $100k in MRR in 12 Months
Bachelor of Science in Computer Science (BSCS), post graduate in project management and co-founder of Intuitive Intelligence, a CRO company sold in 2016 to PMWEB, a Wunderman Company. Entrepreneur for 10 years. After Intuitive Intelligence exit, founded Intellibrand, a leading B2B tech company with a SaaS business model focused on data intelligence and analytics. Our vision is to disrupt the current collaboration model between brands and retailers globally and become the authority in digital trade marketing offering a new collaborative business model to help brands and retailers thrive in ecommerce.
1/23/2019 • 12 minutes, 53 seconds
1277 Mailchimp for Shopify Customers Passes 5,000 Paid, $3m in ARR, 15k Shopify Reviews
Ben is the founder of Privy.com, a marketing automation platform used by over 250,000+ marketers around the globe. Ben has worked with companies like Leesa, Hubble Contacts, Life Time Fitness, the Ellen Show, Dr. Axe and many more to rapidly accelerate ecommerce conversions and sales.
1/22/2019 • 21 minutes, 48 seconds
1276 Workers on Oil Rigs Build Apps Using His Tool
James McDonough is a passionate entrepreneur, technology CEO and past top tier management consultant. James’ unique ability is being able to clearly see and deconstruct an entire complex situation, envision a better future and take practical action to blaze new trails. Using his unquenchable curiosity, structured problem solving and bold creativity, with a smile he energetically and relentlessly hunts opportunities to push boundaries. Over the past 15 years James has been the founder and CEO of an early stage venture capital backed tech company, led strategy and operational excellence engagements as a management consultant and got dirty on the shop floor of industrial operations. Industry experience includes Internet Technology, Oil & Gas, Mining, Forest & Pulp & Paper, Government and Consumer Goods. James’ international experience includes Australia, Canada, China, Germany, Japan, Malaysia and the USA. James has had the pleasure of being invited to deliver speaking engagements at a number of industry forums and top universities all over the world on a range of topics including entrepreneurship, innovation, industrial internet of things (IIoT), and was an honorable mention in Australia’s 30under30. James has earned a MBA - Master of Business Administration, Honours in Business Management, and a Black Belt in LEAN Six Sigma. James is an obsessive book-a-week learner, a passionate traveler and enjoys kiteboarding, snowboarding and ice hockey.
1/21/2019 • 24 minutes, 40 seconds
1275 25 Year Old Hits $10k in MRR with his 3 Friends as Co-Founders
Aayush Jain is the co-founder and CEO of Greendeck, which helps online retailers increase their profits by implementing dynamic pricing. Before Greendeck, Aayush co-founded TrueMD (an online pharmacy) and HealthOS(APIs for healthcare data) and lead to its acquisition by a giant Indian IT firm.
1/20/2019 • 15 minutes, 59 seconds
1274 Does it make sense for him to measure churn?
3x SaaS Founder/CEO and Startup Advisor. Isaac was Co-Founder/CEO of Central Desktop (iMeet Central) a SaaS collaboration platform aimed at marketers and creative teams. Central Desktop was acquired by PGI (NYSE: PGI) in 2014. Isaac is currently CEO/Founder of SalesInsider, a Talent Marketplace for SaaS Sales Professionals.
1/19/2019 • 11 minutes, 54 seconds
1273 270,000 ECommerce Shops Use This Tool (Not Shopify)
CEO @PrestaShop, leading eCommerce solution worldwide
1/18/2019 • 15 minutes, 18 seconds
1272 How This Pricing Page Drives Big Expansion Revenue with $260k/mo Verblio CEO
Steve Pockross is the CEO of Verblio, leading content creation marketplace platform. Steve previously served as VP of BD & Strategy at crowdsourcing pioneer LiveOps, and held leadership roles at Tendril, Western Union and multiple startups and nonprofits. Steve has an MBA from Kellogg and a BA from Wesleyan University.
1/17/2019 • 20 minutes, 50 seconds
1271 This HR Tech Company Incentivizes Your Current Team to Recruit
Kristján is CEO & Co-Founder of 50skills.com which is transforming the way businesses find and hire people. Prior to 50skills, Kristjan was VP of Marketing Products at Meniga (2014-2017), which he helped grow into serving more than 50 million people in 20 countries. Before joining Meniga in early 2014 Kristján was CEO of Icelandic Startups, which focuses on empowering the Icelandic Entrepreneurial Eco-system. For several years, he has played a leading role in Iceland´s vibrant startup scene. He managed StartupReykjavik (2012-2013), the #1 Seed Accelerator in Iceland. He is also an accredited Global Facilitator for Startup Weekend (2009-), who has facilitated more than 10+ Startup weekends in diverse places, ranging from Reykjavík, Iceland to Tehran, Iran (2012-). He was the global partner for Global Entrepreneurship Week in Iceland (2009-2013), TEDxReykjavik licensee (2011-2013) and the former manager of Iceland’s largest idea competition, the Golden Egg (2009-2011).
1/16/2019 • 19 minutes, 11 seconds
1270 Napa Valley Vineyards Use His SaaS Drone Tech To Detect Potential Lower Crop Yield
Brendan is the Co-Founder and CEO of Skycision, an award-winning technology provider that helps enhance the productivity and profitability of the global agriculture industry. Brendan completed his undergraduate degree at the country’s oldest private military school, Norwich University. He played four years of collegiate football and emerged with his B.S. in Computer Security and Information Assurance. From there, he joined Big-4 financial services firm Ernst & Young (E&Y) and worked over a dozen engagements across Florida and the Asia Pacific region. Shortly thereafter, he joined global investment bank Credit Suisse in New York. Brendan decided to go back to school and was admitted to the number one Information Systems Management program in the country at Carnegie Mellon. It was there that Skycision was conceived, and upon finishing his degree, he set out full time to build Skycision into what it is today.
1/15/2019 • 19 minutes, 1 second
1269 How This AdTech CEO Shifted to Pure Play SaaS and $40k in MRR
Mark Simon is the co-founder of Brax where he helps performance marketers scale, automate and simplify native advertising. Previously he helped e-commerce and software companies acquire customers through organic & paid search. He loves data visualization, nutrition and everything outdoors which is his excuse for taking his kids on crazy adventures.
1/14/2019 • 14 minutes, 11 seconds
1268 240 Hotels Use His Tech for HouseKeeping, Passes $40k in MRR
CEO and Co-founder of RoomChecking. I've been working with software engineering since the late 1990s, survived the dotcom burst and continued building great products like myDitto (CES award 2010) and Zpen (Macworld Award 2011). Enjoying working with hoteliers and the great RoomChecking team to help improve the work and results of hotel operations staff.
1/13/2019 • 12 minutes, 45 seconds
1267 Customer Intelligence Platform Powerd by AI Passes 30 Customers, $300k in MRR
An accomplished, published, and recognized academic leader in Data Analytics and a Business Visionary, Derek spearheaded techniques to analyze structured and unstructed data from resources around the web in order to create predictive algorithms for companies across the globe. This knowledge became the foundation of his passion, Stratifyd.
1/12/2019 • 16 minutes, 54 seconds
1266 How To Spin a Business Out of a Public Company
Richard Rabins focuses on strategy, accelerating global growth and scaling the organization. Richard also served as CEO of SoftQuad International from 1997 to 2001, when it owned Alpha. In addition to his 30 years with the company, Richard played a key role as co-founder, and served as president and chairman of the Massachusetts Software Council (now the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council), the largest technology trade organization in Massachusetts. Prior to founding Alpha, Richard was a project leader and consultant with Information Resources, Inc. (IRI), and a management consultant with Management Decision Systems, Inc. Richard holds a master's degree in system dynamics from the Sloan School at MIT, and a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering and master's degree in control engineering from University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. He has served on the boards of Silent Systems, Legacy Technology and O3B Networks, and is co-founder of Tubifi www.tubifi.com.
1/11/2019 • 19 minutes, 41 seconds
1265 How $100m ARR HotSchedules Passed 160,000 Restaruant Customers, 110% Net Annual Dollar Retention
Mike Arenth serves as CEO at HotSchedules. Prior to being named CEO, Mike joined HotSchedules in October 2016, focusing on implementing key leadership changes to support innovation and growth at HotSchedules. Other previous roles include Senior Advisor at Silver Lake, Executive VP for SAP, and SVP & General Manager at Ariba. Mike received a B.A. in economics from John Hopkins and his M.B.A. from George Washington University.
1/10/2019 • 19 minutes, 39 seconds
1264 Why Marketplace DIY Tool CEO Wants to Raise $500k on $3M Pre Money
Serial entrepreneur with 7 years expertise in marketplace businesses. From Paris but currently settled in New York I am a marketer always looking for new markets to conquer.
1/9/2019 • 10 minutes, 14 seconds
1263 1500 Governement Agencies Pay Him $2400/yr To Archive Social Media
Anil Chawla is the Founder & CEO of ArchiveSocial. ArchiveSocial's technology ensures that organizations can maintain legal records of their social media, and is most often used to promote transparency in government. In 2017, ArchiveSocial collaborated with the Obama White House to launch the first-ever archive of presidential social media.
1/8/2019 • 15 minutes, 28 seconds
1262 200 Physicians Have Invested $6m Into This Company at $30m Valuation
CEO of Fruit Street Health a digital diabetes prevention program. Managing Director of Hippocrates Ventures - the first physician funded social impact digital therapeutics venture capital fund.
1/7/2019 • 21 minutes, 6 seconds
1261 How He Went from $0 to $4k/mo Helping Brands Track Customer Facing Video
Create, share, localize & track customer facing videos & GIFs in minutes Built for Support, Sales, Training, HR, and Product teams No camera, production crew, narrator, or hosting.
1/6/2019 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
1260 Whitelabel SMB Tools Platform Raising $1m on $4m Pre with $1.5m in ARR
Matthew is the founder and CEO of Qebot, helping businesses across the globe access and utilize software in a more productive way. Prior to Qebot, Matthew established a presence in mobile advertising and SMB marketing. His time with a very predominant marketing agency led Matthew to found and build Qebot.
1/5/2019 • 20 minutes, 8 seconds
1259 Brazilian SaaS Raising $5m on $20m Pre, $9m in ARR, 20% yoy Growth
Entrepreneur, SaaS Enthusiast, Behavioral Economics Fan, has strong Sales background, leads one of the largests SaaS in Brazil and fosters the local start-up and tech ecosytem since the early 2000s. Has Business Administration degree and specializations in Sales and Marketing.
1/4/2019 • 19 minutes, 5 seconds
1258 This Singapore Based SaaS Helps You Manage Empoyee Feedback, $40k in MRR, 8x yoy growth
CheeTung is committed to bring the same level of analytics, sophistication, and scientific rigour to managing people as is currently applied to managing finance and customers. He is the CEO of EngageRocket. Before becoming an entrepreneur, he was Regional Director of Gallup in Southeast Asia. He read Economics at the University of Cambridge, and has an MA in Political Science from Columbia University.
1/3/2019 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
1257 Shufflrr is Raising $2m, Helps You Manage Presentations Better, 2x YoY to $100k in MRR
James is the co-founder and CEO of Shufflrr, the leading presentation management SaaS that transforms presentations from one-and-done decks to enterprise assets. From creation, to distribution, to presentation and sharing, to reporting and then updating, Shufflrr streamlines the presentation process, so clients get higher ROI on their investment in content, better control of their message and overall increased productivity.
1/2/2019 • 14 minutes, 50 seconds
1256 How Array.VC Raised First $15m, Why They Like Art19 Investment
Shruti, Founder & Managing Partnerof Array, brings a strong mix of operating and investing experience. Previously, Shruti was an early stage venture capital investor at True Ventures, Samsung Electronics, Lightbank, HighBAR Partners, and the i2A Fund. Shruti started working with Machine Learning algorithms while working on her master's thesis in computer science from Columbia University on understanding user behavior on instant messaging platforms. While at IBM she worked on self learning algorithms that detected user location based on IP addresses, which she later incorporated into the Lotus Sametime product. Later, her company Penseev helped users make better connections with their friends based on social data. When not investing, she is hacking on some app or thinking about ways she can be in many places at one time. Shruti also has an MBA from the University of Chicago, where she polished her finance skills before making the switch from engineer/founder to investor.
1/1/2019 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
1255 How This 27 Year Old Went from $0 to $70k in MRR in 6 months
Based out of India, I'm a self-taught entrepreneur who started the online marketing journey at the age of 17. Coming from a Business family, entrepreneurship is rooted in my blood. At the age of 18, I launched my first WordPress security plugin that did 6 figures after which I launched Power Up Hosting in the year 2012 which is now an ISP and a seven-figure business. During my entire Journey, As a CEO, I am the sole Growth Hacker/Marketer in the company responsible for all the customers. My name got very popular in the SEO industry as the PBN guy which led me to launch GoPBN, the very first of its kind PBN Hosting company which does over $70k in monthly revenue which let me two more ventures FlameDomain and Funnelbake.
12/31/2018 • 18 minutes
1254 Detectify Grew 3x Over Last Year to $1.5m in ARR
CEO and co-founder of Detectify. Background as geek with MSC in applied physics, went to management consulting, but then back to technology again with Detectify. From Sweden, lived in multiple countries including US and India.
12/30/2018 • 13 minutes, 45 seconds
1253 GetAccept Breaks 4000 Customers, Grew ARR 3x to $1.7m in ARR Last 12 Months
Samir, the CEO and founder of GetAccept who believes that great companies are built by passionate individuals who focus on execution and teambuilding. Husband and father of 2 kids who is convinced that the day has 28 hours. You can sleep when you die!
12/29/2018 • 15 minutes, 36 seconds
1252 Typeform Now At $19m ARR, 50m Forms Each Month, 40,000 Customers
David Okuniev was born in Belgium and later educated in England, David Okuniev started his professional career as a musician. Expression through music soon turned to expression through product and brand design, which led to David founding the Barcelona-based design studio, Fat-Man-Collective. From working in the same co-working space, David later met Robert Muñoz, and the two co-founded Typeform. Today, David is joint CEO and sweats over everything Vision, product & design related.
12/28/2018 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
1251 Why MailJet Founder Left, Despite Fast Growth, $10m+ in ARR
Hi! I am a 32 yo french entrepreneur and startup advisor. Former COO of Mailjet which I co-founded in 2010, I raised 17M$ and built a team of 25 people on 4 continents. I am now entirely focused on my new venture – Onvey.io – which aims to grow into a SaaS Hub.
12/27/2018 • 11 minutes, 43 seconds
1250 Incentive Every Employee to Sell Using This Tool, $80k in MRR
Patrick is a life-long entrepreneur who has successfully built multiple companies and salesforces, always with an interest in leveraging technology to improve on processes. Energetic and inventive, Patrick is passionate about people's ability to completely change; by changing the story they tell themselves. A self-confessed "freak" about studying habits, routines and easier ways to do things, Patrick's purpose in life is to always be learning and helping others. He loves to seek out new concepts and strategies to improve his own life, find out what works and then share them. Patrick originally created the ideas behind RapidFunnel to help his own salesforce. They were so incredibly effective that it spawned the idea for RapidFunnel, the company. Personally speaking... Patrick has had a life long interest in good health, shaped by his Mom who owned a chain of health food stores. He enjoys mountain biking, crossfit, yoga and pilates. He loves bouncing ideas off of his wife, skiing with his three kids and watching superhero movies with his son. He also admits to holding on to his collection of superhero comics, which carried him through his childhood struggles with dyslexia.
12/26/2018 • 17 minutes, 4 seconds
1249 Hireology Passes $20m in ARR, Helping 5000+ Businesses Hire Better
Adam Robinson is Co-Founder and CEO of Hireology, a venture-backed hiring and talent management platform named a Top 50 Best Workplace by Inc., a Top Company Culture by Entrepreneur, and #94 in 2016 and #332 in 2017 on the Inc. 500 list of America’s fastest-growing private companies. He’s the author of The Best Team Wins: Build your Business Through Predictive Hiring, the host of The Best Team Wins Podcast, and a weekly columnist for Inc. He was named a top 25 Industry Game Changer by Workforce and in 2017 was a finalist for E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year. Adam has a BA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and received his MBA from DePaul University. He's a member of the Economic Club of Chicago, and lives in Chicago's Rogers Park community with his wife and four children.
CEO of Bookafy since 2014... Formerly at another Real Estate technology startup. Lives in Seattle, WA.
12/24/2018 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
1247 This SaaS Product Has No Website but Does $3m in ARR, How?
CEO and co-founder of Burt, where we build data intelligence companies. In a previous life, I hustled in e-commerce, developed award winning marketing campaigns and spent way too much at advertising and internet technology conferences, presenting at events such as Cannes Lions, Web 2.0, DEMO and Techcrunch50.
12/23/2018 • 17 minutes, 3 seconds
1246 What the hell does "We revolutionize everything" mean?
Founder and Managing Director of uptime ITechnologies GmbH, since its inception in 1994. Also responsible for World Check, the banking financial crime prevention software used toady by most of the world’s banks bought by Thomson Reuters. CEO and founder of Pipeliner Sales, Inc., the sales company for Pipeliner CRM. Author of over 100 ebooks on sales, sales management, entrepreneurship and leadership. Kimla studied Protestant Theology in Los Angeles and Vienna, graduating with a Master’sDegree. He is married and father of 3 children.
12/22/2018 • 20 minutes, 22 seconds
1245 He Used These 3 Channels To Hit $50k in MRR in 7 Months
Chris Ronzio built a nationwide video production company that sold over $3 million in youth sporting event videos before he was 25 years old. In 2013, he sold that business and founded an Operations Consulting firm that helps other entrepreneurs create scalable systems and processes. Over the last 5 years, the firm, Organize Chaos, has worked with hundreds of companies in dozens of industries and invested in building 6 of those businesses to over $30 million in annual revenue. Now, Chris' third business, Trainual, is an online platform for business owners and employees to document what they do in simple step-by-step processes. Chris and his team are on a mission to systematize 25,000 small businesses through their technology.
12/21/2018 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
1244 Why Freshbooks CEO was Anti-VC, then Raised $75m
Mike is the co-founder and CEO of FreshBooks, the world’s #1 cloud accounting software for self-employed professionals and their teams. Built in 2003 after he accidentally saved over an invoice, Mike spent 3.5 years growing FreshBooks from his parents’ basement. Since then, over 10 million people have used FreshBooks to save time billing, and collect billions of dollars. A lover of the outdoors, Mike has been bitten so many times it’s rumoured he’s the first human to have developed immunity to mosquitoes.
12/20/2018 • 20 minutes, 40 seconds
1243 Infusionsoft North of $100m in ARR, Details of Mars Mission to 5m SMB Customers
As CEO, Clate is leading Infusionsoft on its mission to simplify growth for millions of small businesses worldwide. Under Clate's leadership, Infusionsoft has landed four rounds of venture capital. Clate is a national speaker, and co-author of the New York Times bestseller “Conquer the Chaos”. Clate has a BA in Economics from Arizona State University, an MBA and a JD from Brigham Young University.
12/19/2018 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
1242 How AdRoll Launched New RollWorks Product, Added $2m in ARR in 4 Months
As CEO of AdRoll Group, Toby Gabriner oversees both divisions of the company’s growth platform business, AdRoll and the recently launched RollWorks. Gabriner has a proven track record as an industry veteran who is not afraid of taking risks that drives transformational vision and breakout growth for tech businesses. With leadership experience at high-growth companies that spans two decades, Gabriner’s been at the forefront of positioning AdRoll as a key company in the marketing technology sector. His experience includes serving as president of Carat Interactive, one of the first large digital agencies, CEO of [x+1], one of the first demand side platforms, and president and CEO of Adap.tv. Under his leadership, Adap.tv saw revenue grow from $200K to over $200M in just four years and was acquired by AOL in 2013 for $465M. Gabriner has also served as a board member and investor of a number of early and mid-stage technology companies. He earned his MBA at Boston University but is a San Francisco native, who enjoys a myriad of fitness activities, reading, volunteering and hanging out with his wife and three children in the sunny state.
12/18/2018 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
1241 His New Way to Prospect Just Passed $1m in ARR, $5.4m Raised
Greg Segall is the founder and CEO of Alyce, an AI-powered corporate gifting and incentive platform. Founded in December 2015, Alyce tells a corporate gifter exactly what to send and the most impactful times to send. Prior to Alyce, Greg was the founder and CEO of One Pica, one the the premier global e-commerce agencies. Greg also invested, scaled and aided the acquisitions of several smaller retailers. One Pica was successfully acquired in December 2012 by a holding company in San Francisco. Greg received his BA in Graphic Design from Boston University in 2001, with a strong focus on computer science.
12/17/2018 • 17 minutes, 48 seconds
1240 Everlance Passes $150k in MRR, Saves 30,000 Customers Big Time Tax Dollars
UCLA B.S. Complex Systems Goldman Sachs, Investment Banking Analyst Valiant Capital, Investor Stanford Graduate School of Business, MBA Everlance, Cofounder and CEO
Neil brings more than 25 years of experience in Software, Hardware and Cloud Technologies to Sailthru. As President and Chief Executive Officer, he leads the development and execution of the company’s strategic vision and daily operations. Before joining Sailthru, Neil served as President and CEO of Vendavo, a leading provider of revenue and price optimization and management solutions. Prior to joining Vendavo, Neil successfully directed Ariba’s North American field operations and, previously, European operations; preceded by 16 years at IBM, serving in a variety of sales and sales management roles in ecommerce solutions. Neil is a native of New York City and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics from State University of New York at Albany.
12/15/2018 • 17 minutes, 39 seconds
1238 With $50k in MRR, They Help Building Developers Scale
Go-to-market specialist within vertical SaaS (B2B). As partner in Serendipity (one of Swedens most well renowned private incubator) Sebastian has worked and implemented a number of go-to-market strategies for SaaS-companies. Like to work close to customers revenue streams and with high ACV.
12/14/2018 • 18 minutes, 7 seconds
1237 Why He Gave Up $5m Agency for Customer Data SaaS Play
As the founder & CEO of SaleCycle, I am focused on utilizing customer data to drive conversions and ROI through behavioral marketing.
12/13/2018 • 21 minutes
1236 He's Currently Raising $3m on $13m Pre, Will He Get The Valuation He Wants?
Victor Levitin took his ecommerce company to $4.5m rev and took Crazylister to $1.5m ARR by making online selling 10x easier for retailers.
12/12/2018 • 13 minutes, 55 seconds
1235 How He's Hit 2% Gross Logo Churn in SMB SEO Tech Space
Myles is Founder and CEO of BrightLocal. He has worked in the local search industry since 2009 and has been a contributor to the Local Search Ranking Factors Study. He has written a regular column for Search Engine Land and spoken at SEO conferences in the US and UK.
12/11/2018 • 13 minutes, 46 seconds
1234 How He Bootstrapped to $160m in ARR in HR Space
Colin Day is chairman and CEO of iCIMS. Day incorporated iCIMS in 2000 with a vision to deliver applicant tracking software emphasizing ease-of-use and an unparalleled customer service. Under his leadership, iCIMS has grown to become the leading best-of-breed provider of talent acquisition software in the industry.
12/10/2018 • 20 minutes, 17 seconds
1233 With 4m Customers, $4b Transfered Every Month, is Transferwise The Cheaper Bank Of The Future?
Taavet Hinrikus is the Co-founder & chairman of @TransferWise the international money transfer platform with over 4 million customers and valued at over $1.6billion makes sending, receiving, and spending money around the world as cheap as possible at the real exchange rate. Previously built @Skype as 1st employee, from Estonia, adventurer, disruptor and investor.
12/9/2018 • 24 minutes, 9 seconds
1232 I should have sold my first company sooner, now LeadDyno $1m+
Brett Owens has co-founded and successfully bootstrapped two software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies that are growing and profitable today. He is currently the Marketing Director and Co-Founder at LeadDyno, an 'instant affiliate marketing' solution for small businesses.
12/8/2018 • 18 minutes, 59 seconds
1231 How He Launched Channel Partnership on Day 1 After Losing Millions
In 2012, Wayne Johnson co-founded encompass corporation, a SaaS business driven by the belief that the best decisions are made when people understand the full picture. As CEO of encompass, Wayne has lead the creation of the company’s Know Your Customer (KYC) automation software for the banking, finance, legal and accountancy sectors.
12/7/2018 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
1230 Collibra passes $60m in ARR, $133m Raised for Data Governance
Felix Van de Maele Co-founder, CEO Felix co-founded Collibra and serves as the company's Chief Executive Officer. As Collibra's CEO, Felix is responsible for the company's global business strategy and has led Collibra from idea to founding to more than ten years of record growth and industry leadership. Prior to co-founding Collibra, Felix served as a researcher at the Semantics Technology and Applications Research Laboratory (STARLab) at the Vrije Universiteit Brussels, where he focused on ontology-focused crawlers for the semantic web and semantic data integration. He holds a Masters degree in Applied Computer Science from the Vrije Universiteit Brussels, a Master of Science degree in software engineering from the Vrije Universiteit Brussels, Master of Science degrees from Ecole des Mines de Nantes (France) and Universidad Nacional de La Plata (Argentina), and a Master in General Management degree from the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School.
12/6/2018 • 14 minutes, 4 seconds
1229 This Single Mom is Turning Mexican Propane Industry on its Head
Energetic, hard-working and determined. Always learning and eager to help fellow entrepreneurs. She has been leading Gaszen and it's team for 3 years now, from idea to product and raising more than USD700K in Mexico. Gaszen is raising interest in 4 countries in Latin America.
12/5/2018 • 11 minutes, 48 seconds
1228 SwiftPage ACT CEO "We're 1-2 Years Away from $100M in ARR"
H. John Oechsle is President and CEO at customer relationship management and marketing automation software provider, Swiftpage. John has a 30-year track record of building highly profitable and sustainable revenue growth for emerging companies and established global leaders. He has been recognized several times for his involvement in the tech industry.
12/4/2018 • 26 minutes, 5 seconds
1227 Would $24m ARR Dashlane Ever Merge with LastPass?
Emmanuel is the CEO of Dashlane, the world's best password manager. He has over 20 years of management experience across the technology and media sectors. Prior to Dashlane, he was CEO of CBS Outdoor France, EVP at Vivendi Universal Games, and the Founder and CEO of Flipside.com. He began his career focused on navigation algorithms for the Mars Exploration Rover. Emmanuel has a Master's in Engineering from Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Universite de Toulouse; he also completed the Executive Education Program at Harvard Business School.
12/3/2018 • 24 minutes, 43 seconds
1226 How GrowSumo is Covering Base Expenses While Growing Performance Based Revenue
Luke's the co-founder and VP Sales at GrowSumo, a Y Combinator and venture-backed company. Before GrowSumo Luke helped his dad build a blues theatre attached to the back of his house, and was active in nonprofit communities
12/2/2018 • 22 minutes, 49 seconds
1225 Enterprise Management Company Alfresco Passes $100M ARR, IPO Next?
Bernadette Nixon, Alfresco’s CEO, leads the company’s strategy for growth, customer commitment and culture. Bernadette is an experienced global leader with a proven track record of growing some of the leading companies in the market and has a wealth of experience in the process and content management industry. Before joining Alfresco, Bernadette served as President of SDL PLC., a global software and professional services company, after having grown its sales team as chief revenue officer. Prior to SDL, she held positions at OpenText, a leading ECM company, as General Manager and Senior Vice President of its BPM Business Unit & Corporate Sales. She was EVP of Sales for the Americas at Metastorm, and served in similar roles at CA Technologies, InterQuad and NCR. Bernadette also held the position of Deputy CIO for the United Nations in Geneva. Bernadette received a BA in Business Studies in Marketing from the University of Hertfordshire. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bernadettenixon/
12/1/2018 • 22 minutes, 10 seconds
1224 CrispThinking passes $10m in ARR helping Enterprise Manage Social Media
Adam Hildreth is one of the foremost global experts on how to keep people safe from the dangers resulting from user generated content posted online. He has worked with global brands, governments and law enforcement for the past 12 years on issues including child grooming, security threats and reputational issues.
11/30/2018 • 15 minutes, 27 seconds
1223 Just $1m Raised and $1m+ in MRR as Formstack Grows in Indianapolis
Chris Byers is the CEO of Formstack, a versatile online form solution that streamlines processes for capturing and managing information. With a mission to empower business professionals through simple and elegant tools that remove complexity from everyday business processes, Formstack is committed to pursuing sustainable growth. Chris works with Formstack's leadership team to advance the company's initiatives, including its culture code and vision, which focus on relationships, results, and community.
11/29/2018 • 20 minutes, 48 seconds
1222 Workable CEO on Saying "No" to Acquisition Offers, $20m+ in ARR
Nikos is the CEO of Workable, makers of the popular recruiting software used by 6,000 companies in 80 countries. He led the company from its inception in 2012 to a fast-growing organization with 185 employees in USA and Europe, raising $40m of venture financing from elite European investors. Nikos has appeared as a speaker at the Nantucket Conference, SaaStr and SaaStock, and has been interviewed in popular podcasts and media like Forbes and the New York Times. Nikos holds a Computer Science degree from Imperial College, London. He lives with his wife and two children in Boston, MA. His twitter handle is @moraitakis.
Alison does not like writing 50 word bios - but does like talking about SaaS, Healthcare, Growth, Insurance Billing, Pricing, Churn, Customer Service, Sales and Human Behaviour. She is lucky to live a life that allows her to talk about all of these things every day as Co-Founder of Jane.
11/27/2018 • 24 minutes, 19 seconds
1220 How He Shields Himself from SMB Churn with 1200 Resellers, $2.3m/mo in Revenue
Brendan King captivates sales, marketing, and software professionals with his humour, intensity, and imaginative thinking. He is the co-founder, CEO and innovative force behind Vendasta. King is passionate about upholding Vendasta's core values of drive, innovation, respect, and agility while leading the company down a path of innovation.
11/26/2018 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
1219 Will Prosperworks and it's 10,000 Paying Customers Win CRM Wars?
Jon holds a BS in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from UC Berkeley and currently resides in Hillsborough, CA with his wife and two daughters. He's a big fan of aquariums and is known for his epic all hands speeches.
11/25/2018 • 21 minutes, 46 seconds
1218 This Browser Notification Company Just Hit 400 Customers, $600k ARR
2X Founder with experience of building martech products. Experience of working across telecom, education and martech and building products that touched over 100Mn users. Passionate about how mobile and web are shaping the future. On the sidelines, I love cycling and catching up with my favorite podcast shows.
11/24/2018 • 15 minutes, 56 seconds
1217 We've increased employee retention 30% at call centers
Sara is the Co-founder of StellarEmploy. StellarEmploy's B2B SaaS platform uses deep learning to help employers hire better hourly workers and improve retention by 30%. She developed the technology while completing her PhD at Harvard. She has ten years of international operations experience and completed her BA at Stanford University.
11/23/2018 • 16 minutes, 47 seconds
1216 PandaDoc CEO: "We've passed $1m in monthly bookings"
I was born in Minsk, Belarus, around the time USSR started to collapse. Severe infection with the entrepreneurship bug got me to do things like wash cars when I was 7 and sell berries when I was 10. Eventually, it got so bad I had to jump on a plane to USA, where this type of disease is not only not treated, but also rewarded. There, I started numerous software companies, raised multi-million dollar financing rounds, built amazing teams, and helped dozens of thousands of businesses to be more efficient.
11/22/2018 • 26 minutes, 51 seconds
1215 Cloudability CEO: We're Past $20m in ARR, 11% of Total AWS Spend
Mat Ellis founded Cloudability in April 2011 and is its CEO. Prior to Cloudability, Mat held executive positions with four startups, and key technology roles at Frito-Lay, Pepsi Cola and Goldman Sachs. He currently sits on the boards of the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network and the Technology Association of Oregon. Originally from the UK and now residing in Portland, Mat is well known as a mentor and advisor to startups across the US.
11/21/2018 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
1214 $3.5m ARR Any.do focused on doing your tasks for you
Founder & CEO of Any.do
11/20/2018 • 23 minutes, 37 seconds
1213 Kabbage CEO: We've lent $5b to 150,000 SMB's, Will Pass $300m in 2018 Revenue
Rob Frohwein is the co-founder and CEO of Kabbage. In 2008, Rob Frohwein recognized that companies like eBay offered automated access to small business transaction data via APIs. Rob realized small businesses could simply share this data to allow underwriters to make better, faster credit decisions and provide a great user experience. He co-founded Kabbage in Atlanta, Georgia, to leverage the power of real-time data automation through technology. Before founding Kabbage, Rob advised, established and/or led several successful businesses, including LAVA Group, U.S. Micro Corporation (acquired by Arrow Electronics) and Surgical Biologics (acquired by MiMedx). Additionally, he led business development and legal for ZapMedia and Security First Network Bank (SFNB), the first online bank.
11/19/2018 • 21 minutes, 40 seconds
1212 Chatbot company SmartAssistant: We'll pass $50m in next few quarters
Markus Linder is the chief executive officer and co-founder of SMARTASSISTANT, the leading global technology provider for Digital Advice and Guided Selling technologies for online retailers, manufacturers and service providers. Over the last 11 years under Markus guidance, SMARTASSISTANT has grown internationally, with offices at several locations in three continents.
11/18/2018 • 22 minutes, 42 seconds
1211 Finally an easy way for teams to edit videos, creative, doing $40k in MRR
Niklas is co-founder of the SaaS company Filestage. Filestage is a solution web application that makes it easy to share, comment on (+draw) and approve videos, designs and documents, allowing customers and colleagues to mark change requests directly online in the file. This helps to avoid long feedback rounds via email. Before Niklas founded Filestage he used to work in different companies in marketing, advertising and e-commerce. In this time he experienced how time consuming and painful the content review process could be. Especially when done via email. So he started Filestage - his first SaaS startup.
11/17/2018 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
1210 How this Niche CRM player passed $7m in ARR after CEO Stroke
CEO and Co-Owner of Z2 Systems, Inc. After making a few mistakes growing up and turning my life around, I decided to focus my life on helping nonprofits. I consider myself one of the luckiest people in the world to own and run a software company that helps nonprofits work towards achieving their missions. We started the company with just two people and some friends and family money, and are now surpassing the largest competitors in the industry.
11/16/2018 • 17 minutes, 2 seconds
1209 He Spent $1.6m Buying Out Investors, Now Owns 100% Gets Rich off Dividends
Chris Vandersluis – a veteran North American project management authority, public speaker and author – is CEO of HMS Software, publisher of world-leading TimeControl® web-based corporate timesheet software.
11/15/2018 • 14 minutes, 33 seconds
1208 Will This $250m+ Valuation Company be DeFacto Security Rating Standard?
Dr. Yampolskiy is a recognized expert in the security field. He is CEO of SecurityScorecard, the leader in security ratings, used by hundreds of customers like GE, McDonalds, Pepsi, AllState, AIG, Bank of NY Mellon, and others. Before founding Security Scorecard, he was the CISO at Gilt Groupe, and has held lead technologist and security roles at Goldman Sachs, Oracle, Cinchcast, and Microsoft. Yampolskiy is a published author and active speaker in the security and software development communities. He has a Ph.D. in Cryptography from Yale University.
11/14/2018 • 20 minutes, 54 seconds
1207 How This Author Launched $800k+ Conference and Research Revenue Stream
11/13/2018 • 17 minutes, 52 seconds
1206 He Helps B2B SaaS CEO's Launch User Conferences
Simone Vincenzi, known as The Experts Strategist, is the co-founder of GTeX, Forbes, Entrepreneur Magazine and Huffington Post contributor, TEDx speaker, Host of the podcast Explode Your Expert Business, author of 3 life-changing books. Simone is passionate about turning experts into authorities using his signature EXPLODE YOUR EXPERT BIZ programs. Every year he speaks in front of more than 5,000 business leaders, which included sharing the stage with Les Brown, Dr John DeMartini, Simone Sinek, John C. Maxwell and many more. He has also organised over 600 events, including Gary Vee speaking from York Hall boxing ring, and he is currently speaking in more than 200 stages every year. Following his passion for making an impact on the younger generation, he also partners with the largest youth organisations in the UK, helping them deliver more effective courses and training. Simone cannot live without 3 things: Speaking, basketball and playing his Didgeridoo.
11/12/2018 • 20 minutes, 20 seconds
1205 The Art of Your First $3k in ARR with Ukrainian CEO Vladimir Polo
Vladimir launched his first SaaS-startup in 2014. Created his first customer academy for that startup and when he saw that a lot of people wanted to have the same academy, he decided to pivot his startup and in 2016 founded an academy builder for SaaS-companies.
11/11/2018 • 15 minutes, 10 seconds
1204 $30m ARR Cloud Backup Company Almost Bankrupt from Thailand Floods
Gleb Budman is co-founder and CEO of Backblaze, which he and his team grew to $20m in revenue and profitability, while building one of the largest and most cost-efficient cloud storage systems on the planet. Previously, Gleb led two product teams from pre-funding through acquisition, and founded three companies.
11/10/2018 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
1203 SEMRush to hit $80m ARR This Year, Here's How
As Chief Strategy Officer Eugene helped SEMrush to more than triple it’s revenue in less than 2 years and raised over $40m from Tier 1 VC firms. Before joining SEMrush Eugene was a partner at Target Global, pan-european growth stage venture fund that invests in consumer Internet space. There Eugene was in charge of US pipeline and invested in number of notable companies including Blue Apron(IPO), Lyft and Juno(acquired by Gett) Eugene started his VC career as Senior Associate and then Partner at Foresight Ventures. Foresight Ventures was focused on early stage US technology companies. Fund generated number of profitable exits over three years and was ranked top 10 Russian VC firm by Forbes in 2013.
11/9/2018 • 24 minutes, 10 seconds
1202 He Raised $20m+ in First Company, Now Bootstrapping in B2B Sales Tech Space, $1m in ARR
I'm the CEO at Siftrock. I joined as ex-post-facto co-founder in Oct 2016. I'm passionate about all things related to SaaS marketing and sales. Previously founder and CEO at Simply Measured in the social analytics space. Also a BOD member at Bizible - leader in b2b marketing attribution.
11/8/2018 • 23 minutes, 11 seconds
1201 How he sold customers before hiring first head of engineering
Max Armbruster is the founder and CEO of Talkpush, the leading messaging recruitment platform. Max is a serial entrepreneur, and has sold his last three companies, most recently a recruitment SaaS company. Max has 17 years of international experience in the US, Europe and Asia, and has held strategic roles at SAP, CNET Networks and AT Kearney.
11/7/2018 • 16 minutes, 38 seconds
1200 How He Got First 250 Customers, $65k in MRR from South Africa HQ
CEO of ProcurementExpress
11/6/2018 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
1199 Bootstrapping your way to your first $10k in MRR
43yo engineer, married, 3 children, living on a farm in North Denmark. Built up a top App agency from 2008 with 15 employees and produced over 120 apps for top danish companies. Sold the company and co-founded PRE.DO to help companies to capture, create overview and progress on ideas from their employees.
11/5/2018 • 15 minutes, 36 seconds
1198 He's done $2b in Transaction Volume, Here's How he Pitches
Oren Klaff - Bio, With securities markets experience in capital raising advisory leadership, Oren is Director of Capital Markets at investment bank Intersection Capital, where he manages its capital-raising platform. Since 2005, Oren has since grown the firm history to approximately $2 billion in aggregate trade volume across a diversified portfolio of companies and transactions. He is responsible for business development and product development, and oversees the firm's flagship product, the Velocity, method of corporate finance. Applying his pioneering approaches to raising capital and incorporating neuroscience into the capital markets programs, Oren has supervised the placement of over $500 million of investor capital from high net-worth individuals and financial institutions. He is the #1 best-selling business author of the McGraw Hill publication Pitch Anything: An Innovative Method for Presenting, Persuading, and Winning the Deal.
11/4/2018 • 21 minutes, 22 seconds
1197 Sell your video content directly to your audience, $4.5m invested so far
JP Fatta is the Founder of StreaMe with a mission to leverage technology to create new entertainment experiences. He has personally funded and operated multiple startups including a production company creating non-scripted TV shows. He is talented in the creation and deployment of cross-functional teams to launch concepts to market.
11/3/2018 • 18 minutes, 35 seconds
1196 How CloudCheckr Drives 145% Net Revenue Retention Annually
Aaron is the co-founder & CEO of CloudCheckr, the cloud management company. A serial entrepreneur, he has founded and sold three successful startups. An acclaimed speaker and author on technology topics 'Enterprise 2.0 and the Oracle Security Handbook' Aaron has been awarded multiple patents in database security and social media.
11/2/2018 • 22 minutes, 9 seconds
1195 3 Metrics Automated Insights Focuses on as a Private Equity Owned Company
Marc Zionts has successfully led companies since 1987 and is the CEO of Automated Insights, a Vista Equity Partners owned company. Zionts is an Independent Board Director for Pivot 3, TEOCO, and Friends of the Earth. Besides enjoying time with family, Zionts is an avid outdoorsman and accomplished bicycle racer.
11/1/2018 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
1194 Screenrecord Testing Tool Hits $1m+ in ARR, Under 2% Logo Churn Monthly
Florian is CEO of Usersnap which helps digital businesses to get feedback, track issues, and create successful products. Companies like Google, Facebook, Dow Jones, and Microsoft trust Usersnap to get actionable insights. Florian is an enthusiastic entrepreneur and founded several companies. He has over a decade hands-on experience building SaaS businesses and delivers on rapid organizational expansion. Most recently, he has been participating in the Salesforce Incubator to launch Usersnap globally.
10/31/2018 • 17 minutes, 51 seconds
1193 Now Anyone Can Use the Tech He Used to Build His $100m eCommerce Brand
John James is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Engine: a cloud-based eCommerce platform focused on creating the best experience for both merchants and consumers.A serial eCommerce entrepreneur, John started his first eCommerce business in his college dorm room in 1994 and financed his medical school education with the proceeds. Since then, he has built and sold multiple businesses including Acumen Brands: a company that raised $100 million in venture capital as it grew to dominate the country wear market in the late 2000's.
10/30/2018 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1192 HIPPA Copmliant Email Tool Breaks $1.2m in ARR
Hoala Greevy is the Founder CEO of Paubox, a B2B SaaS startup that focuses on being the easiest way to send and receive HIPAA compliant email. The company is located in San Francisco and has over 1,000 customers in all 50 states. Hoala likes to go kayak fishing on his spare time.
10/29/2018 • 13 minutes, 20 seconds
1191 How Bootstrapped Time Tracking CEO Drives 100% yoy Growth, $3.8m in ARR
Dave Nevogt is the co-founder of Hubstaff.com which helps teams communicate better through automatic time tracking and activity tracking. He’s been running online businesses since he was 23, and now manages a team of 40 remote employees. Dave has been honored as one of Indianapolis’s top 40 under 40 entrepreneurs, and focuses on teaching others to manage remote teams.
10/28/2018 • 18 minutes, 52 seconds
1190 The 1 Metric GitLab CEO Follows Thats Driven $10m+ in ARR
Sid Sijbrandij is the CEO and co-founder of GitLab, a software company that supports the entire DevOps lifecycle in a single application. Originally a computer programmer for a personal submarine company, Sid was first introduced to GitLab while working as a (self-taught) Ruby programming developer. Under Sid's leadership, GitLab has grown from 49 to 267 employees, closed $20 million in Series B funding and delivered on promises to solve the complete developer lifecycle.
10/27/2018 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
1189 Sococo is a Visual Slack doing $240k MRR, 60% yoy Growth
Marc Kirshbaum is a business leader, strategic advisor and board member to companies in healthcare, software and information technology. Marc is retained by investors, founders and CEOs to build, grow and turn around businesses that will deliver sustainable and measurable results for investors, employees and customers. Marc has been serving as the CEO of Sococo since August 2017.
10/26/2018 • 18 minutes, 29 seconds
1188 Pega About To Hit $1B in ARR as 30+ Year "Overnight Success"
Alan Trefler is a visionary leader, a technology change-agent, an innovative philanthropist, a chess master, and a trusted advisor to business executives around the world. He founded Pegasystems to change the way the world builds software. Today, the company employees nearly 4,500 people around the world and has a market cap of almost $5B.
10/25/2018 • 24 minutes, 6 seconds
1187 The Chinese Gave Him $50M For Orally Delivered Insulin Capsul Idea, Will It Take Off?
Nadav Kidron is the CEO & Director of Oramed Pharmaceuticals, which he co-founded in 2006 to bring oral insulin to the millions of people with diabetes. Kidron holds a bachelor’s degree in law and an international MBA. He’s a member of the Israeli Advanced Technology Industries, and an international lecturer on Israel’s entrepreneurial and innovative culture.
10/24/2018 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
1186 Why Assembla Sold to Venture Equity Firm, Using GDPR to Hit 60% yoy Growth
As the CEO of Assembla, Paul Lynch is responsible for driving the strategic direction of the company. Prior to Assembla, Paul held multiple executive roles within cloud businesses where he drove revenue growth and international expansion. Paul has a Marketing degree from Dublin City University and is fluent in Spanish.
10/23/2018 • 23 minutes, 54 seconds
1185 Bagalore Based Cisco Engineer Quits To Help You Build B2B Apps, $7k MRR
A tech entrepreneur who is always up to something. Studied at IIT Kharagpur (India) and started the career as a software engineer at Cisco. Moved into product management role there and then joined a small startup Calm.io. Calm.io got acquired by Nutanix. Has witnessed the Nutanix IPO and has a software patent filed in his name. Currently, he is working on his new venture Clappia that bridges the business apps innovation gap.
10/22/2018 • 13 minutes
1184 California Mom Bootstraps HR Tech to $5m in ARR
Reena, a serial entrepreneur and philanthropist, interestingly dove into entrepreneurship when most women take a career break, after her first child was born. She began with a staffing company, Avankia, then moved on to TargetRecruit, the most innovative talent management platform built on the Salesforce platform, that modernizes the recruiting cycle at organizations, from front to back office. Reena was featured as CRN's 2016 Women of the Channel, in Entrepreneur Magazine, Power 50 Solution Providers and much more. From supporting girls education to providing job opportunities to stay-at-home mom's at her firm, Reena always strives to do her part to support women. In this pursuit, she has embarked on the journey of Mom Relaunch- an initiative to bring women on a career break back into the workforce. Mom Relaunch is a one-stop solution for moms to have a fulfilling and sustainable career in the HR and IT industry.
10/21/2018 • 21 minutes, 14 seconds
1183 Why 200 Enterprise Clients Pay Him $10m+ to Scale Video Production
10/20/2018 • 24 minutes, 11 seconds
1182 Supercharged Mailchimp for Ecommerce passes $2m in ARR, Bootstrapped
Rytis Lauris is the Co-founder and CEO of Omnisend, the powerful marketing automation platform that’s focused on moving ecommerce marketers beyond the generic email marketing tools. Rytis is a successful entrepreneur who has spent the last 10 years building and driving a few startups which has brought him to ecommerce field.
10/19/2018 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
1181 How MovableInk Broke $40m in ARR with 1 Pricing Axis to Drive Expansion Revenue
Vivek co-founded Movable Ink in 2010 and has led the company through rapid growth to a leading market position with 200+ employees serving 500 of the most innovative consumer brands. Through his leadership, Movable Ink is helping digital marketers embrace a visual world with intelligent creative that adapts at the moment of engagement. Prior to co-founding Movable Ink, Vivek headed Eastern North America and EMEA sales for Engine Yard. Earlier in his career, he held senior engineering roles at Blue Martini and Cisco Systems. Vivek graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
10/18/2018 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
1180 How He's Making $30m/Quarter Mining Ethereum Blockchain
Harry has extensive contacts and experience in Canada's capital markets. He served as Managing Director of Macquarie Capital Markets Canada Ltd. from 1985 to 2015 and as Managing Director of Espresso Capital from 2015 to 2017, investing in and advising startups in the technology and natural resources sectors. A cryptocurrency evangelist since 2013, Harry is the founding CEO at HIVE and is responsible for the company's overall vision.
10/17/2018 • 24 minutes, 12 seconds
1179 Why Co-Founder of $20m ARR Company Took Sabbatical to Write "Dream Teams"
Shane Snow is an award-winning journalist, celebrated entrepreneur, and the bestselling author of Smartcuts and the forthcoming DREAM TEAMS (June 2018), as well as the co-author of The Storytelling Edge. He is co-founder of the content technology company Contently, which helps creative people and companies tell great stories together, and serves on the board of the Contently Foundation for Investigative Journalism. Snow's writing has appeared in Fast Company, Wired, The New Yorker, and dozens more top publications. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts and a recipient of Columbia University's Innovator Award for furthering the cause of journalism. He’s been called a “Wunderkind” by The New York Times, a “Digital Maverick” by Details, and his work “Insanely addicting” by GQ—though he wishes they had been talking about his abs.
10/16/2018 • 22 minutes, 27 seconds
1178 How QASymphony Used Integrations to Drive 115% Gross Revenue Retention, $20m in ARR
David Keil is the Chief Executive Officer of QASymphony and serves on the Board of Directors. Prior to joining QASymphony in June, 2014 he was CEO of Digistrive, an e-commerce software company that as acquired by Deem in 2014. Previously, Mr. Keil was the Chief Executive Officer of Integrated Broadband Services (“IBBS”), a software and services company (owned by private equity firm Pamlico Capital) serving the cable broadband industry. During Mr. Keil's four-year tenure at IBBS, the company doubled in size to nearly $40 million. Prior to joining IBBS in 2007, he served as Chief Strategy Officer and later as Senior Vice President and General Manager of ChoicePoint, a NYSE global information services provider (acquired by Lexis Nexis) where he ran the $140 million Government Services division. Before joining ChoicePoint, he served as Executive Vice President for Novient, an enterprise software vendor. He also spent five years as a Managing Director at the investment bank Robinson Humphrey (now SunTrust Robinson Humphrey).
10/15/2018 • 21 minutes, 58 seconds
1177 Then Turn Your Customers into Advocates, North of $12m in ARR
Rob Fuggetta is the world's leading Advocate marketing expert. Rob Fuggetta (pronounced Few-jetta) is the author of Brand Advocates: Turning Enthusiastic Customers into a Powerful Marketing Force (John H. Wiley & Sons, Inc.), and Founder/CEO of Zuberance, the leading full-service Advocate marketing company.
10/14/2018 • 25 minutes, 46 seconds
1176 How this Developer Made $250k+ Selling Powertools He Didn't Own Via Amazon Ebay Arbitrage
Alex is an intellectually curious life-hacker, software developer, and small business owner based in downtown Austin. Formerly a Management Consultant with Accenture, he currently runs Austin Data Solutions, a five-person consultancy specializing in solving business problems with some of the latest technologies.
10/13/2018 • 20 minutes, 37 seconds
1175 He'll Process $100m in Business Travel This Year
Avi is the CEO and Co-Founder of TravelPerk, a ground-breaking business travel platform offering companies of any size, a one-stop-shop to book and manage all their travel in one place. TravelPerk is one of the fastest-growing tech startups in the world (http://saas1000.com/ we're number 4), and raised $30m from some of the world's leading investors including Spark Capital, investors in Twitter, Slack and Trello as well as Felix Capital, Target Global, LocalGlobe, Sunstone, Amplo and others. Prior to founding TravelPerk, Avi was Co-Founder of Hotel Ninjas, which was acquired by Booking.com in 2014, and VP Product at Budgetplaces, which was acquired by Palamon in 2011. Avi started writing code when he was 12 years old, holds an MBA from IESE, and is a recognized travel-tech thought leader and a frequent speaker at industry events. He lived in three countries and speaks English, French, Spanish, Hebrew, and Klingon.
10/12/2018 • 18 minutes, 9 seconds
1174 Planning a $50m ICO for Property Investing, 55% Unlevered IRR Historically
Andrew is the Co-CEO of Aperture, a real estate tech and investment company that has systematized the acquisition, rehabilitation and sale of distressed residential real estate across the US and is producing unlevered IRRs in excess of 50%. Aperture is launching its Property Coin ICO (security token), the first professionally managed portfolio of real estate assets and loans available via the blockchain to help fund the growth of its existing business. Prior to forming Aperture, Andrew was co-head of capital markets at the largest fix and flip operator in the US and before that was an investment banker focused on the residential real estate and mortgage industries for 12+ years. Andrew graduated from Babson College with a major in Finance.
10/11/2018 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
1173 Loyalty Perk SaaS Hits 2300 Locations, $2.3m in ARR
Sunil is Founder and CEO of Perkville, a rewards platform for local businesses. He started Perkville to help SMBs compete with large companies by giving them a powerful, yet affordable program. He now works with companies of all sizes with over 2,000 locations and 1 million consumers participating each month.
10/10/2018 • 17 minutes, 47 seconds
1172 How He Pivoted to $30m in Funding, 10,000+ Jobs Placed with Recruiting AI Tool
Eyal Grayevsky is the CEO and Co-founder of Mya Systems (formerly FirstJob), creators of Mya, the industry's leading AI recruiter. His 12+ years of experience co-managing his family's recruiting agency and operating FirstJob inspired him to solve the major inefficiencies in the recruiting space. Prior to Mya Systems, Eyal co-founded FirstJob, a job site for companies looking to attract, engage and hire qualified early-career talent from the company's network of over 11M active millennial job seekers. Eyal is also a Founding Partner at DoubleTap Ventures, a community of startup founders that provides an environment for entrepreneurs to share advice. He received his bachelor's degree in Finance from the University of Colorado.
10/9/2018 • 25 minutes
1171 New Founder Talks First 30 Days, $160k in Revenue, Next Steps
Guillaume Moubeche is Co-founder & CEO at lemlist.com. He's a SaaS lover with a passion for Growth Hacking and traveled the world for a year using social networks to stay at locals' for free. He holds 2 Masters degrees, one in Chemical Engineering and one in Marketing.
10/8/2018 • 17 minutes, 18 seconds
1170 Playbook he used for taking 3 companies public f\rom scratch
Will Herman is an entrepreneur, active angel investor, corporate director and startup mentor. He has started and managed five companies, resulting in two IPOs and two corporate sales. Will has also invested in over seventy startups, sat on the boards of twenty and has advised over a hundred more.
10/7/2018 • 23 minutes, 1 second
1169 From $40CPA Model to $900/mo SaaS, 100% yoy growth
Will Fraser is CEO and co-founder of SaaSquatch. He studied electrical engineering and business before starting his first company. Since becoming an entrepreneur he has worked with some of the world's largest companies to help them build digital growth channels that have touched many millions of people around the globe.
10/6/2018 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
1168 Social Media For Lawyers Doubles YOY to $1.5m ARR, Raising $1m?
Adrian Dayton is the Founder of ClearView Social and author of two books on social media for lawyers. His software is being used by over 20,000 professionals including 25 of the 100 largest law firms in the United States.
10/5/2018 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
1167 How FloQast Grew 300% YoY to $8m ARR Selling to Accounting Teams
Mike is the co-founder and CEO of FloQast. Prior to that, he was the fifth accountant hired at Cornerstone OnDemand to help prepare for their IPO. Mike began his career in audit at Ernst & Young in Los Angeles. He holds a Bachelor's in Accounting from Syracuse University.
10/4/2018 • 21 minutes, 45 seconds
1166 He Invented Mattress in a Box 20 years ago But Casper Out-Marketed Him
10/3/2018 • 18 minutes, 49 seconds
1165 Coveo CEO: "We'll pass $100m ARR imminently" on $150m raised for AI powered search
Louis Têtu is Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Coveo. Prior to Coveo, Louis co-founded Taleo Corporation, the leading international provider of cloud software for talent and human capital management. Prior to Taleo, Louis was President of Baan SCS, the supply-chain management solutions group of Baan, a global enterprise software company.
10/2/2018 • 22 minutes, 3 seconds
1164 Want Your Own Alexa, Without Amazon Influence? Mycroft Raises $8m For Opensource Voice Stack
Joshua Montgomery is the Founder and CEO of Mycroft AI - the privacy-focused open source voice assistant. Joshua has more than 15 years of entrepreneurial experience to bring to Mycroft. He previously built one of the few gigabit fiber networks from scratch in the United States.
10/1/2018 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
1163 How Jazz HR Used $6m in New Funds to Add $1m ARR in 3 Months
Pete has 25 years of experience in leadership roles with high growth companies, spending the majority of his career with technology solutions designed for the global small business community. Prior to joining JazzHR, Pete was Senior Vice President of Global Sales at Carbonite where he was responsible for all revenue and led the company's expansion into the SMB market, which grew to exceed 100,000 paid small business customers. Pete was a member of the Carbonite IPO leadership team. Previously, Pete served as SVP & GM for NameMedia’s SMB-focused Domain Marketplace, the largest of its kind in the world, and Chief Operating Officer of Monster Worldwide's consumer relocation division, helping small businesses convert new movers into lifetime customers. Pete is a graduate of Middlebury College and Harvard Business School.
Luke Skurman is the Founder and CEO of Niche.com. Luke holds bachelors and masters degrees from Carnegie Mellon University and is a member of its Board of Trustees; Luke is the Vice Chairman of the Research Innovation and Entrepreneurship committee, he is also a member of both the Finance and the Property & Facilities committees. Luke is a Co-Founder and Chairman of Ascender, a non-profit, 501(c)(3), focusing on bolstering innovation and entrepreneurship in the Pittsburgh region. Luke is the Founding Curator of the Global Shapers Pittsburgh Hub, an initiative of the World Economic Forum. Luke has won national awards related to entrepreneurship from BusinessWeek, Fast Company, and Inc. Magazine and has been featured in numerous media outlets including The New York Times, CNN, and Fortune. Luke was awarded the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year for the Pittsburgh region in 2016.
9/29/2018 • 23 minutes, 10 seconds
1161 How 4m Freemium Users Power Enterprise Content Offering at Scoop.it
Co-founder & CEO of Scoop.it, a SaaS platform that helps marketers publish content using data science. Entrepreneur since 2000: Musiwave (first mobile music platform, acquired by Microsoft), Goojet (pre-iPhone mobile widget platform). Startup advisor and investor: Tedemis (email retargeting, acquired by Criteo), The Refiners, Impact (cross-border accelerators in San Francisco).
9/28/2018 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
1160 Convoy, The Uber for Trucking, Charges Avg $4/mile on 100 mile trip, Takes Less Than 20% Per Unit Shipped
Dan Lewis is the co-founder and CEO of Convoy. Convoy is building the largest connected network of trucking companies in the country, helping businesses ship freight more efficiently, improving drivers' livelihood and reducing the 7% of all greenhouse gases that come from trucking. Before Convoy, Dan served as General Manager of New Shopping Experiences at Amazon, as well as Vice President of Product and Operations at Wavii (acquired by Google), and Group Product Manager at Microsoft. Dan started his career in technology and supply-chain consulting for Oliver Wyman, after studying cognitive science at Yale University.
9/27/2018 • 19 minutes, 37 seconds
1159 SF Company w/ $50m Raised "Of course we're burning cash!"
Zack pioneered the first large-scale Drupal website for the Howard Dean campaign in 2003, co-founded the world's first Drupal development shop, CivicSpace, co-founded a successful Drupal development shop, Chapter Three, and also co-founded Mission Bicycle. What started as a professional website development epiphany ”We're doing it wrong!” evolved into an all-in-one platform after he and a few trusted colleagues got together and started solving problems.
9/26/2018 • 22 minutes, 44 seconds
1158 School teacher developers software, other teachers buy it, $3k MRR
Highschool Teacher for over 8 years, entrepreneur in web design for over 15 and gamification expert for 8 years (3 as international expert).
9/25/2018 • 13 minutes, 43 seconds
1157 From Artist to $200k MRR SaaS Company for Content Publishing
Taj Forer is an experienced publisher, digital media executive, entrepreneur and artist. He currently serves as CEO of Fabl, the cloud-based publishing platform for content marketing, serving a global client base including CBS, Cond Nast, GE and Ducati, among others. Forer is Cofounder of Daylight, the celebrated international publisher of art books and is the author of two books of his own critically acclaimed art photography.
9/24/2018 • 20 minutes, 45 seconds
1156 YC Alum Burning $110k/mo in Cash To Scope Projects and Place Dev Talent Using Machine Learning
Iba Masood is the co-founder and CEO of TARA.ai. Iba is a YC Alum, and was part of YCombinator's Winter 2015 class. She was recently awarded Forbes 30 under 30, for the 2018 list, under the field of Enterprise Technology. In August 2017, Iba became a permanent resident of the United States, through the EB-1A award, which presents individuals of outstanding ability with the green card.
9/23/2018 • 26 minutes, 9 seconds
1155 How He's Used Stories to Build a $20m+ SaaS Platform for Scaling Content
Tom Gerace is the founder and CEO of Skyword, the leading content marketing technology and services company. Skyword liberates brands from ineffective marketing practices and inspires them to create deeper connections with their audiences through storytelling. With Robert McKee, award-winning story authority and best-selling author, Gerace leads Storynomics Seminars, which instruct senior executives and marketing professionals on how to apply storytelling structure to their business in order to drive revenue, margins, and brand loyalty. Prior to Skyword, Gerace founded Be Free, a publicly traded affiliate marketing platform and services company, which transformed online advertising from pay-per-view to pay-for-performance advertising. Early in his career, Gerace served as a senior business analyst at the Harvard Business School, where he wrote the first case studies on the emergence of the Internet in 1998.
9/22/2018 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
1154 How we hit net churn of -5% in Loyalty Program space
Successful serial entrepreneur and investor, advisor, mentor to several startups. Currently the CEO of Zinrelo, a loyalty rewards and referral marketing platform. Has over 25 years of experience in technology industry and holds 19 patents. Loves trekking, running and biking. Currently training for SF-LA, unsupported bike ride.
9/21/2018 • 19 minutes, 16 seconds
1153 We just passed $4m in ARR, considering a raise for CPG CRM tool
Allen Bonde is VP of marketing at Repsly, and an advisor to several start-ups. He also held executive roles at Placester, OpenText, and KANA, and was co-founder at Offerpop (now Wyng). He has been a consultant at McKinsey and Yankee Group, and started his career as a data scientist. An avid speaker (on 4 continents) and writer, he blogs at Small Data Group.
9/20/2018 • 17 minutes, 10 seconds
1152 How Screenful monopolized Trello marketplace to drive $15k in MRR
Technologist & entrepreneur with a passion to product design, founder of Screenful (https://screenful.com). Before founding Screenful, I spent a decade building machine learning models for user analytics, content recommendation, and ad targeting. I co-organise Helsinki Business Analytics meetup and Atlassian User Group Helsinki. In my free time, I enjoy snowboarding and juggling.
9/19/2018 • 17 minutes, 59 seconds
1151 Weebly CEO: 50m Users, North of .5% Conversion to $8/mo
David Rusenko is CEO and co-founder of Weebly. Created in his Penn State dorm room in 2006, Weebly now hosts 50 million entrepreneurs in 225 countries around the world. He's helped scale the company to 300+ employees in 5 global offices. He's dad to a 1.5 year old and his hobbies range from stunt car driving to roaring game of bridge with his mother-in-law.
9/18/2018 • 28 minutes, 39 seconds
1150 Detroit Based Referral Program software passes $600k in MRR
Jeff Epstein is the founder and CEO of Ambassador (getambassador.com) a 40 person, venture-backed startup headquartered in metro Detroit. Ambassador provides relationship marketing software to some of the world's most recognizable brands. A lifelong entrepreneur, Jeff's first internet startup was in 2000 and provided online food ordering for college students. Jeff ran this startup while earning his BA from Michigan State University. While earning his J.D from Chicago-Kent School of Law, Jeff started an affiliate marketing company which he later sold before graduating to allow himself to pay off his law school loans.
9/17/2018 • 20 minutes, 33 seconds
1149 My investors kicked me out of my company, now personality tool at $1m+ ARR
Founder of Crystal for the past 3 1/2 years. Started multiple businesses before then, including an event software company (Attend.com), a pizza box advertising agency, and a bed bug extermination company. Private pilot, songwriter, runner, and local diner regular.
9/16/2018 • 25 minutes, 28 seconds
1148 We've passed $10m in ARR helping companies make sure their analytics are working
Rob Seolas co-founded ObservePoint in 2007, helping grow the company from a lean startup to the global leader in digital data quality, that today serves enterprise clients worldwide. Thought-leader, life-enthusiast and successful entrepreneur, Rob has more than 15 years of experience leading innovation in the digital marketing space. Quick to point out he was fired from every job where he didn't work for himself, Rob previously co-founded and built iLeadMedia, which was acquired by Think Partnership. Today, Rob is an authority in mobile and web analytics and business who approaches digital marketing challenges with the passion and energy of a visionary leader. With extensive experience in startups and private sales investments, Rob leads ObservePoint in redefining the role of digital data quality in business strategy across all verticals.
9/15/2018 • 25 minutes, 8 seconds
1147 We make $200k/mo helping people find financial products
Miron Lulic is founder and CEO at SuperMoney, a leading financial services comparison platform. Millions of people trust SuperMoney to shop for financial products and transparently compare their options in real time. Prior to SuperMoney, Miron was a co-founder at LoanNow, a direct online lender. Miron also helped to launch Optima Tax Relief where he lead digital marketing and product development efforts as VP of Digital. In 2015, Optima was named the #3 fastest growing company in America (#1 in financial services).
9/14/2018 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
1146 How Joomla Pays Bills With $0 Revenue, Opensourced
Robert is President of Joomla and has been an expert in content management systems since 1996. Effective deployment and management of content using internet technologies has been a cornerstone of Robert's philosophy and has helped clients achieve measurable results. He believes Joomla is a huge and growing part of the future of content management.
9/13/2018 • 16 minutes, 26 seconds
1145 How Eero is Locking Down Distribution Channel for "Home Automation Wars" With $100m
Nick is the CEO and co-founder of eero. Prior to eero, Nick worked at McKinsey & Company and then Menlo Ventures, where he sourced investments in startups such as Betterment, Periscope, and Ansible and worked with portfolio companies like Uber, Dropcam, and Roku. Frustrated by the WiFi solutions on the market and unable to find a better solution, he set out to build eero with his co-founders Amos Schallich and Nate Hardison. Nick is originally from Chicago, graduated from Stanford with a BS in Management Science & Engineering, and currently lives in San Francisco with his wife.
9/12/2018 • 22 minutes, 48 seconds
1144 Why I sold my profitable, bootstrapped $5.5m ARR company
Elastic Grid enhances the partner experience by delivering a scalable, easy-to-use channel marketing platform backed by personal support. The result is programs that meet the individual needs of each partner, increased campaign adoption rates, and measurable ROI that channel teams depend on
9/11/2018 • 15 minutes, 23 seconds
1143 Eloqua Founders Launch New Relationship Tool, $600k ARR first 5 Months, $7m Raised
Paul is the CEO and Co-founder of Nudge.ai, a relationship intelligence platform that helps businesses find and grow the right relationships to drive revenue. He is a successful technology executive who has run Services, Customer Success, Account Management, Support and Product Management teams. As part of Eloqua's executive team, Paul helped lead the company from $0 to over $100 million in revenue, then through IPO and a successful acquisition for $957 million by Oracle. He's a firm believer that company culture trumps strategy every time, and that storytelling is an essential part of creating a business. He has a successful track record as a leader with a strong focus on sales and customer engagement.
9/10/2018 • 19 minutes, 52 seconds
1142 Why went public, then sold to Vista for $564m on $100m in ARR
CEO of Xactly Corporation. Seasoned executive with more than two decades of successful senior management experience at both early-stage and public companies. Noted industry expert in issues relating to sales performance management, sales compensation, commission, employee engagement, incentive compensation, benchmarking, big data and software-as-a-service (SaaS) delivery models.
9/9/2018 • 23 minutes, 12 seconds
1141 Not shopify, not stripe, $2b+ in transaction volume processed
Full-time traveler and co-founder/product manager at Foxy.io. Back in 2005, Brett needed a way to add custom ecommerce to existing systems.Foxy.io was launched 2 years later, with the hunch that others needed the same. 10+ years later, Foxy has handled billions of dollars in transactions for merchants around the world. When Brett isn't busy with that, you can find him playing bluegrass
9/8/2018 • 21 minutes, 25 seconds
1140 I only work 17 hours per week, don't trust Google, and make $1.7m+
John has helped thousands of entrepreneurs succeed in their business by doing outsourcing differently. He created and runs OnlineJobs.ph, the largest website for finding Filipino virtual workers, with over 500,000 Filipino resumes and over 100,000 employers from around the world using it. He works about 17 hours per week, choosing to spend his time with his family rather than working.
9/7/2018 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
1139 We're about to close $5m round for our sales document tool
CTO & co-founder at TILKEE, Timothée has an engineering background. As the original founder of oXfoZ, he managed complex web-based projects. He was also a project manager at Traveldoo and carried out several missions for "Doctors Without Borders" as a volunteer. His last challenge was launching TILKEE with Sylvain Tillon in 2012 as the technical director.
9/6/2018 • 18 minutes, 20 seconds
1138 Goldman almost sold us for $12m, thankfully it failed
I'm a life-long entrepreneur, and have been building software for over 20 years. I co-founded Shopper Approved In 2010. In 2016 we made the Inc. 500. In 2017 we made the Inc. 500 again, and we were also #7 on the Utah 100 list - all with no outside funding or investors.
9/5/2018 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
1137 David Skok Matrix Partners on Hubspot Pricing Axis, Category Leaders, $100b Softbank Fund
9/4/2018 • 29 minutes, 30 seconds
1136 Outreach.io CEO: "We'll hit $10m/quarter in 2018" with focus on ARPU expansion
CEO of Outreach, the #1 Sales Engagement Platform. Previously led GroupTalent, Microsoft's Windows phone Business Development team in Latin America and Canada. Prior to that, engineered Amazon's compensation system for Amazon Associates (the web's largest and most successful affiliates business) and Web-Services which accounts for 15% of A's traffic. MBA from Harvard Business School, MS in Computer Science from University of Pennsylvania.
9/3/2018 • 27 minutes, 53 seconds
1135 This app lets you use real money to compete with your friends in crypto, stocks
I describe myself as a recovering investment banker. I run a startup that is helping people invest together with those they know and trust. While I have devoted time across several sectors, the common threads are financial services and capital markets. I have extensive experience in the formation, structuring and financing of public and private companies. Transactions across international capital markets have provided me with considerable insight into valuation, positioning and strategy. I leverage this to contribute to the development and growth of successful businesses.
9/2/2018 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
1134 Ad Network Pivots to On Demand Video Generation
Loren has spent the last 18 years involved in building consumer-facing applications, monetizing page views and working with publishers. He brings extensive start-up experience and leadership to his role as CEO of Answer Media. Previously, Loren was part of the management team at iModules Software, a start-up technology provider that sold to private equity and later with Litmus Media, an online search advertising start-up that was acquired by Inuvo (AMEX:INUV).
9/1/2018 • 15 minutes, 52 seconds
1133 How to slowly quit corporate, code your platform and land your first customer
I am an entrepreneur at heart. I love creating things and finding new and innovative ways to improve the quality of our lives, the way we run our businesses, and to make our world a more efficient place. My background is in Genetic Biology clearly I have take a few twists and turn in life, but I love meet new people, learning about what they are working on and discussing new ideas.
8/31/2018 • 13 minutes, 38 seconds
1132 How He Plans to Take on Moz, SEMRush, with 1500 customers, $180k MRR
Vaibhav Kakkar Co-Founded RankWatch, with an idea of making internet marketing an intelligent process. Apart from helping businesses succeed online and writing about Internet Marketing, he's usually found digging deep into the beautiful world of search engine algorithms.
8/30/2018 • 18 minutes, 43 seconds
1131 We do $70m Annually in Buyer Data Space, 50% Gross Margin
Jay Habegger is the co-founder and CEO of ownerIQ. Jay is a pioneer in digital media and advertising having over 20 years experience. He has built The Q from it's humble beginnings to leading the industry in second party data and as the leading programmatic solution for digital advertisers, retailers and brands. Previously, Jay was the CEO and president of Bitpipe, leading the company through to its sale to TechTarget in 2004 in a $40 million transaction.
8/29/2018 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
1130 "We're way cheaper than Mailchimp", is that enough?
Brick and mortar engineer living in the body of a tech company CEO. Banking technology in the past (Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan), Marketing technology in the present. A Londoner at heart. Using technology to cook beautiful dishes.
8/28/2018 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
1129 He Bought $70m Of ARR w/ Other Peoples Money, Kept 60%+ Equity for Common
H. John Oechsle joined small business CRM software provider Swiftpage in July 2012 and currently serves as chief executive officer. John came to Swiftpage (www.act.com) with a 30 year track record of building highly profitable and sustainable revenue growth for emerging companies and established global leaders. John is an advocate for entrepreneurship and small business growth.
8/27/2018 • 28 minutes, 16 seconds
1128 New CEO with New Funding Grows SalesScout from $35k to $260k MRR
After co-founding a large retail chain in Chicago in the late 70's, Chris was persuaded by one of his mentors to get into the data, predictive analytics and marketing technology space. 35 years later, Chris has developed a reputation as a thought leader and pioneer in his industry. He's launched a number of successful startups, and he's run large corporate divisions at public companies including Equifax, Experian, MDC-Partners, and EDS/Neodata.
8/26/2018 • 18 minutes, 21 seconds
1127 Why don't you sell SaaS Biz to Double Down on Agency?
Andy Beal is The Original Online Reputation Expert. The CEO of Reputation Refinery and Trackur, Beal is an online reputation management consultant, award-winning blogger, professional speaker, and coauthor of the critically acclaimed book Radically Transparent: Monitoring & Managing Reputations Online. His latest book, Repped: 30 Days to a Better Online Reputation is an Amazon bestseller!
8/25/2018 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
1126 How Gong Hit $1m+ in ARR in 1st Year
Amit Bendov is the co-founder and CEO of Gong.io, the # 1 conversation intelligence platform for sales. He brings more than 20 years of leadership experience in hyper-growth enterprise software startups managing product, marketing, and sales for global corporations. Prior to founding Gong.io, Amit was CEO of SiSense and CMO of Panaya.
8/24/2018 • 27 minutes, 35 seconds
1125 He's Sold $5m+ Of Magical Pad w/ 1,014 Needles Athletes Use to Kill Pain
Founder and President of BioWave, Brad Siff invented the signal technology behind BioWave's non-opioid, FDA-cleared, pain relief medical devices, which are now in use by 90 pro sports teams and 32 VA Hospitals. Brad holds undergraduate and master's degrees in engineering, as well as an MBA, all from Cornell.
8/23/2018 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
1124 Why BrandWatch Acquired BuzzSumo, Past $50m ARR
Giles Palmer is the founder and CEO of Brandwatch, a leading social intelligence company. Formerly of BSkyB, Giles started Brandwatch and since its launch in August 2007, it has grown to become one of the world’s leading social media analytics and listening companies.
8/22/2018 • 25 minutes, 6 seconds
1123 Ecommerce Brands Pay Him $3m To Increase Average Cart Value 12%+
Robin is the CEO and co-founder of award-winning and quickly expanding startup Loop54. He holds a Master degree in Industrial engineering and management and has been into sales his whole career prior to Loop45. He currently lives in Stockholm, Sweden, together with the girlfriend and a judgmental dog.
8/21/2018 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
1122 Sales Tech CEO "We've Passed $30m in ARR", 70% yoy growth
Showpad is the second company Pieterjan has founded. In 2010 he co-founded the mobile development agency, In The Pocket and still serves on its board. Prior to In The Pocket, Pieterjan held senior roles at Netlog and Accenture and holds masters degrees in both Communication Sciences and International Business.
8/20/2018 • 21 minutes, 24 seconds
1121 Webinar King? "We grew 180% yoy Bootstrapped to $7.1m in ARR"
Omar Zenhom is the Co-founder and CEO of WebinarNinja, an all-inclusive, easy-to-use webinar platform that allows you to create a webinar in 10 seconds flat. He's also the the host of an iTunes Best of 2014 podcast, The $100 MBA Show. The $100 MBA Show has delivered 900+ lessons and counting to over 50,000 daily listeners.
8/19/2018 • 24 minutes, 27 seconds
1120 He Helped TED Community Connect, Now at $12m in ARR
introNetworks deployed the first social network for the 2003 TED Conference. Mark has successfully created hundreds of introNetwork Communities for global organizations to make a cultural change in how they connect with their audiences. As the co-founder of Wavefront in 1984, Mark helped develop Maya, the first commercial 3D animation system.
8/18/2018 • 10 minutes, 29 seconds
1119 "Channel partners gave us 200,000 customers, $40m ARR"
I'm an entrepreneur and co-founder of SoloSEO, the leading provider of DIY Website Marketing and SEO Tools. I live in Washington state and enjoy racing (triathlon, ironman, marathon, and spartan) and being adventurous with my 4 kids (hiking, backpacking, and camping).
8/17/2018 • 21 minutes, 58 seconds
1118 CEO: How I Bootstrapped to $3m in ARR
Tradable Bits helps music and sports brands know their fans and market smarter. Their fan data platform is built one purpose: to create the best possible fan experiences. Music festivals and sports teams trust them to collect, analyze and activate their fan data at scale - increasing ROI with automated personalization.
8/16/2018 • 16 minutes, 22 seconds
1117 $3m Agency to $20k MRR SaaS, Here's How
I'm the founder and CEO at FunnelEnvy a startup solving B2B website and marketing optimization challenges with a SaaS platform. Arun and his team have optimized websites for some of the largest brands in the world. An engineer and serial entrepreneur, Arun wants to transform the way marketers experiment.
8/15/2018 • 13 minutes, 45 seconds
1116 CEO: "We're definitely too cheap"
Mike Donnelly is the CEO & Founder of Seventh Sense, which is a system that optimizes the timing and frequency of email for sales and marketing professionals. The idea was conceived during Mike's 13 year career as an individual contributor and sales leader for emerging enterprise technology companies.
8/14/2018 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
1115 How Pendo CEO Uses War Chest to Acquire Companies, Integrate
Todd Olson is CEO and Co-Founder of Pendo, a product experience platform that helps product managers deliver successful products. Before Pendo, Todd served as VP of Products at Rally Software Development which he led through its public offering. Todd joined Rally via its acquisition of 6th Sense, a company he founded and served as President and CTO.
8/13/2018 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
1114 Personalized Video Adtech Company Hits $60m TTM Revenues
Founder, CEO of Eyeview. Pioneer in video creative and advertising technology. Recognized leader, published in WSJ, Forbes more. Eyeview ranked 9th growing company in America. Oren hold degrees in Computer Science and Film, played professional basketball, runs Triathlons, performs stand-up in NYC served Israeli’s special forces
8/12/2018 • 19 minutes, 40 seconds
1113 His Vegas Raceway Grossed $10m in Y1, Here's How
Aaron is successful entrepreneur who has founded, built and sold multiple successful organizations. In 2012, Aaron was awarded the "Entrepreneur Startup Award of the Year"​ by the Entrepreneur's Organization. Fessler is the founder and CEO of SPEEDVEGAS, a 100 acre exotic car driving experience in Las Vegas. Prior to founding SPEEDVEGAS, Aaron created MediaSentry, which became the largest provider of anti-piracy services for the motion picture and recording industries. Major clients were Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers, Fox, Disney, and MGM. The company was acquired by Safenet (NASDAQ: SFNT) in 2005 in a $20 million cash and stock transaction. Previously, Aaron founded The Allegro Group, which grew to become the largest provider of email services in the United States. The platform managed corporate messaging for Ford Motor Company, Mercedes Benz, Continental Airlines, and eight of the ten largest law firms in the United States. Allegro was acquired by Mail.com (NASDAQ: MAIL) in 1999 in a $40 million cash and stock transaction.
8/11/2018 • 18 minutes, 1 second
1112 150 Pay Him $3m For Content Marketing at Scale
Joe Griffin is the CEO of ClearVoice, a content marketing platform and talent network that he co-founded in 2013. He has served in executive roles at Web.com and iCrossing, and has founded multiple companies. Joe has employed more than 500 SEO, social media, and content marketing experts over his career, and actively speaks and writes for major media outlets.
8/10/2018 • 22 minutes, 13 seconds
1111 How She Cut Customer Base in Half, But Still Grew 100% YoY
Stacy Chapman is the CEO and co-founder of SwoopTalent. Stacy has been in the talent systems industry for decades, as a vendor, practitioner and implementer. In all those situations, talent data has been a huge challenge, and every year data gets more important – so, her current company solves that.
8/9/2018 • 13 minutes, 6 seconds
1110 Why His $1.2m ARR SaaS Company Shut Down
Hank is an internet marketer who has built both B2B and B2C companies. He grew his marketing service Vytmn to $105k/mo in revenue in a little over a year's time, only to be killed by changes to Twitter's platform. His next company – growth agency Execute.LA - was acquired by Hawke Media January 2018. Hank is now VP Business Development at CoinCircle, a SaaS platform for ICOs and token sales.
8/8/2018 • 21 minutes, 14 seconds
1109 Latin America Content Marketing SaaS Company Breaks $12m in ARR
Diego Gomes is the co founder of Rock Content, the leading content marketing platform in latin america. On my spare time I like to blog about SaaS at http://saasholic.com, support founders and do some small angel investments in SaaS I also co authored the Brazil SaaS Landscape Research and the Brazil Startup report.
8/7/2018 • 13 minutes, 31 seconds
1108 Minneapolis Sales Tech: "We're past $30m in ARR, will raise this year"
Orrin is a serial entrepreneur passionate about applying technology to helping salespeople be more successful and engaged with their customers. His current role leading Modus, a B2B sales enablement company, builds on his professional history in sales leadership, learning, and recruiting software. He describes himself as collaborative, focused, and driven.
8/6/2018 • 20 minutes
1107 Activision Blizzard CEO: ICO's are Just Like Selling Digital Swords in Mortal Combat!
Howard Marks is the co-founder and CEO at StartEngine Crowdfunding/Capital, the leader in Initial Coin Offerings and Online Public Offerings. Marks founded StartEngine with the mission to help entrepreneurs achieve their dreams. Marks was the founder and CEO of Acclaim Games, a publisher of online games now part of The Walt Disney Company. Before Acclaim, Marks was the co-founder of Activision Blizzard and Chairman of Activision Studios from 1991 until 1997. As co-founder, former Board Member, and Executive Vice-President of video game giant Activision, he and a partner took control in 1991 and turned the ailing company into the $50B market cap video game industry leader. As a games industry expert, Marks built one of the largest and most successful games studios in the industry selling millions of games. Marks is also named one of the 500 most influential people in Los Angeles by the Los Angeles Business Journal. Marks is a member of Mayor Eric Garcetti's technology council. Marks has a Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering from the University of Michigan. He is bilingual and is a triple national of the U.S., United Kingdom, and France.
8/5/2018 • 20 minutes, 59 seconds
1106 Fotoware CEO: We've moved 20% of our revenue from on prem to cloud
Before joining FotoWare, Anne Gretland held the position as COO in Compello group. Gretland spent 17 years in Microsoft, and held several leadership positions in Microsoft Norway and Western Europe HQ. She is one of the founders of ODA, the largest network for women in tech in the Nordics (8000 members). She is educated in USA and Norway, in communications, marketing and leadership. In 2017 she was named one of Norway's 50 leading IT women. Blog: www.annegretland.com
8/4/2018 • 21 minutes, 44 seconds
1105 Should you develop every customer request?
Amit Kothari (CEO) spent a decade in London, at the cutting edge of collaboration technologies for the enterprise. His clients were the worlds' largest companies, law firms and government entities. After seeing the problems with emerging chat tools, he realised that the disruption of this industry depended on combining unstructured chat with structured processe. Processes help every business scale their operations and chatting on Slack or project management is not the same as process management. The result of all this was Tallyfy, which has raised $1.3m to date from top investors in Silicon Valley and elsewhere – including 500 Startups and Alchemist Accelerator.
8/3/2018 • 21 minutes, 22 seconds
1104 $3m+ Adtech CEO on Threats from Cypto, Ad Management going in House
Before joining plista, Gagnon worked for PwC both in Canada and Germany. In his last role he served as Manager Strategy Consulting in Berlin advising tech companies on their international expansion. He also acted as a Member of the Executive Committee of the Canada China Business Council and brings many years of experience in various strategy and international business development roles at Bombardier Inc.
8/2/2018 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
1103 When should he quit his agency and go all in on software?
Stefan is co-founder of Userbrain and Simplease, and he started working with his other three co-founders, Andreas, Markus and Mathias, back in 2009 when they were still studying information design in Graz, Austria. Stefan teaches user experience, usability and design to students and clients and gives talks on these topics.
8/1/2018 • 22 minutes, 21 seconds
1102 WebHose CEO on understanding unstructured data, passes $2.3m in ARR
Ran Geva is a serial entrepreneur with over two decades of hands-on experience in software development and leadership positions. After founding Omgili, a search engine for online discussions, and co-founding Buzzilla, one of the top web monitoring and analysis companies in Israel, he went on to co-found Webhose.io - a leading global provider of structured web data, where he serves as CEO and lead technologist.
7/31/2018 • 18 minutes, 20 seconds
1101 Bloomreach CEO: We've turned down acquisition offers in $400m range
Raj brought 10 years of enterprise and entrepreneurial experience with him when he co-founded BloomReach. Before launching the company, he was entrepreneur-in-residence at Mohr-Davidow Ventures. Prior to that, Raj served as Cisco's director of product marketing and was on the founding team of telecom company FirstMark/LambdaNet, which grew to $80 million in run-rate revenue. Raj also worked in technology investment banking at Lazard Freres. He holds a bachelor of science in electrical engineering from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. His thoughts on navigating the challenges of high-growth startups can be found on his blog at DeDatta.com.
7/30/2018 • 17 minutes, 44 seconds
1100 Why aren't more private equity firms paying him $12k/seat?
Greg Silverman, is CEO of Concentric, a software company that licenses Concentric Market, a simulator that improves your planning processes and forecasting capabilities. Previously, he was Global Managing Director, Analytics and Valuation, for Interbrand. He is author of Turning Complexity into Strategic Advantage and the Interbrand Top 100 Brands Report.
7/29/2018 • 18 minutes
1099 Salt Lake Event Management Company Breaks $4m in ARR, 30,000 Paid Events
Kreg is committed to creating extraordinary experiences. He is best known for founding SpinGo, a robust event platform powering 5,500 entertainment apps and delivering live event content for more than 7 million events nationwide. SpinGo is dedicated to providing integrated solutions for its 350,000+ registered event makers, enabling them to efficiently list, promote, and optimize their events. SpinGo was named Internet Company of the Year, Tech Startup of the Year, and Fastest Growing Tech Company of the Year. In April 2017, he founded Aktify, a customer acquisition engine that qualifies and reactivates prospects through goodwill experience marketing.
7/28/2018 • 16 minutes, 24 seconds
1098 Website Redirect Service Launches, Hits $15k MRR Thanks to "Great Partners" Like Hubspot
William Richards is a serial entrepreneur with extensive experience in large enterprise systems design and development. A software architect by trade, William has been building web based technology since the late 90s and has held senior technology positions in companies ranging from startups to agencies to global enterprises.
7/27/2018 • 14 minutes, 47 seconds
1097 CMS CEO: How to Move 1 Time License Model doing $1.5m Annually to SaaS
Brandon is the head honcho at Craft CMS, the word's least worst content management system. He lives in outdoorsy Bend, Oregon despite his preference to be hunched over a computer, and he'd rather not learn the definition of of a millennial out of fear that he is one.
7/26/2018 • 19 minutes, 51 seconds
1096 How TapClicks is Managaing 60% yoy Growth in Marketing Dashboard Space
With over 20 years as a senior executive at Fortune 500, Silicon Valley tech companies specializing in software, hardware, internet and mobile apps, Babak has grown businesses from millions to billions in revenue. He is an alumnus of Harvard Business School, Stanford Management and Entrepreneurship program, and holds a BSEE/CS from SJSU.
7/25/2018 • 23 minutes, 50 seconds
1095 His First Move at Zenefits? 450 Laid Off. Now Eyeing Profitability and $100m in ARR
Jay is Chairman & CEO at Zenefits. He brings more than 20 years of experience in leading both public and private technology companies. Previously, Jay served as CEO of Ooyala, and Agile Software. Before that, Jay was a senior executive at both PeopleSoft and SAP. Jay is a member of the Global Leadership Council at the Lucas Graduate School and College of Business at San Jose State University.
7/24/2018 • 24 minutes, 53 seconds
1094 How he bought 15 people off cap table, hit $9m in ARR in workflow space
Brian Reale is a serial entrepreneur. Prior to founding ProcessMaker Brian founded and later sold Unete Telecom, a long distance voice and data carrier in South America. Brian graduated from Duke University in 1993 and was a Fulbright scholar in linguistics in Ecuador 1994.
7/23/2018 • 19 minutes, 35 seconds
1093 If you're under 30, is agency/coaching a good way to make money?
Being one of Forbes' & Influencive.com's Top 30 Entrepreneurs Under 30, Jeremy C. Adams is not timid to climb the ladder of ultimate success. Armed with an impressive background in sales & digital marketing, at 22 years old, Jeremy went on to become the founder of Prestige Food Trucks, along with launching many other successful businesses including one with Kevin Harrington, a past investor from Shark Tank. Today Jeremy is focused on an exciting new venture with his close friend, Maxwell Finn, called Unicorn IQ.
7/22/2018 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
1092 Why Chef Creator Raised $30m to Replace Walkie Talkies
7/21/2018 • 32 minutes, 28 seconds
1091 Founded in 1999, How He's Managed a 20+ Year "Overnight Success"
A serial entrepreneur, CEO and public company senior executive with 20 years of experience inInternet technology, VoIP, online marketing, eCommerce and mobile applications.
7/20/2018 • 18 minutes, 25 seconds
1090 CEO Eating Own Dog Food for $25m Revenue, $5.5m Gross Profit, $3m Net
Chris Ingham Brooke is the founder and CEO of Pub Ocean, a venture-backed technology company that helps digital publishing become profitable. Our mission is to provide publishers with the toolkit to automate and simplify audience development and ad operations, ultimately creating better content and building more sustainable companies.
7/19/2018 • 23 minutes, 5 seconds
1089 Workato CEO: "We're Enterprise Version" of Zapier, Segment, Elastoic
Vijay has led the creation of market leading integration technologies for over 25 years. Prior to Workato, he was the CEO of Qik, a consumer video communications company acquired by Skype. Before Qik, he helped create two multi-billion dollar integration products. He was part of the team that created world's first middleware platform, TIB (The Information Bus) at Teknekron Software Systems, which was acquired by Reuters Plc, in 1994. He was also on the founding team and SVP, Engineering of TIBCO through its IPO. As Chief Strategy Officer, he then helped launch Oracle's Fusion Middleware platform in 2005.
7/18/2018 • 26 minutes, 55 seconds
1088 How Ex-Salesforce Leader Launched Video for Salespeople Growing 100% YoY
Sati is a seasoned entrepreneur who loves building product, growing people and delivering customer value. He has both enterprise and start-up experience that enables him to transform an idea into a scalable company. He founded Zenkraft (the leading shipping platform for Salesforce), Eversauce (CRM for PR industry) and most recently OneMob, which has earned the support of Salesforce Ventures and was awarded Gartner Cool Vendor and Aragon Hot Vendor. OneMob makes video recording, sending and tracking easy for any professional, with powerful integrations into platforms like Salesforce, Cisco Spark, LinkedIn and more. Before starting OneMob, Sati spent 8 years at salesforce.com, where he built and grew the AppExchange from an idea to 2000 apps.
7/17/2018 • 21 minutes, 7 seconds
1087 Yeah I'd sell (Live negotiation)
Designer and entrepreneur who loves solving problems using technology.
7/16/2018 • 15 minutes, 26 seconds
1086 Sales outreach tool hits $1.2m ARR, would you sell for $4m? No!
Jake Atwood is the Founder & CEO of BuzzBuilder. He's also an author and keynote speaker who is focused on helping companies discover new ways to attract customers and grow their business. He enjoys disrupting the status quo and his ebooks and blogs have been read by more than 500,000 people worldwide.
7/15/2018 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
1085 We're #1 In Salesforce for Call Routing, Tech with $10m+ in ARR
Joshua Tillman began building DialSource in 2005, while studying at the University of California, Davis, to seal the gap between business and consumers through analytics and automation. The engineering firm has since changed the way modern enterprises communicate, earning Product of the Year honors in 2016 and 2017. Tillman received the Sacramento Business Journal '40 Under 40' award in 2016.
7/14/2018 • 22 minutes, 46 seconds
1084 Bulgarian company spends $45k of $65k MRR on paid spend, working!
Murry founded Metrilo in 2014 to help eCommerce store owners grow their businesses. Other than spending lots of time with his customers and his team, he love to do trail running in the beautiful Vitosha mountain.
7/13/2018 • 12 minutes, 56 seconds
1083 How she 2x ARR yoy in mobile testing space to $6m in ARR
I'm the CEO of Apptimize! We're probably installed on your phone right now because we work with top 10 apps in every category in 100+ countries. Prior to co-founding Apptimize, I led the Fixed Income Quantitative Strategies team at GETCO after studying Math with CS at MIT.
7/12/2018 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
1082 Why Public Sizmek Went Private to Fuel Growth via M&A in Buy Side Programmatic Space
Mark Grether is CEO of Sizmek. He focuses on guiding the company, and accelerating the growth of the business. Before Sizmek, Mark was cofounder and global COO of Xaxis. Under his leadership, Xaxis grew into the world's largest programmatic media company, with over $1 billion in revenue in five years.
7/11/2018 • 21 minutes, 30 seconds
1081 With $2m in ARR and $16m Valuation for 7+ Years, Do You Feel Stuck?
Eric Frankel is an innovative business leader with a proven track record in both traditional media and new-and-emerging technologies. He is the CEO and founder of AdGreetz, the industry's leading SaaS video personalization platform that is disrupting the $560b advertising marketplace by empowering brands worldwide to build stronger relationships with customers and exponentially increase engagement, activation and revenue by deploying billions of never-before-available, hyper-relevant, one-to-one, personalized video and display ads and messages, utilizing brand, social, third-party, geo/browser, publisher and user-generated data, delivered on the Internet and mobile via 18 channels. Prior to AdGreetz, spent 20-plus years at Warner Bros., most recently serving as President of Warner Bros. Domestic Cable Distribution (2000-2008). There he created new strategic architecture in the broadcast, cable and pay-TV landscapes, as well as advancements in new technologies including: VOD, HD and the internet. Frankel made numerous record-breaking sales and ground-breaking deals at WB.
7/10/2018 • 24 minutes, 25 seconds
1080 15,000 Customers at $35 ARPU is $500k+ in MRR right? "No"
7/9/2018 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
1079 How He's Pivoted 3 Times Since 1996, Moving to Cloud Based SaaS w/ $10m in ARR
CEO & Co-Founder of CoreMedia. Recipient of the German Fairness Prize 2009. Co-Editor of eEnterprise 2.0 - The Art of Letting Go. Married, father of 4
7/8/2018 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
1078 How agile content marketing solution Turtl hit $125k/mo
7/7/2018 • 15 minutes, 59 seconds
1077 We Bootstrapped Our Way to $2m in ARR, Now $10m ARR
Collin Holmes, founder and CEO, started chatmeter in August, 2009. Prior to chatmeter, Mr. Holmes was VP of Product Management and Marketing at V-Enable (now xAD). His extensive experience in the local search industry, both online and mobile, provides a solid foundation for the direction of the company. He has worked in leadership roles at several other startup companies and held other notable positions in product and marketing roles at Akamai Technologies and AT&T Wireless. He earned his MBA from San Diego State University and a BA from UC Riverside.
7/6/2018 • 16 minutes, 46 seconds
1076 We pivoted to pure play SaaS, now $1m in ARR growing 100% yoy
I'm CEO of SocialRep, providing social sales enablement to global brands since 2008. I ran a digital marketing agency in SF during the dotcom boom, then ran the CMO Council. I’ve been a columnist for BusinessWeek and guest lecturer at Thunderbird. I’m a coach for the California champion Drake Mountain Biking Team.
7/5/2018 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
1075 LogicBay CEO: Love Venture Debt! Helped us pass $10m in ARR
As CEO of LogicBay, John works with leading companies to develop and implement strategies for scaling indirect sales channels using a combination of services and technology that LogicBay offers. He is also the co-founder of VetToCEO, a non-profit focused on helping veterans transition into being entrepreneurs.
7/4/2018 • 13 minutes, 43 seconds
1074 I left Wall Street trenches to do Email Business Intelligence
Michael Johnston is founder of Notablist.com, a competitive intelligence platform for email marketers. Prior to Notablist, Michael was VP of Technology at Critical Mention, where he led development of the firm's broadcast monitoring platform. Prior to his involvement with startups, Michael spent a decade in the Wall Street trenches.
7/3/2018 • 17 minutes, 26 seconds
1073 Are 5 Companies at Once Too Many?
Dr. Foroutan is a parallel entrepreneur and philanthropist with over 30 years of experience in Information Technology, Software Design and Entertainment industries. He is the Founder, Chairman and CEO of Contest Factory, Classitech, ZipTech Media, Virtual NGO and Invitation Records. He holds multiple US patents on Online Contest Systems.
7/2/2018 • 16 minutes, 43 seconds
1072 Boston CEO: "I'd think hard about selling for 2-3x ARR"
Matt Benati is CEO and Co-founder of LeadGnome, the market-leading Reply Email Mining web service that generates account-specific contacts, enhances existing leads, and identifies sales trigger events. Matt believes sales and marketing alignment, transparency, and communication optimize revenue generation, and he champions this philosophy in his teams and writings.
7/1/2018 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
1071 His AI Tool Tells You How To Price Realtime
Adam is the CEO/founder of Arjuna Solutions, an artificial intelligence company. He invented and patented numerous AI technologies used today. At Arjuna, Adam is productizing specific applications of AI, starting with pricing. Adam is also a professor of Business Analytics at Johns Hopkins University and speaker on AI/predictive analytics for businesses.
6/30/2018 • 15 minutes, 47 seconds
1070 Navy Vet Makes Loads Via Lifetime Fitness, Now Digital Asset Management
Mike is the founder, Chief Enthusiasm Officer and inventor of the patented FISION digital asset management/ sales enablement platform. He attributes his experience serving as a US Navy Submariner and US Navy diver as the foundation to his success as a corporate executive and entrepreneur.
6/29/2018 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
1069 Elastic CEO: We're A More Professional Zapier
Co-Founder and CEO of elastic.io
6/28/2018 • 15 minutes, 52 seconds
1068 SiteCake: We Rely on Whitelabel Partners With Unique Kickback Structure
I am an entrepreneur coming from the design and advertising background. I've build Sitecake, a WordPress for static websites. Blockchain enthusiast.
6/27/2018 • 17 minutes, 17 seconds
1067 Vero CEO: "We're API Driven Email Marketing" with $150k+ in MRR
Co-founder and CEO of Vero. We help companies collect and organise data so they can create better customer experiences and happier customers through email. We're five years old and help hundreds of customers send 100s of millions of emails every month.
6/26/2018 • 20 minutes, 1 second
1066 Optimove CEO: "Conditions Were Right To Stop Bootstrapping w/ $20m Raise"
Pini Yakuel is founder and CEO of Optimove, provider of the science-first Relationship Marketing Hub. Pini's extensive experience in analytics-driven customer marketing, business consulting and sales, along with his innovative approaches to entrepreneurship, business-building and marketing, have earned him recognition as a thought leader.
6/25/2018 • 21 minutes, 51 seconds
1065 He should sell for $300k. You agree?
I've started as telecommunication engineer and switched to analytics quite fast. We were analyzing mobile network throughput, daily load, and other technical parameters. In 2007 I've started Fidelity Media as the advertising network. My team was busy with websites representation and ad operations mostly so when RTB appeared that was quite logical that we've continued as Supply Side Platform (SSP).
6/24/2018 • 13 minutes, 2 seconds
1064 AirPR Says "Growing Fast" but won't share revenue #'s, are they?
Sharam Fouladgar-Mercer is the Co-founder and CEO of AirPR, a technology solution to measure the impact of PR. He was an Entrepreneur in Residence at Shasta Ventures focused on consumer internet and the social graph. Prior to joining Shasta, Sharam was a Senior Associate at Sierra Ventures focused on consumer internet, enterprise software (cloud computing / virtualization), and mobile. He served on the Board at Makara (sold to RedHat) and TouchCommerce (sold to Nuance). Sharam began his career as a technologist at Appian, a BPM software startup where he managed the first enterprise-wide tracking system for the Department of Homeland Security. Sharam has lectured at universities, events and conferences, and judged business plan competitions at Princeton, Harvard, Stanford, and Syracuse. He is also an advisor and mentor to eLab (Princeton University's Accelerator), Dorm Room Fund (First Round Capital's Accelerator), and Acceleprise (Enterprise Technology Accelerator). Sharam graduated with honors with a BS in Computer Science from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He played NCAA D 1 ice hockey and is fluent in Farsi. Follow him on twitter @sharamfm.
6/23/2018 • 18 minutes, 29 seconds
1063 How We Spent $7m To Spin Crunchbase Out of AOL
Santi is a General Partner at Emergence Capital. Prior to joining Emergence, Santi founded, AXG Tecnonexo, a SaaS e-learning company in Latin America. He expanded the company to 150+ employees with operations across Latin America and the US. Santi is also a founding board member of Puente Labs, an organization that finds and selects the best founders of high potential growth companies from Latin America and helps them scale their businesses globally. Santi currently serves on the Boards of Civitas Learning, CrunchBase, High Alpha, Quasar, Restorando, Tophat, Xapo and Zoom. Santi received an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School and holds a BS in Economics from St. Andrew's University in Argentina. He is Kauffman Fellow and an Endeavor Entrepreneur. Outside of work Santi is passionate about traveling internationally. He spent 6 months backpacking around the world and continues to work on a personal goal of visiting at least 50% of the world countries. He is an avid opera and classical music follower and, like almost every Argentine, he is passionate about soccer.
6/22/2018 • 20 minutes, 6 seconds
1062 I raised $5m to spin the company out of corporate
David brings a successful track record of executive leadership at growing both private and public venture-backed companies and has been a pioneer in online marketing since 1997. Before TruSignal, David joined eBureau in December 2007, spearheading strategic business and product development efforts. In his previous role as general manager and SVP, marketing analytics at Adteractive, David managed a team of 45 people, spanning all of Adteractive's business units. Under his leadership, Adteractive became one of the fastest growing private companies in America and a leader in online lead generation. Prior to Adteractive, David held executive roles at Drugstore.com and NextCard, Inc, where he was responsible for product management and customer acquisition. David began his career as a software engineer at Decision Systems, a research and development firm focused on voice telephony solutions for the health care industry. David earned a Bachelor of Science in symbolic systems from Stanford University in 1990 and a Master of Business Administration from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley.
6/21/2018 • 19 minutes, 12 seconds
1061 We serve 2b impressions a day including MSN homepage
Eric is the CEO and co-founder of TripleLift, the leading programmatic native ad platform. Previously, Eric was a leader at AppNexus and an attorney at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP. Eric received bachelors and masters degrees in computer science from MIT and a J.D. from New York University School of Law.
6/20/2018 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
1060 Why I Left Salesforce To Join VC Firm
Scott brings over 20 years of deep product management, engineering, and SaaS expertise to his role as a partner on Norwest enterprise team. Scott most recently served as Senior Vice President of Product Management for Salesforce Service Cloud. While at Salesforce, he also served as Head of Engineering, Product, UX, and Documentation for Desk.com.
6/19/2018 • 27 minutes, 21 seconds
1059 $100m In Audio Ad Spend Goes Through Our Platform
Mike Dougherty is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Jelli, the technology platform for the $40 billion global audio advertising market. He has 20 years of experience with online and mobile services and corporate development. Under his leadership, Jelli has developed a cloud platform that transforms audio advertising, enabling advertisers and publishers to buy and sell audio advertising programmatically through a suite of demand-side and supply-side services. Jelli's platform is used by some of the largest broadcasters and advertisers in the audio marketplace, reaching hundreds of millions of people monthly and serving billions of audio ads. Prior to Jelli, Dougherty was Vice President, Business Development at Tellme, a leader in speech recognition applications (acquired by Microsoft), and Senior Vice President of Business & Corporate Development at Loudeye, an early leader in online & mobile music web services (acquired by Nokia).
6/18/2018 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
1058 How Screen 6 his $3.5m in ARR on $600k Raised
As founder / partner of Screen, David has been closely involved in the development and innovation regarding the latest technologies for online marketing and advertising.
6/17/2018 • 14 minutes, 40 seconds
1057 Talend CEO: "IPO was right move"
Prior to joining Talend as CEO, Mike was the CEO of Rapid7, a security software startup that provides one of the leading security assessment platforms. Mike joined Rapid7 in 2008 and grew the company by 10x in the next 4.5 years. Rapid7 was consistently one of the fastest growing companies in Boston, and was recognized as the Best Place to Work by the Boston Business Journal. Prior to Rapid7, Mike was General Manager of Microsoft's SQL Server Marketing team. During Mike's tenure the SQL business grew from $1.5B to $2.5B, and was the fastest growing of Microsoft’s largest businesses. Prior to re-joining Microsoft in September 2003, Mike was General Manager of Polycom's Austin division, a $190mm videoconferencing equipment business. Prior to Polycom, Mike co-founded and was Chief Operating Officer of Paramark, a marketing analytics startup. Prior to co-founding Paramark, Mike spent six years at Microsoft in an expanding range of roles including product marketing, product strategy, and product management. Mike joined Microsoft as a member of the MSN team, and became an early evangelist of the internet and MSN's first internet marketing manager. He spent the last two years as Group Program Manager of Exchange Server, driving Microsoft's email strategy, product definition, and product execution for this $700mm business. During Mike's tenure, Microsoft category market share grew from 40% to over 60%. Mike began his career at Sun Microsystems, working as an engineer on Sun's SPARC workstations. He led the design of an integrated I/O chip, one of two chips that were used across Sun's low-end and midrange systems. Mike holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Brown University (magna cum laude), a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, and a Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School where he was a Baker Scholar.
6/16/2018 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
1056 DataStax CEO: "We're growing 40% yoy with 110% net revenue expansion"
Billy is responsible for the strategy, growth, and day-to-day operations of DataStax. He has 20 years of experience in the database industry in roles ranging from DBA to senior executive. Prior to DataStax, Billy spent 6 years at Quest Software, a provider of systems management software, where his most recent role was VP and GM of the database business unit. Under his leadership, the industry-leading Quest database business grew from supporting traditional relational databases to a portfolio that now includes tools for cloud, NoSQL, columnar, and Hadoop databases, as well as business intelligence offerings. Prior to Quest, Billy led product teams for Embarcadero Technologies' database productivity solutions. He serves as a director of Tableau Software (NYSE: DATA). Billy holds a bachelor of science in computer science from the University of Louisville.
6/15/2018 • 24 minutes, 43 seconds
1055 Utah CEO: We've Doubled YoY to $10m in ARR
Rob Nelson is the Founder, and CEO of Grow (grow.com), a cloud-based analytics software company for small-to-medium size businesses. Grow helps companies accelerate their growth by accessing all their data and measuring their business results in real-time. Rob is an entrepreneur at heart and a technology enthusiast. Rob's previous company Logica was acquired by AFS in 2012. Rob holds a BS in Business Management from Utah Valley University. He is married with 5 kids and lives in Orem, Utah.
6/14/2018 • 15 minutes, 21 seconds
1054 We Cut Our Customer Base In Half But Grew Revenue to $30m
Raj Co-Founded Localytics in 2009, and as CEO until 2017 created the leading mobile engagement platform that is used by many of the world's top brands. Prior to Localytics, Raj spent 12 years building a variety of technology companies. He was a management consultant focused on mobile with Bain & Company and Adventis. At Adventis, Raj worked alongside Steve Jobs at Apple to develop the business framework for the iPhone and led the formation of the multi-billion dollar Disney Mobile venture in Japan. Previously, Raj held sales and marketing leadership positions at Proco Machinery and Requisite Technology. Raj completed his MBA with Honors from the Ivey School of Business and London Business School.
6/13/2018 • 17 minutes, 50 seconds
1053 Me: Did You Sell To Vista for $250m? CEO:"Your math astute"
As the co-founder & CEO of InfoScout, Jared leads a start-up that is fundamentally changing the way brands understand and engage consumers in the 21st century. Previously, Jared led research, product & services for Retail Solutions where he shaped how 500+ CPG companies leverage POS data to improve sales and execution at retail. During his tenure, the company was recognized by AMR. Jared’s storied past includes a few hacks at MIT, co-founding the Pat Tillman Foundation, throwing the javelin & playing Australian Rules Football.
6/12/2018 • 22 minutes, 49 seconds
1052 You're doing $9m in ARR, why write a book decoding creativity?
ALLEN GANNETT is the founder and CEO of TrackMaven, a marketing analytics platform whose clients have included Microsoft, Marriott, Saks Fifth Avenue, and GE. He has an upcoming book The Creative Curve, on how anyone can achieve moments of creative genius, coming out June 12, 2018 from Penguin Random House.
6/11/2018 • 21 minutes, 45 seconds
1051 CEO: "We Went from $35k in MRR to $350k in 12 months"
Software engineer, VC Associate at OpenView Venture Partners, Director Sales & Marketing at InfiniDB, Co-founder & CEO at MarketMuse
6/10/2018 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
1050 3+ Years to Hit $20k in MRR, Sell and Get Out!
Stefan is the only known startup founder to have been successfully sued by David Hasselhoff. His current company pr.co automates and fixes PR for global brands and their agencies. Currently serving 280 companies with content management tools and research automation across geographies, media channels, and company functions.
6/9/2018 • 17 minutes, 51 seconds
1049 We're Bootstrapped And Doubling Revenue YoY, Past $8m ARR
Patrick Campbell is the CEO of ProfitWell, the software for helping subscription companies with their monetization and retention strategies. ProfitWell also provides free, absolutely accurate subscription financial metrics for over eight thousand companies. Prior to Price Intelligently Patrick lead Strategic Initiatives for Boston based Gemvara and was an Economist at Google and the US Intelligence community.
6/8/2018 • 25 minutes, 3 seconds
1048 How Zendesk Figures Out Pricing and Product Strategy
Mr. Price is Senior Vice President of Zendesk's Product Portfolio. Prior to this role he served as Senior Vice President of Marketing and as Vice President and General Manager, Europe, Middle East and Africa. Before joining Zendesk, he served as the Chief Marketing Officer of Troux Technologies, Inc.
6/7/2018 • 23 minutes, 50 seconds
1047 Rokt CEO: Why We Acquired CalReply for $15m on $1-2m in ARR
As an early entrepreneur, Bruce founded his first business at age 16. He was a leader in the consumer practice at Boston Consulting Group and then built Jetstar into the largest low cost airline in Asia with 7,000+ employees. After Jetstar, Bruce revisited his roots and created another world-class company, ROKT. He expanded ROKT from a handful of employees working in Sydney in 2012 to a global team of more than 100 across four continents. His global experience, entrepreneurial spirit, vision for growth, and passion for business exemplify his high standards as a CEO, as well as his determination to build innovative companies.
6/6/2018 • 22 minutes, 41 seconds
1046 She Controls WeWork TV Screens, Passes $4.8m ARR
Nanxi, named Forbes 30 Under 30, is founder and CEO of Enplug. She is also founder of Nanoly Bioscience, which develops polymers that eliminate refrigeration for vaccines. A UC Berkeley alum, Nanxi received an EMMY for producing the Amazon TV show, The Bay.
6/5/2018 • 20 minutes, 26 seconds
1045 Tech CEO: I Sold for $20m! Guess what he's doing now...
Formerly CEO & Co-founder of Geekatoo, scaled from idea to 7000 providers nationwide, sold for $20M in 2016. Now CEO & Co-Founder of Bestfoodtrucks.com. Also a musician who plays live EDM, @cinematronica on Instagram.
6/4/2018 • 20 minutes, 45 seconds
1044 How This Engineer Went From $0 to $44k/mo in Revenue
6/3/2018 • 16 minutes, 26 seconds
1043 HR Tech CEO: I accidently raised $3m!
Jobscience is the #1 provider of Staffing and Recruiting Software on the Salesforce platform, with more customers, awards, deployments, users and development investment. We invented recruitment on the Force.com platform so that recruiters could be more successful.
6/2/2018 • 20 minutes, 31 seconds
1042 "We're selling the company right now" for $10m+
Mike Lapchick co-founded The Chicago Catalog Group in 1996 which was acquired by Lake Capital/ Haggin Marketing (now Epsilon) in 2006. Encumbered by the daily expense of manually facilitating the exchange of product information between their retail and brand clients, Mike saw an opportunity to build an exchange platform that automated the process. He launched Shotfarm's Product Content Network in 2010 which enables rapid retail channel and product assortment expansion for more than 12,000 Brands and Retailers today.
6/1/2018 • 27 minutes, 36 seconds
1041 From Sake to $1m ARR SaaS
Marc Smookler has founded 6 companies 2 of which have been acquired and 3 of which are market leaders in their respective spaces the leading brick-and-mortar retail analytics company (IdealSpot.com), a leading online retailer (SakeSocial.com), and a cutting-edge marketing services platform (Written.com). Marc's companies have generated over $300M in lifetime revenues and sold over 150,000 products worldwide. His current focus, IdealSpot, matches brick-and-mortar businesses to their ideal locations by mapping local demand for their product or service. Marc is also a partner/mentor for Austin tech incubator/fund(s) Capital Factory and Techstars, and invests and serves as a board member/advisor for a number of companies in the B2SMB/B2C spaces.
5/31/2018 • 24 minutes, 33 seconds
1040 To Get Rich, Don't Need $1b Exit, She Has 4 Exits Across 10 Companies
Roz Lemieux is the Director of Blackbaud Labs. Blackbaud (BLKB) is the world's leading software company powering social good. Over 18+ years in campaign tech, Roz has served as the CEO of Attentive.ly (now a Blackbaud company), founding partner at Fission Strategy, and Executive Director of the New Organizing Institute (NOI).
5/30/2018 • 19 minutes, 54 seconds
1039 The Argument For Utility Based SaaS Pricing, $.85 Per Booked Hour, 18.4 Million Booked Hours
Greg Tanaka is CEO and Founder of Percolata. Percolata helps retailers optimize their retail sales teams giving retailers up to a 30% sales uplift using the same labor budget. They do this by using sensors data to schedule the right number and composition of salespeople to handle the forecasted shopper profiles using proprietary deep learning technology. Percolata has closed their Series A in 2017 and is funded by Google Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Menlo Ventures and others. They have had contracts with over 40 different retail brands in the United States, Europe and Asia. The company is based in Palo Alto with a R&D office in Shenzhen, China. Greg is also on the Palo Alto City Council. Previously, he served on the Palo Alto Planning and Transportation Commission and the Infrastructure Blue Ribbon Commission, and he started the imaging group and held other senior business roles at Rambus, a leader in Intellectual Property. Greg has also played key roles at two other venture backed startups and at Synopsys, a $5B public software company, where he sold and marketed multi-million dollar solutions. He is a Caltech and UC Berkeley alumni.
5/29/2018 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
1038 How Prezly Bootstrapped To $1.6m+ in ARR
Building stuff since i was young. Had 1 'real' job where I was hired as an assistant, built their website, their intranet, their parent company...Started web firm, grew it to about 10 people. Started startup which never really took off (trackmypeople.com). Moved on to a large agency where we grew from 5 to 80 people. In charge of sales. Moved to Prezly about 3 years ago, never looked back
5/28/2018 • 15 minutes, 14 seconds
1037 Clate Mask on ICON, Infusionsoft IPO, Exit Strategy
As CEO, Clate is leading Infusionsoft on its mission to simplify growth for millions of small businesses worldwide. Under Clate's leadership, Infusionsoft has landed four rounds of venture capital. Clate is a national speaker, and co-author of the New York Times bestseller 'Conquer the Chaos'. Clate has a BA in Economics from Arizona State University, an MBA and a JD from Brigham Young University.
5/27/2018 • 20 minutes, 12 seconds
1036 How He Took SMB Churn From 12% Monthly to 4% In Social Media Marketing Space
Emeric started his career in 1996 as a business lawyer in Washington DC. He launched his first startup in France in 2000. After 3 semi-failed Saas projects in the social media space, he finally got traction with Agorapulse, a social media management software launched in 2012. It got to $5M in ARR and is growing 80% per year.
5/26/2018 • 18 minutes, 7 seconds
1035 How He Restructured $4.5m Company, Then Exited Jan 1
Bret has over 15 years of experience in affiliate marketing software development and business. He is the CEO of LinkTrust, a recognized leader in the affiliate & referral tracking. His experience in building businesses, working with teams and developing enterprise software has honed him into a valuable mentor.
5/25/2018 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
1034 How GetResponse Bootstrapped to $50m+ Revenue
Simon Grabowski is the CEO and founder of GetResponse. With only $200 in his pocket, Simon created the first version of GetResponse in 1998 to solve a business problem he needed an easy way to build an email marketing list and send drip content to customers at preset intervals. The product worked so well that Simon established GetResponse with the mission to bring big-company technologies to small businesses. Over the years, his vision and leadership has attracted a team of over 300 highly-skilled employees to create an innovative online marketing platform known for great design, simplicity, and an unmatched user experience.
5/24/2018 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
1033 Couple Cashes Out 401k in 2010, Now Doing $15m/Year
Bryan Miles is CEO & Co-founder of BELAY. Bryan (alongside his wife, Shannon) leads a US-based virtual solutions company that has over 550 people on payroll, all working from home, virtually. Prior to starting BELAY, Bryan worked for companies in the tech and construction industries. Bryan obtained his B.A. in Business from Mount Vernon Nazarene University in Mount Vernon, OH, which is where he met his wife, Shannon, who also co-founded BELAY.
5/23/2018 • 23 minutes, 5 seconds
1032 How Indian RetailTech CEO Is Attacking Market with Tags
Deboprio Ghosh is a serial entrepreneur and founder at Rewango, an AI and ML based retail analytics and proximity marketing technology. He also was the Co-Founder and CTO of Sustanalyze, a company that develops AI and ML based simulation software for chemical and materials R&D.
5/22/2018 • 16 minutes, 28 seconds
1031 How VWO Bootstrapped to $15m+
Paras Chopra is the Founder & CEO of Wingify, an India based fast-growing software company that makes globally admired technology products like Visual Website Optimizer (VWO) and PushCrew With a background in computational biology, machine learning, online marketing and web technologies, Paras started Wingify in early 2009. Twice featured in the Forbes list, in 2014 the Forbes India “30 Under 30” List followed by 2016 top “promising young leaders and game changers” under the age of 30 in Asia, Paras believes in customer obsession, innovation, experimentation & failure, and data driven decisions. Paras is an avid reader & his interests include philosophy, science, and business.
5/21/2018 • 16 minutes, 30 seconds
1030 Would you sell for $1.5m?
Pushkar is the founder of Aeroleads which is a bootstrap prospect generation software startup with over 20,000+ users. When not working, he likes to work on finishing his time machine!
5/20/2018 • 13 minutes, 1 second
1029 The Right Way to 18x Your Price Point With $1.2m MRR Pendo CEO
Todd Olson is CEO and Co-Founder of Pendo, a product experience platform that helps product managers deliver successful products. Before Pendo, Todd served as VP of Products at Rally Software Development which he led through its public offering. Todd joined Rally via its acquisition of 6th Sense, a company he founded and served as President and CTO.
5/19/2018 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
1028 Advertisers Put $250m Through Him Last Year As Top Google, Facebook Alternative
Dan Greenburg is the CEO and co-founder of Sharethrough, a platform which powers in-feed native advertising for many of the world’s largest publishers.
5/18/2018 • 25 minutes, 7 seconds
1027 Finally a $10m+ PR Company Focused on Analytics!
Erik is an expert in PR analytics and big data. Before leading TrendKite, he ran Product for Sprinklr after the merger with social analytics firm Dachis Group. He brought to market Dachis Group’s platform that enables brands to optimize paid, owned and earned tactics through the lens of earned media.
5/17/2018 • 21 minutes, 46 seconds
1026 "Juri, would you sell to me now for $1.5m?"
Juri Kaljundi is the CEO & Co-founder of Weekdone, a weekly team check-ins and quarterly OKR goal-setting service, turning any team into superheroes. He is a serial entrepreneur, having started building web-based products in 1994. He's a product guy with tech background and vast business leadership experience. In addition to Weekdone, he is the Co-Founder of Garage48 startup foundation.
5/16/2018 • 15 minutes, 49 seconds
1025 Expecting Mom Quits $150k+ Corporate, Launches Soap Line
5/15/2018 • 14 minutes, 26 seconds
1024 How He Bought Out His VC's, Won His Company Back, Now Doing $24m Annually
Nigel Shanahan set up Rant & Rave after a poor experience at a motorway service station. He believes that consumer emotions drive their behaviour and a company’s revenue. Rant & Rave is on a mission to change the world of customer feedback from dull surveys to a conversation that customers want to have
5/14/2018 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
1023 Will He Win Battle For Bottom of Blog
John Lemp is an entrepreneur who has built two internet companies from the ground up into multi-million dollar businesses, and all with $0 in funding. John graduated from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a Bachelors of Science in Information Technology. In 2013, John Founded Revcontent, a content recommendation network. Revcontent has grown into one of the largest Native and Content Recommendation companies in the world, powering over 250 Billion Content Recommendations per month.
5/13/2018 • 23 minutes, 18 seconds
1022 How This Barcelona Sales Tool Grew 2x YoY, Raised $16m, Charging $200/Seat
Oscar Macia is an experienced, sales-orientated manager and entrepreneur. He is the co-founder and CEO of ForceManager. ForceManager has transformed from small start-up to leading competitor in sales management in just a short space of time. This rapid growth has seen ForceManager’s impact spread globally to over 35 countries, with offices already open in Spain, London and Latin America counting with a wide portfolio of clients including several large multinationals. Maciá earned a degree in Nuclear Engineering from UPC and an Executive MBA from IESE Business School.
5/12/2018 • 18 minutes, 42 seconds
1021 How He Solved Translation Marketplace Space and Grew 7x YoY to $24m in Revenue
Entrepreneur and CEO with more than 10 years of experience in linguistic technologies and services. Now focused on building an operating and payment platform for the global translation industry, Smartcat.ai, through enabling collaborative workflow and automating hiring and settlements for all market participants.
5/11/2018 • 20 minutes, 39 seconds
1020 Urban Outfitters Inventory Management Tool Breaks $6m in ARR
John has spent the last two decades helping retailers, distributors, and brands optimize their omni-channel strategies and operations. Prior to Celect, John was VP of Product Management & Strategy for Oracle Commerce, coming to Oracle via the Endeca acquisition where John was VP of Marketing & Product Management. John started his career within Deloitte Consulting’s Strategy & Operations practice. John holds a BA in Economics and Computer Science from Boston College and received his master’s degree from the Harvard Business School.
5/10/2018 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
1019 The Tool Tesla's Data Analysts Use Hits 3,000 Customers
Jack Parmer is the CEO at ploy.ly
5/9/2018 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
1018 Why He's Making Leap from AdTech to Data As A Service Business Model
Kevin Tan is an accomplished entrepreneur and advertising industry technology leader with over 20 years of experience. Kevin is the co-founder and CEO of Eyeota, the global leader in audience data with more than 3.5 billion unique profiles across Europe, Asia-Pacific and the Americas.
5/8/2018 • 19 minutes, 24 seconds
1017 The New Nielsen? $12m in Revenue Says, Maybe!
Peter Daboll has more than 25 years of experience in the science and business of advertising effectiveness. He has spent his career developing and implementing analytical models and testing systems to measure consumer response to advertising. As CEO of Ace Metrix, Peter has led the company in developing innovative metrics and methods for helping advertisers make better, more impactful video creative. Peter was also the CEO of Bunchball, Chief of Insights at Yahoo!, and president and CEO of comScore Media Metrix. He has received numerous industry awards recognizing his leadership in advertising research including a 2011 Great Mind award from the ARF, and is a regular contributor to media outlets and advertising industry associations. Peter recently wrote and published the Amazon Bestselling book, AD-Itude.
5/7/2018 • 23 minutes, 27 seconds
1016 How He Managed Launching 2 $100m+ Companies At Once
Vijay is a serial entrepreneur with a track record of building successful businesses delivering enterprise-class solutions. Before starting Cygilant, he founded AppIQ, an application storage resource management provider acquired by Hewlett Packard in October 2005, and WebManage Technologies, a policy-driven content delivery solution provider acquired by Network Appliance in August 2000.
5/6/2018 • 18 minutes, 39 seconds
1015 How He's Using $10m In AdSpend to Power New SaaS Offering
Chris Treadaway is Founder & CEO of Polygraph Media, a Facebook Marketing Partner in Ad Technology. Chris was previously Group Product Manager of Web Strategy at Microsoft in Redmond and was also a co-founder of Stratfor. He resides in Austin with his wife Kim and daughter Margot.
5/5/2018 • 16 minutes, 58 seconds
1014 Zoom CEO on Killing His Old WebEx Baby With $150m+ in ARR
Eric S. Yuan is the Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Zoom. Prior to founding Zoom, Eric was Corporate Vice President of Engineering at Cisco, where he was responsible for Cisco's collaboration software development. As one of the founding engineers and Vice President of Engineering at WebEx, Eric was the heart and soul of the WebEx product from 1997 to 2011. Eric proudly grew the WebEx team from 10 engineers to more than 800 worldwide, and contributed to revenue growth from $0 to more than $800M. Eric is a named inventor on 11 issued and 20 pending patents in real time collaboration. In 2017, Eric joined the Forbes Tech Council and was added to the Business Insider list of the 52 Most Powerful People in Enterprise Tech. Eric is a graduate of the Stanford University Executive Program.
5/4/2018 • 21 minutes
1013 Guess How This Data Tool Will Break $100m In 2018
With over 20 years growing and leading technology companies, Frank Bien built his career on nurturing strong corporate culture and highly efficient teams.. Prior to Looker, Frank was SVP of Strategy for storage vendor Virsto (acquired by VMware) and VP of Strategic Alliances at big-data pioneer Greenplum, leading their acquisition by EMC (now Pivotal). He led Product Marketing and Strategy at early scale-out data warehousing company Sensage and was VP of Solution Sales at Vignette/OpenText. Earlier in his career he held executive roles at Dell and the Federal Reserve.
5/3/2018 • 19 minutes, 33 seconds
1012 SquareSpace CEO Tried Acquiring First, Now King of SMB Data
Dane is a serial entrepreneur with a focus on technology, data, and small business. He has been CEO of a dozen companies like SumAll and Squarespace, mentors of far too many others and had the pleasure of building the careers of thousands will creating billions in equity value and sometimes losing millions.
5/2/2018 • 21 minutes, 36 seconds
1011 How He Drove $1.4m in ChatBot PreSales
Travis Stephenson is a software entrepreneur and marketing coach that specializes in all things Facebook and Instagram. Travis has been a soloprenuer for 8 years and has branched out recently to start a SaaS platform called Chatmatic.
5/1/2018 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
1010 The Boston Poker Player Turned B2B Advertiser Breaks $10m Revenue Mark
Patrick Shea started AdDaptive Intelligence with Co-Founder Kevin O'Malley in 2010 to create technology around gathering and using data to improve targeting and analytics for marketers. Outside of work Patrick is married with two young girls and likes poker, cars and philosophy.
4/30/2018 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
1009 The Argument for Shutting Down and Launching With 100% Control
Justin Kline is the co-founder and COO of Markerly, an influencer marketing company focusing on influencer identification and tracking for some of the world’s largest and most rapidly growing consumer brands. Markerly partners with brands and infleuncers to create original and authentic content. Influencers share this content to their social media communities to inspire interest, engagement, and to drive purchases. Check out markerly.com to learn more...
4/29/2018 • 17 minutes, 50 seconds
1008 WePay CEO on $1b+ in Transaction Volume Helping Your Favorite Online Platforms Process Payments
Bill Clerico is CEO and co-founder of WePay, where he drives the company's vision, strategy and growth. WePay’s payments API is built specifically for platform businesses like marketplaces, crowdfunding sites and small business software. These platforms empower millions of sole proprietors to start and grow their businesses.
4/28/2018 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
1007 How Outbound.io Grew to $30k MRR Before Exiting to ZenDesk
Josh is founder and director of go-to-market at Outbound, customer communication technology acquired by Zendesk in May 2017. Josh challenges businesses to rethink communication with customers by centering marketing, sales and service teams on the human relationships they can build using customer data.
4/27/2018 • 25 minutes, 35 seconds
1006 How To Get Rich Bootstrapping to $1m in Revenue
NathanLatka.com/Patreon exclusive! Jeremy is a serial entrepreneur with a calling to build enterprise marketing software. He currently is the Co-founder and CEO of Pulse Insights, which uses innovative technology to help enterprises understand customer needs and to efficiently collect user information to deliver richly personalized experiences. Prior to Pulse Insights Jeremy founded UberTags Tag Management system to help companies instantaneously deploy marketing and analytics tags on websites. In 2013 he sold UberTags to [x+1] and stayed on to lead client mgmt and product management teams. Prior to UberTags, Jeremy grew up managing digital experiences at American Express including leading acquisition and product management teams. Prior to that he co-founded Buzz Wireless, which was sold to Vaultus in 2000. He earned an MBA from Columbia Business School and a double degree from Oberlin College in Electronic Music Composition and Economics.
4/26/2018 • 2 minutes, 47 seconds
1005 How She's Managing 4+ Business Models at Once
Heidi Yu is the founder and CEO of Boostinsider, one of the Silicon Valley’s hottest startups that focuses on using advanced technology to help brands to boost on social media through influencer marketing including SocialBook.io, SocialSaaS.io, SocialAdwords.io, and SocialSDK.io. She is a fashionable nerd, a passionate business woman, and a serial entrepreneur. Miss Yu holds an MBA from Seattle University, and is a well-connected real-life influencer.
4/25/2018 • 19 minutes, 2 seconds
1004 Can sharing team size hurt your growth?
Mani Iyer is CEO of Kwanzoo, a leading provider of Account-Based (ABM) Advertising and Retargeting solutions for mid-to-large B2B enterprises. Mani previously founded a software business acquired by Oracle/PeopleSoft. Mani is a serial entrepreneur, industry speaker on account-based marketing, demand generation, B2B marketing and advertising, and a startup adviser.
4/24/2018 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
1003 With $150m Raised, He's Sold 3m "Weird" Domain Names
4/23/2018 • 20 minutes, 22 seconds
1002 How He Makes $10m+ Speaking Every Language on Earth
"Jack is a technology early-adopter, serial entrepreneur, software patent-holder, product evangelist, and combat-decorated Air Force pilot. Before founding Smartling, he served as SVP of Product at eMusic and COO/CTO at SheSpeaks and RunTime Technologies. He also co-founded Trio Development, a software company that created the first personal information manager, which was acquired by Apple in 1993. He holds a BS in Computer Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, where he also studied linguistics and interned with Professor William Labov, and an MBA from Cameron University in Germany. Jack was named one of Fast Company’s “Who’s Next” in 2011, and was named a 2013 NYC Venture Mentor by the New York City Economic Development Corporation."
4/22/2018 • 21 minutes, 17 seconds
1001 Why People Pay Him 30% of Spend For His AdTech Platform
"David Benoliel has spent the past 25 years at the intersection of technology and marketing as a software designer, marketer, salesman, project manager, executive and whatever else it took to keep things running. As a startup junky, he enjoys participating in the creation of things that did not exist before, and working with passionate, smart and committed people who feel the same way that I do. Today he works with leading brands and publishers to deliver high performing, content-driven advertising solutions through a company that he founded in late 2014 called The Real Content Network."
4/21/2018 • 12 minutes, 45 seconds
1000 The Genius in Agency + SaaS Business Model
Sean Schroeder is the Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) of blueriver and co-founder of the Mura Digital Experience Platform. A former front-end developer and designer, he's been on a mission to simplify and enrich lives by helping others find Flow long before he knew it was a thing.
4/20/2018 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
999 He Bet Big on Salesforce, Now His CMS Does $7.5m
"Doug Girvin is the CEO and Founder of Stantive Technologies Group, whose flagship product, OrchestraCMS is the first and only known Enterprise class Content Management Platform built 100% natively on the Salesforce.com platform. Throughout his career Doug has led teams to focus on helping customers leverage advanced technologies to solve significant, mission critical, business challenges both within and beyond their organizations. Always with a goal of driving business value and improving the user experience, Doug’s leap from hardware to software has cemented his professional edict to “bring value to users quickly ~ first, second and always.”"
4/19/2018 • 15 minutes, 50 seconds
998 Influencer Marketing for ICO's Next Big Thing?
4/18/2018 • 14 minutes, 39 seconds
997 AI Company is Real Deal with 4x YoY Revenue Growth to $3m+ in ARR
David Benigson founded Signal Media in 2012 with the belief that artificial intelligence would fundamentally change the way businesses worked. As CEO, David has led Signal through multiple funding rounds totalling £8.2m, most recently a £5.8m Series A fundraising in December 2016. He was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe list in January 2017.
4/17/2018 • 15 minutes, 20 seconds
996 Guess Why This $600m Man Came out of "Martha Vineyard" Retirement
Marc Daniels specializes in launching SaaS companies and rapidly developing the infrastructure and internal sales organizations to drive multi-million dollar revenue streams. Prior to Results.com Marc was a founding member of Diligent Board Member Services, which sold to private equity for $NZ 941 million in 2016.
4/16/2018 • 18 minutes, 44 seconds
995 Pakistan King of SaaS
Founder and CEO of Cloudlead (formerly EListGuy). I am a motivated, tech savvy and result-driven business leader with a thirst for achieving accelerated revenue growth for a diverse client base. I have been involved in assisting SMEs with head hunting, executive search and building comprehensive B2B databases through outsourcing.
4/15/2018 • 16 minutes, 57 seconds
994 Why Forbes Uses Quizzes Instead of "Opt In Landing Pages"
Josh Haynam is the co-founder of Interact Quiz Builder, a tool used by more than 30,000 businesses including The American Red Cross, Home Depot, and Forbes. He's probably seen more quizzes than any other human on earth right now
4/14/2018 • 15 minutes, 56 seconds
993 The Argument For Buildling a Product For Yourself First, $6.5m in Funding Later...
Luke Beatty serves as the Chairman and CEO of Brandfolder, a digital asset management platform located in Denver. Prior to that, he served as the President of Media Brands at Verizon/ AOL. Luke founded Associated Content, Inc. in 2004 and served as its President & CEO. He sold that company to Yahoo in 2010. Prior thereto, Luke served on the executive management team of WAND, Inc. His expertise is in contextual advertising models, online media collection, and distribution strategies. In his free time, Luke is a youth lacrosse coach and fly fishes around the world. He holds an M.Ed. from Harvard University and a B.A. from Connecticut College.
4/13/2018 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
992 Is She Building The New Wordpress for Enterprise?
"Linda Holliday is an entrepreneur who has spent a career at the intersection of media, marketing and tech, building leading-edge strategies, technologies and companies that empower the most demanding marketers and publishers to learn, teach, target, sell, and story-tell across an ever-expanding array of opportunities and challenges. She is the founder and chief executive of Citia, a first and only 3rd party system that creates swipe-able card-based media flows that integrate into the native feeds and flows of mobile media."
4/12/2018 • 22 minutes, 2 seconds
991 He's Built 400+ Chatbots Making $800k in The Process
"Andrew started a $30M company built on email marketing when email marketing was just getting started. Many know Andrew from his company Mixergy, where he has interviewed over 1,500 entrepreneurs and startup founders, such as the founders of Airbnb, Twitch, Groupon and LinkedIn. In recent years, he has been an angel investor in two of the early chat messaging platform companies (Manychat & Assist) which eventually lead him to build Bot Academy. Bot Academy is an online program that teaches people how to create marketing chat bots, enabling companies to reach potential customers via Facebook Messenger instead of email. With email on the decline and chat apps on the rise, Bot Academy teaches how to build successful marketing campaigns using Messenger. The skills learned at Bot Academy help graduates build consulting companies that build chat bots for their clients or help marketers enhance their email campaigns with Messenger marketing messages."
4/11/2018 • 24 minutes, 51 seconds
990 How Commenting App Disqus Makes $20m+ Annually
"Daniel Ha is the CEO and cofounder of Disqus. Daniel studied computer science engineering at UC Davis and interned at big companies before deciding to drop out of school to pursue the startup world. Disqus is the web's most ubiquitous discussion network, reaching over 2 billion unique visitors every month and spanning nearly any topic or type of community imaginable. Backed by Y Combinator, Union Square Ventures, North Bridge Venture Partners, Iris Capital as well as many great angel investors. Daniel often writes and speaks about digital media, online publishing, consumer products, and startups. Outside startups, he spends his time on the race track."
4/10/2018 • 22 minutes, 52 seconds
989 How This CEO Split His Company and Cleaned Cap Table At Same Time
As the Founder of 5 start-ups, John has made more mistakes than most. He’s currently the CEO of HireMojo, a SaaS Hiring Automation Platform with a RecruiterBot®. He also founded Accolo, an award-winning RPO and was VP of HR at BofA. He has a BS in Math from Notre Dame and was on the US National Rowing Team.
4/9/2018 • 18 minutes, 43 seconds
988 Livechat on Website Wars
4/8/2018 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
987 Secret Button Big Brands Push to Launch 40,000 Landing Pages at Once
"Expertise and dedication define our company/team. Daniel Rust, a gifted software architect and Mark Michael a bold entrepreneur met in high school. They've been working together ever since. DevHub recognized a gap in the CMS market between website builder and enterprise scale, and pounced, launching DevHub. DevHub received funding from the best VC and angel investors in Seattle, LA, NYC and Silicon Valley. From our downtown Seattle HQ, we successfully help big name global and national clients manage hundreds of thousands of digital products and millions of campaign performance dollars at scale."
4/7/2018 • 17 minutes, 14 seconds
986 The College of The Future Just Hit $10m in ARR
Beri Meric is the Co-Founder & CEO of IVY, The Social University (IVY.com) which unites rising leaders through a lifetime of learning, growth, and impact. IVY has 20,000 members and 200,000 followers who support its mission to unlock potential and spark a new renaissance promoting human unity, progress, and fulfillment.
4/6/2018 • 19 minutes, 22 seconds
985 How Expensify Hit $60m+ Magic on Bottom Up Business Model
David Barrett started programming at the early age of 6 and has been aspiring to become an expense report magnate ever since. David attended the University of Michigan where he worked in the Virtual Reality Lab, before moving to Texas to write 3D graphics engines for the video game industry. Next he moved to California to join Travis Kalanick in building a peer-to-peer file transfer technology called Red Swoosh, which was acquired by Akamai in 2007. In 2008, David left Akamai to start Expensify and has since been relieving the world’s frustrations, one expense report at a time.
4/5/2018 • 17 minutes, 6 seconds
984 New King of Influencer Marketing Grows Revenue 6x YoY to $8m
"Gil Eyal is the CEO and Founder of HYPR, the World’s largest influencer search and discovery directory. Founded in 2013, HYPR offers brands and marketers in-depth audience analytics for over 10 million influencers across major social channels. Gil has revolutionized the way many of the World’s biggest agencies and brands are running influencer marketing by focusing on the same data, analytics and audience demographic information relevant to any other form of marketing. Under Gil’s direction, HYPR boasts a client base of over 100 Fortune 500 brands, as well as the biggest advertising and PR agencies in the world, including LVMH, Next Models, PepsiCo, Mediacom, Michael Kors, Calvin Klein, Time Inc. and Estée Lauder."
4/4/2018 • 18 minutes, 4 seconds
983 200 People Have Paid Him $2k To Live Forever
Steven Clausnitzer is CEO of Forever Labs, a Y Combinator company. Prior to Forever Labs, Steven spent 15 years mentoring and developing top-talent at fortune 500 companies including American Express and Wolters Kluwer. Steven has extensive experience in strategic growth, commercialization, and team leadership.
4/3/2018 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
982 Marketing and Sales Tech? He'll Acquire You!
Brandon is the COO and Co-founder of Cirrus Insight – the sales plugin for Gmail and Outlook. The company is #41 on the Inc. 5000 and the fastest-growing company in Tennessee. Brandon once raced his bicycle 508 miles across Death Valley in 35 hours and 7 minutes.
4/2/2018 • 22 minutes, 37 seconds
981 The Problem With 100% MarketShare
Erica Brescia is the Co-founder and COO of Bitnami. With over 1M deployments per month, the company provides the largest source of application and development environments to the world’s largest cloud service providers. In 2016, Erica was the recipient of the Top Women in Cloud award. Erica sits on the board of directors at The Linux Foundation and was an investment partner at XFactor Ventures, which empowers female-led businesses to succeed.
4/1/2018 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
980 How This Company Uses Free Goodie Boxes and Reviews to Hit $12m in Revenues
Aydin Acar is the Co-Founder and CEO of Influenster, the leading product discovery and reviews platform, and was recently recognized by Entrepreneur as one of 25 Inspiring Entrepreneurs Under 40 Who Are Creating the Next Big Thing.
3/31/2018 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
979 How Funnel.io 3x ARR to $2.1m in Last 12 Months
Fredrik Skantze is CEO and co-founder of Funnel.io. Prior to starting Funnel he was co-founder of the automotive e-tailer Autoquake in London and worked as Product Director for mobile internet pioneer Openwave in San Francisco. He holds an MBA from Stanford and a Masters Degree in Engineering from MIT.
3/30/2018 • 17 minutes, 46 seconds
978 Why Sole Founder is OK Burning $40k Cash and Bootstrapping
Sam Saltis is a technology entrepreneur with over 20 years experience in growing online companies and executing digital strategies. Sam is currently the founder and CEO at Core dna, a SaaS Digital experience platform (DXP) that is disrupting the way website properties are built and managed.
3/29/2018 • 17 minutes, 34 seconds
977 How Mindtouch Landed $1m+ Customers, $7m ARR Bootstrapped, Now $20m+
Aaron Fulkerson is an information technology businessman and co-founder of MindTouch, Inc. Fulkerson helped pioneer the open core business model, collaborative networks, and the application of Web Oriented Architecture to enterprise software. Prior to co-founding MindTouch, Aaron was a member of Microsoft's Advanced Strategies and Policies division and worked on distributed systems research.
3/28/2018 • 24 minutes, 59 seconds
9 of you donated $527, show will continue
Big thanks to Lee, Shadi, Sarah, Norris, Blake, Hugh, Gregory, Brandon, and Gijs who told me they wanted the show to continue using their wallets on Patreon. Get exclusive interviews, access to monthly SaaS call, and monthly excel file with data at Nathanlatka.com/Patreon
3/27/2018 • 5 minutes, 52 seconds
976 How JotForm Passed 3m Users, $45m in ARR Without Raising Capital
Steve Hartert is Chief Marketing Officer at JotForm.com, with responsibility for marketing programs, brand management and corporate partnerships. Prior to joining JotForm, he was president of Hartert and Associates, a marketing consultancy that worked with B2B and B2C companies. Steve has more than 25 years of marketing management experience.
3/27/2018 • 19 minutes, 52 seconds
Shutting show down
Save the show by going here today: nathanlatka.com/patreon
3/26/2018 • 8 minutes, 8 seconds
974 How Portland Company 7x ARR Over Last 12 Months Helping Clients Launch Interactive Lead Campaigns
Robert Haydock has a background in the performance optimization of digital marketing and advertising campaigns. He co-founded Zembula in 2016 after seeing a need for a new marketing format that intrigued consumers. Zembula has quickly found its place in the market by delivering consistently better engagement than traditional marketing techniques.
3/25/2018 • 15 minutes, 32 seconds
973 How Digilent is Competing in Changing Programmatic Ad Landscape, $40m in Volume over TTM
Alan is Chief Executive Officer at Digilant, the paid media arm of ispDigital, in charge of the company's business development and expansion worldwide. He is also President of ispDigital, responsible for Sales, Human Resources and Compliance.
3/24/2018 • 15 minutes, 34 seconds
972 How Battery Paid Off Early Shareholders in Secondary Offering of $40m+ ARR Health Tech Company WebPT
As CEO of WebPT, Nancy Ham is focused on guiding the company through its next phase of growth, bringing with her a wealth of experience in developing, growing, and operating private and public healthcare IT companies. During her robust career, she has achieved powerful results in healthcare IT and was named one of Health IT's 25 Most Powerful Women Thought Leaders by HealthData Management. Prior to WebPT, Nancy served as CEO of Healthagen Population Health Solutions, an Aetna company. There, she oversaw several tech businesses, including Medicity, the market leader in clinical data exchange and interoperability. Nancy also previously served as CEO, president, and a director of MedVentive (later acquired by McKesson), and has held executive roles at Sentillion, ProxyMed, Healtheon/WebMD, and ActaMed Corporation.
3/23/2018 • 20 minutes, 56 seconds
971 How Namely Passed 1000 Customers and $40m in ARR
Matt Straz is the founder and CEO at Namely, the leading HR platform for mid-sized companies. Matt has grown Namely to over 900 clients, 140,000 users, and has raised $157.8M from leading investors. Prior to Namely, Matt was co-founder of Pictela, an ad tech company he sold to AOL in 2010.
3/22/2018 • 22 minutes, 2 seconds
970 28 Year Old Turns Down $12m Acquisition Offer, Doing $65k in MRR in CoBrowsing, Live Chat Space
Founder and CEO at Tagove. Loves to research in AI, Machine Learning, chatbots, NLP, neuroscience.
3/21/2018 • 20 minutes, 45 seconds
969 How Scribd Passed $54m in ARR Building Netflix for Books
Trip Adler is an American entrepreneur. He is the CEO and co-founder of Scribd, a digital library and document-sharing platform. Trip grew up in Palo Alto, California and graduated from Harvard University. Scribd was launched in 2007. Scribd has over 80 million monthly readers and 500K subscribers.
3/20/2018 • 15 minutes, 20 seconds
968 How Tumult Hit $5m in Sales, Handled Co-Founder Leaving for Apple
Jonathan is the founder and lead developer of Tumult Hype. He's always had one foot in the programming world and the other in visual arts. He previously was an engineering manager at Apple on various macOS projects. Jonathan was born in St. Louis, educated at Purdue, and now resides in San Francisco.
3/19/2018 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
967 With $1b+ In Transaction Volume, He Helps Merchants Get Power of Amazon Checkout
Ralph Dangelmaier is the CEO of BlueSnap, a leading global e-commerce payments company. He is a 'FinTech payment veteran' with a wealth of experience creating innovative product solutions for retailers and financial institutions worldwide. He has a strong track record of growing private and public companies, both organically and through M&A activity. Ralph formerly served as the President of ACI Worldwide, a billion-dollar global provider of payment software and solutions. Before joining ACI, Ralph was the CEO of P&H Solutions who in 1997 pioneered internet banking for businesses. He grew the VC-backed company to be the leader in the space. Ralph's career has focused on using technology to innovate and simplify payments for businesses and consumers around the world. He has authored numerous articles leading to television and speaking appearances, including features on Bloomberg, NPR, 21st Century TV with Donald Trump Jr., WEEI Radio with Barry Armstrong, World Business Review with Alexander Haig, New England Cable News, PYMNTS.com, and Cowen PayFac Reporting. He has also written popular guest posts in TechCrunch, GigaOm, TechCity News, and VentureBeat. Ralph is frequently invited to speak at industry and investment conferences that focus on payments, mobile, and technology. His speaking engagements include Zuora Subscribed, PYMNTS Innovation Conference, Card Not Present Expo, Mass Innovation Technology Exchange (MITX), Mobile Monday, TiECon East, Sibos, Goldman Sachs Future of Finance, William Blair, Credit Suisse Future of Commerce Payments, Gerson Lehman Group, Citi FinTech Conference, and Pacific Crest.
3/18/2018 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
966 "We'll Process $1b in Corporate Travel Expenses Over Next 24 Months" Says RocketTrip CEO
Dan Ruch is the Founder & CEO of Rocketrip, the leading tech platform for reducing corporate travel costs. Rocketrip motivates below policy spending by giving employees data-based trip budgets and letting them keep half of what they save. Venture-backed by Bessemer Venture Partners, Canaan Partners, Genacast Ventures, and Y Combinator, Rocketrip helps clients including GE, Edmunds, and Twitter create a positive culture around spend management.
3/17/2018 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
965 Why This $14m ARR Company "Went Public" To Win Marketing Automation Space
Mr. Carlson is the founder and CEO of SharpSpring, Inc. (NASDAQ: SHSP), a next generation marketing automation platform. In his 20-year career, Carlson has held numerous sales, marketing, and product roles for Internet companies, and is considered an expert at sale and marketing.
3/16/2018 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
964 How SocialBakers Went From $27m to $35m in ARR Over Last 12 Months
uval is the CEO of Socialbakers. He has more than twenty years of experience as an entrepreneur and executive in both private and public companies. Before joining Socialbakers, Yuval served as CTO at Outbrain, the leading content discovery platform, managing a global team of 200 people. Prior to that Yuval spent 5 years as CTO at AVG Technologies (NYSE: AVG), where he played a key role in taking the company public. Before joining AVG, Yuval was CTO of the cybersecurity company Finjan, where he led six international groups. He is also the co-founder of the web application security software company, KaVaDo. Yuval is a graduate of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel and a holder of 20 U.S. patents. He is a frequent commentator in the media and speaks regularly on technology topics.
3/15/2018 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
963 How Ping Identity Moved $75m One Time Revenue to $100m+ Recurring and Sold for $600m in 2016
Andre Durand, CEO of Ping Identity, is on a mission to simplify how enterprises provide secure and seamless digital experiences. In 2002, Andre founded Ping Identity with a vision of securing the Internet through identity. He recently sold his company to Vista Equity Partners. Before that, Andre co-founded and was CEO of Durand Communications, which was sold to Webb Interactive in 1998, and in 2002 he founded Jabber Inc., which was sold to Cisco in 2008.
3/14/2018 • 17 minutes, 27 seconds
962 Why Hubspot Spent 1000's+ Hours On Pricing
Brian Halligan is Co-founder and CEO of HubSpot. He has co-authored two books, 'Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media', and 'Blogs Marketing Lessons From The Grateful Dead'. Recently, he's been writing about how to turn your startup into a scale-up. Top 10 Highest Rated CEO by Glassdoor in 2014, 2015, and 2017. He was named an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of the Year in 2011 and an Inc. Founders 40 in 2016. Brian is a senior lecturer at MIT's Sloan School Of Management. His favorite charity is Camp Harbor View.
3/13/2018 • 21 minutes, 52 seconds
961 How He Sells Commercial Real Estate Data to PE Firms for $5m+ in ARR
Michael is Co-Founder + CEO of CompStak. CompStak creates transparency in commercial real estate by gathering information that is hard to find, difficult to compile or otherwise unavailable. The world's largest brokerage firms and most preeminent real estate investors use CompStak's commercial real estate data to compare properties and make investment decisions. Since launching CompStak in early 2012, Michael has helped navigate the company through tremendous growth, with $20 million raised, 70 markets launched, and a 50 person team. He has been named 30 Under 30 by Real Estate New York, and a Rising Star by The Real Deal. Michael is a regular speaker on the future of commercial real estate, real estate technology, and data transparency. His speaking engagements include talks for the Urban Land Institute, the CCIM Institute, NAIOP, the Zell/Lurie Real Estate Center at Wharton, the GSAPP program at Columbia University, the Schack School at NYU, Drexel University and Babson College. Michael has also appeared on Fox Business and National Public Radio, and has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Bloomberg Businessweek and other notable publications. Before starting CompStak, Michael led the NY metro data center practice for Grubb & Ellis, where he was named National Rookie of the Year. He graduated Babson College in 2005, where he led the Babson Entrepreneurial Exchange and was a member of the world's first live-in business incubator, the e-tower. Michael is also a proud alum of the 500 Startups accelerator in Mountain View, California.
3/12/2018 • 19 minutes, 26 seconds
960 How SmartBear Passed $90m in ARR Helping 10,000 Customers Test Software
https://smartbear.com/company/team/featured-people/justin-teague/ Justin is responsible for SmartBear's strategic direction and overall operation. Prior to his role as CEO, Justin served as SmartBear’s COO and President where he oversaw all sales, marketing, product management and strategy functions as well as execution for the company. Justin came to SmartBear from Bullhorn where he was COO.
3/11/2018 • 23 minutes, 41 seconds
959 Zoho Founder's New CRM Passes $300k MRR from 3000 Customers
I am from Hyderabad (South India). I studied BTech at JNTU (Hyderabad) and MS at University of Delaware. I worked at AT&T for 2 years. In 1995, i joined Tony Thomas shortly after he founded Zoho Corporation (formerly Adventnet). In 2004, i then followed Tony when he launched another startup, which transformed to become Vtiger in 2007. I have been CEO at Vtiger since 2008.
3/10/2018 • 16 minutes, 42 seconds
958 When Founders Died, He Acquired $50m+ SaaS Company That Helps You Hire Smarter
Mike Zani is the CEO of The Predictive Index. He also runs a search fund called Phoenix Strategy Investments. Mike was previously the CEO of LEDCO and ShapeUp. Prior to running companies, Mike was the 1996 Olympic Sailing Team coach, and he was named Coach of the Year for the sport of sailing.
3/9/2018 • 20 minutes, 47 seconds
957 Why He's Moving from Self Serve to $3k/yr Plans in Recruiting Space
Raj is the co-founder & CEO of Recruiterbox, a saas recruiting software with 2100+ customers. He is fortunate to work with 35 passionate team members across two countries and has bootstrapped Recruiterbox over the last six years. He is also the author of prePARE, a hiring guide for founders and first-time managers.
3/8/2018 • 18 minutes, 24 seconds
956 How Does He Find Sharp People At $900/mo For BI Tool Doing $75k in MRR?
Mohit is the founder and CEO of Contify, a market intelligence product that enables businesses to track competitors, industries, markets, and industries. He has 16 years of experience across media, consulting, and technology. Mohit has spent the last 8 years building and scaling Contify with the objective of organizing intelligence from the web. As CEO he plays a key role in developing a long-term roadmap and daily execution. Mohit started his career with Deloitte in the US. Prior to founding Contify, he held leadership roles at The Indian Express group and Hindustan Times. He is a graduate of IIT Delhi and INSEAD.
3/7/2018 • 15 minutes, 26 seconds
955 How Skillshare Doubles YoY to $30m+ With Huge Content Library
Michael is the founder of Skillshare, which is a learning community for the new economy.
3/6/2018 • 20 minutes, 17 seconds
954 Launched in 1991 How is Agiloft Closing $1.8m Deals?
Colin is the CEO/founder of Agiloft. Before Agiloft, he worked at IBM, GE and start-ups as developer, product manager and CIO. His vision was to dramatically boost the agility of business applications by removing the need for manual coding and Agiloft has become the market leader in no-code enterprise software.
3/5/2018 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
953 Why Wishpond Pivoted Into Marketing Automation Space and $7m in ARR
I lead Wishpond, a marketing automation platform built to help businesses grow online.
3/4/2018 • 19 minutes, 2 seconds
952 How Teamwork.com Got 20,000 Customers and $18m in ARR With No Funding
Teamwork.com provides a suite of 3 software apps that can help run your business and are used by over 25,000 businesses all around the world, including some of the biggest brands names like Netflix, Airbus, and Walt Disney. Our flagship product is Teamwork Projects which is the best project management app on the web aimed at professionals.
3/3/2018 • 22 minutes, 35 seconds
951 How He Created LiteCoin, the Silver to Bitcoin Gold
Charlie Lee is the creator of Litecoin, the most popular alternative currency to Bitcoin. He was previously Director of Engineering at Coinbase, the most popular crypto-currency wallet and exchange. Prior to joining Coinbase, he spent 6 years at Google working on YouTube Mobile, Chrome OS, and the Google Play Games platform. Charlie earned a Bachelors and Masters degree in electrical engineering and computer science from M.I.T.
3/2/2018 • 21 minutes, 34 seconds
950 How Clickfunnels Grew From $14m to $60m in ARR in 18 Months
Over the past 10, years, Russell has built a following of over a million entrepreneurs, sold hundreds of thousands of copies of his books, popularized the concept of sales funnels, and co-founded a software company called ClickFunnels that helps tens of thousands of entrepreneurs quickly get their message out to the marketplace.
3/1/2018 • 21 minutes, 39 seconds
949 API Plubming for Internet Passes 200 Customers, $10m ARR
Mark Geene, co-founder & CEO of Cloud Elements, is recognized as a leading visionary for unifying the world's APIs by defining the first API Integration platform. This revolution of API integration is the next frontier in API Management as developers address the challenge of consuming millions of disparate private and public APIs.
2/28/2018 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
948 How Barcelona Company Grew Past 600,000 Users With Email Open Tracking
Founder and CPO of Mailtrack.io. Previously founder of Panoramio.com (acquired by Google) and partner at Loquo.com (acquired by eBay). Background in Psychology/UX.
2/27/2018 • 24 minutes, 7 seconds
947 Is He The New King of Education? 80k Student Customers and $24m in Revenue Says "Yes!"
Ryan is the Founder and CEO of Treehouse. His mission is to create the future of education, so he can help as many people as possible. He's also obsessed with Spartan Racing.
2/26/2018 • 25 minutes, 43 seconds
946 He Changed Ideas 7 Times at Y Combinator, Now 500,000 Employees More Engaged Because of Him
Taro co-founded Fond in 2012 and serves as the CEO. Born and raised in Tokyo, Taro is a Y Combinator graduate and part of the first Japanese team ever to be admitted to the program. He studied Law at Keio University in Tokyo and was named one of Business Insider's "Silicon Valley 100: The Coolest People in Tech Right Now."
2/25/2018 • 18 minutes, 38 seconds
945 He's Democratizing Health Data Across Big Pharma With 200 Customers, $3.5m Revenue
Ex BCG, EY with a PhD from EBS Frankfurt and grad degree from IIT Bombay. Ex board member at think tanks working in complexity science and Innovation management. Advisor to Government and Big Pharma in future management and Digital. Teaches at B schools, key note speaker, published in scientific and management Journals, coauthored a Book; In editorial boards of scientific journals.
2/24/2018 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
944 Why He IPO'd CyberSecurity Company and How He Did $230m in 2017 Revenue
Qualys helps organizations streamline and consolidate their security and compliance solutions in a single platform and build security into digital transformation initiatives for greater agility, better business outcomes and substantial cost savings. The Qualys Cloud Platform and its integrated Cloud Apps deliver businesses critical security intelligence continuously, enabling them to automate the full spectrum of auditing, compliance and protection for IT systems and web applications on premises, on endpoints and elastic clouds.
2/23/2018 • 20 minutes, 11 seconds
943 Bootstrapped and Rich, $14m 2017 From Helping Suppliers Accurately Print
Reuben Malz founded GlobalVision in 1990. A friend in the printing industry told him about quality issues he was facing, and Reuben became interested in solving his problem. He founded GlobalVision to respond to the lack of quality control in commercial printing. The company grew from there, moving with the changing technologies and adding inspection capabilities that now cover the entire printing process.
2/22/2018 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
942 0-50m Users Now Launching Paid SaaS Model at $120/yr To Gamify Learning
Erik Harrell is the Chief Executive Officer of Kahoot!, the global game-based learning platform with more than 50 million users. Prior to that, Erik held several C level roles for more than 10 years at Opera Software (COO, CFO, CSO) and VP roles at J.P. Morgan & Co. in New York. Erik is also an angel investor and has extensive experience as a board member of organizations such as the board of the Alliance Venture Spring Fund, a leading V.C. fund in Norway, with $100 million under management. He was also on the board of Opera Software’s joint venture in China. Erik has an MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School and an MA and BA (Phi Beta Kappa) from The Johns Hopkins University. Originally from the U.S., Erik lives in Oslo, Norway, is a passionate tennis player, and is a father of three children.
2/21/2018 • 21 minutes, 32 seconds
941 From Affiliate Marketer to $150k MRR SaaS Entrepreneur
Jimmy Kim is the CEO and the co-founder of Sendlane - an email automation company. Over the past 8+ years as a digital marketer, his need for a reliable platform that understands digital marketers, lead him to build his own platform just 4 years ago. Since opening doors in just 2 years, he's helped over 30,000 businesses and entrepreneurs deliver their messages to their subscribers and followers, with heavy focus on digital marketers, eCommerce owners, and affiliate marketers.
2/20/2018 • 19 minutes
940 5000 Enterprises Pay Him $100m+ in ARR To Battle CyberSecurity Threats
Tom Kemp is co-founder and chief executive officer at Centrify. Under his leadership, the company has become one of the fastest growing security vendors in the industry with over 5,000 customers, including more than half of the Fortune 50. Prior to Centrify, Kemp held various executive, technical and marketing roles at NetIQ Corporation, Compuware Corporation, EcoSystems Software, and Oracle Corporation. Mr. Kemp was also an Entrepreneur in Residence at leading venture capital firm Mayfield. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science and History from the University of Michigan.
2/19/2018 • 24 minutes, 8 seconds
939 How he Bootstrapped To $15m in ARR Before $20m Round from IVP
Chris Hall, the CEO of Bynder has grown his company to over 200 employees with six international offices in just 3 years. He first conceptualized Bynder in 2010, while working to establish a web development company, Label A (still in business). In 2012, the Bynder was incorporated and by early 2013 had a license for business. Chris is an entrepreneur at heart, has successfully setup and scaled multiple SaaS companies, Bynder being most notable to date. Chris built these companies on the belief that young people, with the right attitude and coaching can achieve great results. Chris is currently a coach and mentor for young entrepreneurs, interested in tech and startups.
2/18/2018 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
938 Will 28 Year King of Malware IPO with $130m in ARR in Next 12 months?
Marcin Kleczynski is the CEO and co-founder of Malwarebytes. Kleczynski co-founded Malwarebytes in 2008. By 2014, Malwarebytes had treated over 250 million computers worldwide. Kleczynski was named one of Forbes Magazine's '30 Under 30' Rising Stars of Enterprise Technology in 2015.
2/17/2018 • 21 minutes, 4 seconds
937 SaaS: How He Gets 100-150% Expansion Revenue in Customer Year 2
Pierre-Loic Assayag is the CEO and Co-Founder of Traackr. A veteran of the internet economy, Pierre-Loic is focused on using technology as an instrument of change and innovation to transform companies and industries as he did successively at Viant (first internet pure play consultancy), Invivia (seamless computing), Optaros (SaaS implementation for e-commerce), and now at Traackr. He sees Traackr, and the underlying practice of influencer marketing the company founded, as a catalyst for inevitable change for all organizations to regain the trust and attention of their customers.
2/16/2018 • 18 minutes
936 He Made $8m Last Year Getting Ordinary People On Stage with Bon Jovi
2/15/2018 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
935 How to Reset After Raising $27m and Hiring Too Fast
Fred Shilmover is the CEO and co-founder of InsightSquared. He has helped grow the sales intelligence company from a single spreadsheet into one of Boston's premiere tech startups. Prior to founding InsightSquared, Fred was a corporate development associate with Salesforce Ventures and before that he held several key roles at Bessemer Venture Partners including associate and Director of IT. He is a board member of TUGG, an organization that brings together tech entrepreneurs with social enterprises that support at-risk youth. Fred received his B.A. from Tufts and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He is an mediocre triathlete and runner, but he tries hard. In fact, he managed to complete the last three Boston Marathons. He enjoys turning large pieces of wood into small ones. Fred is also an avid wakeboarder.
2/14/2018 • 19 minutes, 19 seconds
934 The Acquired Company at $160k MRR, 12 Months Later at $500k+ MRR, Here's How
Prior to coming to RingLead, Chris founded and presided over one of the fastest growing divisions at CA Technologies the Security and Storage Division. Chris served as Senior Vice President of the division. Chris also founded Total Defense, a cloud-based endpoint security company for consumer, SMB, and enterprise. Following his time at Total Defense, Chris served as President of Teq's cloud-based SaaS educational platform. Teq was one of the first companies to build a robotics program for New York and New Jersey schools. Teq remains one of the largest independent educational resellers. Chris is married to his wonderful wife, Denise Hickey. Together they have two beautiful children, Lauren and Tyler. Chris is involved in many charities and is a major supporter of the National Center of Missing & Exploited Children. One of Chris' first objectives as CEO was to create a performance-based culture and ensure that all RingLead employees are eligible for equity stake at RingLead upon meeting their expectations. Chris is a huge advocate of performance-based cultures and has successfully introduced the culture at the last three companies he lead. Chris is devoted to increasing the productivity of your company by bringing you an end-to-end, industry-leading data management solution, and world-class customer support.
2/13/2018 • 25 minutes, 17 seconds
933 Why Wordpress CEO Raised $300m, Replaced Himself, and New Gutenberg
Matt Mullenweg, co-founder, WordPress; founder & CEO, Automattic Matt Mullenweg is the co-founder of the open-source blogging platform, WordPress, the most popular publishing platform on the web, and the founder & CEO of Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, WooCommerce, and Jetpack. Additionally, Matt runs Audrey Capital, an investment and research company. He has been recognized for his leadership and success by Forbes, Bloomberg Businessweek, Inc Magazine, TechCrunch, Fortune, Fast Company, Wired, University Philosophical Society, and Vanity Fair. Matt is originally from Houston, Texas, where he attended the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts and studied jazz saxophone. In his spare time, Matt is an avid photographer. Matt splits time between Houston, New York, and San Francisco.
2/12/2018 • 37 minutes, 29 seconds
932 How ShareASale CEO Kept 100% Equity, Sold For $35m+
As the founder and CEO of ShareASale, Brian has connected thousands of merchants and affiliates alike, ensuring mutual profitability while preserving the spirit and core values of the affiliate marketing industry. Since 2000, his leadership and vision have helped shape the industry into what it is today. ShareASale currently supports over 4,000 retailers on the ShareASale Network, working strategically with its clients, both on the advertising and publishing end, to maximize their individual potential. Brian is a three-time winner of the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Award for Affiliate Marketing Advocate of the Year, and has served as the President of the Board of Directors for the Performance Marketing Association. In January 2017, ShareASale was acquired by global Affiliate Marketing network Awin.
2/11/2018 • 20 minutes, 28 seconds
931 Qualtrics "Well Past" $250m in ARR, When Will The Go Public?
Ryan Smith co-founded Qualtrics in 2002 with the goal of making sophisticated research simple. Ryan is a graduate of Brigham Young University and is a frequent guest lecturer at Brigham Young University's Marriott School of Business and Stanford University's Graduate School of Business.
2/10/2018 • 28 minutes, 15 seconds
930 How a $10m Software Guy Ends up In Furniture Business and Tony Robbins
Founded Timeslips - grew to 10m sold for 8 figures, CEO of Tony Robbins and Chet Holmes Business Breakthroughs Int'l then wrote my book: The Invisible Organization and now I build Certification Programs.
2/9/2018 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
929 MuleSoft 2.0? Passes $40m in ARR Integration Platform as a Service
George has more than 20 years of leadership experience in the enterprise software space. Prior to Jitterbit, George was a founding member of C3, a Tom Siebel venture focused on energy and carbon management. Previously, George was vice president of worldwide sales at Cast Iron Systems, leading global field operations for the integration appliance vendor prior to its acquisition by IBM. George has also served as regional vice president at Oracle and Siebel Systems, leading the most successful sales team in the history of the company.
2/8/2018 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
928 1.5m Pay Their Parketing Meters Every Month Using This App
2/7/2018 • 16 minutes, 55 seconds
927 SaaS Security Company Hits $40m in ARR, $.50c on $1 to Bottom Line
RedSeal's network modeling and risk scoring platform is the foundation for enabling enterprise networks to be resilient to cyber events. Government agencies and Global 2000 companies rely on RedSeal to help them improve their overall security posture, accelerate incident response and increase the productivity of their security and network teams.
2/6/2018 • 18 minutes, 44 seconds
926 How Teen Launched $250k Record Label, Then Kidney Failure, Now $1.5m Agency
I had built a successful record label and toured the world before turning 24. Then, I was diagnosed with end stage kidney failure. Today, I run a digital agency which works with exciting early stage companies and I want to inspire people to find their purpose through the pain.
2/5/2018 • 20 minutes, 52 seconds
925 How to Grow ARR 48% YoY from $17m to $28m in SMB SaaS Space
Intense, boisterous, imaginative. Brendan King, CEO of Vendasta is the innovative force of the company. Constantly in discussion with partners, Brendan is committed to finding new ways to help enhance brand awareness, increase revenue and drive down cost of acquisition. It’s his ability to look at the big picture while maintaining quality on the finest details that ensures Vendasta's success.
2/4/2018 • 25 minutes, 51 seconds
924 How to Spin a Million Dollar SaaS Company Out of Media Agency
Matt is America's leading expert on the millennial generation, having consulted for over half of the Fortune 500. In 2002, he founded MRY, which grew to 500 employees and was acquired in 2011 by the Publicis Groupe. In 2016, Matt joined Crowdtap as CEO (a company spun-off from MRY), and has since focused on bringing Crowdtap's real-time consumer research product, Suzy, to market.
2/3/2018 • 19 minutes, 54 seconds
923 He's Doing $10m-$30m in ARR Between Adtech and SaaS
Amit is the founder and CEO of Taykey, a real-time data company. He started programming at the age of 10. After high school, he went to work developing innovative technologies for the Israeli Defense Ministry. Amit is also the founder of bWitty and I WittySearch, an award winning search engine.
2/2/2018 • 20 minutes, 38 seconds
922 SaaS: Is $120m ARR Workfront About to IPO?
As President and CEO, Alex drives Workfront's overall strategy, vision, and execution, ensuring Workfront is a dedicated partner in helping customers transform the work experience. Shootman brings over 25 years of experience in all areas of revenue and profit generation for technology organizations, with significant experience leading SaaS-based companies.
2/1/2018 • 25 minutes, 27 seconds
921 SaaS: How to Get 500k Consumer Customers Paying $40/yr To Turn Into Business Customers
Emmanuel is the CEO of Dashlane, the world's best password manager. He has over 20 years of management experience across the technology and media sectors. Emmanuel has a Master's in Engineering from Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Universite de Toulouse; he also completed the Executive Education Program at Harvard Business School.
Roy Raanani is the CEO of Chorus.ai and an engineer with a passion for business and sales. He's spent his career working with start-ups and advising technology companies on strategy and operations. Roy started his career at Bain & Company, and holds a BASc in Engineering Science from the University of Toronto, and an MBA from Stanford. He was the first hire at Eric Schmidt's Innovation Endeavors.
1/30/2018 • 24 minutes, 6 seconds
919 SaaS: A More Engaging Slack Passes $500 Customers, $7m Raised
Brad Palmer is the CEO and co-founder of Jostle. He has more than 30 years of experience leading multidisciplinary teams and driving the commercialization of technology businesses. Brad loves helping organizations create extraordinary workplaces by putting people at the heart of it.
1/29/2018 • 13 minutes, 58 seconds
918 SaaS: Fraud Prevention Company Raises $54m, Passes 500 Customers
Rob is the Chief Executive Officer of Coupa, and drives the company's strategy and execution. Rob has over two decades experience in the business software industry. He came to Coupa from SuccessFactors, where he ran Global Product Marketing & Management, as a member of the executive management team, as the company scaled from an early start up to a successful public company. Prior to that, Rob directed Product Management at Siebel Systems, where he helped build Siebel ERM into one of the company's fastest growing product lines. Rob also did a stint in management consulting at McKinsey & Company, and spent four years at Accenture, where he focused on global SAP systems implementations. Rob is a guest lecturer at Harvard and Stanford business schools, and a frequent contributor to Forbes and Fortune magazines. He can often be heard providing commentary on major news channels including Bloomberg and NPR. Rob earned a BS in Information Systems from the State University of New York at Albany and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
1/28/2018 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
917 SaaS: How To Help Non-Profits and Build $12m ARR Company
Scot is the CEO & Co-Founder of Classy, a social enterprise that creates world-class online fundraising tools for nonprofits, modernizing the giving experience to accelerate global social impact. Since 2011, fundraising on the Classy platform has doubled each year—resulting in thousands of nonprofits collectively raising over half a billion dollars.
1/27/2018 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
916 SaaS: Y Combinator QA Company Passes $12m+ in ARR After Graham Shits on Name
1/26/2018 • 20 minutes, 10 seconds
915 He Hunts Down University IP and Figures Out How to Commercialize at Scale
1/25/2018 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
914 Finally Gamers Get Rid of Lag Using New, $6m Funded Tool
Adam Toll was set on solving a big problem for video gamers: internet lag. Adam invented Haste with cofounder Taric Mirza, which uses next-generation network software that reduces lag and improves overall network stability. Adam was the first Haste investor and previously Co-Founder and COO of BigChampagne.
1/24/2018 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
913 Adtech: Revenues of $110m on $500m Spend, How it breaks down
Shawn Riegsecker founded Centro in 2001 intent on building software to eliminate operational inefficiencies, solve growing complexity and fragmentation challenges, and help marketers make smarter decisions. He has built Centro into one of the largest providers of media operations software and managed services in the industry.
1/23/2018 • 23 minutes, 31 seconds
912 SaaS: Internet Hacker Builds Bootstrapped Productivity Tool, Passes $2.4m in ARR
Rob is a former medical doctor turned Internet entrepreneur who is now running Timedoctor.com and Staff.com. He is from Sydney Australia and has grown to love all things SaaS.
1/22/2018 • 20 minutes, 19 seconds
911 SaaS: Instapage passes $10m+ ARR Competing with Optimizely, Unbounce
Tyson Quick is a digital marketing wiz who’s focused on perfecting the landing page optimization process. Tyson founded Instapage in 2012 after seeing how marketers were losing money in wasted ad spend. His vision since then has been to create a landing page platform that maximizes returns through advertising personalization.
1/21/2018 • 15 minutes, 51 seconds
910 Sales Call Technology On How To Sign 1000+ Seat Accounts, Pass $24m in ARR
Eric Esfahanian is CRO of Gryphon Networks, a Boston-based Saas company that specializes in driving phone-based sales effectiveness for large distributed sales teams. With over 30 design and process patents covering every aspect of advanced telephony, Gryphon counts ADT, Sprint, Santander, and New York Life among over 700 enterprise clients.
1/20/2018 • 21 minutes, 7 seconds
909 AdTech: How to Get Advertisers to Put $20m Through Your Platform While You take 5%-50%
Vitaly is a co-founder of StackAdapt, a venture-backed advertising technology company that helps brands accelerate customer acquisition. StackAdapt was named Top 20 Most Innovative Emerging companies in Canada in 2017 by CIX. StackAdapt was a part of STARTUP 50 of Canada’s Top New Growth Companies in 2017 by CanadianBusiness.
1/19/2018 • 17 minutes, 9 seconds
908 SaaS: Miva is Enterprise Shopify, Passes $16m in ARR Founded in 1996
With over 20 years of executive-level experience, Rick has a unique vantage point on the business shift to ecommerce, asserting that business society is still very early in the transition to ecommerce, with less than 10% of retail and even less of B2B transactions currently conducted in online commerce.
1/18/2018 • 22 minutes, 39 seconds
907 SaaS: How Proov Was Able to Raise $21m Pre Revenue
Toby Olshanetsky is the CEO and cofounder of prooV, the first Pilot-as-a-Service platform, which helps companies find, test-drive and implement new technologies. In the past 20 years, he has led several successful businesses, and is an active board member and mentor to numerous startups.
1/17/2018 • 17 minutes, 12 seconds
906 SaaS: Interactive Video Company Passes $1.2m ARR After Unique Way of Handling Churn
Disappointed with digital video's inability to rise to its potential, Erika started Rapt Media. Erika has worked to build a business positioned at the top of emerging video technologies, providing interactive solutions to enterprise companies. Erika has solidified an A-list customer portfolio including companies like PwC, Samsung, Accenture, and Vodafone.
1/16/2018 • 19 minutes, 59 seconds
905 Went Public, $650m Market Cap, Crashed, Now $10m ARR But Only $1.8m Market Cap, Why?
Peter Friedman is a social media visionary and veteran with over 30 years of experience in the space. He's the founder, Chairman, and CEO of LiveWorld. He's also the author of 'The CMO's Social Media Handbook, A Step By Step Guide For Leading Marketing Teams in the Social Media World'.
1/15/2018 • 25 minutes, 30 seconds
904 5 Revenue Streams of Financial Services Business Makes Founder $7.5m Annually
1/14/2018 • 16 minutes, 40 seconds
903 $700m Goes Through BizX As SMB's Barter and Trade Services and Goods
1/13/2018 • 16 minutes, 42 seconds
902 SaaS: Bootstrapped BiznessApps Passes $17m in ARR, 3000 Agency's Building SMB Mobile Apps
Andrew Gazdecki is the founder and CEO of Bizness Apps, a do-it-yourself mobile app builder and mobile website creator for small businesses with over 500,000 customers worldwide.
Ross Andrew Paquette is the founder and CEO of Maropost, ranked as one of North America's fastest growing tech companies by Deloitte. After starting Maropost in 2011, Ross has grown the company from a one-man-operation in his apartment, to an international business valued at $160M USD, in just six years.
1/11/2018 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
900 He Helps Hospitals Make More Money By Connecting Data Sources, $1m+ ARR
1/10/2018 • 14 minutes, 39 seconds
899 How to Reward Customers with GiftCards at Scale Using $10m+ Revenue TangoCard
Tango Card Founder and CEO. Cofounder and SVP Sales and Strategy FiberTower. On Board of Mighty Oakes Heart Foundation and prior Board member at Summer Search. Father of 2 and SoundersFC fan/atic.
1/9/2018 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
898 SaaS: SnapApp Lands Amazon as Customer, Passes $8m in ARR
Seth is the founder and CEO of SnapApp. As a repeat entrepreneur, Seth was previously the founder & CEO of Pangea Media (acquired by AdKnowledge) and co-founder & CEO of Focalex, (acquired by Intermix / MySpace). He started out as a banker at Credit Suisse First Boston.
1/8/2018 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
897 His Mobile App Was Downloaded 8m Times, Now Builds for Others Doing $9m+ This Year
Brian Co-Founded InMotion Software in 2008 with the vision of a studio focusing on mobile development. He has lead the studio to create over ~30 mobile titles, with 6 reaching the top 100, including a #1 hit in the AppStore. Today Brian leads a team of 60+ developers and designers
1/7/2018 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
896 How Fuse Plans to Introduce Paid Product to Free Community Built Over 5+ Years
CEO & Co-founder of Fuse, a cutting-edge UX tool suite for mobile app designers and developers. Currently in beta, for Mac and PC.
1/6/2018 • 20 minutes, 49 seconds
895 $10m+ Balancing Act Between SaaS and Variable CPM Revenue
Erik Matlick guides vision and corporate strategy at Bombora, bringing over 15 years in founding, board and executive management experience. An online performance marketing pioneer, Erik's insights about the confluence of data analytics, media operations, ad serving technology, sales and marketing processes are the driving force behind Bombora's value proposition.
1/5/2018 • 18 minutes, 26 seconds
894 SaaS: How Broadly Got SMB Churn Sub 2%, 5m+ ARR
Josh Melick is CEO and Co-Founder of Broadly.com, a review generation platform focused on local business online reputation. Prior to founding Broadly, Josh was Director of Product at DemandForce, which was acquired by Intuit in 2012. Josh also held leadership roles with Ingenio, which was purchased by AT&T in 2007.
1/4/2018 • 18 minutes, 11 seconds
893 SaaS: How Zapier Passed 60k Paid Seats and $20m in ARR
Co-founder and CEO of Zapier
1/3/2018 • 24 minutes, 16 seconds
892 SaaS: How he Sold 80,000 Seats at $10 a pop
Enterprise software veteran, worked for Oracle and Cashedge (now part of Fiserv) prior to founding Apptivo. Working to change the way small businesses will run their business to minimize costs, optimize business processes and make better business decisions.
1/2/2018 • 20 minutes
891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Max lives in Indianapolis serving as the Co-Founder and CEO of Lessonly. Max and Lessonly are focused on building and delivering team learning software that helps people do better work. Every day, Max is grateful for being cut from the basketball team two years in a row.
Eugene Woo is the CEO of Venngage, an infographic design tool. His mission is to help businesses tell their stories with compelling and memorable visuals. He enjoys reading and writing about content marketing, entrepreneurship, and data visualization. You can read more of his articles on the Venngage blog.
12/31/2017 • 24 minutes, 55 seconds
889 1% of Humanity Uses This Bootstrapped Tool, $100m+ Revenue
David Erickson is the Founder and CEO of FreeConferenceCall.com. His simple ideas and deft execution have transformed the telecommunications industry to better suit the needs of consumers and businesses worldwide. Dave founded FreeConferenceCall.com on the simple principle that collaborative communication should be available to everyone, both affordably and efficiently. He purchased a $10 URL, which sparked the first viral movement in the telecommunications industry to support free conferencing around the globe.
12/30/2017 • 21 minutes, 44 seconds
888 SaaS: How To break $480k MRR by Focusing on 1 Vertical
Unite and automate all the moving parts of your business so that you can do the work you love from one smart platfrom.
12/29/2017 • 27 minutes, 5 seconds
887 22 Year Old King of Influencer Marketing?
Victor Ricci has always loved the Internet and creating things. He had experimented in different areas of technology and business to find what he was passionate about. During this process he started a half dozen web companies before founding one he loved, TrendPie.com.
12/28/2017 • 22 minutes, 25 seconds
886 SaaS: 27 Year Old Breaks $240m in Annual Revenue, Piping of the Internet
Segment's co-founder and CEO; He studied Aerospace Engineering at MIT and fell into the world of customer data and analysis when he and three of his college friends started Segment in 2011 as part of Y Combinator. He and his wife Erika, who he met at MIT, live together in San Francisco.
12/27/2017 • 26 minutes, 7 seconds
885 Auction Marketplace will Sell $500m This Year, Takes 25% As Revenue
Andrew Blachman is the COO of Tophatter, the world's fastest, most entertaining marketplace for mobile shoppers, where he oversees ongoing business operations within the company. Previously, he was the CEO of GET ME IN! Blachman has both a B.A. and M.S. degree from Stanford University.
12/26/2017 • 16 minutes, 43 seconds
884 SaaS: From Startup to $1b+ IPO, the Coupa Story
12/25/2017 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
883 SaaS: What To Do When Your Lead Developer Quits
25 years-old French entrepreneur. Turned a grad-school side-hustle into a +$20K monthly recurring business in a few months. I founded LeadGuru.io to stop B2B companies from spending hours building bad, boring, low-yielding cold-emailing campaigns. We come in and pump their cold-emailing capacities to the next level. They just sit and watch hot leads flooding their inbox.
12/24/2017 • 20 minutes, 37 seconds
882 AdTech: $250m on $1b Ad Spend as Rubicon Project Enters Header Bidding Space
Joe Prusz is Global Head of Revenue at Rubicon Project, responsible for all revenue-related activities across Publishers, Demand-side Platforms, and Global Agency Relationships, tasked with the goal of continuing the adoption and growth of automated advertising across all screens and devices, driving more than $1B in advertising spend. Formerly he was Head of Seller, Americas, responsible for Rubicon Project's largest revenue region for publishers across North America and LATAM. Prior to that, he was the Head of Mobile globally, where he was responsible for general management and strategic oversight of the Mobile business, the fastest growing division of the company. Charged with building the Mobile revenue team and product, analyzing M&A opportunities for both Mobile and the company at large, and overall was an evangelist for both the company and the mobile advertising technology industry. Under his leadership, the Mobile business unit grew from $0 to over $325M in Managed Revenue globally, catapulting Rubicon Project to become the world's largest independent mobile advertising marketplace in less than four years. His greatest joys are his wife and two children.
12/23/2017 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
881 He's Helping Other Podcasters Launch for $5-10k
12/22/2017 • 18 minutes, 34 seconds
880 SaaS: Why Is This Engineer Competing in Highly Competitive Space?
Building social media automation and more for SMB's around the world. Jack of all trades, master of some. Lean startup enthusiast. Strong opinions weakly (& weekly) held.
12/21/2017 • 17 minutes, 45 seconds
879 SaaS: From $360k Agency to 2 month old, $30k ARR SaaS
Gal Dubinski and Tomer Aharon: We're both 28 years old. Co-founders of Poptin (SaaS) and Ecpm (a digital agency). We met in a gifted class in high school and have been best friends since then. Started our business as university students while living together in the same apartment with our girlfriends (today wives).
12/20/2017 • 18 minutes, 20 seconds
878 SaaS: Bootstrapped and $10m+ in ARR Founder Rides Mechanical Bull To Lock Down Demos
Founder of Vuture, the 16th fastest SAAS business in the world (2017) Finalist of the Shell Livewire Young Entrepreneur of the year. London based entrepreneur, who has lived and worked in New York and Sydney. A bootstrap expert, with a strong belief in the fundamentals of underpinning profitability with growth.
12/19/2017 • 21 minutes, 49 seconds
877 SaaS: Construction Team Management App Passes $1m ARR Using 500 Sausages and Beer
Ulrik is GenieBelts Chief Genie, and part of the coolest start up team in Copenhagen. With a long commercial background and experience with various startups, he's bringing GenieBelt to a construction site near you. Ulrik's favourite tool: nail gun
12/18/2017 • 24 minutes, 55 seconds
876 SaaS: Selling Discounted "Lifetime Subscriptions" For One Flat Fee is Huge Risk
Daniel is a father of 2 and has been married to his wife Samantha for almost 10 years. Daniel left school at 15 to work full-time. From there, he learned design and started freelancing. Marriage life and children meant focusing on a more secure method of employment, so he secured a Telecoms & Networks Engineer role. After 5 years, he knew that working for somebody else wasn't his calling. With his co-founder Matthew Spurr, they started a branding agency using Daniel's skill of design and Matt's skill of sales and marketing. This venture was cut short though because of Quuu. The rest is history :-)
12/17/2017 • 25 minutes, 7 seconds
875 SaaS: Bizable Passes $1m MRR in Attribution Wars
Aaron Bird is the full-stack CEO at Bizible, a venture-backed startup that makes marketing measurement and planning software for B2B companies. He holds an MBA from Pepperdine University and a B.S. in Computer Science from UCSB. Previously, Aaron worked at Microsoft on Bing Ads.
12/16/2017 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
874 How This $10m+ Agency Keeps 85%+ Gross Margins
Bob Gilbreath is Co-Founder and CEO of Ahalogy, a data-driven social and influencer marketing company with clients such as Nestle, Kraft and Costco. He is the author of The Next Evolution of Marketing (McGraw-Hill) and was named an Advertising Age Top 50 Marketer. Bob has degrees from NYU and Duke.
12/15/2017 • 17 minutes, 20 seconds
873 How ShareThis Is Pivoting To A B2B SaaS Data Play
12/14/2017 • 24 minutes, 29 seconds
The "GiftCard Trick" to $6m in ARR
JazzHR CEO Pete Lamson explains how the company uses $25 Amazon giftcards to drive customer conversions. It's working. The company has over 3000 paying customers today and $6m in ARR.
12/13/2017 • 20 minutes, 27 seconds
871 Which is Smarter: Buying vs Starting Companies
JD Graffam makes an interesting argument for buying companies instead of starting new ones.
After receiving his MBA from Stanford, Steven Benson worked in Sales at IBM, HP and Google where he was Google Enterprise's Top Sales Executive in 2009. In 2012 Steven founded Badger Maps, the #1 Sales App in the Apple App Store, which helps Field Sales People be more successful. How do you put touch on such a low price point? The sales cycle is quick, about 3 weeks, so we're able to put touch on most free trials even though starting price point is $35 a seat. Marketing, Sales, and customer success all tied together but manage themselves in pods. There is no variable comp, including the sales roles. Everyone is on salary and everyone owns equity so they can take part in upside. What is revenue growth? Back in December 2016 we were doing $130k, now in August 2017 we're at about $180k in MRR so about 80% yoy growth rate. We're using bank debt, 19% interest rate with LighterCapital, to fund growth because its non dilutive. In July 2017 spent about $15k on paid marketing. Has sales team of 30 that works those leads and makes up larger part of cost structure. Are you cash flow positive? (Minute 17) Yes because we're pulling cash forward in the form of multi year deals. We incentivize this by giving customers a 20% discount. Favorite business book is Predictable Revenue. I'm following Jason Lempkin at SaaStr. My favorite online tool is gmail. Steven has no kids, gets 7 hours of sleep and is currently 39. He wishes his 20 year old self would choose a career path that he enjoyed, that their are jobs in, and that he was good at. Connect with Nathan: Website Twitter Facebook Page Snapchat Instagram
12/8/2017 • 23 minutes, 52 seconds
866 SaaS: Sports Teams Use This $40m+ Company To Manage Communication
I really enjoyed this interview with Dave for two big reasons: He’s playing in a space that is not typical for B2B SaaS He’s using freemium consumer adoption to drive enterprise leads at a very low CAC of $80 which he makes back in well under 12 months. Dave is the CEO of TeamSnap. He has more than 20 years of experience in technology leadership positions. He was previously CEO of SANRAD, a venture-funded storage networking company, which he joined in 2006. He also helped found LeftHand Networks, a Boulder-based company sold to Hewlett Packard. Prior to that, Dave was with Hewlett-Packard. An avid skier and wannabe competitive cyclist, Dave lives in Boulder with wife Deb and two children, Mariel and Gabe. He enjoys reading, cooking and microbreweries Revenue Model: Over 1m teams use TeamSnap and 250,000 of those teams pay Dave $80 per year to use TeamSnap to manage team communication, logistics, and more. The average team has 30 people ranging from coaches, to players, to players parents. TeamSnap leverages 3 revenue streams with the SaaS component making up 40% of the total revenue mix. SaaS revenues are about $20m in ARR from 250k teams paying $80 per year. Total revenue is approaching $50m which Dave expects the company will cross in Q1 2018. Overall the business is growing over 100% year over year. On Launching in 2009 in poor economy: Dave: 2009 was best time for us to launch. The trough of a recessions is best time to get company going due to low opportunity cost. In recession there are talented people available for hire. 2009 revenue was less than $100,000. It took Dave just 3 years to break $1m in ARR which happened in 2012. Fundraising First 5 years from 2009 to 2014 the company was bootstrapped. Dupont funded the company with his own capital and local area angels. He put a couple hundred thousand in himself in early days. In 2014 they took their first institutional capital and have sense raised a total of $43.7m. On seasonal users and how that affects TeamSnap gross logo churn monthly: Teams pay $15 during the season then stop paying us off-season. We don’t look at this as churn because we know they come back next season. They are simply “in-active”. The company looks at revenue per customer on an annual basis which averages about $80. On customer acquisition: We use our consumer app which people use for free to drive enterprise sales in a land and expand strategy. 30% of new consumer customers come through referrals. We’ve boosted that up by spending about $500k per month on Google and FB ads mostly. Payback is pretty strong, under 12 months. They’ll pay $80 to acquire a customer that is worth about $280 over their lifetime which puts LTV to CAC ratio at about 3.5. Cash Flow: Net burn is really close to our discretionary marketing budget of $500k/mo. We are in good shape cash wise. Near September of next year (2018) we’ll be cash flow breakeven at much higher revenue level. We’ll figure out then what to do strategy wise. We are on the path to being a billion dollar company. I have no desire to sell out quickly to anybody. Build as big as can, shoot for IPO, create fantastic product over long haul. Strategy towards IPO: Large competitors like Comcast compete with us with their subsidiary called SportsEngine. Dicks sporting goods has a competitor in space called BlueSombrero and AffinitySports. Lastly, a private equity funded company called BlueStar Sports compete with us. Many of our competitors are purchasing small players and just aggregating. A short term private equity play versus a long term 20+ year deal. Would you accept $400m offer from Comcast? (minute 22) Well it would depend on the moment in time. In 2016 probably, in 2017 maybe, next year when revenue is higher, no way in hell! What is your favorite business book? The Hard Thing About Hard Things Is there a CEO you’re following or studying right now? Samir, SendGrid CEO Whats your favorite online tool? Apple pencil to evernote. How many hours of sleep do you get every night? 7 What would you tell your 20 year old self? I’m married with 2 kids, married for 30 years, and I’m “approaching a milestone birthday”. I wish my 20 year old self knew that “nobody does it alone”. Connect with Nathan: Website Twitter Facebook Page Snapchat Instagram
12/7/2017 • 28 minutes, 5 seconds
865 SaaS: Hootsuite On It's 16m Paying Customers, $100m+ ARR and Social Media Marketing
12/6/2017 • 27 minutes, 28 seconds
864 SaaS: LiquidPlanner Goes Niche Project Management, $6m+ in ARR
12/5/2017 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
863 AdTech: $720m Valuation, The 50+ Year Unicorn Processing $160 Billion in Spend
12/4/2017 • 26 minutes, 59 seconds
862 With $150m+ Revenue, Plus New Product, Can Anyone Catch Sprinklr?
12/3/2017 • 33 minutes, 17 seconds
861 SaaS: Started at 15 Years Old, Can They Beat Intercom, Hotjar?
12/2/2017 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
860 10% Churn: When SaaS Pricing Gets Attached to Campaign Driven Product
12/1/2017 • 15 minutes, 2 seconds
859 How Kabbage Took Small Business Lending Crown: $500m raised, $4b Lended
Rob Frohwein. Back in 2008, he recognized that companies like eBay offered automated access to small business transactional data via APIs. He also realized that small businesses could simply share this data to allow underwriters to make better, faster credit decisions and provide a great user experience. Because of that, he co-founded Kabbage in Atlanta, Georgia, to leverage the power of real-time data automation through technology. The company has since expanded to serve all small businesses throughout the U.S., providing billions of dollars to more than 100,000 customers.
11/30/2017 • 22 minutes, 11 seconds
858 SaaS: College Business Plan Turned $4m Biz, "We Just Raised $6m"
Tom Coburn. He’s the cofounder and CEO of Jebbit. He left Boston College to pursue the company and is currently in the Forbes 30 under 30 list. He’s also the cofounder of Enjoy Life Education, a non-profit that empowers teens to be the best versions of themselves, and SSC Ventures which invests in Boston College entrepreneurs.
11/29/2017 • 19 minutes, 37 seconds
857 How The New Rich Use Instagram To Travel $10k+ For Free
Zach Benson. He’s the cofounder and CEO of Assistagram and he’s one of the standouts in the world of online entrepreneurship, especially, influencer marketing. He’s a TedX speaker, social media trainer for international brands like The 4 Seasons, Ritz Carlton and Vice Roy. He was a past participant on “So You Think You Can Dance”. He doesn’t only manages his own Instagram network of millions, he’s also guiding other influencers and Fortune 500 companies through Assistagram to social media success.
11/28/2017 • 16 minutes, 1 second
856 SaaS: How Brightfunnel CEO Replaced Himself After Hitting $2m+ ARR, 45 Employees
Nadim Hossain. He has over 17 years of experience in building marketing and selling cloud applications. Prior to founding BrightFunnel, he was VP of marketing at Power Reviews, paving the way for a $170M exit. He was also the marketing executive at Salesforce from 2007-2010. He has a BA from Cornell and an MBS from Stanford.
11/27/2017 • 23 minutes, 29 seconds
855 How This Bootstrapped CEO is Competing with $400m Raised Qualtrics
Greg Harris. His company is Quantum Workplace and he started with a vision to create tangible measures for leadership strength inside of companies. His company surveyed tools for measuring employee engagement and recognizing the best places to work. It’s grown into an engagement platform that talent-minded companies use now to accelerate performance.
11/26/2017 • 18 minutes, 38 seconds
854 How He Uses Internal Software To Make His $2m+ Agency more Valuable
Harpreet Singh. He’s one of the cofounders of Kvantum. He’s in a lot of positions based in data science including big companies like Target and Sapient.
11/25/2017 • 13 minutes, 59 seconds
SaaS: North Dakota $400k+ MRR Helping You Manage Marketing Calendar
Garrett Moon. He’s the CEO and founder of CoSchedule, the web’s most popular marketing calendar and the fastest growing startup in North Dakota. As a thought leader, Garrett has been blogging and speaking about content marketing, social media marketing, and startup businesses for more than six years.
11/24/2017 • 22 minutes, 6 seconds
852: FinTech: Businesses Process $10b+ In Supplier Payments Through NvoicePay
11/23/2017 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
851: SaaS: How Exponea CEO Plans to Raise $7m on $50m Valuation This Month
11/22/2017 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
850: SaaS: How Promorepublic Went From $6k to $20k MRR
Max Percherskyi. He’s a passionate SaaS entrepreneur whose mission is to connect professional SaaS companies and startup hubs to help them form long-term relationships and good, win-win partnerships. Currently, he’s connecting angel institutional investors, cofounders, exceptional talent and partner companies across three different countries to make the PromoRepublic ventures succeed at a global scale. Prior to cofounding PromoRepublic, he worked in marketing agencies for ten years and was responsible for business development, digital marketing and sales. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Top 101 Growth Hacks What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — WorkFlowly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Max would tell himself that not all people will love him Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Max to the show 02:22 – PromoRepublic is a social media content automation tool that helps SMBs create their social media presence 02:38 – PromoRepublic is a SaaS business 02:45 – Pricing starts at $15 a month for an annual package 02:55 – ACV is $20 a month 03:00 – Max was in Episode 403 03:27 – PromoRepublic will soon have a $100 plan 03:53 – CAC is now $150-170 04:18 – Paid channels spend varies every month 04:33 – Affiliate network is the one that is working now 05:28 – PromoRepublic has raised $1.85M in total 06:12 – Team size is 22 06:26 – PromoRepublic has 3 offices 07:30 – PromoRepublic hired a sales guy to sell their high value plans 08:29 – There’s commission for every plan sold 10:00 – PromoRepublic has around 5,500 customers, 3000 are from AppSumo 10:32 – Most of the customers from AppSumo just bought the product; some are active, some aren’t 12:33 – Last month’s MRR was $20K 12;54 – Logo churn is around 5.8% 14:07 – 2016 revenue was €110K 14:33 – 2017 total revenue will be around $300K 15:08 – PromoRepublic is going to receive a grant and will take an additional loan 17:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your team size must align with your profitability. Paid advertising takes time—test to see which ads will work the best. Use your capital wisely. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/21/2017 • 19 minutes, 20 seconds
849: SaaS: Kinvey Acquired for $50m To Help Frontend Devs Be Backend Devs
Sravish Sridhar. He’s the VP and General Manager at Kinvey Progress and was previously the CEO and founder of Kinvey before it was acquired by Progress. He’s also an angel investor in multiple startups with successful exits. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Matt Barbey Favorite online tool? — If This Then That How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would never become a movie actor” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Sravish to the show 02:18 – Kinvey’s acquisition closed on June 1st and was announced on June 28th 02:30 – Kinvey does “backend as a service”, which is a term that they coined 02:58 – Schneider Electric has a lot of apps that are used to interact with its hardware, employees and customers 03:13 – Kinvey is in charge of the backend features that an app needs 03:44 – “We make every frontend developer become a backend developer” 03:55 – Developers don’t have to learn the backend processes, they can simply drag and drop 04:07 – Kinvey has three types of customers: 04:10 – First, those who are building apps as a hobby or trial and pay nothing up to $200 a month 04:22 – Second, business edition customers who pay an average of $24K a year per application 04:44 – Lastly, enterprise edition customers who pay around 6 figures a year 05:03 – ACV is around $80K to $90K 05:24 – When Sravish came up with the idea for Kinvey, he knew it should be a venture-backed company 05:46 – Sravish funded the initial capital of $150K 06:06 – Kinvey has raised over $15M before the acquisition 06:30 – It took Kinvey 15 month to launch their product 06:43 – In the second year, they started to build their revenue 07:10 – In 2013, they were doing high 6-figures in revenue 07:24 – They broke their million dollar mark in 2014 07:54 – Sravish invested in startups to learn strategies and build his financial portfolio 09:20 – Sravish has three things he looks for when investing in a startup: 09:22 – The team’s relationship with each other 09:39 – The space of the startup 09:55 – The potential he has to help the startup to grow 10:40 – Kinvey has over 50 enterprise customers 12:54 – The acquisition of Kinvey by Progress was for $50M 13:13 – Sravish shares how the board and himself decided on the acquisition 14:40 – Sravish’s discussion with Progress 15:43 – Team size prior to acquisition was 44 and everyone stayed after the acquisition, current team size is 65-70 16:00 – Kinvey had multiple offers and it took them 2-3 months to decide 16:40 – Progress matched the best offer 17:00 – Kinvey and Progress are both based in Boston 17:58 – Kinvey had direct sales models and enterprise sales reps 18:10 – CAC is $95K to $100K and LTV is $2.1-2.2M 18:33 – Payback period is 13-14 months 19:04 – Kinvey has 98% retention rate 20:40 – Progress has been thoughtful with their employees’ restricted stock units (RSU) 23:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Choose the deal that will be a great fit for the long-term. Always consider the company and, most importantly, your team’s future when making decisions. Investing isn’t just about the financial gains, it’s about your ability to believe in and help a company grow and succeed. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/20/2017 • 25 minutes, 35 seconds
848: SaaS: Wistia Video King? $10m+ ARR, 10k+ Customers on Just $1m Raised!
Chris Savage. He’s the CEO and cofounder of Wistia, a leading video platform that enables business teams to harness the connective power of video. They help over 400K businesses connect better with their customers using video as the medium. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Masters of Doom What CEO do you follow? – Ben Chestnut Favorite online tool? — Quip How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Persistence is the difference between success and failure” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:51 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:17 – Wistia is a SaaS business 02:20 – Wistia is a platform where you can upload your videos and customize them for your site 02:49 – Wistia charges based on the number of videos 02:55 – ACV is $100 a month and it’s 25 cents per video 03:38 – Wistia is already 11 years old 04:09 – Wistia didn’t make money their first year 05:08 – Chris and his cofounder needed at least 15K a month to live 05:55 – Wistia made a mistake when they weren’t charging based on the storage 06:35 – Chris explains their decision to change their pricing 07:04 – Gross margin is in the 70s 07:43 – Total number of customers 08:00 – Wistia still has a free trial for 3 videos 08:05 – There are a few hundred thousand free users 09:21 – One the best things Wistia offers is inspirational and useful content for free accounts 10:05 – Wistia gets 15% of direct, attributable conversion from free accounts 10:30 – Wistia has raised two rounds with a total of $1M 11:09 – “We are very focused on long-term” 11:29 – Chris wants Wistia to be less complex for users 12:27 – Customer churn is 1.6% a month 12:47 – On a unit economic basis, Wistia is consistently expanding 13:11 – LTV is approaching $5K 13:20 – CAC 16:00 – Stretch goal in December of 2017 16:09 – Wistia is focused on profitability 17:06 – Wistia is doing a more than million dollars a month in revenue 17:22 – Wistia has raised less than what they’re making monthly 18:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Changing the price of your product won’t necessarily equate to profitability—balance is the key. Converting customers from free to paid takes a lot of testing and patience. Persistency is the difference between success and failure. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/19/2017 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
847: SaaS: How DaPulse has 3x'ed Revenue YoY
Roy Mann. He’s a career entrepreneur, artist and 3D printing enthusiast. His experience is in the field of product development and marketing and before co-founding dapulse, Roy was part of Wix’s senior management team, which is a big, runway success. Prior to joining Wix, he founded the online social game, Save an Alien. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Avishai Abrahami Favorite online tool? — FullStory How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Whatever you learn, you learn—and in the end, we all die” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Roy to the show 02:27 – dapulse is a tool for managing operations for teams 02:38 – dapulse is a SaaS product 02:40 – dapulse has a free trial of 14 days 02:52 – ACV 04:00 – Roy was in Episode 404 of The Top 04:06 – Team size is 70 04:14 – 1/3 is in engineering and they’re expecting to grow to 100 this year 04:40 – Most of the team are in Israel and some are in the USA 05:00 – dapulse currently has 15K customers 05:15 – dapulse raised $25M at the start of 2017 05:34 – They’ve raised a total of $34M 06:13 – MRR is over $1M and $13M ARR 06:33 – dapulse is a B2B company, but their approach is like a B2C 07:06 – dapulse aims at individuals who will potentially purchase the product for their team 07:16 – dapulse has spent $1.5M just last month on online ads 07:45 – CAC 08:24 – Payback period 09:37 – dapulse’s campaign can attract a high number of customers 10:27 – Roy wants to build a product that fits everyone 10:42 – dapulse has a negative net revenue churn 11:18 – Monthly logo churn is between 1.5% to 2% 12:13 – Churn is calculated on the top line 13:48 – dapulse has -.05 net revenue churn 14:20 – dapulse sells to large companies through their Instagram ads 15:40 – dapulse doesn’t give an incentive for those who post about their user experience 16:47 – 2017 ARR goal is $17M 17:21 – December 2016 ARR is $6.5M 18:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A B2C approach can still get you customers, even if you’re B2B company. If people gain value from your product and enjoy it, they will share about it. We all make mistakes, just make sure you learn and move on. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/18/2017 • 21 minutes, 8 seconds
846: SaaS: $50m Raised, $12m+ ARR To Incentivize Reviews and Influencers
Mark Organ. He’s the founder and CEO of Influitive, helping companies mobilize their advocates to produce massive increases in referral leads, reference calls, social media participation and more. He revolutionized B2B marketing and the founding CEO of Eloqua, the world leader in marketing automation software, which was acquired by Oracle for $871M. In between, he was the go-to marketing consultant for SaaS companies in North America and Asia. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Getting to Yes What CEO do you follow? – Dara Khosrowshahi Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How important it was to build new relationships with people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Mark to the show 02:17 – Mark left Eloqua even before the acquisition 03:25 – It was the VCs that pushed Mark to leave 03:54 – Mark still had a great exit from the company 04:10 – Influitive helps companies grow by getting more value out of their happy customers 04:46 – Mark saw the importance of mobilized customers when he was still in Eloqua 05:13 – Influitive created communities where companies invite their customer advocates 05:51 – ACV is $50K annually 06:10 – Influitive currently has 270 customers 06:33 – ARR is close to $10M 06:51 – it would take 4-5 years for Influitive to reach their $100M ARR mark 07:02 – Influitive was founded in 2010 07:21 – Influitive has raised $50M 08:09 – Mark shares why he had to raise 09:13 – Influitive’s growth is faster than Eloqua’s 09:40 – 2016 revenue 10:05 – Influitive is averaging more than 50%, year-over-year growth 10:50 – Influitive is cash flow positive on some months 11:08 – Team size is 125 with 8 people in sales 11:22 – “I want all the sales guys to make money” 12:03 – Increased quotas make it impossible for salespeople to hit their numbers 12:55 – CAC is around $40K 14:10 – Payback period is a year to 15 months 17:01 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: VCs are there for a reason, trust them. Reaching one’s quotas takes a much longer time than it did a decade ago. Networking and relationships are crucial to your personal and business life. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/17/2017 • 19 minutes, 10 seconds
845: SaaS: 2014 $1.4m, Now $30m ARR how BirdEye Aiming To Be Hubspot 2.0
Naveen Gupta. He’s an entrepreneur with experience building startups and growing a hundred million dollar profit and loss statements. Before cofounding BirdEye, which is his current company, he held executive positions at RingCentral, Monster and Yahoo. He’s launched industry-leading products across advertising, consumer search, social media and monetization. He lives in Sunnyvale, California with his wife and two kids. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Predictable Revenue What CEO do you follow? – Brian Halligan Favorite online tool? — Outreach and ZoomInfo How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Naveen wished he would have taken more risks and pursued his dreams of starting a company Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Naveen to the show 02:19 – BirdEye is the leading SaaS product that helps businesses on their customer journey 02:54 – The two things that drive purchases are customer experience and business ratings 03:20 – BirdEye grows 160%, year-over-year in revenue 03:33 – BirdEye has 25K paying customers 04:40 – Business model is based on location and not per seat 05:20 – On average, a business would have 2-3 locations 05:47 – BirdEye caters from SMBs to enterprise businesses 06:07 – BirdEye has a broad platform which has different functionalities 07:42 – Pricing on SMBs start at $3K and $100K for enterprise per year 08:12 – ACV is around $5K 08:33 – 50% of the revenue is SMB, 30% mid-market enterprise and 20% for channels 09:00 – ACV is per location 09:24 – MRR is close to $2M 10:43 – BirdEye was launched in 2012 10:55 – They came up with the idea after looking for a surgeon with great reviews to take care of their mother 12:07 – BirdEye was initially bootstrapped 12:33 – BirdEye has raised a total of $33M 13:16 – Team size is 170 globally 13:48 – Around 60 are on engineering, 70 on the sales sides and the rest are in different departments 14:30 – BirdEye is investing heavily on hiring the best people 14:45 – CAC is around $1K for a new business 15:05 – Payback period is 3-4 months 15:21 – 60-70% of their contracts are paid up-front, annually 16:00 – Revenue churn 16:11 – Net churn is close to 0.5% 16:28 – BirdEye is still too young to calculate LTV 16:48 – Naveen’s estimate is 3-5 years 17:05 – Paid ads spent annually is $200K 17:55 – Gross margin is 85-90% 18:43 – To acquire new customers, they email potential clients and ask them if they want to know their competitors’ reputations and how they compare to them 19:24 – 2016 ARR was close to $13M and 2017 will be close to $30M 19:37 – 2015 ARR was $5M and 2014 was $1.5M 21:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Have a business model that will benefit not just your own company but your customers as well. Most people rely on business reviews before trying out a product or service. Hire the best people and you’ll have the best product and provide the best customer experience. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/16/2017 • 24 minutes, 27 seconds
844: SaaS: How Ignoring CAC Works for ~$100m ARR Expensify
David Barrett. He started programming at the early age of 6 and has been aspiring to become an expense report magnate ever since. He attended the University of Michigan where he worked in a virtual reality lab before moving to Texas to render 3D graphics engines for the video game industry. Next, he moved to California to join Travis of Uber in building a peer-to-peer file transfer technology called Red Swoosh, which was acquired by Akamai in 2007. In 2008, David left that company to start Expensify and has since been relieving the world’s frustration one expense report at a time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Docs How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “It is possible for everyone else around you to be wrong and for you to be right” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:46 – Nathan introduces David to the show 02:38 – Expense reports have been overlooked 02:56 – David took the opportunity that will take care of expense reports 03:18 – Expense report is synonymous with any business 03:52 – David shares how his eagerness to help the homeless led him to create an expense report reimbursement app 05:09 – David was in Episode 655 of The Top 05:16 – Expensify isn’t looking to raise another round at the moment as they just raised $25M 05:23 – Expensify is currently profitable and not burning capital 05:27 – Team size is 120 05:33 – Expensify was founded in 2008 06:04 – Expensify currently has 42K customers 06:21 – Expensify also has millions of free users 06:49 – Pricing has a free account which offers 10 receipts a month and a paid account starts at $9 per active user 07:15 – Enterprise plans also start at $9 08:21 – ARR is still under $100M 09:44 – The expansion is the bulk of Expensify’s revenue growth 10:40 – Expensify has a $5 plan for a group 11:10 – Revenue retention is over 100% annually 11:24 – Every 3 years, a customer pays 500% more 12:55 – The most effective strategy to acquire customers is to hand their product to the individual employees and promote it within their own companies 14:14 – David shares how the payment shifts from the employee's personal card to the company’s expenses 16:16 – The target is to share to at least one other person 16:35 – Expensify doesn’t have any paid channels 16:40 – They do lots of conferences which is more for establishing brand leadership 17:25 – They spend a single digit million, annually, for their conference 17:32 – Their conference is ExpensiCon 18:00 – Only 100 selected people can join 19:35 – David believes that the cost of sales doesn’t equate to the cost of customer acquisition 21:38 – The most important decisions are not quantifiable 22:40 – David won’t sell Expensify for $300M 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Getting your own clients to refer you is the best way to grow your customer base. The most important decisions for your company are sometimes not quantifiable. Focus on the best possible brand or product you can offer. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/15/2017 • 26 minutes, 21 seconds
843: SaaS: Call Tracking Convirza on $10m ARR, Major Acquisition to Double Business
Jeremiah Wilson. He founded Convirza over 15 years ago. As the patent-holding inventor of The Maculon, the original, passive, remote conversation monitoring device and sales management system, he shaped the call tracking and marketing analytics industry. He’s positioned the capital raises and recent acquisition. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – 48 Laws of Power What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Salesforce App How many hours of sleep do you get? — 6 If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I believed in myself more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:51 – Nathan introduces Jeremiah to the show 02:22 – Convirza acquired a portion of their competitor’s assets to expand their customer base 02:56 – Jeremiah shares how they found out about the acquisition 03:29 – Call tracking is what drives the calls 04:00 – Convirza also listens to the calls with machine learning to check the quality of the call 04:46 – If a phrase that the sales agent used didn’t drive conversion, it should be changed 05:00 – Convirza tracks the attribution rate 06:20 – Convirza finds out which billboard led a prospect to call, the cost of the billboard and the actual sales made from those calls 06:54 – Convirza only focuses on where the lead came from and the conversation itself 07:01 – “Our objective is strictly the audio, strictly the call” 07:54 – Convirza is a SaaS business and charges a platform fee plus minutes 08:13 – ACV is around $600K 08:40 – ACV is per business 09:27 – Prior to Convirza, Jeremiah was a national trainer for a company in Ohio and was teaching people how to sell on the phone 10:35 – In 2000, salespeople were looking into live call recordings 11:20 – Jeremiah set-up the stick and the device that could plug into a computer and record calls 12:00 – Jeremiah started with 100 units which cost him $70K 12:20 – Convirza was launched in 2001 13:30 – Convirza had their first client within six months that paid $20K 13:47 – 2010 revenue is $3M 14:05 – Convirza listened to their clients in order to improve their product 14:17 – Convirza has raised $24M in total 14:46 – The investors are private investors 15:55 – Convirza has over a thousand customers 16:09 – Convirza has 50K unique businesses using them 16:42 – 2017 ARR goal is $10M 17:33 – Gross logo churn is 3% 17:44 – Convirza has been focused on having their net negative churn negative for the last 2 years 18:56 – Team size is 66 with 7 in sales and 25 as engineers 19:21 – They have a team of 40 in India who are augmented in their engineering 19:47 – Convirza has an office in Utah and California 20:08 – Pre-acquisition CAC is $1200 21:00 – From the acquisition, they gained around 500 customers (more than double of what they had) 21:23 – LTV is 4 years 21:41 – Convirza’s best source for customers is their webinars 21:52 – They partnered with similar associations and publications in the space to promote their webinars 22:54 – Payback period is 9 months 22:18 – Paid spend was around $6500 in July 2017 24:01 – Gross margin is 60% 24:24 – Convirza built their own platform 26:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Acquire a part of your competitor’s assets to grow your own business and customer base. Having another team in another country can be your secret key to success. Focus on one specific goal at a time. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/14/2017 • 27 minutes, 55 seconds
842: SaaS: Ukraine SEO Tool 3x MRR yoy from $20k July 2016 to $70k July 2017
Artem Borodatyuk. He’s the founder of NetPeak Group and cofounder of Seed Fund WannaBiz. He’s focused on the development of B2B SaaS product companies. His first SaaS company was an all-in-one SEO platform for professionals called Serpstat.com, with 2000 customers and 100K users. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – From Third World to First What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Spreadsheet How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Find some experienced entrepreneur and mentor” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Artem to the show 02:23 – Serpstat was born as a cure to a search tool that was built by Netpeak 03:00 – Netpeak is the biggest SEO agency in Eastern Europe 03:20 – Netpeak currently has 300 projects in 4 markets 03:38 – Netpeak was founded in 2007 and was initially bootstrapped 03:43 – They haven’t raised funds for the agency side of Netpeak 04:27 – 2016 revenue of the agency side of Netpeak was $5-$15M 04:50 – Serpstat was initially created to be used by Netpeak itself 05:35 – In April 2015, Serpstat became independent 07:00 – In 2016, Serpstat received $250K of funding for 15% equity from Digital Future, a local VC fund 07:41 – Serpstat will almost hit their $1M ARR mark 07:58 – July 2017 MRR 08:26 – Igor Gor is Serpstat’s evangelist; he markets their product 08:45 – Team size is 52 in Serpstat with 20 in marketing 09:25 – ACG is $69 09:39 – Total number of customers is between 1000 to 2000 paid customers 10:36 – Serpstat can be paid in monthly payments or a one-time payment 12:03 – Serpstat loses 1-3% of their users monthly 12:40 – CAC 13:50 – LTV 14:20 – Serpstat spends $2K monthly on AdWords and $1K on Facebook Ads 15:04 – Serpstat is based in Ukraine 15:38 – Serstat plans to expand globally soon 16:02 – Gross margin is around 89% 17:23 – In July of 2016, monthly revenue was $20K 17:54 – 2016 revenue is almost $190K 19:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create a product that can be used by your own company; that way you can attest to its usability and value. Europe offers different recurring payment plans than what is offered in the US. Take an offered fund as an opportunity to grow your company. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/13/2017 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
841: Why He Can Charge $1000 CPMs, $31m Raised Helping Create Better Content
Shaul Olmert. He’s the cofounder and CEO of Playbuzz, an award-winning, storytelling platform that empowers publishers, brands, and agencies worldwide to create interactive content for editorial and commercial purposes. The world’s top publishers and brands worldwide use Playbuzz's desktop and mobile-friendly storytelling tools to improve audience engagement, optimize social sharing, increase site traffic and lengthen page-viewing time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Evernote How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Shaul would have told himself that everybody else in the world is as clueless as he is Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Shaul to the show 02:25 – Playbuzz is a platform that helps make one’s storytelling more compelling and engaging 03:10 – Playbuzz's tools are completely free for publishers 03:20 – Playbuzz currently has tens of thousands of publishers 03:24 – Playbuzz has market leaders using their toolset 03:46 – Playbuzz makes money when publishers opt-in to their monetization program 04:11 – Advertisers want to present their brands to the audience that is listening 04:54 – Playbuzz's revenue is in the dozens of millions on ad spent on the platform 05:18 – Playbuzz's volume is high and consistently growing 06:10 – Playbuzz manages the distribution of the content items which will benefit the publishers as well 07:00 – Nathan summarizes how he understands Playbuzz to work 07:50 – The brands create their content and Playbuzz shares them on their partnered website 08:16 – Playbuzz charges per view 08:35 – The charge depends on how long their content is being viewed or listened to 10:00 – Playbuzz is creating new ways to grow their engagement 10:37 – Playbuzz has two revenue streams 11:53 – Playbuzz has been around for 5 years and has been in the market for 3 years 12:36 – Playbuzz has 2 founders and 170 employees globally 12:54 – Playbuzz has raised a total of $31M 13:40 – Shaul shares what he thinks of Disney’s efforts in advertising 14:43 – “The more value we create, the more our value increases” 14:54 – Playbuzz is still burning capital and scaling up 15:10 – Playbuzz is constantly creating to optimize data 15:36 – The majority of the funds go to engineering, product and data 15:49 – Shaul believes that eventually they will win the war by having superior technology 16:50 – Shaul shares his take on using voice searches for collecting data 17:30 – Shaul is looking to take podcasts to a wider audience 19:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Content is KING. No matter how good your content is, if you can’t share it with an audience, it’s useless. Voice searches will change how we do advertising, and this change will happen soon. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/12/2017 • 22 minutes, 44 seconds
840: Ad Tech: $400m from Apple? Deal! FlashTalking Doing 15-40b Impressions/month
John Nardone. He’s the CEO of Flashtalking, a first generation adtech pioneer. He served as the founding board member of the Internet Advertising Bureau. He’s known for his groundbreaking work at Pepsi, Modern Media and Marketing Management Analytics and received the Adtech Industry Achievement Award in 2012. As CEO at [x+1], he helped transform that business into a top-rated data management platform or DMP. Rocket Fuel acquired the company for $230M in 2014. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Getting Naked What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Amazon and eBay How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I might have started having kids a little bit sooner” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:52 – Nathan introduces John to the show 02:40 – Flashtalking was a partner of [x+1], currently known as Rocket Fuel 02:45 – Days after the acquisition, John got an offer to work with Flashtalking 03:23 – John decided to give-in to the offer and saw Flashtalking as an opportunity to stay in adtech 03:39 – John joined Flashtalking in 2015 03:53 – Flashtalking had been around since 2000 and it was bootstrapped by the founders 04:25 – Flashtalking came to the US in 2010 05:36 – John joined the company, mainly because of his vision and excitement for innovation and marketing 06:43 – John has bought a part of the company 07:03 – Flashtalking uses real-time data to personalize the communication with each consumer 07:10 – A simple example is retargeting 08:04 – Retargeting can happen on multiple devices 08:27 – One of Flashtalking’s clients is Walmart 08:56 – Flashtalking analyzes the customer’s behavior on a website 09:54 – Smartphone and current devices have changed the way we consume digital marketing 10:50 – Location data is included with the data that Flashtalking gathers 11:13 – Flashtalking makes the decision for what kinds of ads to show to the customers 11:30 – Flashtalking charges per CPM 12:05 – There are discounts for those with bigger volumes 13:01 – Flashtalking is not currently using AI technology 14:10 – Flashtalking currently has 40 clients that account for 80% of the revenue 14:26 – Flashtalking focuses on their big, global clients 15:20 – Average volume of impressions is 15B to 40B a month depending on the season 17:00 – Flashtalking focuses on helping their clients improve and get the experience that will drive their success metrics 17:50 – Team size is 280 globally 17:56 – Flashtalking hasn’t raised any capital aside from the buyout and it has been profitable since Day 1 19:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your vision will lead you to the companies that will help you grow, and eventually change the world. Technology has significantly affected how we consume advertising. There are specific markets where AI technology can be used well. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/11/2017 • 22 minutes, 40 seconds
839: Marketplace: Zola Wedding Registry Passes $120m GMV Run Rate
Shan-Lyn Ma. She’s the CEO and co-founder of Zola. Launched in October 2013, Zola is an online wedding registry for millennials. In just three years, it has become the fastest growing wedding registry in the country, seeing 10x revenue growth year-over-year and 3x growth in 2017. Over seven million guests have attended a Zola wedding and 350 million in gifts have been added by Zola couples. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Create Products Customers Love What CEO do you follow? – Sheryl Sandberg Favorite online tool? — Headspace How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That stressing out about things do not make them better” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:47 – Nathan introduces Shan-Lyn to the show 02:32 – In Q4 of 2016, Zola reached $120M in GMV runway 03:30 – GMV is reflective of the number of wedding gifts that are given to couples when using Zola as a wedding registry 03:56 – Zola is an ecommerce business, it’s a typical retailer 04:40 – Most of the items offered in Zola are what the couples want as wedding gifts 04:50 – Zola has added Airbnb as this was requested by couples 05:20 – Zola takes a percentage from an Airbnb gift card purchased on Zola 06:14 – Zola goes after the brands that are usually requested by couples and some brands have reached out to Zola for their products to be on Zola’s website 06:54 – Since 2013, 300K couples have registered with Zola 07:25 – The number of new couples signed-up in 2016 08:10 – Over time, more and more couples are using Zola as their ONLY wedding registry 09:40 – More guests will buy from Zola if the couples are using Zola exclusively as their wedding registry 10:02 – Zola incentivizes couples by adding the gifts that they want 10:24 – There’s an additional feature where couples can bring any product to Zola 11:12 – First year revenue 11:38 – Zola had a seed round of funding of $500K in a convertible note 12:17 – Zola has raised additional capital with a total of $40M in VC funding 12:36 – Zola has passed through the typical startup life-cycle 14:14 – Paid ads spend is more than $100K 14:41 – The hot KPI that investors are looking for is the LTV:CAC ratio 15:51 – CAC depends on the channel and historical data of the channel’s performance 17:42 – “We are not trying to create more lifetime value” 18:30 – The challenge for Zola is getting newly engaged couples to find out about their services and sign-up for them 19:49 – Zola currently has over 50K products 20:22 – Zola just launched their new product, Zola Weddings, a free website for couples to manage their whole wedding 23:25 – The Famous Five Key Points: Listen to your customers desires and needs and respond accordingly. LTV:CAC ratio is what investors are usually looking for in a company. Create more products that could be an extension of your existing products—this will encourage your clients to use your products more. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/10/2017 • 25 minutes, 21 seconds
838: SaaS: Conga Passes 9,000 Customers, $77m Raised for Documents, Contract, and Data Management
Matthew Schiltz. He’s an experienced, senior executive with a proven track record in building successful, high growth technology and cloud companies ranging from the private startup stage to public companies. He’s responsible for his current company, Conga, and its growth strategy which includes financing, driving global sales and expanding product offerings. His extensive executive management and leadership experience is driving strong company growth which has resulted in several Inc 500, Fast 50 and Top 100 Places to Work awards. Past CEO successes include Insightful Corporation, CourtLink, DocuSign, Tier 3 and Blue Box Group. He has received several industry accolades in recognition of his past successes and is considered an expert on software, technology, and cloud business practices. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People What CEO do you follow? – Dan Springer Favorite online tool? — Email How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Matt would let others know that SaaS technology is about the people Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:58 – Nathan introduces Matt to the show 03:07 – Matt is the first professional CEO hired for DocuSign 03:38 – Matt was also recruited by the board of Conga as their CEO 04:41 – Matt has worked with founders who are great in product and technology, but were not able to grow their company as a CEO 05:25 – The partnership with DocuSign’s founder was a successful experience 06:18 – Conga is one of the top 5 global ISV (Independent Software Vendors) in the Salesforce ecosystem 06:44 – Conga specializes in data and electronic contracts 06:57 – They take live, Salesforce data and turns it into dynamic documents that are automated 07:21 – Conga is pure SaaS play 07:45 – Renewal rate is astronomically high 08:08 – Conga has a negative revenue churn 08:44 – Conga has a mix of mid-market and enterprise customers 10:30 – The customers pay directly on the number of seats 11:05 – Customers can start with one product, then expand to five products 11:55 – Conga’s customer base is two thirds midmarket and one third enterprise 12:33 – Conga’s document generation product pricing starts at $200 monthly for 10 seats 12:59 – “It’s a pretty low risk threshold” 13:30 – The Salesforce AppExchange is the number one customer vehicle for Conga 16:06 – 80% of Conga’s customers regard them as offering a critical tool that they need to use 17:00 – Conga has over 9000 customers globally 17:30 – Conga is growing quickly 18:03 – Conga grew 200% last year and another 100% this year 19:59 – Conga is in a typical gross margin rate 20:10 – The majority of Conga is owned by Insight Venture Partners of New York 20:46 – Conga has announced Salesforce Ventures as a strategic investor in May 2017 21:15 – Matt shares how they decide which companies to acquire 21:50 – Is it a good strategic fit for Conga? 22:02 – Is it a great people fit? 22:30 – Conga has 250-500 employees 23:53 – Matt shares his thoughts on Conga taking the IPO route as a funding event 25:05 – DocuSign just announced their intention to go public 27:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Not all founders can grow their business; the right CEO can be the answer. The growth of a company isn’t based solely on the product, but the people who are behind it. The IPO route for funding is a fantastic place to start. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/9/2017 • 31 minutes, 16 seconds
837: SaaS: A Good Reason to Have Flat Growth at $200k MRR
Aseem Badshah. He’s the founder and CEO of Socedo which is a twenty person, B2B, social media demand generation company backed by Techstars Ventures, Vulcan Capital and Divergent Ventures. Before this company, he was the founder of Uptown Treehouse, a social media marketing agency working with brands like Uniqlo, Nike, Western Union and Lenovo. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella Favorite online tool? — Outreach How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be patient and focus, above all, on people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Aseem to the show 02:06 – Socedo helps B2B marketers find the relevant prospect on social media 02:37 – “The last 9 months have been all about efficiency” 02:47 – Socedo now has $4K in MRR per month per AE 03:42 – Socedo is now moving away from the outbound and ABM model 03:47 – Socedo targets SMB companies now 04:03 – Socedo has free trials on their website 04:18 – The point is to become a pipeline for their AEs 04:58 – Socedo is helping Pendo’s growth 05:08 – Socedo is looking at moving up their ACV 05:57 – Socedo helps B2B companies cut through the noise 06:24 – On the sales side, Socedo is more focused on selling to B2B as opposed to B2C companies 07:00 – Average MRR 07:23 – Aseem ties employee count to growth 07:45 – The idea of scaling too quickly isn’t really healthy 08:40 – Aseem wants to make sure that their focus is on the right segment of the market 10:00 – Everywhere in SaaS is crowded these days 10:21 – The outbound path is where Sodeco will bump into their competition 10:54 – Sodeco is specifically serving the B2B social media marketers who are underserved individuals 11:20 – Sodeco helps them grow their presence 12:34 – Hootsuite is great for marketers who are managing their content for their audience 13:00 – Sodeco finds and grows the audience by targeting the right prospects on social media 14:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Scaling up does NOT necessarily mean growing your team. Even though your market may be crowded, you can find a way to stand out. Managing your audience is a very different process from growing your audience. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/8/2017 • 17 minutes, 41 seconds
836: Crypto: $94m Raised to Be Enterprise Blockchain for Global Payments
Stefan Thomas. He’s the CTO of Ripple. He’s also the producer of the popular “What is Bitcoin?” video and the founder of the largest website for novice bitcoin users, WeUseCoins.com. He created a set of open-source bitcoin libraries called BitcoinJS, which today are maintained and used by Bitcoin businesses of all sizes including BitPay, Blockchain.info, BitAddress, Coinpunk and others. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Draw to Win What CEO do you follow? – Thomas Mcleod Favorite online tool? — StumbleUpon How many hours of sleep do you get?— 3 or 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Schedule your blocks of time. Clean up and separate your spaces. Tell yourself to stick to what you should be doing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Stefan to the show 02:15 – Stefan got into crypto 7 years ago 02:22 – “What is Bitcoin?” video now has 10 million views and two versions 02:52 – Bitcoin is different from how current financial institutions work 03:27 – Blockchain has a lot of definitions and for Stefan, blockchain is a shared ledger 04:03 – With any technology, it is about how it can make a change that is beneficial to everyone 05:43 – Stefan currently focuses on their project, Inter Ledger, which is essentially a protocol that can tie different ledgers together 05:54 – It is an open project and Ripple is a contributor 06:44 – Some of the crypto users have gotten a little too mainstream 07:18 – People are now looking at the possibility of getting what they want without having to rely on clunky, shared ledgers 07:41 – Stefan sold WeUseCoins to a company who has invested in bitcoin 08:20 – Stefan didn’t make much from the exit 08:36 – Stefan is responsible for the technical vision of Ripple 09:00 – Ripple’s customers are mostly banks 09:05 – Banks license Ripple’s technology and software 09:33 – You can get the most from bitcoin technology without changing how financial institutions work 09:53 – Small banks can interoperate with other banks without going through huge hubs 10:04 – “Creating that efficiency by creating competition” 10:20 – Siam Commercial Bank in Thailand is one of Ripple’s customers 10:30 – Siam Commercial Bank and SBI Remit in Japan have partnered to license Ripple’s technology 10:40 – Thailand expats staying in Japan can now send money to Thailand through their partnership 12:18 – Shared ledgers are growing smaller and smaller with these new coins coming out and by private blockchains 12:27 – Stefan believes that the next interesting technology will be the interoperability of the blockchains and central ledgers 13:02 – Ripple has only been focused on payments, but there are hundreds of use cases for blockchain 13:28 – Payments is the underlying thing for any kind of asset movement 13:55 – Ripple is also focused on the crossing borders advantage to it 15:21 – Licensing fee of Ripple depends on their customers 16:21 – Team size is 170 16:36 – Ripple has raised $94M and has sold some digital assets 16:55 – Stefan joined Ripple before it was incorporated and he has equity 18:31 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Changes in technology are intended to make life better for the collective. With bitcoin technology, payments have become more efficient and convenient. The vision that you had years ago will definitely change overtime. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/7/2017 • 25 minutes, 9 seconds
835: $3m+ in Revenue, How to make a SaaS and Professional Service Model Work Together
Scott East. He founded his company MSIGHTS in 2004 to help marketers make better decisions with better data and reporting. His experience includes global ads and digital agencies of Fortune 20 telecom and AOL prior to founding MSIGHTS. He understands how to engage marketers as he has 20+ years in this area. His new book, The Cuttlefish Marketer: The Five Essential Traits of a Modern Marketer, focuses on helping marketers transform themselves into modern marketing leaders. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – E-Myth What CEO do you follow? – Jason Fried Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Sales Navigator How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Scott wished he had focus more on “pull goals”, not “push goals” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:54 – Nathan introduces Scott to the show 02:38 – Scott wrote a book because it was on his bucket list 03:00 – Scott’s publisher is Advantage Media 03:46 – The book is now available on Amazon and Apple 04:06 – It has sold around a couple of hundreds of copies 04:20 – Scott worked on his book for 10 solid months 05:05 – MSIGHTS provides data management and performance reporting services for large marketing departments 05:21 – MSIGHTS’ primary model is a SaaS model and they charge based on the data they integrate 05:38 – “We giveaway licenses for free in our platform” 05:58 – Scott wants as many enterprise companies as possible to use their reporting for decision making 06:18 – MSIGHTS charges based on the volume that they’re integrating onto the system (in bulk) 07:00 – MSIGHTS’ professional service is a recurring service 07:40 – Scott shares why the SaaS model is different from a professional service, even if both services are recurring 08:24 – ACV is $250K per client 08:47 – MSIGHTS has 35 people 09:20 – Scott shares how the data they receive needs to be analyzed 10:15 – MSIGHTS integrated the data and added the translation key, but it took the founders more than an hour to decide if they would take it 11:03 – Scott self-funded the company 11:33 – MSIGHTS was officially launched in 2003 12:00 – First year revenue is around $150K 12:10 – 2013 revenue 12:31 – 2016 revenue was $3.21M 13:04 – Churn is less than 5% annually 13:30 – Some of their clients have been with MSIGHTS for five years plus 13:50 – MSIGHTS is still bootstrapped 14:15 – Blended gross margins is a low 85%, platform side is 80% plus and 70% on professional service 15:05 – Last month total revenue is around $264K 15:30 – CAC 15:54 – Payback period is around a month 17:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you want something and it’s within your reach, GO for it! Having a great product could mean you’re bootstrapped for years, even a decade. Professional services can be a recurring service. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/6/2017 • 20 minutes, 27 seconds
834: SaaS: He Hit 5x YoY Revenue Growth in Performance Marketing Space
Oscar Nelson. He’s the CEO of Musqot, the marketing technology and SaaS company he co-founded after spending 12 years in various marketing roles in small and large companies. Industry-wise, he’s had a mixed background from consulting, media, telecommunications and enterprise software. He considers himself a business generalist more than a specialist. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Five Dysfunctions of a Team What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — DocuSign How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – It is more important to focus on your cofounder than your business idea Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:52 – Nathan introduces Oscar to the show 02:18 – Musqot is a marketing performance management app 02:24 – Musqot helps their customers increase their marketing effectiveness and efficiency, enabling their marketing ROI 02:44 – ACV is around $25K annually 02:55 – Some customers pay 6 figures 03:04 – Musqot was founded in 2014 03:16 – On their second year, Musqot launched their beta product and just a year ago, they launched their real product 03:40 – Musqot was bootstrapped. They were able to sustain their first year without revenue through personal financial support and savings 04:05 – Oscar and his co-founder have initially put in around $100K for the company 04:47 – First year revenue 05:37 – 2017 target is $3M in ARR runway 06:12 – Musqot just recently passed their $100K MRR mark 07:06 – Musqot currently has 60 customers 08:14 – Musqot’s expansion is due to their support and onboarding efforts 09:13 – Team size is 25 with 20 full-time employees and 5 consultants 09:30 – 5 are in sales, 2 are in presales and onboarding, 1 in marketing and the rest are in development 10:45 – Musqot gets customers from different sources 11:00 – Musqot is on the Salesforce AppExchange 12:14 – Full weighted CAC 13:31 – Payback period is roughly a year or more 14:10 – Paid ads spend is around $20K monthly 14:50 – The bigger customers are happy and tend to stay longer than the smaller customers 15:32 – Logo churn is around 2% and revenue churn is negative 16:27 – Musqot has raised $1.2M 16:44 – Musqot’s HQ is in Stockholm, Sweden and Bangalore, India 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A startup can thrive through personal savings and financial support if need be. Share your business ideas with your business partner and make sure that your thoughts and visions for the company are aligned. Plan carefully where you will place your paid ads. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/5/2017 • 21 minutes, 6 seconds
833: SaaS: Almost Broke, Pivots 2013, Now $5m+ in ARR in Social Hashtag Tracking Space
Tim Sae Koo. He’s a 26-year old, LA-based native residing currently in San Francisco, California. He’s dreamed to become the first Asian American president of the United States to solve impactful problems with a purpose. He found his legacy rules to be inefficient. He studied entrepreneurship at University of Southern California and graduated early to naively start a company and fulfill his original life mission. His company is TINT. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Delivering Happiness What CEO do you follow? – Mark Cuban Favorite online tool? — Wunderlist How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s okay to make mistakes because that’s how you’re going to learn” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Tim to the show 02:26 – TINT is a marketing software platform that works with B2C brands 02:37 – They help source the best customer content on social media 03:11 – TINT is SaaS based 03:19 – ACV is from $1K to 5K a month or $12K to $60K a year 03:31 – The variations in price depend on different options including the number of hashtags to track 03:58 – They have a high base price 04:14 – The moderation feature can also be included using manual moderation or machine-learning 04:41 – TINT was launched in 2013 04:48 – TINT is completely bootstrapped 05:00 – Tim raised $370K for the previous company before pivoting to TINT 05:18 – The initial product was a consumer application and the market was quite saturated—this led to the pivot to TINT 05:55 – The initial company was getting zero revenue with 5K users and 3 team members 06:35 – Tim and the founders were paying themselves $36K a year 06:54 – Tim worked while he was still in college 07:35 – Keep your expenses low 07:44 – TINT’s team size is around 30 07:52 – TINT currently has 700 customers 08:23 – Average MRR is around $700K 08:50 – 2017 goal is to get around $7.5M in revenue 09:15 – 2016 ARR is around $5M and cash basis is around $6M 10:08 – Current ARR is around $5.5M 10:30 – Tim hasn’t raised capital yet because he thinks he won’t be a good CEO if he does that 10:36 – Tim identifies himself more as a founder than a CEO 11:32 – TINT has always been profitable 12:16 – CAC is around $2K 13:00 – TINT is still figuring out the best channel for them to invest more 13:38 – Paid ads is $10-15K a month 14:10 – In the beginning, Tim used to acquire more customers by offering to draw any animal 15:20 – The main idea is to make something that can bring a smile to someone’s face and that will help them remember Tim 15:35 – Team members are based in different states and other countries like Dubai, Brazil and London 15:50 – There’s now a big push for a technology investment in Dubai 16:23 – Tim is now paying himself something modest, but nothing too grand 16:39 – Tim has two co-founders and half of the company is owned by the team; the other half for investors 17:35 – Tim shared how he started entrepreneurship and his plans for the future 18:20 – Tim might consider a $30M acquisition at the moment 20:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The most successful in the entrepreneurial world are not the ones who know how to expand their revenue; they are the ones who know how to reduce their expenses. Think about how you can make people happy—this will make you memorable. Be the leader, not the boss. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/4/2017 • 21 minutes, 49 seconds
832: SaaS: Machine Learning and AI for Re-Engaging Customers, $250k ACV and $1.5m Raised
Victor Szczerba. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Yeti Data, solving big data problems for customers. Prior experience includes running product strategy at the data division at SAP. He was a McKinsey consultant and sales VP for Tadpole Computer and Utopy. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One and How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How to be patient” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Victor to the show 02:14 – Yeti Data makes virtual data warehouses 02:30 – Yeti Data’s model is an enterprise SaaS model 02:45 – An average customer pays Yeti Data $250-500K a year 03:02 – “We love universal usage of our data with inside of the customer” 03:19 – Clients get data from their customers’ behavior 04:24 – AI is a blanket term and machine learning is something very specific 05:08 – Victor shares how machine learning works and they put in details manually 05:52 – In digital marketing, there are ways to understand the customer and their purchasing behavior, but it still can be tricky 06:47 – Yeti Data currently has around 5 customers 07:07 – Yeti Data is close to reaching an $800K, ARR mark 07:31 – Yeti Data was launched 3-4 years ago and was in development mode for the first few years 07:50 – Yeti Data raised capital for RND and they’ve been really lean 08:07 – It was a convertible note 08:31 – 4% interest and 10% discount with a teaser for the second round 09:18 – On pre-revenue, Yeti Data has 3 core people and some consultants 10:03 – Amazon and Walmart have a software that is similar to Yeti Data 10:39 – Some companies that are in competition with Yeti Data are IBM and HP 11:08 – Yeti Data created a way to virtualize their data connections 12:00 – It is still too early for Yeti Data to have their metrics 13:00 – A good ARR of a million bucks can get Yeti Data to a good series A 14:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Regardless of how congested your market is, you can still find a way to stand out. Use your competition as motivation to push harder. Focus in on what you’re good at. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/3/2017 • 16 minutes, 49 seconds
831: You Have $10k, Should You Defer or Deduct?
Garrett Gunderson. He’s the chief wealth architect at Wealth Factory and author of the New York Times’ bestseller, Killing Sacred Cows. Wealth Factory helps entrepreneurs optimize cash flow, streamline their finances and keep more of their hard-earned money so they can make more powerful investments in their best wealth sector—their business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Scaling Up and The War of Art What CEO do you follow? – Rich Christiansen Favorite online tool? — OmniFocus How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It will be okay and I don’t mean to stress as much as I did” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Garrett to the show 02:10 – It took Garrett two years of contemplating before writing Killing Sacred Cows 03:26 – Garrett worked with a publisher and the promotion firm Green Leaf 04:30 – Garrett is earning higher royalties for his book deal than the usual 05:00 – The possibility for bigger redistribution impacted the book deal 05:35 – Garrett was able to sell copies of the book even before it came out 06:10 – Garrett decided to have a publisher because it was more relevant than to self-publish 07:10 – Garrett self-published The Rockefellers last year 08:22 – Garrett co-published New Rules to Get Rich with Nightingale 08:45 – Garrett has self-published a few books which are more profitable than the one he made with the publisher 09:30 – Just because you’re starting a business doesn’t mean you know about investing 10:00 – For investing, investor DNA needs to be considered 10:04 – The core values, drivers and diversification 10:43 – There’s no magic product or magic investment 11:40 – Nathan shares how he deals with his real estate investments 12:10 – People think they need to invest because the money is there 12:40 – It is more important to invest in the RIGHT opportunity and something that we KNOW 13:50 – There are good, bad and lucky investors—but don’t rely on luck 14:37 – In terms of taxes: 14:42 – Never confuse deferral with deductions 16:00 – Garrett shares his stance on deferrals 16:54 – Tax should be a secondary consideration 18:00 – Garrett shares how he makes money 18:14 – Garrett works with entrepreneurs with $1-10M in ARR 19:10 – Garrett doesn’t offer asset management, they’re more on financial and cash flow management side 19:40 – Garrett’s co-founder passed away in 2006 from a plane crash 20:20 – Wealth Factory’s income is steady and they’ve raised their fees substantially 21:20 – “We’re the very best people” 21:31 – 2017 revenue goal 22:27 – Wealth Factory has 10 new customers monthly 22:37 – Team size is 20 24:04 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Investing and starting a business are two very different things. Deferrals are different than deductions. Billionaires don’t have the best financial advice. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/2/2017 • 28 minutes, 21 seconds
830: SaaS: With $20m Raised, $10m+ ARR, He's For Enterprise Customer Management on Social Media
Josh March. He’s the founder and CEO of Conversocial, a customer engagement solution that helps businesses increase their customer loyalty by enabling effortless, in-the-moment, customer service to social and mobile channels. The largest global firms including Google, Sprint, Hertz and Hyatt Hotels turn to his platform to deliver an amazing, social, first, customer service experience at a large scale. He previously founded the leading social application platform, iPlatform, one of the world’s first Facebook preferred developer which was acquired in 2012. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Four Steps to the Epiphany What CEO do you follow? – Ben Horowitz Favorite online tool? — Twitter How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Be more self-aware and your own thinking can become your bias Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Josh to the show 02:51 – iPlatform was sold to Betapond in 2012 03:28 – The acquisition was a mix of cash and equity 03:53 – Conversocial is an enterprise SaaS product 04:20 – Conversocial follows up on customers through social media sites 04:38 – Conversocial collects messages from different social media channels and analyzes them 05:04 – Conversocial has raised $20M of venture capital 05:33 – Conversocial started from iPlatform 06:00 – Josh saw that they needed to move quickly with Conversocial, so they raised funds 06:29 – The first round was $2.5M and was a priced equity round 07:24 – Some of Conversocial’s customers were an upsell from iPlatform 07:34 – Team size is around 100 08:00 – Josh was initially involved with the product development of Conversocial and as they grew and hired great people, he began shifting more of his time to customer acquisition 09:33 – Their biggest customer pays around a million dollars annually 09:50 – Conversocial also has customers who pay from $25K to $200K 11:00 – Conversocial focuses on customer care 12:00 – The need for a customer contact center is greatly increasing 12:28 – Conversocial currently has 200 clients 13:30 – Conversocial has passed their $10M ARR mark 14:12 – Conversocial has a higher logo churn with small companies 14:47 – Conversocial’s net churn is around 120% 16:21 – Josh flies a lot just to meet customers 17:48 – Fully weighted CAC varies dramatically depending on the deals 18:24 – Payback period is around 18 months 18:43 – Josh won’t sell to Sprinklr 19:10 – Josh thinks Sprinklr’s vision is far off of Conversocial’s vision 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on the needs of the customers and figure out how you can solve their problems. Social media is being used not only for marketing, but for customer service as well. An entrepreneur should go the “extra mile” just to get a client. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/1/2017 • 24 minutes, 41 seconds
829: SaaS: Will He Get $25m Valuation on $1m ARR in Predictive Analytics Space?
Christopher Day. He’s been a successful entrepreneur, having sold two companies to a Fortune 100 company before turning 40. He’s had businesses from residential painting to investment banking doing cross-border M&A transactions. Along the way, he has found time to mentor other entrepreneurs and participates in helping solve legislative issues to foster entrepreneurial growth in the State of Indiana. He’s now building a platform with DemandJump that is looking to solve prescriptive analytics and qualified traffic. The DemandJump team has discovered marketers only have 20% visibility of their actual ecosystem. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Jack Welch Favorite online tool? — One Pager How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The power of relationships” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:48 – Nathan introduces Christopher to the show 02:36 – DemandJump sells their platform on a subscription basis 02:41 – They have annual subscriptions and professional services 03:10 – 82% of the revenue is from SaaS, 1% is from a one-time payment and the rest is for the other model 03:48 – DemandJump allows marketers to have 100% visibility of their competitive ecosystem, which is the first time this has been made possible in history 04:57 – They show marketers where to focus to capture traffic from their competitors 05:15 – Average annual contract value is $45K with beta customers 05:30 – Average annual contract value now is $100K -$250K 05:43 – DemandJump has started to work with mid-market companies 06:00 – Self-service for mid-market will be from $200 to hundred million 06:27 – DemandJump currently has 22 customers 06:50 – DemandJump is getting close to their million dollar revenue mark 07:11 – DemandJump was launched in 2015 07:36 – The traffic cloud was built in October 2016 08:05 – 2016 revenue was $165K 08:20 – MRR by December 2016 was $10K 08:30 – 2017 goal is to hit $1.5 in ARR 08:54 – DemandJump raised $4M with 18 Angel investors on their board 10:08 – DemandJump is looking to raise another $5M with a 15% pre-money valuation 11;12 – Christopher sold software companies before 12:00 – Annual logo churn is 8-9% 12:24 – Annual revenue churn is almost the same with logo churn 13:00 – CAC is around $10K 13:31 – Most of DemandJump’s customers pay annually upfront 13:55 – Paid marketing spend was around $5K 14:19 – 40% of DemandJump’s budget goes to sales and marketing 15:49 – They will double or triple their paid marketing spend because of their target 17:20 – Assumed LTV is 36 months 18:54 – Team headcount is 17 19:29 – They’re all based in Indiana 19:40 – 7 are in engineering, 3 focus on customer success, 3 on sales, 2 on marketing and a newly hired CFO 21:17 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Marketers will have a HUGE advantage if they have 100% visibility of their ecosystem. Paid marketing should be aligned to your target market, otherwise you’re just wasting your money. Relationships and networking is of the UTMOST importance. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/31/2017 • 23 minutes, 40 seconds
828: AdTech: MobFox Acquired for $14m by Matomy, Now $36m+ in Ad Spend Annually
Gil Klein from MobFox where he’s the managing director and a C-level executive at Matomy Media Group. Having joined the company in 2006, he’s been the member of the executive management team since 2014. He previously served as senior VP of media and senior VP of clients for this particular group. He holds an MBA in International Management from the College of Management in Israel. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Brian O’Kelley Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Travel even more than you already have, experiment, take a lot of risks and spend as much time as you can with your family Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:57 – Nathan introduces Gil to the show 02:30 – Matomy is a global performance company that holds a few entities 02:44 – Gil personally runs and oversees MobFox, which is an mobile in-app audience SSP acquired by Matomy in 2014 03:15 – The acquisition was for $12M in cash 03:30 – Gil was with Matomy since 2006 and he helped the company grow 04:00 – MobFox makes money when their clients make money 04:17 – The tools of MobFox are usually for the developers and publishers focused on the in-app space 04:48 – MobFox tries to contact the best demand partners in the space like YuMe, AppNexus and PocketMath 05:50 – In 2015, MobFox generated $18M of the transaction volume 06:10 – MobFox’s charges depend on the deals they have 06:32 – MobFox usually keeps 17-20% of the transaction 06:56 – MobFox has grown to 36% 07:09 – Gil believes that MobFox is currently in a great space 07:51 – In 2017, Gil’s goal is to stretch as much as he can 08:21 – MobFox is currently working with 20-30K publishers, 4K are SDK-based 09:13 – MobFox currently has 180 DSP (Demand Side Platforms) 09:35 – A single DSP can have a thousand advertisers 09:42 – “We connect to a programmatic player” 10:00 – Current headcount of MobFox is 73-74 10:11 – 50 are engineers and the rest in sales, retention, HR and finance 10:26 – MobFox team is global 11:29 – Gil can and will do anything to get new customers, like suddenly showing up with presents and asking for a meeting 12:23 – “I try to listen to the customer” 13:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Set numbers for your goals, but aim to SURPASS those numbers. Find the best partnerships that you can where you can mutually benefit each other. Don’t hesitate to TAKE risks! Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/30/2017 • 16 minutes, 20 seconds
827: VC: $140m FinTech, InsurTech Fund on How They Invest
Andrew Pitz. He’s an investment manager at Transamerica Ventures, the global venture capital fund of Transamerica that specializes in investing in insurtech, fintech and enterprise software companies. There, he has led the firm's investments in PolicyGenius, Digital Currency Group, Everplans, SmartAsset and Hixme. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Venture Deals What CEO do you follow? – Jonah Goodhart and Vinny Lingham Favorite online tool? — Fortunes Term Sheet, Mattermark Daily, Crunchbase Daily How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Andrew wished he had understood domain names and technology Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 02:16 – Transamerica and AEGON are global investment and insurance firms 02:56 – $140K is the fund size they’re currently working with 03:04 – The fund was already set-up from the beginning 03:25 – Their first fund was in 2014, in the European market 03:47 – They had 17 unique companies with 23 investments 04:25 – They don’t share company information with their parent company 04:39 – They don’t want the corporate parent to be involved in the business 05:25 – They haven’t had any exits yet 05:39 – Andrews shares fund-to-fund deals with FinTech Collective 06:38 – They put in a $2M check and the total funds raised were $75K to $100K 06:55 – They put in $1M to another fund to fund the deal they had 07:00 – Their first fund was around $10M 07:28 – FinTech Collective is based in New York 07:38 – Some of the fintech companies they’ve invested in are Art Invest, MoneyLion, 401k and Elephant Tech 08:24 – Andrew gets his salary and bonuses from the deals 08:50 – Andrew shares how their boss missed deals that are worth billions now 09:30 – There are instances where they need to let some deals pass 10:00 – In a week, they’re receiving hundreds of newsletters from different companies (around 5000 in a year) 10:13 – Andrew studies 500 deals and meets with around 250 11:10 – Initial check size was $1-5M as a follow on investor 11:34 – Andrew chooses PolicyGenius and Hixme 12:40 – Andrew thinks PolicyGenius will have a good exit 13:07 – H2O as an open source 13:33 – Red Hat pioneered the open source 14:36 – The goal is to invest in direct technology and create partnerships 14:54 – Andrew shares the kind of partnerships they’re looking for 15:14 – Andrew wanted to do work in Asia because of the many opportunities 17:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are thousands of companies created daily—you have to research and choose which one to invest into wisely. Forming partnerships is MORE important than monetary gain. Technology can take you anywhere. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/29/2017 • 20 minutes, 19 seconds
826: AdTech: Bootstrapped to $1m-$10m With 20% EBIDTA Margin
Christian Geissendoerfer. He’s the CEO of Yoose, the leading expert in location-based advertising in Asia and Europe. He’s an entrepreneur passionate about building businesses and leading teams. He recently started something parallel to Yoose which is a German Accelerator in Southeast Asia that helps German startups expand into that region. He loves living in Singapore and Vietnam, traveling the world and learning languages. He’s fluent in German, English, French and Spanish. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – A Monk and the Riddle What CEO do you follow? – CEO Collaborative Group Favorite online tool? — Xero and Zapier How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do it over again” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Christian to the show 02:28 – Yoose is a location-based mobile advertising company 02:36 – Yoose helps brands to target people in specific geographic locations 03:28 – Yoose is aggregating inventory from different mobile networks 04:05 – Yoose is buying the inventory for the company and running campaigns on specific locations 04:25 – Yoose is selling a premium product 04:42 – Yoose charges per CPM 04:59 – There’s current request for CPC charges 05:23 – Yoose was launched in 2008, in Berlin, and moved to Singapore in 2010 06:00 – 2016 revenue is in the million dollar figure range 06:08 – Team size is 15 and the majority are based in Vietnam 06:16 – Yoose is a bootstrapped business 07:12 – Yoose is working on a different platform based on audience profiles and attribution 08:10 – Customers use Yoose over their competitors because of the full service they offer 08:49 – Yoose is also geographically focused 09:12 – Yoose is currently working with the major media agencies and secondary agencies 09:35 – There are 25-30 agencies in total 09:47 – Yoose has partnerships in different countries that they serve too 10:32 – Yoose and the partners both take a cut from the charges 10:45 – “We are transparent on costs on both sides” 11:00 – The EBIT (Earnings Before Interests and Taxes) margin in the space vary 11:14 – Yoose is in the middle of the margin, depending on the country 11:43 – At this stage, Christian is putting the capital back into the company 12:46 – Christian has put all his personal money into starting Yoose 13:08 – Christian has worked in France prior to Yoose 13:43 – Christian initially wanted to build something similar to Tinder 15:33 – German Accelerator works with the German government and has been in the US market for 5 years, they’re now expanding to Southeast Asia 16:05 – Christian gets his salary from the government 17:32 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be transparent with your partners, so you’ll gain their trust. This will also lead to more partnerships. The corporate world can help shape and grow your skills but don’t regret taking another route to succeed. Create something that you want, yourself. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/28/2017 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
825: SaaS: 4 Founders, 150 Customers Paying $30k for Pipeline and Revenue Management
Bonnie Crater. She’s the CEO of Full Circle Insights. She’s a 5-time VP of marketing and executive at many software companies in Silicon Valley. She’s been named one of the 100 Most Influential Women by the Silicon Valley Business Journal and one of the Top 20 Women to Watch by Sales Lead Management Association. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Docusign How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “My path has been just fine” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Bonnie to the show 02:24 – Full Circle Insights helps marketing people accurately measure and track the impact of their marketing campaigns on pipeline and revenue 02:50 – Full Circle Insights has an annual contract and usual contract which pays $30K a year 03:00 – Full Circle Insights launched their product in 2012, but it was started in 2010 03:10 – “Never start a company on December 31st” 03:18 – The IRS would want a tax return for 1 day of business 03:51 – Bonnie quit her VP of marketing job prior to Full Circle Insights 03:58 – Bonnie was invited by her friends to start Full Circle Insights and there are 4 founders 04:20 – Two of the founders were from Salesforce, including Bonnie 04:49 – Full Circle Insights is built on Salesforce 05:01 – Full Circle Insights was on Salesforce’s AppExchange 05:54 – Bonnie was a CEO in 2001, but it was a failure and she had to hire and fire a hundreds of people 07:35 – Bonnie was a VP of marketing a couple of times with different companies after the failure 08:04 – Full Circle Insights was initially bootstrapped, they raised $11M 08:14 – They raised money because they were going broke 08:21 – They were paying themselves 08:50 – First capital was raised in 2012 09:12 – Her first product was built from the money the founders had put in 09:32 – Dan, the CTO, is the developer 09:53 – Full Circle Insights has around 150 customers 10:12 – Team size is 35 10:38 – 8 in engineering and product, 12 in sales, 4-5 in marketing, 7-8 in customer success and some in accounting 11:17 – Full Circle Insights have broken around $4M in ARR 11:33 – Full Circle Insights’ model is to double, then triple 12:33 – Full Circle Insights has 90% renewal rate 12:40 – Churn is usually from acquisition and CMO changes 13:26 – Bonnie was hoping to have a 100% renewal rate in the coming years 14:37 – Full Circle Insights has a sales rep who has a puppy that he brought to the tradeshow 14:53 – The puppy became a booth magnet and they were able to acquire new customers 15:25 – Fully weighted CAC is $18-20K 15:30 – Payback period is less than 6 months 16:30 – Lowest marketing expenses is digital marketing and the biggest is from tradeshows and events 17:31 – LTV 18:30 – Full Circle Insights’ new VP of sales 19:01 – ARR target is $7M 20:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Never start your business on the last day of the year. We all make mistakes and we just have to learn from it—just don’t make the same mistake twice. Be creative and do what you need to do to draw new customers in. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Ron Jacobson. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Rockerbox and Hindsight. Ron was a project manager at AppNexus and a proud McGill alumni. Follow him on Twitter. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Made in America What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Mark Cuban Favorite online tool? — Spectacle How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “There are going to be a lot of highs and there are going to be a lot of lows, but you just got too keep moving” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:36 – Nathan introduces Ron to the show 02:01 – Rockerbox is an online marketing technology company 02:09 – Hindsight is a secondary offering which is an off-site analytics platform, complementary to Rockerbox 02:28 – Rockerbox is a management service and Hindsight is the SaaS part 03:00 – Rockerbox was launched in early 2014 03:03 – Team size is 18 03:13 – Target customers are marketers 03:25 – Rockerbox has partnerships with publishers and data providers 04:40 – Through different partnerships, they’re able to know the source of potential customers 05:25 – First year revenue was $640K gross 05:30 – 2015: under $2M , 2016 was around $4M and it will probably be $8M this year 05:48 – 10% of the customers are on Hindsight 06:50 – In 2016, Rockerbox has served 50 customers 07:19 – Hindsight currently has around 13 customers with a MRR of $16K 07:43 – Some of Rockerbox’s customers are Vimeo and Vanguard 08:16 – CAC and LTV 08:26 – No logo and revenue churn yet 08:50 – Some small companies can’t scale and their pricing is “take it or leave it” 09:32 – 5 team members are focused on Hindsight 09:59 – Hindsight is self-funded and is based on Rockerbox 10:14 – Ron shares why they raised funding despite doubling Rockerbox’s ARR 11:05 – Ron has reached out to people whom he hasn’t talked to for decades just to acquire new customers 11:16 – Ron shares the content of his email 13:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Having fewer customers with a larger paywall works well, it allows you to focus more on your customers’ needs. Stick to your pricing and your target market. Through the highs and lows, just KEEP MOVING. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/26/2017 • 15 minutes, 40 seconds
823: SaaS: Pre Rev SF Based with $3.3m Raised Aiming to Help SMB's Build Mobile Apps, Will People Pay?
Arun Saigal. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Thunkable, a Ycombinator-backed startup in San Francisco. Thunkable is a platform that allows anyone to build their own mobile app without needing to know how to code. Prior to Thunkable, Arun was the lead android developer at Quizlet. He also worked at Khan Academy, Aspiring Minds and Google. He holds a BS in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – Shantanu Narayen Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Investing in others is one of the best ways to invest in yourself” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Arun to the show 02:13 – Thunkable is a drag-and-drop tool to make a mobile app 02:23 – The space is quite crowded 03:08 – Thunkable is simple but powerful enough for non-coders to have a powerful app 03:20 – Thunkable is currently free 03:34 – Thunkable has raised $3.3M to date 03:59 – Arun shares why they’ve raised first before implementing a paywall 04:07 – They wanted to hire the team and have the platform that they needed with the money raised 04:30 – They’ll start charging in a few months 04:48 – Thunkable was launched in 2016 04:53 – Team size is 10 05:16 – Thunkable has turned on their revenue for a small stream 05:35 – The charge is a high 5-figures and is an annual contract 06:16 – Long-term model: charge for a premium product 06:36 – When they turn-on their features, that’s when Thunkable will charge 07:25 – Arun saw problems they didn’t know existed from those who were building an app for Thunkable 08:30 – Arun wants to help people who really need an app for free to solve their problems 09:00 – The conversations they’ll have with people who will use Thunkable for profit 09:24 – Target price is $20 a month 09:40 – Arun believes they can maintain profitability 10:14 – Arun believes that SMBs need Thunkable more than the enterprise businesses 11:03 – Thunkable’s goal is to capture most of the apps from the app store 12:38 – December 2017 MRR goal is $10K 14:16 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Assist those who need help in any way that you can. Choose your timing wisely when it comes to putting up your paywall. You learn and grow by investing in other people. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/25/2017 • 16 minutes, 15 seconds
822: SaaS: 25 Years Old and $250k+ in MRR, Here's Trick to Starting With No Developers
Ian Blair. He founded BuildFire while he was in college and has grown up to become one of the most successful app builders with 30 employees and close to 10K apps in the app store. His expertise is online marketing and growth hacking. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – David Skok and Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Ahrefs How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Ian wished he would have taken a crash course on how the world actually works Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:55 – Nathan introduces Ian to the show 02:37 – BuildFire is a mobile app building platform that allows non-technical people to build their own app with no coding required 02:50 – BuildFire is like the WordPress for mobile app 03:18 – BuildFire allows customization 03:36 – Ian started BuildFire in college 03:40 – BuildFire has a reseller program 04:18 – In 2013, they were making $300K a year 04:32 – It was just for white labelling 04:42 – BuildFire was officially built with the technology in 2014 05:02 – BuildFire has raised $2.5M so far in a convertible note 05:46 – It was in 2015 when BuildFire broke their $1M a year mark 06:20 – In January of 2016, BuildFire 2.0 was launched where they added customization 06:48 – Since then, things took off 07:05 – In December 2016, BuildFire was doing a little less than $300K a month 07:33 – This year, BuildFire is developing 07:59 – BuildFire has an ongoing subscription fee and upfront payment 08:20 – BuildFire is getting close to $200K a month for their SaaS side 08:33 – BuildFire is now leaning more into their professional services 09:15 – Total number of customers 09:25 – Customers pay starts at $59, $149 or $499 a month 09:50 – Average a month is around $400 per customer 10:40 – Team size is 40 10:57 – Ian self-funded BuildFire initially 11:11 – Their current CTO started the initial development for BuildFire 12:00 – BuildFire gets customers mainly through online marketing 12:20 – Paid ads spend is around $10K a month 12:30 – BuildFire also has a lot of organic traffic and they’re going to tradeshows as well 13:48 – Monthly logo churn 14:25 – Revenue churn 14:50 – BuildFire is on its way to a more predictable revenue model by the end of 2017 15:31 – CAC 17:00 – SaaS businesses are capital intensive 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Listen to your customers and make adjustments to your products depending on their needs. Online marketing is a necessity for every businesses. College won’t teach you how the real world works. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/24/2017 • 22 minutes, 36 seconds
821: Crypto: $17m Raised to Speed Up Mining Blocks Using New "Validators"
Jae Kwon. After graduating from Cornell in 2005 with a BS degree in Computer Science, he worked as a developer at Alexa and Yelp and has co-founded iDonethis, a productivity service. He since worked on open-source projects including a CoffeeScript compiler and interpreter written in Javascript, an end-to-end encrypted email system called Scramble.io, and a cryptocurrency exchange. He invented and refined The Tendermint Consensus Algorithm with the aim of liberating the blockchain from the costs and drawbacks of proof-of-work mining. His mission is to make the technology more accessible in order to accelerate the adoption of decentralized ledger technology. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Snow Crash What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — GitHub and Chat How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Find the problem and solve it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Jae to the show 02:46 – Bitcoin is something that you want to be small and accessible 03:10 – Blockchain is not owned by any entity but is still secure 03:24 – Tendermint is one of the engines that enable the creation of blockchain 04:05 – Tendermint’s partner in Europe is Ponton 04:46 – Tendermint was initially self-funded by Jae 05:03 – Jae saw the need to build Tendermint 05:08 – People were struggling with bitcoin fork 05:51 – Proof of work is how bitcoin secures itself, which is like a lottery system 06:40 – The transaction fee for block reward in bitcoin is much smaller 07:55 – Proof of work in the blockchain has its drawbacks 08:30 – The validators are the users of Tendermint—they validate the block and sign off and vote on what the next block should be 09:20 – Jae’s opinion on Dash’s masternode 09:50 – Cosmos is the internet of blockchain 10:18 – Jae has all in his money in Tendermint 10:31 – Team size is 20 10:40 – Tendermint was funded through a fundraiser 11:00 – “We avoid the term ICO because we don’t want to be associated with a security offering” 11:13 – Tendermint released their own token and they’ll create the cosmos hub 11:30 – The tokens will allow you to vote on the blockchain 12:10 – Tendermint had a cap of $17M 12:32 – They were accepting bitcoin and ether in exchange of an atom 13:00 – Part of the liquidation went to the Cosmos software and development 14:00 – Out of the $17M, less than $3M has been liquidated so far 15:47 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The block reward in the blockchain allows people to not just earn tokens, but contribute as well. Keep your liquidation conservative and focus on the development of your product. If you see a problem and you think you can create the solution, DO IT. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/23/2017 • 17 minutes, 48 seconds
820: How to Bankrupt a $4m/yr Business then Relaunch as SaaS
Mateo Munoz. He’s the COO and managing director of the Americas for Duuzra or Duzzra Group. Mateo has been a crucial part of the management team that helped the company turnaround from group consultancy to its second series A and is leading it from its service-based model to a SaaS-based model. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Never Eat Alone What CEO do you follow? – Falon Fatemi Favorite online tool? — Glow Baby and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Listen a little bit more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:49 – Nathan introduces Mateo to the show 02:25 – Duuzra was launched in 2012 as an event technology company 02:35 – It was on prem and they’ve worked with different companies 02:58 – They saw where the market was going; so, they started a solution on the cloud 03:18 – They got a little bit of the model wrong and there was some mismanagement 03:31 – They’ve burned $3M from 2012-2015 03:40 – Their current CEO is from a venture-traditional bank 04:14 – Duuzra then rolled over and Mateo had to deal with the IRS because of their back taxes 04:52 – Duzzra Group is from UK 05:15 – Duzzra was opened up in USA as an Inc. founded by the original management group 06:12 – Duzzra had their Series A 06:45 – In 2016, Duzzra made over £2M 07:12 – Current team size is 30 from the 80 people in 2015 07:19 – Duzzra raised £2.3M in their series A 07:32 – 20 people are in the UK, the rest are remote and are from other countries 08:17 – Mateo was the VP in marketing and he also had his own advertising company 08:42 – Mateo was offered the MD role by the CEO, he also acquired some equity 09:11 – Series A was a typical venture, but it was done through private wealth 09:28 – They’re currently looking into raising £5M for series B 09:39 – Duzzra just released their SaaS product coming in as a beta product 10:05 – Target revenue for 2017 10:24 – Duzzra currently has a great team that is doing an amazing job 11:24 – The valuation will be important, but they also want the investors to be happy with their series B 12:30 – Duzzra has invested $400K on their new product 13:08 – An average pay per customer is $2500 a month 13:11 – The benchmark for Duzzra’s predictable revenue was the license for the actual event 13:39 – Duzzra is moving to a completely different model 13:51 – Duzzra is now a content delivery and engagement tool with analytics on the back end 13:58 – Applications can be packaged quickly and easily 14:36 – Duzzra currently has 10 paying customers for the SaaS side and they still have their full-service suite 15:13 – CAC is around $3500 17:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Sometimes you have to accept that there will be loss at times while building a company. If the business can maintain its credibility (even after burning millions) investors will still trust you and will invest. Listen to others and learn from them; don’t try to do it all on your own. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/22/2017 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
819: AdTech: Bake Off Leads to Major Acquisition and $100m+ In Media Spend Under Management
Sandy Lohr. She’s a mother, wife, dog lover and leader of one of the best advertising technology teams in Silicon Beach. Growing up in the industry, she transitioned from client side to tech provider over 2 years ago. Her team strives daily to help local businesses globally find the best customer with her company, MatchCraft. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Jab Jab Jab Right Hook What CEO do you follow? – Susan Wojcicki Favorite online tool? — Accompany How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be humble” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Sandy to the show 02:18 – MatchCraft performs well and keeps its customers 02:46 – MatchCraft is a tech company in the adtech space 02:52 – 2018 will be MatchCraft’s 20th year 03:02 – MatchCraft matches buyers and sellers and has mastered the craft for doing so 03:10 – MatchCraft has 2 founders who came up with the strategy in 1998 03:21 – Sandy is the CEO and she joined MatchCraft 2 years ago 03:40 – MatchCraft acquired the client side of the company in 2014 03:50 – MatchCraft has a technology platform that helps run programmatic searches 04:15 – MatchCraft has been doing it a long time with scalability 04:50 – MatchCraft is a managing service and SaaS model 04:59 – The managing service is 70% of the business 05:46 – MatchCraft doesn’t work with any merchants 06:06 – Resellers of MatchCraft have over 6000 sales reps globally 06:23 – Resellers pay MatchCraft their media fee 06:35 – For the managing service, the fee is 17% to 12% depending on the volume 07:08 – MatchCraft has strategy discussions with their resellers 07:27 – The SaaS model varies, too 07:57 – MatchCraft provides ad copy in different languages and formats 08:50 – On the SaaS side, fees can go up to 7% of media spend depending on the volume 09:50 – MatchCraft is a privately held company 10:33 – Prior to MatchCraft, Sandy was on the client side and she was working for Advance Publications Inc. 11:30 – Sandy shares what she was doing prior to MatchCraft 13:15 – Advance Local Inc. bought MatchCraft and Sandy is now the active CEO in MatchCraft 14:08 – Sandy’s background has always been in marketing and she enjoys learning about technology everyday 14:25 – MatchCraft’s team size is nearly 100 and they promote diversity with their global offices 15:13 – MatchCraft doesn’t have to raise capital 15:39 – “We have extremely aggressive goals” 16:19 – MatchCraft has grown 26%, year over year 16:45 – MatchCraft has processed more than $100M ad spend annually 17:03 – Sandy’s opinion on the idea of Time being sold and what she would do if they buy one of Time’s brands 19:43 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s nothing you cannot learn that you really WANT to learn. If your product is performing well, people will remain loyal to you and to your product/service. Acquiring a company requires your due diligence—make sure it’s WORTH it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Ben Kartzman. He’s the CEO and founder of Spongecell, one of the fastest growing companies in the United States. Earlier, Ben worked at venture-backed Guidester (now Searchandise.net) in product and business development. He graduated with honors from Carnegie Mellon with a dual BS in Human Computer Interaction and Information & Decision Systems. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Five Dysfunctions of a Team What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Mint How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Don't stress about your first job—just find things that are interesting for you, follow your passion and do those things Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:55 – Nathan introduces Ben to the show 02:25 – Spongecell is one of the fastest growing companies because they are revenue driven 02:36 – It was in 2009 when Spongecell first measured their revenue 03:15 – 2017 revenue goal 03:30 – $26M has been invested in the company and their largest investors is Safeguard 04:27 – Nathan shares about his first investor report 04:50 – Spongecell is a dynamic and creative company in the adtech space 04:55 – Spongecell works directly with marketers 05:21 – Spongecell’s technology manages different creative variations 05:49 – The variations can grow very quickly 06:04 – Spongecell sells licenses to a platform and beyond that, it is based on usage 06:25 – The licenses are billed monthly and their biggest client is spending $3M a year 06:47 – Spongecell is working with hundreds of customers 07:20 – Spongecell is moving to target more enterprise customers 07:39 – To fire clients, Spongecell raises the minimum 08:47 – People are leaving because of the changes in the service 09:30 – Usage-based charges per impression 10:00 – For every 50 cents CPM, a company would spend $50K with Spongecell 10:15 – Spongecell doesn’t get involved with the media side 10:49 – Most clients have an allocated budget to be spent on Spongecell 11:50 – Spongecell has a base amount and the average usage is based on how people are using it 12:06 – Spongecell was launched in 2006 and they raised their first round in the same year 12:41 – In 2009, they saw the need for programmatic media, which is the buying and selling of ads through technology 13:22 – Spongecell has 95 people on the team 13:53 – Average ARR 14:35 – Spongecell’s intuition with their platform is one of the reason why companies choose them 15:40 – Spongecell has promised to set up an Amazon database so clients can look up the data 16:50 – Fully weighted CAC is changing as they’re slowly transitioning, but it is more than $5K 17:43 – Ideal cohort of customers for Spongecell 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s not easy to let go of customers—however, there are times where it’s the best decision to make for your company. The transition to focus on enterprise clients isn’t as quick or as easy as it seems. Find your passion and GO with it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Chris Golec. He’s built three, successful, technology businesses in the last 18 years. Today, he’s the founder and CEO of Demandbase and his mission is to transform B2B advertising, marketing and sales through innovations and digital technology. Today, hundreds of blue chip enterprises across financial services, hi-tech, manufacturing, healthcare and telecom industries have adopted a demand based on the B2B marketing platform and account-based marketing technology to dramatically improve the way they acquire and grow customers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Straight from the Gut What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff, Steve Jobs, Jack Welch and Sundar Pichai Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Don't start a company just to NOT work for someone else Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:28 – In the last two years, Chris has seen that there’s a dramatic increase in demand 03:13 – Chris is seeing 50% growth in revenue this year 03:22 – Demandbase just closed funding of $65M in May 2017, which is on top of the $90M they’ve raised 03:50 – Chris shares the reason that they’ve raised another round 03:53 – The ABM category 04:10 – Demandbase has developed new innovations 05:27 – ABM is more of a business process and Demandbase is much more of a platform 05:41 – Demandbase has multiple products integrated into their solution 06:10 – Demandbase was launched in 2007 06:22 – Demandbase currently has a lot of options 06:33 – Salesforce and Marketo are getting into the ABM category as well 08:25 – By the end of 2017, they’ll pass the $100M revenue mark 09:00 – Demandbase’s customer expansion 09:44 – Current customer count is around 400-600 09:57 – Team size is 300 10:17 – Demandbase will probably break even or be cashflow positive in Q1 or Q2 of 2018 10:55 – Demandbase is increasing investments ahead of plan and that allows them to generate new products 11:13 – It makes new customers come to the platform 11:44 – Demandbase has offices in San Francisco, Seattle, New York and London 12:25 – Demandbase has 50-60 quota-carrying reps, 20-25 in marketing, 10-15 HR and the rest are in data, R&D and engineering 13:20 – Account-based marketing allows you to save a lot of money 13:58 – Customers pay annually 14:09 – Payback period is around 12 months 14:33 – Chris is lenient with their payback period 15:13 – LTV 15:30 – Chris won’t barter just to acquire new customers 17:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Raising a large amount of capital will help develop the business quickly. Account-based marketing can save you more money. When you start a company, you’re working for EVERYONE. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/19/2017 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
816: Crypto: With $1b+ Cap, DASH Wants to be a Better Venmo
Ryan Taylor. He’s currently the CEO of the Dash Core Team. Dash is an innovative digital currency that offers a number of improvements over bitcoin. Ryan is an expert in the payments industry with over 15 years of experience in financial services and technology. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Mastering Bitcoin What CEO do you follow? – Jack Welch Favorite online tool? — BitInfoCharts How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t worry about what everyone else has to say, follow what you really want to do” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Ryan to the show 02:21 – Dash is based on the bitcoin code base and operates with the same level of security 02:28 – Dash has improved in 3 areas: 02:31 – First is governance that allows people to vote on changes 02:49 – Second area is that it’s self-funded 03:14 – Dash has incentives for people to contribute to the network 03:25 – Dash received its own funding from the network itself to operate 03:44 – There are masternode owners in Dash 05:48 – Team size is 50 05:55 – Dash currently has 15 open positions 06:44 – Dash has a more sophisticated economic system than the early coins 07:00 – Getting donations for funds is what is primarily happening in the bitcoin world 07:46 – Alot of them are ICOs that don’t have an ongoing source of revenue to sustain themselves 08:15 – Ryan’s opinion on Civic’s model 09:00 – Dash currently has 4500-4600 masternodes, which is a marketplace 09:39 – An owner can own more than 1 masternode 09:52 – There’s no way to know the number of masternode owners 11:22 – The outcome of a vote 11:30 – There are people who don’t vote, but there’s a minimum threshold 12:30 – Utility-wise, Dash is aiming to create a world-class payment system 12:39 – Some tokens are focused on smart contracts while Dash focuses on the payment 13:05 – Dash is launching their landmark product next year called Evolution 13:42 – Dash is aiming to make payments as convenient and secure as possible 14:31 – The treasury is where they allocate transaction fees and block rewards that all cryptocurrency collect 14:55 – With Dash, 45% goes to miners, 45% to infrastructure or masternode owners and 10% is set aside to the treasury 15:33 – The treasury pot currently has $1.2M and the network is extremely well-funded 16:20 – Dash incentivises each component of the network for it to remain functional 16:44 – Dash has integrations that they’ve funded 17:00 – Charlie Shrem just gave them a proposal to create a US debit card 17:14 – Dash has worked with Alt36 17:36 – Dash has funded cards 18:00 – Dash’s miner plus masternode combo allows things to be done instantly 19:42 – Ryan left his job at a multi-million dollar hedge fund to start Dash 19:50 – Ryan believes that there’s monetary and non-monetary rewards at stake with Dash 20:10 – Dash has the potential to bring cryptocurrency to a whole new audience 20:30 – Most of those involved have put their own stake into the network 21:29 – “My incentives are perfectly aligned with the network, the way it should be” 22:18 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A blockchain company that uses its own network to fund itself remains self-sustaining and self-functioning. Most ICOs rely on donations for funds, which can be unstable. Ignore the noise—do what YOU want to do. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/18/2017 • 25 minutes, 35 seconds
815: SaaS: He's Replacing the iClicker Growing From $800k ARR to $1.5m ARR in 6 months
Johnny Warström. He’s the CEO and founder of Mentimeter. He’s an engineer from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. He’s worked in 10 countries and visited over 60. He loves adventures and growing his company and he’s getting married soon. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Sebastian Siemiątkowski Favorite online tool? — Intercom How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do more crazy stuff” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Johnny to the show 02:21 – Johnny founded Mentimeter with his three friends right out of university 02:38 – Mentimeter is an interactive presentation 03:00 – You can connect the audience's’ phones with the presentation and they can vote or participate 03:53 – Mentimeter has a free and premium model 04:04 – Mentimeter has over 10M users and 400K presenters who lead meetings 04:31 – The presenters are the ones who pay 04:50 – Mentimeter currently has 6K enterprise customers 05:03 – Mentimeter is purely a B2B SaaS 05:36 – Average customer pay per month is $150 a year 05:56 – Mentimeter also offers packages 06:13 – ARR is around $1.5M 06:47 – Mentimeter was launched in 2003 and was initially bootstrapped as a side project 07:00 – Johnny was part of Telecom and his co-founders were managing consultants 07:18 – It took them 2-3 months to build Mentimeter and they showed it to their bosses 07:40 – Mentimeter had their $350K angel round in 2004 and they have a total of $500K funds raised 07:52 – Team size is 16 and everyone is based in Stockholm 08:25 – Mentimeter has no paid activities and relies fully on organic growth 08:53 – The goal of Mentimeter is to be a mass market product 09:38 – Mentimeter has 1 in sales, 9 in product and 6 in marketing 10:27 – Mentimeter was part of 500 Startups last spring 11:17 – Fully weighted CAC 11:42 – Payback period is almost instant 12:20 – The team has been doing different experiments to increase customer engagement 13:48 – Mentimeter is on -5 net churn 14:22 – Mentimeter has a licensed model 14:51 – 1% monthly churn 15:18 – Some do not continue with their annual plan 15:44 – Mentimeter won’t give money back, but there’s a 40-day refund 17:00 – Johnny shares about a big, annual event in Europe that he’s a big fan of 17:00 – Mentimeter has a built-in, voting module which functions as a simulation for a contest 17:37 – Mentimeter received a lot of attention from that event 2 years ago 18:12 – 2017 revenue goal is $2.3M 18:17 – 2016 revenue was $800K 18:52 – Johnny targets $10M in ARR for 2019 19:22 – “We’re not looking for funding at the moment” 19:38 – Johnny isn’t interested in selling the company at the moment 21:33 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Keep an open mind—your side project can be your next successful business. Business ideas can come from the most unexpected of places—don’t discount your ideas. Success gained from organic traffic IS possible. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/17/2017 • 23 minutes, 53 seconds
814: My Hero: $3m+ In Revenue in SF, She's Resisted Funding While Helping Companies Digitally Transform
Neha Sampat. She’s the CEO of Built.io, a 2017 Gartner Magic Quadrant Vendor and 2016 Gartner Cool Vendor that provides a digital business platform that helps organizations excel their digital transformation. She’s a recognized industry leader and has led product marketing, cloud computing and online experiences for Sun Microsystems and VMware. She’s a proponent of diversity and outspoken advocate for nurturing women leaders in her industry. She was named the San Francisco Business Times’ 40 Under 40 honoree and one of 50 Women in Tech Dominating Silicon Valley in 2015. She is part of SF Business Times 2017 List of Most Influential Women in Business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Moneyball What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Alfred How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do not start questioning yourself, you’re confident now. Keep that confidence, anything else will just slow you down” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Neha to the show 02:42 – Built is a digital transformation platform 02:37 – Neha started Built 10 years ago when digital transformation wasn’t a thing yet 03:21 – Built sells products to enterprise companies 03:24 – Built is mainly a SaaS model, but they also offer services and license deals that may not be SaaS 03:37 – Built started as a professional services company 03:44 – Built is still bootstrapped 03:59 – “We’re not a typical Silicon Valley company at all” 04:08 – Built was made based on the real needs of customers 04:27 – Team size is around 200, spread across India and San Francisco 04:50 – The team in India is mainly the R&D team and the professional services team 05:20 – Built has a real economic advantage having the majority of their team in India 05:49 – Built is in the remote part of Mumbai 06:16 – The office in India is where Neha’s co-founder’s family is from 06:48 – Neha shared how they started building their office with a not-so-good internet speed in India 08:12 – Built is slowly transitioning mainly to SaaS model 08:45 – First million dollar year was in 2013 09:13 – Neha started Built with her co-founder in 2007, and Neha took an advisory role at first 09:42 – Neha used her own money to fund Built 10:03 – Neha was very careful in handling her money 10:16 – When Neha and her co-founder started Built, they wanted it to be a product company 10:30 – Neha’s co-founder was from the integration space and gave her the idea of transitioning to Built in 2013 11:30 – Average customer pay per month is $50K 12:00 – Built currently has thousands of trial signups and hundreds of paying customers 12:30 – Neha is a certified sommelier and when they go to conferences, they’ll have wine tasting events to get new customers 13:40 – Gross logo churn 13:48 – Built has a 90% retention rate and has maintained it 14:12 – Fully weighted CAC and payback period is less than 10 months 14:43 – Built tries to always get paid cash upfront 15:10 – Gross margin 15:24 – Some of the services are used to fund their SaaS 16:06 – Most of the marketing is for conferences 16:54 – End of 2017 revenue goal 17:28 – They’re focusing on doubling their SaaS revenue 19:11 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you build a product that begins by addressing people’s needs, you will always have customers. Don’t raise funds if you don’t need to, staying bootstrapped is an advantage. Cash is king, always try to get paid upfront. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/16/2017 • 21 minutes, 15 seconds
813: AdTech: Scoota Raised $10m, $5m in Revenues, Looking at US Expansion for Programmatic Ad Platform
James Booth. He’s the founder of Scoota and he founded it in 2008. Prior to that, he was the co-founder and CEO of a company that led Europe’s rich media, providing infrastructure. He sold that to DoubleClick and Google back in 2007. He’s won numerous awards for his service to online advertising, an active Angel investor and a non-executive to a number of startups. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Joe Zawadzki, Jeff Green and Robert Grazioli Favorite online tool? — Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – James hoped he knew the internet was coming Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces James to the show 02:21 – The company that James exited was Tangozebra 02:26 – They found the name by accident and in 1999, they couldn’t find a .com address 03:17 – It was initially bootstrapped and they eventually raised capital 03:49 – They had trouble articulating what they were doing 04:24 – They raised $1.6M and part of the business went to a media group for 5 years before it was sold 04:49 – Tangozebra was sold to Google for $30M 05:15 – After the exit, James spent 6 months creating a business plan 06:19 – James launched Rockabox (now Scoota) in 2007 with his co-founder, Torie 06:51 – James had put in his own money at the start of the business 07:08 – To date, they’ve raised £12M 07:15 – Scoota is a technology company specializing in programmatic technology 07:40 – Scoota charges a low cost per thousand fee with a benchmark of £1.50 per thousand 08:05 – There’s also a managing service where Scoota takes a percentage 08:37 – Self-service is high-margin and media is low 09:17 – Two-thirds of the revenue comes from the self-service side 09:30 – Team size is 30—based in London and looking to open a New York office 09:53 – Scoota has global campaigns as well 10:41 – In the early days, James would make up all sorts of things just to get new customers 10:59 – In 1999, James had a conversation with a journalist where he spilled out mockups that gave them the exposure they needed 12:17 – Suddenly, there was a story about them 13:00 – Average number of customers 13:33 – 40 agencies and hundreds of brands 14:04 – It was in 2013 when Scoota broke their million dollar ARR mark 14:26 – In 2016, Scoota hit $10M from their managing service side 15:50 – Average ARR in 2016 was a little under $5M 17:33 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Digital advertising has improved tremendously profitable and continues to grow. Continue to create something even after your first, big exit. At the start of every business, you have to do what you can to get the first customer. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/15/2017 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
812: Crypto: $3m Raised, He's Build the SSL for Cryptocurrency
Zooko Wilcox. He’s the creator of Zcash and has more than 20 years of experience in open decentralized systems, cryptography and information security along with startups in general. He’s recognized for his work in Digicash, Mojonation and many other things that he has worked on. He’s also the founder of Least Authority. If you’re following him on Twitter, you’ll know that he sometimes blog about health science and is very active in Twitter and the crypto space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Constellation Games What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Signal How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That he would start learning by doing than learning from going to school” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Zooko to the show 02:28 – Zcash is a cryptocurrency similar to bitcoin 02:55 – Zcash is like the SSL version of bitcoin 03:20 – Zooko explains why additional security is needed in the crypto space 04:33 – Bitcoin is mainly used for payment transactions 04:40 – Other uses of blockchain is widely proliferating and apply the same technology 05:18 – In any transaction, you need to protect not only the identity of the person, but the transaction in the system as well 05:38 – In bitcoin, there’s no identity needed for the bitcoin address but the flow of funds—where the bitcoin is going may be visible to anyone who’s in the blockchain 06:55 – Zooko shares his partnership with JP Morgan for their blockchain security solution 07:00 – They had an open, public blockchain which is as global as bitcoin 07:26 – The Zcash blockchain has had huge success going around the world 07:50 – It was successful because it made it to the top tier of the blockchain system 08:50 – Zooko really wanted Zcash currency to be more available globally and they received more users from China 10:00 – Yunbi is one of the exchangers in China 10:45 – The strategy was to attract users from different places 11:13 – Some crypto projects have pre-money and some have ICOs or pre-sale 11:44 – The Zcash blockchain started mining, where people can get their own Zcash tokens 12:44 – Zooko changed the algorithm for mining coins 14:30 – Zooko has raised $3M and promised investors that they will get a cut from the mining 15:28 – There are transaction fees, but it’s different from what the investors get from the mining 15:45 – It’s the miners who give the share of the reward over to the founder and they choose to do so 16:17 – Zcash is still early in the space 17:06 – The fundraising happened early 2015 17:50 – Zcash has a unique structure to their system 19:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: While blockchain system is known to be secure, it doesn’t hurt to have additional security features in place with cryptocurrency. ICOs and pre-sales are quite the trend for blockchain companies. You can’t learn everything from going to school—learn by DOING. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/14/2017 • 21 minutes, 51 seconds
811: Crypto: After $2m ICO, He's Building the Bloomberg Terminal for Crypto
Maksim Balashevich. He’s a former IBM software engineer and co-founder of a successful, hosting business in Belarus. He now manages the overall product and leads the Santiment team. He’s a veteran leader, having spent more than a decade trading successfully using Santiment and Elliot Wave as analysis. He’s also a guru in yoga and meditation. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Nick Szabo Favorite online tool? — Blockchain and Reddit How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Move faster to the same goal Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Maksim to the show 02:30 – Santiment builds information for the emerging cryptocurrency token economy 03:30 – When Santiment had their ICO, they’ve established a token for their platform 03:36 – To get access to Santiment, you can buy the monthly subscription by paying in dollars or by depositing your tokens into the platform 04:12 – There’s no revenue on the SaaS side yet 04:33 – Santiment has raised $500K in July 2017 05:03 – Santiment has sold 45K tokens 05:17 – Santiment’s token name is San 05:44 – Santiment got 720 participants on their token sale 06:14 – Santiment has 8 full-time people and a few contractors 06:29 – Santiment hasn’t liquidated their funds yet 06:43 – Santiment got 12K ethereum from their presell, which they used to fund the development of the business 07:44 – Maksim is hoping to start charging in 3 months, but it seems like it will take 6 months 08:10 – From the community’s response, Maksim can’t charge for Santiment yet and people are asking for specific kinds of data 09:34 – It’s not that they will not charge, but they can’t charge just yet 10:00 – Maksim shares how Santiment works in the crypto economy 11:15 – Prior to ICO, Santiment didn’t take additional capital and just used the presell 11:46 – Maksim shares how they came up with the number of tokens to issue 11:49 – For crowdsale participants, it is 54% of their outstanding 12:04 – For presell participants, for every 12K ether contributed, Santiment will issue them 50M tokens 12:21 – The rest will be part of the team’s tokens, which is currently locked 13:55 – Maksim hasn’t seen any active competitors yet 14:34 – Iconomi is one of Santiment’s partners and is also in the same space 16:16 – Maksim’s prediction for the next blockchain that will do well 16:48 – Maksim personally likes Polkadot which connects blockchains 17:10 – There are also projects that introduce the token economy 17:24 – There’s a growing number of blockchain companies providing decentralized storage solutions 18:17 – Maksim shares the latest issue on hacking in cryptocurrency where $7M was stolen 21:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When to charge for your service isn’t an easy to decision to make—you have to consider the community and the value that they want to get from the company. In recent hacking events with ICO, security issues are being called into question. If possible, start working towards your goals as EARLY as possible. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/13/2017 • 24 minutes, 57 seconds
810: SaaS: With $70m Raised, White Board Videos Secret to VidYard 2x YoY Growth
Michael Litt. He’s the co-founder and CEO of a leading video marketing platform called Vidyard. While he’s not bringing leading video-based technologies to market, he serves as general partner at Garage Capital, a seed stage fund focused on supercluster companies looking to expand their networks in the Silicon Valley. He also sits as Communitech’s board of directors, a KW-based organization designed to help companies start, grow and succeed. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Shannon Stubo Favorite online tool? — Coinbase How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – You need a big support network and focus your energy into building a business Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Michael to the show 02:16 – Michael was in Episode 414 of The Top and back then, they only had 132 people on their team 02:30 – Vidyard now has around 250 employees 02:38 – Vidyard has 3 offices 02:44 – Vidyard has launch multiple products including a self-serve product called Viewedit 03:13 – Vidyard just had 100K users sign up after launching Viewedit, which is free 03:33 – It’s currently a chrome extension 04:22 – Michael shares how they spent their last amount that was raised 04:51 – Vidyard had their series C in January of 2017 05:30 – Michael believes that the CFO should be the “house of no” 06:00 – Everybody should be accountable for their finances and Vidyard uses Adaptive Insights for budgeting 06:43 – Vidyard has to be very careful with their lifeline and maintain their cash flow 07:23 – Michael’s goal as the CEO 08:39 – Vidyard’s RPU has grown over time 08:53 – Target for upsell is 30% of net new revenue 10:03 – Annual logo churn 10:13 – Net retention 10:42 – Over thousands customers are using Vidyard’s platform 10:57 – Viewedit is being used in tons of organizations 11:46 – Michael believes Vidyard will double, year over year 13:00 – Streaming cost for Vidyard 13:11 – Vidyard streams over 50M videos a day 13:15 – Vidyard subscribed on the Netflix model 14:41 – Weirdest strategy Michael employed to get new customers 15:08 – The strategy was inspired by Gary Vaynerchuk 17:17 – Michael shares how they were able to get customers from companies in other countries 19:10 – New CMOs in a company are one of the best target customers, so Michael looks out for new CMOs announcements 19:54 – Payback period is usually 18 months 21:02 – Payback period reflects your company’s status 21:20 – CAC 21:35 – Michael is also looking into zero-cost marketing 22:09 – Michael won’t sell Vidyard to Salesforce, even with a $300M offer 22:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Use your funds conservatively and make everyone accountable for budgeting. How your company is doing reflects on your payback period. Make sure you have a big support network in place. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/12/2017 • 26 minutes, 51 seconds
809: How This $12m Accounting Biz Moves from On-Prem to SaaS Model
Barry Clapp. He brings over 30 years of experience in sales and management to Centage. Beginning with IBM, he held successional positions with increasing responsibility on software and internet businesses. At DigitalGlobe, a satellite imagery company, he served as VP of international sales opening distribution in over 20 different countries. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Biography of Richard Branson What CEO do you follow? – Marcus Lemonis Favorite online tool? — Salesforce How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Be bolder, take more risks and get more equity from businesses with potential Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:43 – Nathan introduces Barry to the show 02:12 – Centage makes a budgeting and planning tool simple 02:20 – Every company budgets and most use Excel, which can be very difficult 02:49 – Centage automates budgeting to replace Excel 03:10 – Centage is a SaaS business 03:18 – Centage was launched in 2002 03:37 – Centage’s current business model is a changing from their previous licensing model 04:27 – Centage is in the SMB space and they have less competitors 04:55 – One of their competitors, Adaptive Insights, has just raised $175M 05:13 – Centage has raised a total of $13.5 M 05:50 – Barry shares what he did prior to Centage 06:24 – The top three PE firms for Barry, in Boston 07:16 – Centage’s customer pays an average of $35K to $40K a year 07:26 – Centage has also sold services in their first years 07:48 – Pricing is per seat 08:18 – Centage currently has a thousand customers or 10K users 08:46 – Most customers have 3 or more subsidiaries 09:06 – Barry is hoping to break the $30M ARR number 09:20 – Centage just launched their new product that is currently on beta 09:57 – 30% of Centage’s customers are on subscription and the 70% are installed on premises 11:07 – 2016 ARR was $12M 12:43 – Team size is around a hundred with some remote 13:13 – Average CAC 13:36 – Centage has an inside sales model 14:29 – Annual logo is quite higher than the previous model 14:41 – Centage has 80% retention rate 15:43 – Centage’s product has been continuously improving over the years 16:32 – Centage has always made 10-12% of their revenue from upselling 16:52 – Centage sells additional training 17:11 – Barry shares the weirdest thing they did to acquire new customers 18:50 – Gross margin 19:10 – Centage runs webinars, goes to tradeshows, spends at least $10K a month on Google AdWords and total marketing spend is around $100K a month 21:06 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be BOLD and take risks now! Shifting from a previous model does NOT mean that you should force your current customers to shift as well. If people see value and how you can make life easier for them, they’ll stay loyal to your product. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/11/2017 • 23 minutes, 54 seconds
808: AdTech: AdForm Beats $40m Revenue Monetizing These 3 Days
Gustav Mellentin. He’s the founder and CEO of Adform in the adtech space. Before that, he was an engineer in the banking world with an MBA, and was also doing consulting. He just recently came back from a European holiday. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Daring Greatly What CEO do you follow? – Jorgin Vig Knudstorp Favorite online tool? — Vivino Wine App How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Be bold and do what you think is right Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:46 – Nathan introduces Gustav to the show 02:20 – Gustav shares his European holiday experience 02:30 – It was pure leisure 02:50 – Adform is a tech company that has developed an ad tech platform 03:13 – Adform typically takes a percentage of the spend in the trading model which is on a monthly fee 03:27 – Adform also has a per usage model for their application software 03:50 – Average fee from the data model starts at $5K 04:23 – Most of the revenue from Adform is from the trading space 04:42 – Adform’s data model is the fastest growing part of the business and 10% of the revenue comes from it 06:07 – Adform takes around 10% from the trading model 06:21 – Gustav believes 10% is healthy for spend 06:55 – Adform was launched in 2002 07:10 – Gustav shares how they came up with Adform 07:41 – First year revenue 08:15 – Adform has past their million dollar mark in revenue, in 2010 08:40 – Team size is 780 globally 09:01 – Adform was initially bootstrapped, then they raised $5M in equity and $20M from debt 10:23 – Gustav shares about the deal they made 10:40 – “At the end of the day, it’s all about trust” 12:50 – Adform has a great management team that is able to manage their number of employees 14:20 – Adform’s DMP or data management platform was launched 18 months ago 14:34 – Current number of customers is around a hundred 15:16 – Gustav has flown his whole team in 15:38 – Gustav shares what people do at their end-of-the-year party 16:18 – Target revenue by end of 2017 is $50M to $100M 17:00 – Gustav is one of the major shareholders of Adform 18:00 – Gustav shares what other entrepreneurs could learn from his story of entrepreneurship with his personal relationships 20:27 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Zero revenue can turn into millions if you focus on your goals. Keep your people happy and make them feel that they’re part of the company’s success. Entrepreneurship and personal relationships can grow at the same time. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/10/2017 • 23 minutes, 11 seconds
807: He Exited His Company Than Invests $1m Into Energy Company For Operations Roll
Christopher Engman, the founder of companies like Vendemore, Retain24, TaxiSystem and many others and he’s also an active investor. One of his companies, which he’s now active and an investor in is called Climeon. He’s also involved with Proof Analytics, Trigger Bee and many others. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Inside the Tornado What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Put learning fast in front of prestige” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Christopher to the show 02:14 – All of the companies Christopher founded are profitable and are growing companies 02:50 – Christopher’s biggest exit was Vendemore 03:04 – Christopher ran it for 9 years 03:12 – Vendemore was initially bootstrapped and raised funds 03:51 – The exit was three years ago 04:42 – Christopher and his wife owned 75% of Vendemore 05:40 – Christopher took 50% of his Vendemore exit to start Climeon 05:53 – It has 350 shareholders 06:11 – Christopher believes that Climeon will be the next dominant player in mechanical engineering 07:13 – It is easier to raise funds if you have a number of shareholders 07:28 – The next round for Climeon will be a big round 08:08 – Christopher shares how Climeon works 09:50 – The process of energy transformation inside the Climeon 10:37 – Christopher believes in the potential of Climeon 11:24 – Team size is 40 11:41 – Climeon has less than 10 customers 12:10 – Climeon’s target clients are steel plants, cement plants and those in geothermal energy 12:36 – Christopher runs sales and marketing 12:42 – Climeon’s founder is in CTO side 12:54 – Christopher shares how he found out about Climeon 13:20 – Christopher’s shares in the company is quite big 14:05 – The starting contract value of Climeon 14:40 – Climeon is getting several hundreds of millions of dollars per client 14:51 – Christopher doesn’t get commission from the sales 16:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Building companies isn’t always about revenue, but the value you bring. If you believe in something, go for it. Turning heat into electricity is the future of energy. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Daniel Chait. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Greenhouse, which designs tools that help create and navigate a new world of work. Daniel has been a technology entrepreneur in New York for nearly 20 years. Before Greenhouse, he co-founded Lab49, a global firm providing technology consulting solutions for the world’s leading investment banks. He’s a proud graduate of the computer engineering program at the University of Michigan. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Nudge What CEO do you follow? – Kim Scott Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The dotcom crash” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Daniel to the show 02:10 – Greenhouse sells recruiting software that corporations use to design and execute their hiring process 02:40 – Greenhouse is a SaaS company 02:50 – Average customer pay per year varies 03:05 – The pricing model depends on the size of the company 03:40 – Greenhouse tends to price higher than their competitors’ because they offer a premium software solution 04:05 – Greenhouse is in the recruiting software space which is currently crowded 04:15 – Daniel shares some of their competitors depending on the categories 05:10 – The competition is extremely fragmented 05:33 – Greenhouse falls into all the categories, from the smaller ones to enterprise 06:05 – Greenhouse offers three tiers 06:24 – Greenhouse was launched in 2012 06:32 – First year revenue was around $50 07:33 – Post product revenue is around $1M 08:25 – Greenhouse currently has 2000 customers 09:03 – Team size is 195, based in San Francisco and New York 09:30 – Greenhouse has raised $16M from their series C round 09:53 – Daniel enjoyed doing their fund raising and he believes in their investors 10:13 – Every round is different 10:40 – This was the first time that Daniel raised outside the investment 11:19 – Greenhouse has a world-class retention rate 11:36 – 97% of their customers have renewed 11:55 – Most of the team is in inside sales 12:36 – Daniel shares where their expansion comes from 13:11 – Greenhouse’s newest product is Greenhouse CRM which is still in beta 14:10 – The inside sales team job is heat mapping the products used by a customer 14:41 – The expansion is through additional growth 15:15 – LTV-CAC ratio 15:48 – “We have a healthy ratio” 16:04 – Payback period 17:00 – The weirdest thing Daniel did to acquire new customers 17:43 – They went from market research to marketing 17:57 – ARR 18:07 – Daniel on hitting the $50M ARR mark by end of 2017 19:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create something that will make you stand out in a competitive and crowded market. Focus on how you can increase your customer retention rate—perhaps it’s by adding new products that will better serve them. Raising a capital round can help you gain new customers. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/8/2017 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
805: SaaS: 30,000 Customers Make Him King of Call Tracking and Attribution
Todd Fisher. He’s the co-founder and CEO of CallTrackingMetrics, a top rated call automation and lead management platform serving over 30K businesses around the globe. Todd developed the initial software and continues to be the driving technical force behind the company. He has also made a number of notable developments in the technical field, especially within the Ruby on Rails community. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — it How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Get your shit together” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Todd to the show 02:00 – CallTrackingMetrics has 30K paying customers 02:45 – CallTrackingMetrics sells phone numbers and provides functionality and features to those 03:08 – It can track which ads resulted to a phone call 03:27 – CallTrackingMetrics was launched in 2011 03:40 – Todd started with Revolution Health Group in 2005, then in Captico in 2008 04:24 – Todd started with a website that accepts credit cards for CallTrackingMetrics 04:58 – Todd met his wife in 2008, and who is also part of the CallTrackingMetrics company 06:00 – First year revenue was around $10K MRR 06:26 – In 2012, CallTrackingMetrics had 1700 customers which became 5K in 2013 06:43 – Currently, they’re passing 30K customers 07:05 – Todd shares how they increased the number of their customers 07:42 – The first few customers found CallTrackingMetrics through a small landing page which was put into Google AdWords 08:30 – Todd’s conversation with Living Social’s founder, Erin 08:55 – Todd learned the RIGHT way to target customers through AdWords the HARD way 09:28 – Todd tracks their own app 09:46 – Last month, they spent 6-figures on AdWords and they also did other paid channels 10:49 – Average CAC 11:20 – Customers pay an average of $2K a month from a marketing agency 11:46 – Call tracking is an enhancer for their campaign 12:08 – CallTrackingMetrics has two types of customers 12:43 – 20% of the 30K customers are marketing agencies 13:16 – Last month’s MRR is around $1.2M 15:04 – Churn is around 6% monthly 15:43 – Team size is 23, 15:55 – 3 in sales, 2 in marketing, 5 engineers and most are in support 17:35 – The Famous Five 20:08 – CallTrackingMetrics is totally bootstrapped Key Points: Continue to explore what you want to do until you find something that will make you content and happy. Ask around for opinions and don’t make decisions out of frustration. Create something that adds value and brings joy to others. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/7/2017 • 21 minutes, 18 seconds
804: SaaS: Yapp Passes 80,000 Events Powered
Maria Seidman. She is the CEO and co-founder of Yapp, the top platform for event applications. Prior to Yapp, she was the GM for mobile and VP for Warner Bros. Digital Distribution. She has her MBA from Stanford and her BA from Yale and resides in New York City. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How What CEO do you follow? – Stewart Butterfield Favorite online tool? — FullStory and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take more risks” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Maria to the show 02:29 – Yapp already has 85K apps published on their platform since they started 02:28 – Yapp was founded in 2011 and launched in 2012 02:56 – Maria left Warner Bros in 2010, then she met her co-founder for Yapp and they started in 2011 03:40 – Yapp’s market is professional events or the “mice industry” 03:54 – Yapp provides event technology for organizers who are in corporations or associations 04:25 – Yapp isn’t for casual events 04:56 – Yapp is a SaaS business and charges monthly fees 05:17 – Nathan shares how his former business, Heyo, was seasonal and the churn was difficult to manage 05:40 – Maria shares how Yapp attracts customers because of its affordability and its ability to adapt to different types of events 06:10 – Yapp has an internal communications tool 06:44 – Most customers are having multiple events per year 07:00 – Yapp’s pricing starts at $400 up to their volume pricing which is annual 07:32 – Small organizations tend to avail of Yapp more 08:34 – Team size is 5, all remote 08:48 – 3 are engineers, 1 in marketing and Maria is in charge of other tasks 09:12 – Yapp started with a small debt round for capital, but was bootstrapped after the growth 10:19 – The investors were supportive of Yapp 10:45 – Maria aims for Yapp to be a group of tools targeting marketing and events 12:14 – Yapp is in a competitive market and can’t share their numbers 12:42 – Yapp is focused on their ARPU and is going deeper on the enterprise 13:16 – Maria shares the weirdest thing she did to get customers was sneak into tradeshows 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The seasonality of the business affects churn drastically so having a second revenue stream is a must. Smaller groups are having more events than corporations are having within the frame of a year. Applications that are versatile get more users, especially from the business market. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/6/2017 • 19 minutes, 5 seconds
803: SaaS: Email He Used To Get From $0 to $10k MRR
Spencer Coon. He’s the co-founder of HiBox.co and Joincube. He has over 5 years of experience in enterprise collaboration software and 7 years working internationally. He has managed teams across 3 continents and 5 countries. Previously, he was in investment banking at JP Morgan in New York City. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Black Swan What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Intercom How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Spencer wished he knew that technology was going to be more of his passion Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Spencer to the show 02:20 – HiBox is a collaboration app for teams 02:31 – It has an artificial intelligence to bring everything together and enhance productivity 03:19 – HiBox is a SaaS model with a 14-day free trial 03:30 – It has 3 different versions, including a pro version and an enterprise version 03:57 – ARPU is $32 a month 04:03 – An average account has 7-8 people 04:55 – Spencer wanted to have his own product, so he left JP Morgan 05:13 – He wanted to create something tangible and has been passionate about Latin America 05:39 – Spencer started HiBox in Buenos Aires 05:46 – It’s less competitive to start a business in Latin America with talented people and their rates are more competitive 06:16 – There are 5 people on the tech team and 15 people in total 06:28 – Most of the team is in Barcelona 06:36 – Spencer left JP Morgan in 2012 and went to another company where he met his now business partner 07:28 – First year revenue was less than $10K 07:43 – HiBox is Spencer’s first baby as an entrepreneur 08:00 – Spencer used up his savings to start HiBox 08:41 – HiBox has raised some seed rounds 08:54 – It was more difficult to access VC funds in the USA because HiBox is based in Latin America 09:16 – They had 2 priced rounds with a total of $500K funds raised 10:00 – Spencer is still in the middle of negotiations for their next round 10:20 – Over 10K companies have signed up to HiBox and there are 35K active users 10:38 – HiBox is their main focus at the moment 10:42 – Joincube is an enterprise social network focused on multi-national companies in Latin America 11:13 – There are 300 companies paying for HiBox 11:30 – MRR is around $10K for the pro version 11:54 – Last month’s revenue 13:05 – Joincube will become HiBox corporate 13:34 – Gross monthly churn is 6.2% 15:10 – Spencer shares why their product would still be beneficial for their clients after the upgrade 15:46 – It’s almost similar to Intercom, but better 16:00 – CAC is $233 16:10 – Most are used for online ads 16:26 – It is a fully weighted CAC 16:38 – $3K was spent on paid advertising last month 16:57 – Spencer is hoping that the business will be profitable at the outset 17:32 – They’re doing as many tests as they can 18:05 – ARR target by the end of 2017 19:00 – Weirdest thing we ever did to acquire clients was tell them I lost a bet and would give them a 50% discount forever 20:00 – Gross margin 20:48 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s never too late to start your entrepreneurial journey. Starting your business in a country with less competition is a cost-efficient and wise decision. An upgrade should NOT affect customer loyalty and their experience with your product. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/5/2017 • 23 minutes, 27 seconds
802: Crypto VC: After $10m Raised in ICO for Fund 3, Now Demand High for $250m Fund 4
Spencer Bogart. He’s a managing director and the head of research for Blockchain Capital, the premier venture firm for investing directly in the blockchain companies. Prior to joining Blockchain Capital, Spencer was a VP of Equity Research where he covered traditional software and internet stocks. He had his first industry report on blockchain technology and is the most active analyst covering bitcoin. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Balaji Srinivasan Favorite online tool? — Telegram How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I just wish I would have spent more time on bitcoin” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:48 – Nathan introduces Spencer to the show 03:10 – Crypto hedge fund has created a “honey pot” for hackers 03:18 – The “honey pot” is actually bigger on the exchanges 04:23 – Most companies are now making bitcoins more accessible 04:45 – Spencer shares how to use Coinbase 05:00 – Spencer has predicted that there’s a sub 25% chance that the US SEC is approving a bitcoin ETF 05:21 – It is difficult for regulators to get comfortable with bitcoin 05:30 – Spencer shares the pros and cons of approving a bitcoin ETF 06:02 – There has been changes in US SEC’s administration that could be favorable with the approval 06:39 – There’s an ETF that was disapproved, but appealed and it was then granted 07:34 – There are speculators who moved in beforehand 08:03 – Blockchain Capital is a VC firm that has focused on blockchain for the last 4-5 years 08:14 – The last fund they did was their own ICO 08:23 – Their cap was a $10M offering 08:33 – Their offering’s sold out in just 10 minutes 08:50 – They are currently raising their fourth fund 09:10 – The industry has been changing consistently 09:36 – “We’re just all hands on deck” 10:08 – Blockchain Capital’s fund one was $3-5M and fund two was $15M 10:40 – Target fund for the fourth one is $250M 11:12 – Spencer shares about their Civic deal 11:50 – Civic allows you to provide your identity to others without them getting your identity 12:28 – Civic’s ICO 12:50 – Spencer discusses with his team how they handle situations where they had an initial investment of token sales 13:22 – Tokens are not dilutive 13:57 – People who bought into token issuance won’t directly benefit from the acquisition of companies 14:08 – There’s a lot of demand for under-line technology 15:35 – Spencer shares the problems Civic is trying to solve 16:18 – Civic wanted to sell enough tokens to get the attributions abroad to create an initial user base 16:35 – A company won’t sell its equity upfront 17:45 – Spencer made their acquisition and token issuance in two totally different time frames 18:13 – Token offerings have different models 20:19 – Nathan asks Spencer how an entrepreneur can manage his money in order to run the business vs. what to keep 20:31 – Most of the funds that have been raised should be converted to dollars so they can pay the bills 21:05 – Spencer is liquidating usually 80% 21:19 – “Do yourself a favor, convert into a currency that you can actually pay your bills in and pay the developers in” 21:57 – Spencer believes that Coinbase is the biggest brand in the space, especially in exchange 22:38 – Nathan asks Spencer, “what if any government starts normalizing crypto?”— the demand for the exchange would decrease drastically 22:58 – Coinbase was incentivized to not see widespread government adoption of cryptocurrency because they need people to put money into their system 23:20 – Spencer believes that if this happens, this will be a high class problem for Coinbase 23:25 – There are companies who are using Coinbase, not just for exchange 26:24 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Bitcoin is becoming more accessible to people because of the demand. The government’s regulation on cryptocurrency is still in its beginnings. Liquidation of the funds depends on the company’s decisions regarding what they need and their what their goals are. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/4/2017 • 28 minutes, 53 seconds
801: The $60M King of Ticket Sales
Jayesh Parmar. He’s a serial entrepreneur with two decades of event industry experience. Currently, he’s the CEO and co-founder of Picatic and is listed as one of the world’s top 10 tech entrepreneurs disrupting the event industry. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Amy How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Failure is just a data point” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Jayesh to the show 02:10 – Picatic brings people together and does things that are absolutely different from others 02:22 – Picatic has given away a product for free 02:55 – Picatic has changed the ballgame with their pro product 03:13 – Picatic offers Picatic Anywhere which is a new ticketing service 04:00 – The bigger stream for Picatic is the commission-based stream 05:00 – Average pay for Picatic varies 05:26 – Picatic has a basic product which is free and the pro product which is commission-based 05:33 – Base rate is a dollar and commission rate is 2.5% per ticket 05:46 – Stripe is on top of Picatic 06:18 – Enterprise API ranges from $5K to $100K depending on the API calls and ticket sales 06:58 – Event businesses are seasonal, but Picatic has partnered with different venues and organizations that aren’t seasonal 08:00 – Picatic was launched in 2008 as a side project 08:20 – Picatic went through Extreme Startup and got $250K with 10% equity 08:33 – Picatic has raised $1.5M as additional capital 09:22 – First year revenue is less than $10K 09:48 – 2015 revenue is less than a $100K 10:05 – As an event organizer, Jayesh wanted to de-risk events 10:31 – Picatic has pivoted from their previous model 11:40 – 2016 revenue 12:22 – The revenue is around $1.2M 12:40 – Team size is 15 based in Vancouver, Canada 13:55 – 2017 goal 14:05 – Picatic grows 100% year over year 14:25 – Jayesh has been going to different events to market his Picatic by being a doorman 16:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t stick with your current business model just because—test other models that your company could benefit from. The online ticketing world is consistently improving. The best way to get your business out there is by marketing it yourself. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/3/2017 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
800: Crypto: He's Advisor Behind Worlds Top ICO's
Ransu Salovaara. He’s the CEO of TokenMarket, the leading token sale advisory and information hub based on Gibraltar. He’s also an advisor for numerous blockchain startups. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Digital Gold What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kalanick Favorite online tool? — Coinbase How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Don’t be so arrogant, don’t think that you know it all. Listen more, talk less Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Ransu to the show 02:00 – In February 2014, Ransu’s friend called him and asked if he knew about bitcoin 02:14 – His friend told him to get into bitcoin 02:50 – Ransu is like the Bloomberg of crypto stuff 03:07 – Ransu gets money from the commission of their services to raise money for startups 03:15 – Ransu is involved in Firstblood 03:55 – Ransu shares what he knows about Joe Zhou of Firstblood 04:21 – Christoph of DAO was in Episode 781 of The Top 04:55 – TokenMarket didn’t exist yet during the DAO 05:15 – Ransu is getting 7% of their deal with the startup 05:52 – Ransu shares how they advise startups who are looking into raising money 06:28 – Ransu believes that startups focus more on building their company 06:46 – TokenMarket markets ICOs by going into different community platforms 06:52 – BitcoinTalk, Twitter, Facebook and Telegram are some of the community platforms 07:33 – There are 5000 investors in the ICO field 08:40 – Ransu shares why startups won’t just use ether 09:38 – Civic is one of the ICOs that TokenMarket just recently advised 09:57 – Civic has a KYC system 10:24 – Civic has raised $33M 11:07 – TokenMarket has advised Edgeless, which is their TokenMarket’s first ICO 11:23 – Edgeless raised $3M 13:25 – For the first time, Ransu feels that the USA is falling behind in the crypto world 13:58 – Ransu’s rule of thumb for startups 14:50 – Nathan shares why he thinks ICOs are a scam, and how they actually are not scams 17:00 – The hype of crypto explained 17:20 – Ransu believes that crypto is the beginning of the new digital assets era 18:48 – Every month, the market gets better 19:15 – Nathan shares what he thinks about Uber’s surge pricing and its relativity with ICOs and the crypto world 20:08 – Modern day businesses and startups are the best concepts to go launch ICOs or token issuance 21:38 – There are ICOs with the same concept as Uber and Airbnb, but are still not at par with the two 22:40 – Ransu often receives different pitches and some have concepts that are difficult to execute 23:00 – An ICO fail because of the team, the market, the demand, their failure to deliver and lack of tokens 24:45 – Transitioning from a regular startup to an ICO is difficult 27:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Companies looking into their ICO should focus on building their business and strengthening its foundation and service first and foremost. Not all concepts work for an ICO. Cryptocurrency is the beginning of the new digital asset era. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/2/2017 • 29 minutes, 45 seconds
799: SaaS: How He Grew To $200k MRR, $2m Raised at $7m Cap
Olin Hyde. He’s the co-founder and CEO of LeadCrunch.ai, an intelligent demand generation platform that accelerates sales with high precision analytics and content delivery. In less than 10 months since they’ve launched, the company has grown to more than 90 customers and are getting 300% higher sales conversion rates. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Humans What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Salesloft How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Olin hoped he would have known how important linear algebra is Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Olin to the show 02:09 – The last exit of Olin was Auto-Semantics that analyzed social media feeds 02:22 – It was sold to ai-one 02:28 – Olin spent 2 years with ai-one 02:38 – LeadCrunch started with healthcare 02:51 – LeadCrunch has beat IBM Watson 02:59 – LeadCrunch is using their targeting technology to help mid-market companies find their next best customers 03:17 – Olin shares why they’re targeting SMBs 03:34 – Olin likes to work with people who help others make their dreams come true 03:43 – LeadCrunch’s first product was Private Alpha with 1,070 small businesses signups 03:56 – LeadCrunch stays away from the enterprise because they like the idea of democratizing the power of AI to enable everyone to achieve their dreams 04:08 – LeadCrunch’s business model is a combination of subscription and on-demand 04:42 – It is still early for LeadCrunch’s SaaS model, so most of their revenue is from on-demand 04:53 – With on-demand, LeadCrunch got 130 rebooks from customers in just 90 days 05:17 – Average customer pay is $20K 06:05 – Olin won’t call their revenue ARR, but on-demand 06:40 – LeadCrunch has a customer success function 06:50 – LeadCrunch was launched in August 2015 07:27 – Trailing 12 months revenue is around a million dollars 07:36 – Monthly revenue is around $200K in bookings 07:46 – The product was launched in September 2016 08:04 – LeadCrunch was initially bootstrapped and has raised about $2M in capital 08:36 – LeadCrunch has kept the cap of $6M 09:33 – LeadCrunch has around 90 lifetime customers and 55 on their current product line 10:50 – Olin shares the weirdest thing he did to get a customer 11:44 – Gross margin 12:03 – LeadCrunch optimizes for growth and not for margins yet 12:48 – Customer payback period is 2.1 months 13:15 – On-demand customers pay as LeadCrunch delivers 13:36 – LeadCrunch’s CAC decreases as they get more customers 13:57 – Paid spent is around $6500 14:41 – LeadCrunch does A/B tests to discover new funnels 14:58 – LeadCrunch is influenced by Traction of Justin Mires 15:18 – LeadCrunch is conservative and capital efficient 15:35 – Team size is 15 16:04 – “We could get cash flow positive in 60 days if we want to” 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work with people that you believe in the most. Revenue models vary depending on which model works best for the company. Cash flow positive is great, but you shouldn’t have to sacrifice your people to reach it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/1/2017 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
798: Mobile Ad Tech Passes $100m in Revenues
Harry Kargman. He’s a passionate entrepreneur who bootstrapped Kargo over 17 years into the leading mobile brand advertising marketplace. He’s obsessed with art, design and New York and has been helping steward the ad council in a partnership for New York. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Only the Paranoid Survive What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Skype, Slack and other product tools How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s going to be okay” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:08 – Nathan introduces Harry to the show 02:41 – Kargo is the largest brand advertising company for mobile 02:45 – Their focus is on high end brands that are highly creative 03:16 – Kargo is a technology company 03:43 – They built a technology that will make an ad on mobile a high end brand experience 04:12 – The ad renders perfectly on a mobile page 05:52 – Kargo works with around 98% of the major media companies and publishers 06:21 – Most of Kargo’s customers are Fortune 1000 companies 07:13 – Kargo charges as a technology play for publishers, like a SaaS model 07:28 – It is integrated into the media that runs on the platform 07:50 – Kargo also takes a percentage of media that runs through the platform 08:21 – Kargo is focused on quality as they’ve turned down a lot of publishers 08:41 – Kargo only has the best quality for advertisers 09:00 – The average cut Kargo is taking 09:25 – Harry shares how they’re taking the cut with the kind of service that they provide 10:29 – The vision that Kargo has is that they’re on equal partnerships 11:14 – In 2015, Kargo passed $100M in annual revenue 11:18 – The growth, year over year, is around 100% 11:56 – 2017 is a big year for Kargo where they’re building a technology that is new to the market 12:23 – Kargo has an AdLab that they try to bring to advertisers 13:11 – Kargo is 15-20% SaaS and 85% is media 13:22 – The goal for next year 13:58 – Total team size is 270 14:25 – Kargo will have a partnership with NBC in 2018 15:07 – Kargo is completely bootstrapped 15:32 – Before pivoting, Kargo was trying to build software and services for operators 15:38 – However, operators wanted to take 18 months to 2 years for testing which is impossible for startups 16:18 – Kargo just got into the water, expecting major media companies to sell their ads and media properties 17:36 – The Famous Five 19:12 – Harry’s wife, Jill Kargman of Odd Mom Out will be on tour 3 Key Points: Develop a product that will make Fortune 1000 companies need you. Regardless of the size of the deal, maintain equal partnership with your partners. Stay bootstrapped as long as you can and as long as you want. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/30/2017 • 21 minutes, 18 seconds
797: SaaS: How He Did $30m 2016 Revenue And Will Hit $40m This Year
Irv Shapiro. He’s responsible for the overall business strategy and corporate leadership as the CEO of DialogTech. DialogTech provides the industry a leading, actionable, marketing analytics platform for businesses that value inbound sales calls. The company was named an Inc 500 company in servicing close to 5000 businesses worldwide—ranging from emerging companies to the world’s largest enterprises. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Purple Cow What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? —The Top Inbox How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I should have stayed in architecture school” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:04 – Nathan introduces Irv to the show 02:51 – DialogTech is Irv’s third rodeo in the industry 03:10 – Metamor Technologies is a system information business that built large office systems 03:35 – It scaled to 500 people and was sold to Corestaff 03:51 – It was sold in 1997 for $38M 04:11 – After Metamor, Irv started Edventions which was in the early days of the internet when schools were concerned about internet safety and its environment 04:40 – Edventions provided a safe internet environment 04:51 – In 2000, everything crashed and it was sold to Edison Schools 05:17 – DialogTech’s team size is 150 05:20 – Current revenue is at $40M 05:25 – 2016 revenue was $35M 05:30 – DialogTech raised a total of $60M 05:45 – DialogTech did their A round in July of 2007 06:15 – DialogTech helps companies who receive inbound calls to become more effective, efficient and close more sales 06:37 – DialogTech does four things technology-wise: 06:59 – It tells the customer’s behavior on your website 07:04 – The data then can be used by the marketing team 07:33 – An example of this is a life insurance call 08:18 – Tracking is by a unique phone number 09:38 – When a website is visited, a unique phone number is shown 10:14 – DialogTech is a SaaS model, but is in essence a cloud model 10:32 – Charges vary if the calls are in a batch or if it is an unlimited plan 10:37 – Customers pay between $150K a month to over $100K a month 10:55 – DialogTech has almost 5K customers 11:19 – Irv shares a growth tactic they tried that didn’t work 12:36 – They sent burner phones to over 200 marketing executives that have videos on them that will play after opening the phone 12:55 – They’ve spent over $20K for the campaign but they were not able to get a single sale 13:20 – Annual logo churn is around 8-9% 13:35 – Monthly revenue churn on the enterprise side is around .4% 13:47 – DialogTech has around 98% revenue retention 14:59 – 3K of their 5K customers are legacy customers who are at a lower price point 15:09 – Irv believes that they will reach $40M in revenue by end of 2017 15:30 – The volume of calls that DialogTech processes requires a technology that needs funds 15:55 – Gross margin is around 65% 16:38 – CAC depends on segment 16:43 – Gross margin payback is 18-24 months 16:59 – Irv explains how they compute it 17:45 – LTV is 5-7 years for enterprise customers 18:13 – DialogTech has around 40 engineers, 50 in sales overall, 12-15 customer support, and the rest in back end 19:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Target goals can be reached with a consistent model and growth tactics in play. We learn from our mistakes, so don’t be afraid to make them. Weigh the pros and cons of raising capital; if there is a need, then go for it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/29/2017 • 22 minutes, 22 seconds
796: Crypto: Kim Jong-un Crypto Funded Nukes vs. Billions Out of Poverty
Andreas Antonopoulos. He’s a technologist and serial entrepreneur. He has become one of the most well-known and well respected in bitcoin. He’s the author of Mastering Bitcoin, published by O’Reilly Media. Andreas is also considered the best technical guide in bitcoin and The Internet of Money—another term that he coined—is his book about why bitcoins matter. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Digital Gold What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “What you’re worrying about is really not worth worrying about, just go for it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Andreas to the show 03:17 – Cryptocurrency is still volatile 03:20 – Most ICOs nowadays still converts 60-80% of funds 04:00 – There’s no single system in crypto 04:21 – Andreas thinks that it isn’t the matter of ideology, but a matter of being a rational actor 04:48 – From a regulatory perspective, Andreas foresees that more than 90% of the ICOs will fail 05:00 – Founders get rich because of the investors not doing much to evaluate the ICOs 05:20 – There’s a lot of immature products coming to ICOs 05:47 – The cycle will just burn through a lot of money 06:12 – Andreas isn’t involved in any ICOs and he’s actually against investing in them 06:50 – ICOs can be seen as another space for crowd funding which bridges the gap between angel investment and VC 07:15 – At this time, there’s a lot of risk in ICO 07:44 – Cryptocurrency is the application of networks and market economics to the flow of money internationally 07:50 – Just like the internet was the application of a flat network system to communication around the world 08:23 – It is a system that doesn’t belong to any company or to any one person 08:27 – It removed intermediaries in banking and finance 09:00 – You don’t have to trust the person you’re dealing with, but just trust the platform 09:32 – It is extremely important for developing nations 10:28 – Andreas shares how cryptocurrency protected his mom’s cash retirement from failing Greek banks because of Greece’s current economy 11:12 – Nathan shares a sample scenario with ISIS using cryptocurrency to attack Greece 11:28 – Andreas shares why the US shouldn’t have spent 20 years bombing them as it led them to acquire weapons 13:30 – If Kim Jong-Un wants to acquire weapons in cryptocurrency, there’s no current way to regulate it 14:42 – The ability of the government to control the money leads to corruption and oppression of people 15:03 – “No, you can’t control money” 15:50 – Andreas is more interested in insuring that people who are trapped in poverty have the means to provide for basic necessities 16:50 – Andreas’ point regarding the future of the world depending on cryptocurrency 17:56 – ICO is a productive application of capital and investment, believing that there will be a return 18:31 – There’s a lot of people speculating about the future 19:11 – The comparisons between different cryptocurrencies and their market capital are not useful 19:24 – It is mostly based on speculation at the moment 20:50 – Andreas’ primary advice is not to buy crypto, but to earn it 20:55 – It is an online visual economy 21:22 – He has been earning his cryptocurrencies for the past 3 years 21:44 – The speaking deal of Andreas is in bitcoin, plus 20% 22:06 – He liquidates his tokens on a monthly basis 23:00 – There are some establishments that receive cryptocurrencies 23:45 – There are also a lot of BTMs or bitcoin automated machines available 24:22 – There are also local traders for cryptocurrencies but you just have to be cautious 25:12 – The questions Nathan should be asking for a pitch of a $5M crypto hedge fund 25:30 – Crypto funds are holding crypto for thousands of investors 25:40 – Their security should be a thousand times better and most companies can’t do that 26:00 – It’s easy to hack on a computer 26:35 – This is very similar to DAO 26:44 – The better way is to hold crypto funds individually by putting them into a wallet 27:24 – “You can’t keep information securely concentrated in one place” 28:57 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As of this moment, it is not that wise to invest in an ICO. The future of cryptocurrency can have both a positive or negative effect on people. Don’t buy cryptocurrency, earn it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/28/2017 • 30 minutes, 53 seconds
795: SaaS: With $117m Raised, Google Tried to Kill Him But He's Winning App Deeplinking Wars
Alex Austin. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Branch, a leading mobile deep linking platform with solutions that unify mobile user experience and measurement across devices, platforms and channels. He founded Branch back in 2014 while attending Stanford Graduate School of Business. Before founding Branch, Ale founded Kindred Prints, had engineering roles at NASA and holds many research papers under his name. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Mistborn Trilogy What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — JMP Statistical Analysis How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – You have to start your own company, don't wait. There is never the right time. Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:04 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 02:46 – Alex shares how he moved from NASA to a deep linking platform 03:33 – Alex realized that he hated school and loves building instead 03:57 – Alex still does building projects on his free time 04:33 – Alex started Branch when they were building the Kindred app 04:46 – The problem they faced was discovery as it was hard for people to find the app 05:36 – The only way people find Kindred is through the app store 05:48 – Alex created an ability to link to their photobooks with the ideal model 06:00 – They were able to do deep linking which is the ability to link to a page inside an app and have people discover the app for the content inside 06:12 – Branch was then able to solve a general problem 06:28 – Alex then decided to sell Kindred 07:34 – They didn’t see Kindred as a billion dollar company 07:47 – When they started Branch, people were already asking them about the technology 08:30 – Currently, 40% of the app ecosystem is using Branch today 08:42 – Airbnb is one of the apps that uses Branch—if you use it to find a property, then send a link to a friend, that link would be a branch link 09:05 – The goal is to get 90% of the app ecosystem to use Branch 09:26 – Google will allow you to search data on the web and Branch will search through all the pages 09:37 – Branch charges through the usage of the link 09:41 – The ultimate goal is to build a discovery platform 09:47 – Branch is a SaaS business 10:19 – For big companies, the charge is actually by tier 10:47 – Average deal size for enterprise client is $55-60K annually 10:57 – Branch just started selling to enterprise 11:03 – Branch was launched in 2014 11:09 – The platform was initially being given away 11:33 – They only turned on their paywall more than 7 months ago 11:39 – Branch raised $117M 11:57 – It was a priced seed round and a carryover from Kindred 12:38 – Team size is around 120 with 65 engineers 13:40 – The weirdest marketing tactic they did was they went to Stack Overflow and answered questions back linking to their product 14:38 – Branch just started a meetup group where people can talk about mobile growth 15:22 – Over 26K developers are using the SDKs 15:33 – When they first started, they’ve worked on different series of ideas that failed to work 15:51 – It took a couple of months for them to gain momentum 16:40 – Number of paying customers 17:18 – 99% of the revenue comes from enterprise customers 18:35 – The app ecosystem is like Yahoo, in 1995 18:53 – Google allowed the access to the information on the web 19:19 – Branch is built as SaaS because it keeps the lifeline long 19:55 – How Alex delivers his pitch 20:18 – Alex doesn’t want to have competition and they always make sure to kill off those who start to compete 20:57 – The platform is designed to have a network effect 21:36 – EOCO is the company that closed after competing with Branch 22:20 – Alex’s wife is a VC but she’s not invested in Branch 24:28 – Alex isn’t really doing Branch for the money alone 24:58 – Alex sees Branch as his contribution to make a great impact 26:00 – “There’s always a big company to go after” 26:13 – Google launched a product last year which is a direct replica of Branch 29:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Develop a solution to a problem and customers will flock to you. As shady as your tactic may be, organic traffic is still the best source of traffic. There will always be bigger companies than yours; don’t let it stop you from improving and growing. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/27/2017 • 34 minutes, 22 seconds
794: SaaS: How He Used Pizza to Hit $7.5m in ARR and $18m Raised for his Lead Scoring Tool
Evan Liang. He’s the CEO and co-founder of LeanData which he founded after managing a data cleanup project at his first company and felt the pain of cleaning Salesforce data by hand. Prior to LeanData, he was the GM and VP of products at Caring.com where he grew a small acquisition within the company’s main business. Generally, he owned 50% of the company’s revenue over 2 years. Before Caring.com, Evan worked at Shasta Ventures, a leading venture capital firm focused on end-user driven businesses. Before that, he worked in project management at eBay and business development at Microsoft where he helped launched the Xbox 360. Evan started his career at Battery Ventures where he specialized in software and ecommerce investments. He holds his MBA from Kellogg and BS in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Rich Hagberg Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I want to be an entrepreneur and not a VC first” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:03 – Nathan introduces Evan to the show 03:04 – LeanData helps marketing and sales scale their lead management processes 03:11 – They’re focused on two business processes: lead routing and marketing attribution 03:20 – Cloudera is one of their customers 03:30 – With all the leads that are coming into Cloudera’s system, LeanData will figure out which sales rep should follow up 03:43 – LeanData works well with lead scoring predictive vendors 04:30 – LeanData is a SaaS business 04:36 – Average customer pays $20-30K a year 04:42 – Large enterprises are paying 6 figures 04:54 – The pricing depends on the number of seats 05:24 – Marketing attribution is an upsell from the product 05:34 – LeanData was launched in 2012 05:46 – Evan has always been passionate with startups and he was just waiting for the right idea to come along 06:18 – Evan was at Caring when he saw the problem that LeanData was able to solve 06:40 – They had a large amount of data in Salesforce that was a big mess 07:25 – First year revenue of LeanData was $200K 08:08 – LeanData raised $1.3M from their seed round 08:19 – Total funds raised $18M 08:28 – The seed round was a priced round 09:12 – Current team size is 50 09:28 – 15 are engineers, 15 in sales, 5 in marketing, 8 in CS 09:48 – LeanData currently has 250 enterprise customers 10:13 – MRR is around $600K and ARR is around $7.5M 10:34 – The weirdest marketing strategy of LeanData’s was sending pizzas to people 11:00 – It was a marketing campaign and the customers picked the pizza place where they wanted their pizzas from 11:27 – The problem was some chosen pizza places wouldn’t deliver so one of the SDRs would have to buy the pizza and deliver it 11:56 – They were still able to get some sales from that campaign 12:08 – The primary CAC is for events 12:32 – One event is the Lunch and Learn Event 13:05 – They spent around 600K in strategizing conferences over a year 13:17 – Paid advertising spend is less than 10K 14:04 – Annual logo churn is 15% 14:13 – LeanData is currently net negative revenue churn 14:30 – ARPU expansion is between 5-10% 14:48 – LTV is around 5 years 15:35 – LeanData’s competitors in the ABM lead scoring space 16:27 – Gross margin is 80% 16:42 – LeanData benefits from Salesforce 17:16 – LeanData doesn’t need backend servers 17:30 – Evan answers about their exit strategy since it seems like Salesforce is the only one who can acquire them 18:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Organizing your data is crucial for the company’s operations. The weirdest marketing strategy can take people aback and still win business for you. The exit of a company depends upon the possibility of an acquisition; however, there will always be other options. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/26/2017 • 21 minutes, 20 seconds
793: Will This Funded Event Ticketing Company ICO?
Sandy Khaund. He’s the CEO of Upgraded, a platform for tickets using blockchain technologies. Previously, he was the CTO at InStadium, a sports venue ad network and senior director at Turner Broadcasting along with CEO of Iryrnsoft, a video-based learning for mobile devices. He was also the COO of teen social network at Piczo and director at Microsoft. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The World is Flat What CEO do you follow? – Reed Hastings and Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — OneNote How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The secret of life is doing what you do for free and getting someone to pay you for it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:02 – Nathan introduces Sandy to the show 02:37 – Upgraded has a solution widget that addresses the problem of event tickets 02:52 – Alot of the tickets are fake and being sold on Craigslist 03:31 – The Cryptography has worked so well that there’s only one bitcoin 03:54 – Upgraded has a tokenization aspect which converts tickets into a blockchain ticket 04:02 – Another revenue model as an alternative to Stubhub 05:04 – Upgraded has already made less than $50K in revenue 05:11 – Sandy started Upgraded last March 05:30 – There are 4 full-time people on the team 05:45 – The cofounder was initially a consultant and Sandy has more in equity 06:07 – The initial fund was from Sandy’s personal savings 06:14 – Sandy took an Angel investment of $300K on a convertible note 06:33 – With 4% interest and $7M cap 07:11 – Sandy and the team are still talking about the ICO 09:00 – Right now, cryptocurrency relates to the currency valuation 09:12 – For Sandy, he’s more about the technology rather than the currency 11:10 – Sandy wants to make sure that what he will do what is right for the business 11:50 – Nathan talks about the regulations in ICOs 12:11 – Sandy had a talk with his attorney about ICOs and blockchain 12:40 – As of the moment, anything can happen 13:30 – There was also some acquisition talks with Upgraded but Sandy turned it down 14:03 – Sandy didn’t build Upgraded for the money 14:20 – “I just want to keep creating” 15:16 – Sandy thinks it is still too early for the company to do ICOs 15:45 – Nathan talks about the issue DAO had 17:41 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: While ICO is one of the hottest topics in blockchains, some companies would rather not delve into it at this time. Create a utility that can solve one of the most taken for granted problems. Do the work that you would do for free and then get someone to pay you for it. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/25/2017 • 20 minutes, 38 seconds
792: SaaS: $7m ARR Founder Used Ice Cream To Get Customers, How?
C. Lee Smith. He’s the CEO of SalesFuel, a multi-million dollar sales enablement firm he founded in Columbus, Ohio in 1989. SalesFuel leverages critical insights that enables its clients to acquire, develop and retain their best employees and customers. The company is launching a brand new product called TeamKeeper that will revolutionize the way managers manage and develop their people which leads to a happy, business culture and a reduction in turnover. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Sales Bible What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Tim Cook Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator and Lynda How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Relax man, you’re going to make it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:02 – Nathan introduces Lee to the show 02:42 – SalesFuel does sales enablement 02:48 – It helps salespeople to sell better, close more deals and be the trusted advisors for their client 03:23 – SalesFuel leverages critical insights for both sales prospects and employees 03:35 – SalesFuel has 3 SaaS products: AdMall, TeamKeeper and one still in the works 03:59 – TeamKeeper is already up and working 04:13 – AdMall is for media companies 04:22 – When Lee started the company, the idea was to provide business intelligence based on business type 04:35 – SalesFuel currently has over 450 types of businesses that they’re researching 04:41 – The research team is the second largest team in SalesFuel with 10-15 people 04:57 – Total team size is 30-40 05:08 – 2016 total sales is $6-10M 05:30 – SalesFuel was on the internet in 1995 with a few companies still new to the web when they had their first product 05:56 – It was in 1997 when SalesFuel built their first web application 06:25 – An AdMall customer pays an average of $500-1K a month 06:51 – AdMall’s pricing model is based on the size of the sales team 07:41 – The price depends on the range of the number of employees 07:59 – For a digital agency, they have a different price because of the numbers of tools that they use 08:21 – SalesFuel currently has 1500 customers 09:21 – Columbus is a foodie town 10:03 – Lee sent packs of dry ice cream from a local artisan to their potential clients 10:09 – Lee had calls returned to him—he thinks it was the weirdest marketing strategy he ever used 11:10 – Lee closed a deal from that marketing strategy 12:06 – SalesFuel is 100% bootstrapped 12:38 – First year revenue is around $100K 12:50 – Revenue in 2000 was around a million 13:45 – 2010 revenue is close to $3M 14:40 – SalesFuel’s retention rate year over year is above 98% 15:20 – SalesFuel has client and revenue growth year over year 15:54 – Logo churn is equal to revenue churn 16:34 – CAC 16:48 – SalesFuel gets their leads from thought leadership and business development 17:23 – For research and blog, SalesFuel spends a little over $250K annually 17:45 – SalesFuel currently has 2 SDRs 18:02 – Product team has close to 18 people 18:15 – Sales and marketing team has 10 people and the rest are in operation 19:23 – SalesFuel has around 100 new customers every year 20:52 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A slow hustle is never a bad strategy— grow slowly and consistently. There are tons of new ways to gain customers; be creative, bold and just go for it. Believe that you can and will make it! Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Chris Mann. He has over 25 years of experience in product management and strategy. In 2010, he joined Bizo and created a marketing automation system for B2B paid advertising and led the company through its $175M acquisition by LinkedIn. He was also involved in LinkedIn’s advertising business. Prior to Bizo, Chris held product leadership role in IBM and Coremetrics. Today, he is the CEO leading Brightfunnel. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hard Thing About Hard Things and High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – Russ Glass Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Come from the heart” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:00 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:53 – Chris was the head of product at Bizo when they were just starting with 15 people 03:31 – Chris began advising for Brightfunnel when there were only 18 people in the company 03:41 – He was still at LinkedIn at the time and the previous CEO told Chris to join them 03:58 – Chris joined as head of product and the transition was planned for him to take the CEO seat 04:06 – Chris took the CEO seat in April 04:30 – Chris had to stay with LinkedIn after the acquisition 04:55 – Chris thinks LinkedIn won’t have a mature and dominant advertising platform from a scale standpoint 05:22 – “The scale would never get to Facebook” 06:20 – Chris has been in the advertising game for 8 years 06:35 – Back at Bizo, Chris built something like Brightfunnel 06:49 – When Bizo came to LinkedIn, they acquired Fliptop 07:18 – LinkedIn isn’t the company you should go to when you want to improve your advertising 07:39 – Chris solved the problem and he knows B2B marketing well 08:24 – Chris talks about the transition 08:46 – The transition has been smooth 08:53 – Chris has built great credibility and relationships within the company 09:13 – The company just had a record quarter where new ARR was three times more than last year 10:33 – In B2B marketing today, there isn’t a measurement platform that can see every single marketing activity 10:49 – Brightfunnel puts the data together in a way that it is understandable for the marketers to optimize 11:55 – Brightfunnel is SaaS-based with an annual subscription 12:08 – ASP last quarter was $93K which is great for a cloud company 12:35 – 150 marketers have touched Brightfunnel 13:33 – Brightfunnel doesn’t take any deal less than $30K 13:44 – Average ARR per customer is around $50K 13:53 – Team size is 45, 1/3 engineers with 8 in marketing and 6 in sales 15:00 – When Brightfunnel was at a Marketo’s conference, the head of marketing brought in puppies 15:30 – There were a lot of people who came to their booth 15:57 – Cost per lead has been around $59 across all programs 16:10 – Conversion is 30% of their pipeline 17:38 – For $1M a quarter for a new ARR, Chris wants to have 5M pipeline 18:00 – Team is based in San Francisco with 2 remote 18:24 – Brightfunnel just crossed the 70-customer mark 19:09 – Average ARR 19:50 – Logo churn is around 10% annual 20:20 – RPU expansion is around 20-25% 21:41 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The transition from one company to another is always a learning experience. LinkedIn won’t have a mature and dominant advertising platform. Marketers need a platform like Brightfunnel that will help them become more effective with their campaigns. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/23/2017 • 25 minutes, 52 seconds
790: Book in a Box Passes $11.3m in Revenue, 500+ Authors
JT McCormick. He’s an American businessman, author and speaker. Most recently, he served as President of Technology company HeadSpring before his current role as president & CEO at Book in a Box. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Cyrus the Great What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – It’s not about the high school diploma. It’s about the work ethic and the sacrifice you’re willing to put in to achieve greatness Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:47 – Nathan introduces JT to the show 02:08 – It is possible to buy a bestseller from Book in a Box 02:23 – The cost will depend on many factors 02:40 – One of Nathan’s friends spent almost $250K on Book in a Box because he wanted to put out a book and increase his speaking fee 03:15 – There are many people who paid more than $250K to get a book out 03:21 – Nathan read his friend’s book and thought it was trash, but his friend’s speaking fee increased 03:33 – It’s still a positive ROI 04:02 – Book in a Box specializes in ensuring the books are filled with valuable and meaningful content 05:11 – Book in a Box has made it possible for authors to publish their book 05:27 – JT just met a professional speaker who has been in the business for 22 years, but never had a book 05:34 – He never got the time to write a book 05:41 – Book in a Box will just interview him and write the book for him 05:52 – “Your book written in your tone, your voice” 06:09 – Nathan shares how Book in a Box makes you spill the beans 06:41 – Cost is $25K which is $5K a month for five months 06:58 – The quality of the books are the same as the ones from Barnes and Noble 07:13 – Nathan got a deal from Portfolio Random House 07:37 – Book in a Box provides proposals and manuscripts for their clients to bring to publishing houses 08:00 – Book in a Box has worked with a total of 500 authors 08:31 – Book in a Box launched in 2015 09:00 – Book in a Box is one of the unicorn companies in the startup world 09:13 – “We, as Book in a Box, have no debt, no private equity, no VC money and we are extremely profitable” 09:27 – Book in a Box has changed pricing a couple of times 09:38 – When JT met Tucker and Zach, the co-founders, he was actually looking for someone to write his book 10:14 – Tucker offered JT three pricing models, $10K, $18K and $30K and JT chose the latter because he wanted a high-quality book 10:51 – JT explained how the pricing turned out to be just one pricing model which is $25K 11:33 – Total revenue since 2015 is $11.3M 12:07 – Book in a Box currently averages 25-30 books a month which has continuously grown to 50-75 a month 12:29 – Team size is 30 full-timers with over 100 freelancers 13:13 – “We’re a relationship company” 14:17 – Book in a Box treats their freelancers with respect and pays them on time 15:05 – Book in a Box helps with marketing and book sales 15:14 – Customers go to Book in a Box for one of three reasons; credibility, thought leadership or lead generation 15:48 – Book in a Box created Thought Leader Media 16:01 – Pricing starts at $15K to up to $75K yearly 16:17 – The pricing varies depending on the author needs 16:51 – Thought Leader Media just rolled out in Q1 16:58 – 35 out of 250 published books are in Thought Leader Media 17:10 – Total book sales from Book in a Box authors 18:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Those who want to have a book written, but can’t manage to start can simply utilize companies such as Book in a Box. Pricing is crucial in every business—it’s either you make it big or lose everything. Respect and an excellent work ethic are keys to success. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/22/2017 • 20 minutes, 59 seconds
789: Google Bought Their Beacons to Distribute Free Wifi in India
Sharat Potharaju and Ravi Pratap Maddimsetty, co-founders of MobStac. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Traction What CEO do you follow? – Ed Catmull who wrote Creativity Inc for Ravi Favorite online tool? — Rapportive How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That entrepreneurship is a very, very painful journey” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:07 – Nathan introduces Sharat and Ravi to the show 02:23 – Sharat and Ravi were classmates since fifth grade and were roommates in college 02:53 – MobStac is trying to solve the problem of online to offline device connections 03:04 – They use the technology of WiFi, bluetooth and beacons in mobile devices 03:17 – Beaconstac is one of MobStac’s products 03:22 – It is a SaaS-based product that uses Bluetooth beacon technology 03:29 – It allows businesses to gather analytics 03:34 – It charges monthly 03:47 – Beaconstac is MobStac’s main revenue stream 04:08 – Businesses use bluetooth beacons that can be deployed to physical stores 04:18 – Beaconstac’s platform can then be used to track marketing and analytics 04:27 – Pricing starts at $49 to $99 monthly 04:34 – The price will vary depending on the number of beacons deployed in any physical location 04:45 – Average cost per beacon is $5 monthly which is on top of the starting price 05:25 – Beaconstac has a mixed group of customers, from mom and pop stores to enterprises 05:57 – Some would pay $50 a month and $5000 a month for others 06:04 – There are currently around 10K beacons deployed in total 06:27 – MobStac is a software company 07:03 – MobStac has partnered with a Chinese OEM who makes the hardware 07:35 – The pay for the hardware is a one-time cost 07:40 – “You own the beacons once you pay for the beacons” 07:43 – Charge per beacon is $22 07:50 – The margin is very small 08:07 – They make revenue mostly from the software and not from the hardware 08:15 – MobStac was launched in 2010 08:24 – It was focused in building products in the mobile space 09:20 – After pivoting, first year revenue was not zero but it was small 09:35 – 2014 revenue was less than $250K with 10-15 people on the team 09:54 – Current team size is 20 10:00 – The company is based in Bangalore, India but Sharat goes to New York as well 10:17 – Last month total MRR is close to $25K 10:22 – Target ARR by the end of 2017 is 500K 10:37 – Which was only from the Beaconstac product 10:56 – Beaconstac currently has 100 customers 11:12 – One of Beaconstac’s biggest customer is Google India 11:14 – Google has deployed over 2000 beacons at 117 train stations 11:28 – It is the largest public Wi-Fi project in the world 11:32 – The beacons are used to send notifications and awareness to people who are waiting at the stations 11:46 – Sample notification 12:20 – MobStac has raised $3.5M 13:07 – The strangest customer acquisition strategy they’ve done 14:10 – Google has made the beacon technology compliant with the chrome browser 14:23 – Someone who is near a beacon can receive a notification as long as he has a chrome browser and bluetooth on; no need to download an app 15:15 – One of their customers is a freelancer who bought a beacon so whenever he goes to an event, the beacon will send a notification to other attendees to market his services 15:56 – MobStac isn’t spending anything on paid marketing 16:01 – Ravi does some content marketing for the company 16:37 – Cap table 17:31 – Sharat and Ravi still own more than half of the company 19:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be scared to pivot if it is for the betterment of your company. The easiest and cheapest way to market your product is by using it. Entrepreneurship is definitely not an easy route—prepare your mindset for a rough (but worth it) journey. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/21/2017 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
788: Ad Tech Agency Does $17m Gross Profit 2016, $30m VC Raised
Patrik Fagerlund. He’s been working with mobile internet since the 90s. He’s an engineer by training and now, he’s the CEO and founder of Widespace, a mobile adtech company. Outside of work, he loves spending time with his family with his four kids and his wife along with many activities and sports. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Business Insider What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack and Flatly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be what you want to be” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:00 – Nathan introduces Patrik to the show 02:36 – Widespace is a mobile advertising campaign 02:40 – It was spun out in 2007 from what Patrik thought was a great media channel 03:04 – Patrik sold media fueled by their technology 03:10 – Selling media per CPM which is $10 per impression 03:31 – This was the business model in 2009 04:00 – $2M was the total ad spend for the previous model and 40% went to the company 04:26 – Team size was 9 04:38 – Widespace's current business model spent $30M for ads 04:40 – Team size is 130 04:41 – “We’re moving into selling technology at a rapid space” 04:49 – Widespace extends their tools and technology for both the supply and demand 05:09 – Widespace focuses more on selling their technology 05:28 – The model is close to SaaS, but the pricing depends on the volume and usage 06:11 – Of the top 50 global advertisers, Widespace serves 70% of them 06:24 – Widespace works with most of the umbrella agency companies in the world 06:51 – The tech of Widespace is a full-stack offering 07:01 – The algorithm is based on interests 07:18 – If Widespace goes against other legacy technologies in adtech, Widespace will outperform them 07:46 – A customer pays 50% of their ad spend to make use of Widespace’s technology 07:54 – It’s a volume game, the more a customer pays, the less Widespace charges 08:04 – If a customer puts $20M into Widespace’s system, it will go down to below $10M 08:53 – Average ARR is around $4M 09:06 – Since Widespace is a full-stack, they service both demand and supply 09:11 – There’s a cap on the demand side and a supply cap to serve the supply 09:26 – The suppliers are the top publishers in the world 09:45 – Widespace takes a cut from the demand and supply side 09:56 – Widespace charges on the extended version of the algorithm as well 10:11 – Last year’s processed ad spend is shy of $40M 10:49 – 2016 total revenue is around $17M 11:04 – Widespace was initially bootstrapped 11:16 – Widespace has raised close to $30M 11:33 – Over the years, Widespace had propositions from strategics but they turned them down 12:08 –Widespace is currently working with 500 suppliers/publications 12:17 – Widespace keeps control of their supply and has deeper integration 13:07 – A few years ago, Widespace was the only one who was servicing the publishers 13:40 – Widespace doesn’t have any exclusivity 15:02 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Adjust your technology depending on the needs of your target market. Find the right partners with whom you can grow your business. Be what you want to be! Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/20/2017 • 18 minutes, 1 second
787: Crypto: With $163m Raised, He Launched the #1 ICO
Eyal Hertzog. He’s been a venture-backed technology entrepreneur for over 20 years. He’s the founder of Metacafe, Israel’s fastest growing video sharing site which has reached over 15M uniques at its peak. Previously, he founded Contact Networks which was one of the first social networks in 1999. He’s now at Bancor Network and has been an outspoken thought leader on cryptocurrency in Israel and is a talented piano and bass musician. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Spider and the Starfish What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Keep How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You never stop evolving” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:49 – Nathan introduces Eyal to the show 02:40 – Bancor is a non-profit organization which is in a new model that has been rising recently 03:36 – Similarly to Etherium, Bancor is also a token that is solving the problem of liquidity 04:00 – Eyal talks about any kind of liquidity that works today with crypto tokens 04:14 – There is a token that represents gold and a token that represents a dollar which you can convert back to gold and dollars 04:24 – “Real assets from the real world are already represented in the blockchain” 04:47 – Bancor provides a different way that doesn’t require traders to bid for an asset; it automatically finds a market trait according to a certain formula 05:09 – Nathan shares about his interview with Joe Zhou who is the founder of Firstblood 05:56 – The pricing of ether and other cryptocurrencies is always changing 06:25 – Bancor provides a much better solution than cryptocurrencies exchanges, like what Coinbase is doing, for liquidity 06:46 – Bancor is an alternative way to convert cryptocurrencies 06:52 – The exchanges that are based on smart contracts are automated so they won’t require central services 07:14 – Bancor did their own ICO for their token which is BNT or banking network token that will be used in Bancor’s network of token conversion 07:26 – Within three hours, Bancor raised $153M 07:44 – It was in June 12, 2017 08:03 – Bancor was very open during their ICO and told people that everyone who will invest in 2 hours will have an opportunity and they will get exactly the same rate 09:11 – There are currently 20 people involved in Bancor’s operation 09:31 – Bancor liquidates as little as possible which is less than 10% 10:11 – Bancor currently has 12445 token holders 10:22 – Eyal has worked with VCs for a long time prior to Bancor 12:05 – People who hold a lot of cryptocurrencies are called “whales” 12:29 – The goal of people in the crypto world is to build a new financial ecosystem 13:14 – The foundation where the proceeds from the crowdsale go is called V Protocol 13:27 – The foundation sold 50% of the tokens and the other 50% went to different buckets 14:07 – Bancor runs on the ethereum blockchain so they already have miners and won’t need miners for their own tokens 15:18 – Nathan summarizes Bancor’s figures 16:40 – Eyal had a dream to build something that will have a cultural effect or something that will change how we do things 17:07 – When Eyal learned about bitcoin, he thought that it would be a huge, cultural evolution one day 17:55 – In terms of completed ICOs, Bancor ranks number one 18:28 – Eyal shares where the demand for Bancor came from 20:34 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are better ways to do cryptocurrency exchanges that benefit the token holder more. Be open to your investors, so you can earn their trust. You are always learning and evolving. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/19/2017 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
786: How This Ad Tech Company Used $1m+ In Mezzanine Debt to Grow Profitably
Mitchell Reichgut. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Jun Group. Prior to founding Jun Group in 2005, he led Bates Interactive, the online unit of Bates Worldwide Advertising which is now owned by WPP. As general manager and creative director, he helped grow Bates Interactive into a 70-person integrated unit with clients such as EDS, Warner-Lambert and many others. Before joining Bates, he was the creative director at Think New Ideas. He began his career as Art Director at Grey Advertising where he created print and TV ads for clients. Throughout his career, he’s worked with major brands in the industry including Procter and Gamble, Parker Brothers, Reebok and others. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Anything written by Seth Godin What CEO do you follow? – Jack Welch Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Mitchell wished he knew the kind of discipline it took to make things work Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:05 – Nathan introduces Mitchell to the show 03:08 – The “Jun” in Jun Group means truth 03:11 – Mitchell founded his company believing that advertising can be transparent, honest and deliver tangible results 03:19 – Jun Group’s job is to get millions of people to engage with videos and visit websites of the Fortune 500 brands 03:38 – Nathan reads Jun Group’s website line 03:52 – Mitchell gives an example of a spaghetti sauce brand that targets Hispanic mothers who are 35 and up, in the USA 04:01 – Jun Group will use the video of the brand to connect with their target market on their phone, tablets and computers 04:16 – Customers can opt-in in exchange for something like rewards points 04:38 – Jun Group is an in-app solution 05:37 – Jun Group only charges when someone chooses to engage and the client gets the value of what they’re paying for 06:06 – When you don’t interrupt people, they tend to watch to the end 06:08 – Jun Group gets 90% of people to watch a 30-second ad until the very end 06:13 – 3-5% of the viewers are visiting the brand’s website 06:50 – From the publisher, the brand will appear in a mobile app 07:29 – Each app integration creates an interaction depending on the app user’s behavior 07:46 – In web environment, app developers pay CPI 07:52 – Jun Group never had a pop-up and they never interrupt 08:14 – Jun Group has a sophisticated tech platform that works well with app developers 08:21 – “Apps are complex business” 08:41 – Jun Group was bootstrapped until 2015 08:47 – Then they had a private equity deal with Howard Capital 08:58 – They’ve raised $28M 09:09 – They’ve decided to raise because they found the right partner 09:55 – Growing an adtech business is quite unusual and requires hard work 10:02 – Jun Group has brands, app publishers and consumers that they need to take care of 10:27 – Jun Group is an adtech platform and not really an agency 10:30 – Most adtech platforms lose money and want to grow fast 10:49 – Jun Group has been growing slowly, but steadily and profitably 11:13 – The revenue comes from commitments from brands and media buying platforms, some are per project and some are per annual commitment 12:00 – Jun Group’s pricing model varies depending on what the ad is 12:34 – A CPM (cost per thousand) in the industry usually costs $8 up 12:40 – Jun Group charges cost per engagement which is more than the average CPM 13:22 – Mitchell left Bates and started Jun Group at home 13:31 – Mitchell didn’t really plan to be an entrepreneur 13:53 – Mitchell get into the adtech industry with his partner when it was just starting 14:12 – By 2008 and 2009, Jun Group was earning $1-2M in revenue 15:08 – Jun Group usually take a percentage from the sales they make 15:39 – Most of the money goes back to the campaign 16:05 – Jun Group had debt with WTI or Western Technology Investment that helped the company grow 16:34 – The debt was in millions 17:05 – The media spent through Jun Group’s system 17:18 – Jun Group is still cash flow positive 17:53 – Jun Group really had a strategic partnership with their seed round 18:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Have the right partners who will not just provide the funds but help the company grow. Adtech isn’t an easy industry with fast growth; it takes time and the right model to thrive in it. It takes firm, hard discipline to make things work. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/18/2017 • 20 minutes, 52 seconds
785: He Makes $500k+ From Udemy Helping You Code
Evan Leong. He’s the VP of Product at Devslopes, a learn-to-code platform focused on taking beginners to paid professionals to curated project-based videos. He’s always been involved with startups since 2015, when he took the leap from a corporate job to join the startup world full-time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Follow your instincts, follow your gut, and don’t let age stop you from what you want to do Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:05 – Nathan introduces Evan to the show 02:31 – Devslopes is a learn-to-code platform for iOs, MacOS and TvOs 02:39 – A version for Windows will be available soon too 02:48 – Devslopes is similar to Treehouse 03:00 – Devslopes has been around for a year and a half 03:10 – Devslopes has just converted to SaaS 03:22 – They garnered 130 subscriptions just after the launch 03:33 – Average pay per customer is a little over $20 a month 04:05 – Devslopes was funded through Kickstarter and an investor 04:15 – They raised $190K in Kickstarter 04:35 – Devslopes’ CEO is a good salesperson and they had a strong community even before Kickstarter 05:04 – The Kickstarter campaign was blasted around 05:11 – The community size is around 10K 05:22 – Devslopes has raised an additional of $300K from Redfoo of LMFAO 05:42 – Devslopes was launched in March 2016 05:53 – First year revenue was $600K 06:04 – 2017 goal is to reach a million 06:39 – Devslopes has large courses that will take people more time to stick with them 06:48 – Devslopes is pumping out target topics which are 2-3 hour courses 07:13 – Team size is 8 07:48 – The CEO started in e-learning marketplaces 08:05 – By the time Devslopes started, the CEO already had 40K students on Udemy 08:33 – Devslopes gets students from affiliates too 09:12 – Devslopes want to fully dive into the learning experience 09:32 – They liked the idea of having everything in one program so they created the SaaS model 10:17 – Devslopes publishes to affiliates the content that the affiliates want to promote 10:26 – Udemy likes to promote 30-60 hour courses 10:43 – Devslopes is also on Skillshare, Learnability and Inkydeals 10:58 – 90% of the content goes to Udemy and the rest are spread out to the rest 11:08 – 90% of the revenue is from Udemy, too 11:30 – Devslopes is just starting to use Facebook ads which is their only paid marketing 12:05 – CAC 12:11 – Most of what Devslopes gets from Facebook ads is social presence but no paid leads yet 12:44 – The charge of Udemy fluctuates depending on how they promote their content 13:21 – Evan focuses on the product and handles the team 13:37 – Devslopes currently have 5K iOs downloads and a couple of thousand from Mac 15:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With the advancement in technology, more people are opting to learn from the comfort of their own home. Target your market so it will be easier for the company to adapt a new business model. Customers will stick with your product if it is of value to them. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/17/2017 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
784: Crypto: How ICO Companies Turn Money Raised Into Cash-In-Bank To Fund Growth
Joe Zhou. He’s the founder and CEO of FirstBlood, an eSports startup that recently broke the speed record for crowdfunding, specifically in the crypto world. Prior to founding FirstBlood, Joe co-founded Alt-Options, a Boston based fintech or financial technology startup that built the first American style option trading platform for digital currencies. Joe holds a BSBA from Boston University Questrom School of Business and an entrepreneur residence at Babson College. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Joe wished he was less concerned about how he was perceived in school Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:11 – Nathan introduces Joe to the show 03:00 – FirstBlood is a platform that allows players to play games, not just for fun but for money 03:23 – FirstBlood charges money for each game or tournament played 03:49 – FirstBlood was launched in April 2016 03:55 – Joe’s co-founder, Anik, is also a big gamer 04:08 – They were both fans of League of Legends 04:14 – They attended a Hackathon where they were challenged to build an application that has never existed before 05:00 – Joe co-founded Alt-Options while he was still in college 05:15 – The technology was built from scratch 05:18 – There were about 2K users during the testing phase 05:50 – It was bootstrapped and $50K was raised from families and friends 06:02 – There were a group people who wanted to get into the space and Joe worked with them as a consultant for half a year 06:44 – Joe decided to do the token issuance because of the support they were getting 06:55 – DAO was successful until hackers were able to get into it due to a bug 07:19 – FirstBlood was one of the most promising projects that was going to DAO 07:26 – DAO or Decentralized Autonomous Organization is like a decentralized venture capital firm; it was managed by every person who has a token in it 07:52 – FirstBlood was operating under Project Tron in the DAO community 08:15 – After the bug, FirstBlood started building what was needed to run a successful crowdfunding campaign 08:52 – Joe and Anik gave talks and presented multiple ethereum meetups regarding their project 09:37 – Joe came home with a budget of 3-5 years runway for the entire team 09:46 – They’ve raised $5M in funding 09:52 – Team had 6 people and now they have 15 people 11:14 – They’ve calculated the ethereum’s pricing and deployed the contract to the network 11:51 – FirstBlood raised the money in just the first four blocks and processed in just 7 minutes 12:41 – FirstBlood has sold 465,313 ether tokens 13:10 – Joe shares why they released their own FirstBlood tokens 13:16 – Ethereum has some limitations 13:34 – The FirstBlood tokens are given unique utilities that are crucial to making the network work 13:42 – First layer is the transactional level utility where both ether and FirstBlood tokens work 14:20 – Witness program utility can only be run by FirstBlood tokens 14:52 – DotA is the first mobile strategy game and now is a stand alone 15:53 – When a game is settled, a set of information is sent to a network of witness nodes 16:02 – Witness nodes will then run tests using computational power to fetch the data and cross reference the data to make sure that it is valid 16:14 – The data then gets published into the blockchain and smart contract 16:32 – The winner of the games will pay a small percentage fee to the network 17:40 – The token price isn’t that important for the team 18:14 – The ratio of the token is arbitrary 19:24 – A lot of Dapps don’t have a real money function yet 19:39 – FirstBlood is closed to launching the beta 19:59 – Currently, there are 1592 people who have FirstBlood tokens 20:51 – Joe doesn’t think that it’s risky for them to have a lot of people handling the network 21:06 – The selection process has a cap rate on how one will get selected 21:19 – “We did cap at 1% for a maximum impact” 22:20 – Joe can’t disclose the amount he owns from FirstBlood tokens 22:50 – The allocation for founders is around 10% of the tokens 23:24 – Nathan asks Joe if it’s possible to cash out a million tokens into real dollars if he ever needs it 24:35 – FirstBlood made the headlines because they raised a $5M equivalent to ether 26:38 – The fund is owned by the project 27:08 – The ether can be used to keep buying the project 27:30 – Some of the money from the funds are used to pay the team 28:03 – FirstBlood liquidates 80% of the ether post cross-sales and 20% remains in the smart contract 28:39 – FirstBlood has around $4M in the bank that pays salaries and other company expenses 29:55 – The technology of FirstBlood has made people more interested in the project 31:00 – The decision to raise $5M was from the advice they’ve received regarding what it takes to increase network profitability 31:51 – Ether was valued when Joe liquidated the 372K shares at $11 per share 32:38 – Joe didn’t wait for the share value to increase because they needed the money to get the project running 34:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: In crypto, startups create their own currency if they think their network will be better of with it. Listen to your advisory board—if it’s time to raise for specific purpose, your business might be better of because of that decision. People will become interested in your project if it’s first in the space and they believe in your technology. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/16/2017 • 37 minutes, 8 seconds
783: SaaS: Here's How RFP Scout 3x YoY to $1.2m+ in MRR
Alex Yakubovich. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Scout RFP. Prior to Scout, he was a co-founder of another startup which was acquired by LivingSocial in 2012. At that company, he led the operations team and helped the company become the largest online ordering providers in the country. He attended Case Western Reserve University where he studied mechanical engineering. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Shoe Dog What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Salesforce How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Take big risks Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:25 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 02:58 – Scout RFP helps companies make online purchases by finding suppliers and the best deals 03:14 – One of their newest customer’s is Beam Suntory who makes Jim Beam bourbon 03:56 – They use Scout RFP to source for the best deals on raw materials that they use to make their liquor 04:15 – Scout RFP is a SaaS model 04:20 – Scout RFP charges per user basis 04:47 – They charge only the buyers who are making the purchase and not the suppliers 05:00 – Scout RFP also has different tools that they offer depending on the plans 05:34 – Average per seat is $5K annually 05:53 – All contracts are annual contract 05:59 – Scout RFP has raised capital: $27.5M in total 06:27 – Alex’s last company just raised $500K and it had a great exit 07:00 – Alex has thought about what it’s like to have big companies involved in your company 07:30 – The capital allowed them to not skim and invest on growth upfront 07:49 – Current team size is 50 07:59 – Half is the engineering and product side and half is for the sales side 08:29 – The exit price of the first company was in the tens of millions 09:37 – Alex has co-founders who were with him in the first company 10:43 – There are over 100 companies that use the platform 11:10 – The number of seats per company depends on the company 11:54 – Scout RFP has overall users and paid users 12:12 – Paid users is more than 3K 13:05 – Scout RFP is part of Silicon Valley Sourcing Leaders Group 13:31 – The group is about networking and sharing information and knowledge 13:49 – There are now sourcing leaders programs in New York 14:00 – The group helped Scout RFP to acquire new customers 14:30 – The organization hosts their companies 15:18 – Gross customer churn 15:31 – Logo churn is not that high 16:00 – Scout RFP has 17% net negative churn 16:58 – Scout RFP has a customer success team, a sales team, ADPR team and management team 17:38 – As a business grows with Scout RFP, the LTV grows as well 18:22 – The average deal size per business is quite consistent, about 10 19:09 – CAC to LTV ratio is 3 19:25 – Payback period is around 15 months 20:17 – Paid acquisition costs are around $40K a month 20:49 – They do LinkedIn ads, some Facebook and Google, and a lot of tradeshows 21:23 – Gross margin is 85-90% 21:44 – Target ARR this 2017 22:14 – Scout RFP is currently over $1.2M in MRR 23:54 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An acquisition is an opportunity to build a bigger and better business. Being in a group with your target market is a big opportunity for you to acquire new leads. Let your big questions guide you in growing your business. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/15/2017 • 26 minutes, 15 seconds
782: Crypto: With $50k MRR, He's Buildling Crypto Database To Track Accuracy
Bruce Pon. He’s the CEO and founder of BigchainDB and he’s been playing in the crypto world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Mungerisms by Charlie Munger What CEO do you follow? – Vitalik Buterin Favorite online tool? — Streak CRM How many hours of sleep do you get?— At least 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Buy bitcoin earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:03 – Nathan introduces Bruce to the show 02:44 – Bruce built BigchainDB to manage data 02:55 – Bitcoin is a payments cryptocurrency in a global network while Ethereum is a business logic in a global network 03:11 – People pass trusted data over the blockchain network for enterprise use cases and consumer applications 03:32 – From the business logic, you can exchange bitcoin and other types of value 03:42 – The problem with the use case on top of the bitcoin blockchain 3 years ago was it didn’t scale 04:04 – Bruce was building io which is putting intellectual property into the blockchain 04:25 – You can sell your intellectual property over the network 04:48 – It was built over the bitcoin blockchain and got difficult to develop over time 04:54 – Ascribe.io needed meta data about the creative work, author and licensing model 05:04 - Ascribe.io isn’t just built for bitcoin—it’s like trying to using a Lamborghini to move your house 05:49 - Ascribe.io had AI, scientists and other PhDs who told them that building Ascribe.io wasn’t worth it 06:09 – Team size is around 20 and is based in Berlin 06:24 – BigchainDB has raised $6M in price round series A 06:41 – Open source software is traditionally a dual license model 06:53 – BigchainDB is looking at an enterprise model 07:00 – They’re looking into the ICO craze too 07:21 – BigchainDB is like a SaaS model 07:27 – They’re looking at per transaction charges but it may not work for the long-run 07:54 – BigchainDB just released their 1.0 08:08 – They give premium support 08:27 – Bruce is looking into 5-6 figures per month for their starting price point 08:58 – One-third of the work in businesses happen in the back office 09:13 – Blockchain allows you to have a single source of truth 09:29 – BigchainDB unlocks the opportunity for different organizations to have a single source of truth 09:48 – When you can make IoT, AI and blockchain tools, you can track the product from the inception until it gets to the customer’s hand 10:01 – The customer will now understand how the product is made 10:03 – The regulators will know that the product followed the guideline 10:07 – The company will know if there’s a recall or quality issue and they will know where exactly the product is 10:40 – BigchainDB can work with different kinds of products 11:20 – Blockchain is definitely auditable 11:30 – Before the product comes to you, it will be signed by entities with a cryptographic key in every process 12:00 – With AI, you can also see who is in the very process of making your product 12:34 – The key metric Bruce is measuring is the number of people that are building upon them 12:56 – Target MRR is $100K by end of 2017 13:03 – BigchainDB is currently at $50-60K MRR 13:19 – Number of customers 13:44 – There are 300 developers in BigchainDB’s channels and there are 5K clones of their software 13:54 – BigchainDB has 1K monthly downloads of their whitepaper 14:45 – The ratio of developer to clone is the 300 developers to 5K clone requests 16:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Data that is passed over the blockchain network can be used for enterprise use case and consumer applications. The beauty of blockchain is that it is auditable and has accountability capabilities. Some tools that are built over the bitcoin network won’t always work; even if you have the best people in the industry. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/14/2017 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
781: Crypto: What AirBnB Looks Like In Digital Currency World
Christoph Jentzsch. His background is in Theoretical Physics and he’s been part of the Ethereum project since 2014 as a lead tester. At the end of 2015, he co-founded Slock.it, working on decentralized sharing economy through the connection of blockchain and IoT (Internet of Things). One of the more famous projects that he was part of was the DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization). Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – God Favorite online tool? — GIthub How many hours of sleep do you get? — 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Avoid the bug in the DAO” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Christoph to the show 02:20 – DAO stands for Decentralized Autonomous Organization 02:26 – It is a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain which aims at connecting people to pull their funds together and run small contracts 02:45 – It failed and all the people got refunded 03:10 – Christoph believes that Anthony Di Iorio is one of the founders of Ethereum 03:24 – As a lead tester for Ethereum in 2014, Christoph was responsible for driving tests 03:39 – Consensus tests are for client implementation 04:10 – Nathan’s analogy of cryptocurrency using railroad tracks 04:55 – Augur has launched their own token on top of Ethereum 05:18 – They created their own token of value in exchange of the virtual currency of ether 05:47 – There has been a lot of ICOs (Initial Coin Offering) lately and there has been opinions around them 06:03 – Bitcoin was always meant for virtual currency 06:09 – While Etherium has a virtual currency too called ether, its actual purpose is to be an open source platform to build decentralized applications or Dapps 06:22 – People now create simple Dapps issuing a token on the Ethereum blockchain to fund Dapps projects 06:32 – People thought DAO was an ICO but it wasn’t 06:35 – DAO has collected a hundred million dollars in ether 06:44 – After that, many ICOs have gone out 07:40 – There are only a few hundred people who send ether into their contract 08:11 – There was an article Nathan had read regarding Bitcoin’s current problem 08:28 – The main problem is public blockchains are not scaling 08:38 – In the protocol, one blockchain can only have 1 megabyte 09:04 – There is now a high demand that leads to a higher price 10:33 – Everybody can take part in the cryptocurrency game 11:45 – People can create their own blockchain but they’re missing the network effect 12:18 – There are some minors who control the network 12:48 – As long as there are users in the system, they don’t mind the minors 12:54 – Minors serve the blockchain, but Christoph believes the users are the ones in-charge 13:21 – After the DAO failed, there was a discussion of how things should be done 13:27 – Some are saying to split the blockchain into 2 versions: the new version is where people get refunded and the old version is the hackers who have the money 14:58 – There are now 2 Ethereum classes: ethereum classic and ethereum 15:19 – Christoph’s focus is now on Slock.it where they’ve built a decentralized sharing economy 16:02 – It is built over the public ethereum and they don’t have tokens 16:17 – They’re using ether as a payment 16:33 – Most startups are called ICOs and make their own tokens to fund themselves 16:40 – Slock.it is VC funded with a seed funding of $2M 18:06 – Slock.it isn’t currently getting any payment but they will in the future 18:38 – Slock.it collaborates with Innogy 18:51 – Innogy allows electric charging stations to connect with smart contracts in the blockchain 19:00 – A user can charge his car, making him enter the smart contract 19:10 – If you’re the owner of a charging station and you have an electric car, you can set the price for the station and offer it to public 20:05 – Noke padlocks can now be open and closed through Bluetooth and Slock.it has added a payment option where it can be opened by paying 20:34 – Slock.it can be integrated into the device and it is different from Airbnb 21:28 – As long as the ethereum blockchain is alive, the Noke padlock can be used through Slock.it 22:10 – Christoph currently resides in Germany 22:45 – “As of now, crypto is not a very good currency” 23:23 – Ether is as volatile as bitcoin 23:45 – You can definitely exchange your tokens for real dollars, but it’s not an efficient system 24:03 – Paying people with ether isn’t that easy at the moment 24:12 – Currency is the least interesting aspect 24:19 – There’s a limitation in scalability and in privacy 24:40 – Christoph thinks ethereum, smart contracts and blockchains own up as programmable money 25:55 – Slock.it is currently integrated into an existing hardware 26:20 – There are currently thousands of charging stations under Slock.it 26:36 – Team member is currently 14 26:48 – The seed round was in February 2017 28:02 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Some startups are coming out as an ICO to fund themselves, but not all of them are legal. Cryptocurrency still isn’t very stable so as a business owner, paying your people with this currency isn’t efficient. Public blockchains are not scaling and there’s a protocol that needs to be followed. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/13/2017 • 30 minutes, 2 seconds
780: SaaS: How Did He 2x ARR In Last 12 Months from $6m to $12m?
Brandon Bruce. He’s the COO and co-founder of Cirrus Insights, the sales plugin for Gmail and Outlook. The company is number 41 on the Inc. 5000 and the fastest growing company in Tennessee. Brandon once raced his bicycle 508 miles across Death Valley in 35 hours and 7 minutes. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Energy Bus What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Google Drive and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would’ve tried to start a full-fledged company earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Brandon to the show 02:25 – Brandon was in Episode 226 of The Top 02:38 – They had $550K in funding 02:48 – The team back then was 55-60 and now it’s 70 02:59 – No additional funding has been raised 03:16 – Cirrus Insights is a fast-growing company that didn’t rely too much on VC 03:35 – 5 years ago, Cirrus Insights wanted to solve the problem of going back and forth between Gmail and Salesforce 03:53 – Cirrus Insights brings Salesforce into the inbox 04:05 – They also help sales reps to seamlessly update Salesforce from the back end 04:13 – Salesforce isn’t actually a CRM 04:38 – Cirrus Insights just launched Flight Plans, which is an extension of their philosophy 04:42 – It is fully built-in to Outlook and Gmail 04:44 – It allows people to setup a sequence of sales touches 04:58 – It’s personalized and low scale 05:51 – Cirrus Insights’ growth is mostly from the Salesforce app exchange 06:00 – Continued growth is still from word-of-mouth 06:31 – Cirrus Insights has passed 100K seats with an average seat price of $6 06:53 – The average seat price has gone up now 07:19 – Flight Plans is a new tier 07:24 – Cirrus Insights is the product name and Flight Plans is going to be an addition 07:27 – There are now 3 additions to the product 08:18 – Cirrus Insights has just passed $1M in MRR 09:00 – Customers are choosing Cirrus Insights over others because some are overpaying and underutilizing marketing operations 09:29 – Marketing and sales are now working as a team with Cirrus Insights 09:58 – Cirrus Insights now charges $8 per seat 10:32 – Marketing operation has 4 big, unicorn companies 10:49 – There are now hundreds of tools in marketing operation and it will be interesting to see a consolidation 11:04 – Brandon is thinking customers will just utilize the best tools for the job 11:33 – Cirrus Insights is trying to position themselves to be the best at what they do 11:43 – They’re also continuing to offer more in the future 13:00 – Gross customer churn: 15-20% annually, but they’re targeting to lower it down to 10% 13:30 – There’s a lot less churn in the enterprise 14:17 – Net annual revenue churn is still negative and net seat churn is below 10% 15:16 – Most of the new leads are from word-of-mouth, with some small scale paid acquisition 15:22 – They’re more focused on the content that can drive more people 15:25 – Brandon has read The Slow Sale which is about how slowing down can win more deals 16:30 – Budget for paid marketing is $25-50K 16:43 – They’ve done sponsorship for conferences, but the ROI is getting low 17:25 – Check out their podcast: Our Love Hate Relationship with Sales, which drives sales as well 18:22 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As saturated as the market is, there’s still a way for your business to stand out. Marketing and sales teams are looking for tools that will not just help them with their workload, but encourage them to work together. If your company constantly adds value, word-of-mouth will be your driver of sales. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/12/2017 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
779: Foursquare CEO on Transition From Consumer Social Network to B2B Enterprise Data Company
Jeff Glueck. He became the CEO of Foursquare in January of 2016 after 18 months as the COO of the company. Prior to that, he was the CEO of Skyfire Labs, co-founder of Site59.com and CMO of Travelocity. Previously, he was a strategy consultant at Monitor Company and served as a White House Fellow in the Clinton Administration. He holds a master’s degree from Oxford as a Marshall Scholar and a bachelor’s degree from Harvard College. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Adam Neumann Favorite online tool? — Stitcher How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s going to be okay when you take a risk” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:46 – Nathan introduces Jeff to the show 02:53 – Jeff has been with Foursquare for 3 years 02:55 – Jeff joined the company while it was evolving into a hot social network in 2012 03:10 – Foursquare developed the technology of Pilgrim that turned it into a powerful enterprise business 03:19 – Foursquare’s early valuation was based on the fact that it would be the next big social media network 03:51 – The valuation was only made up because it wasn’t based on revenue 03:57 – When Jeff entered, they raised a round and they’re now growing over 60% in the past 3 years 04:13 – Foursquare is now more rationally valued 04:55 – Foursquare has a powerful community of people mapping the world 06:05 – Pilgrim is based on Foursquare’s nearly 12B check-ins 06:13 – Foursquare is having more check-ins today than it did 2 years ago 06:30 – The check-ins are called explicit ground trips 06:55 – Everytime someone check-in, they’re mapping the business for Foursquare 07:15 – The explicit ground trip makes the program powerful 08:06 – Foursquare launched the Pilgrim SDK which is a white label way for their developers to add in background content and give users a better experience 08:24 – Using the Pilgrim technology, Capital One can ask its user if they want to opt-in for being informed about how to receive rewards points 08:36 – People overwhelmingly opting-in 09:08 – The notification from Capital One encourages people to actually use their mobile wallet 09:18 – TouchTunes uses the Pilgrim technology 09:25 – TouchTunes runs 65K jukeboxes through mobile app 10:37 – Pilgrim technology has learned when to send notifications 10:47 – Pilgrim technology also informs their developers of the best time to send notifications 12:08 – When Jeff joined, he saw how everyone, including Fortune 500 companies, was using them for free 12:15 – Jeff told their CEO that they’re actually losing money and that they needed to start charging customers 12:42 – Foursquare didn’t lose even a single developer after putting up a paywall 12:49 – The model was licensed-based depending on the usage 14:15 – Three of the largest headphones in the world are Foursquare’s customers 14:40 – Jeff understands how the market changes 14:55 – 92% of the consumer spending is far from the 8% they spend on e-commerce like amazon 15:10 – Foursquare has predicted how Chipotle’s sales will go down by 30% 15:20 – “We’re not investors, we’re technologists” 16:16 – Jeff believes that Foursquare’s mission is to be a location intelligence company 16:34 – Jeff is proud of Foursquare’s technology; they can build tools that help companies 17:07 – Foursquare started out as a consumer company but now, more and more apps are using them for their applications 17:51 – Jeff believes that in the future, they can also make real estate better 18:45 – 90% of Foursquare’s revenue is from B2B 19:34 – Foursquare’s paying customers are some of the biggest brands in the world who want a company that is as good as Google Maps 19:58 – People don’t want to be dependent on Google in the future 20:18 – “A lot of smart companies want to build differentiated mobile experiences in the future and we’re helping them do that, that is our business” 21:48 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Even if your company can go IPO, it doesn’t mean that it should. Offering your services or products for free may work for the short-term, but if your service adds value to your customers, they WILL pay. Focus on what your company is good at. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/11/2017 • 24 minutes, 32 seconds
778: SaaS: With $80M Raised, He Left Salesforce to Bring Finance Departments to The Cloud
Dave Kellogg. Dave has more than 20 years of experience in high growth companies. Dave has been CEO of MarkLogic, CMO of Business Objects and member of Aster Data board of directors. Dave steered MarkLogic to $80 million in revenues. Business Objects witnessed equally impressive growth as it reached a revenue of billion dollars under his able guidance. Tune in and listen to Dave as he discusses various financial metrics of Hostanalytics. Targeting small businesses and enterprise level businesses, this company has grown 4x over the past 3 years. Read on and find out what makes this SAAS business tick. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Chaos Monkeys What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — WordPress How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Go read Power: Why Some People Have It and Some Don't by Geoffrey Pfeffer Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:14 – Nathan introduces Dave to the show 03:19 – Host Analytics is a SAAS company that is disrupting the space for enterprise performance management 03:58 – Not dabbling in premise products at all 04:28 – Corporate finance does not scale up with growing company size; number of users for such a software is dependent on the centralization philosophy 04:42 – A big company might be heavily centralized with only a sprinkling of users, whereas a little company might have hundreds of users 04:52 – Pricing model is a combination of a fixed based fee and a user fee 05:00 – Fixed fee varies from 25k to 50k—both fixed fee and user fee are recurring 05:25 – User fee depends on the user type and to which extent the software features are being used 05:45 – Fixed fee per user per month may vary from a couple of hundred dollars to a thousand dollars 06:10 – Re-entered the startup world once he quit Salesforce and joined Hostanalytics 06:24 – Passed on the reigns at Mark Logic to Gary Bloom—Mark Logic is still doing very well 07:05 – Best strategy to exit a startup is to exercise 83B options 08:00 – Exercising all options results in FMP (Fair Market Value) equaling strike price 08:07 – You lose the optionality—shares might not increase in value at a later date 09:00 – Met VC’s, entrepreneurs and angels while looking for a new opportunity after quitting MarkLogic 09:16 – Dave’s buddies coaxed him to join Salesforce as CMO 09:39 – Learnt a lot about SAAS at Salesforce. However, he found out that he was more comfortable running smaller companies 09:58 – Dave met the founders of Host Analytics through a common friend who was on their board 10:31 – HostAnalytics was clocking revenues of $10 million when Dave joined them in 2014; a great board and a proven SAAS model are the other factors which compelled Dave to join the firm 11:20 – Revenues have grown 4x since 2014 11:42 – Founded in 2001, HostAnalytics grew via bootstrapping for seven years. They finally secured VC funding in 2008 12:01 – Raised $85 million to date 12:32 – Used 75 cent “I love EBITA” stickers and funnily enough, won customers due to that 13:47 – Servicing 700 customers, as of today 13:50 – Pareto’s 80/20 principle is not applicable to them; they are bimodal with a dual focus on smaller businesses as well as enterprise businesses 14:20 – Both of them are run as different cohorts by different salesforces; revenues are split equally between small business and enterprise 14:50 – Each client is aggregating revenues of $70,000 per annum 15:13 – Payment terms are a tricky issue in SAAS 15:18 – While other SAAS players go for monthly and quarterly payments, HostAnalytics opts for annual payment 15:34 – If you are giving a discount smaller than your churn rate, then everybody wins 16:15 – Customer churn and revenue churn are surprisingly equal 16:25 – Spending on an average $1.5 to $ 2 for a dollar of AR to acquire a customer 17:16 – A team of 300 people out of which 100 are located in India, entire sales force of 60 is located in the US 17:23 – Company co-founded in US and India 18:10 – Average lifetime value of a client varies from 6x to 7x or half a million dollars 19:39 – Cloud penetration of this market is just 5% 19:57 – Finance department is 10 to 15 years behind sales in adoption of cloud 20:17 – 9.5 out of 10 people would say “Not now” 20:56 – Blended Gross Margin is lower since they have a slightly bigger services business than most SAAS companies 21:10 – ERP is a heart transplant. EPM is a knee transplant 21:20 – Services business helps reduce churn and create cash flow 22:57 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A big company might be heavily centralized with few SAAS users, whereas a small company might have hundreds of SAAS users. Focusing on services reduces churn and creates cash flow; however, gross margins are less compared to other SAAS companies due to this. Focusing on small businesses as well as enterprise businesses is important—at HostAnalytics, revenue is split equally between these two models. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/10/2017 • 27 minutes, 19 seconds
777: Will Masterclass Win Online Course Wars?
David Rogier. He’s the CEO of MasterClass where he leads the company’s vision of redefining digital learning by leveraging the expertise of world-class experts with the cutting-edge technology platform. David created MasterClass after seeing how the online education space was offering low-quality content and an unfair advantage of students. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Science of Shopping What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Doodle How many hours of sleep do you get?— Average 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – David would tell himself that entrepreneurship will be the hardest thing he’ll ever do Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:05 – Nathan introduces David to the show 03:05 – MasterClass offers classes from the absolute best in the world 03:14 – Online classes are offered both pre-recorded and live, both price at $90 03:31 – Students can study anytime they want and they have access forever 04:04 – Prior to MasterClass, David worked for a VC fund in the Bay area 04:21 – David worked for Michael Dearing of Harrison Metal 04:50 – Michael wrote David a check for $500K to start his idea for his business 05:03 – David tried almost everything to get an idea until he remembered his grandmother’s story 05:49 – His grandmother applied for medical school while working in a factory 05:55 – She was rejected by almost 50 medical schools 06:20 – The reason she was rejected was because she was a woman, foreigner and Jewish 06:27 – One school accepted her and she became a doctor 06:53 – She told David that education is the only thing that people can’t take away from him 07:04 – David thought of getting into the education space and studied it 07:53 – MasterClass was launched in May of 2015 08:00 – Total capital raised was around $50M 08:35 – The fund goes to expanding the team as well as production so they can shoot more classes 08:42 – Team size is currently 68 and will be 100 at the end of 2017 09:04 – Year One: number of students 10:13 – When they started, David was expecting a 10X increase in sales daily 10:38 – David cried after their first day of sales 11:18 – Reid Benson who is part of David’s sales team and was formerly with Netflix, wasn’t even scared after the launch 11:58 – Reid told David that their CAC was amazingly low 12:34 – The first 3 classes were led by Dustin Hoffman, James Patterson and Serena Williams 13:06 – The CAC for different subjects was actually close to each other 13:43 – Paid ads spent on Day 1 were less than $100K 14:14 – Paid advertising on different channels works well for MasterClass 14:22 – Instructors are also promoting their classes 15:00 – David can’t disclose the deal they have with the instructors 15:13 – Most instructors teach because they really want to teach and not just to earn from it 15:51 – David shares how they handle instructors who don’t want to teach, but want to share their knowledge 16:10 – Classes are designed by how instructors want to share their own craft 16:14 – Instructors have complete control over their class 16:28 – David shares what a class looks like for Serena Williams 17:24 – MasterClass partners with the instructors in their classes 18:17 – David shares why he won’t share the deal with the instructors 18:38 – James Patterson teaches with MasterClass because of his own reasons 21:00 – David shares why instructors pick MasterClass over LinkedIn, which is more popular 21:50 – There are now 20 classes in MasterClass 22:07 – The number of classes should double, year over year 22:52 – Half to 80% of their first students haven’t taken any online classes before 23:10 – Not all students are fans of the instructors 23:43 – David won’t sell MasterClass for $300M 25:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Never miss an opportunity being offered to you, it was offered to you for a reason; so trust yourself and go for it. Most successful people in their field want to share their craft through any way possible. Education is one thing that people can’t take away from you. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/9/2017 • 27 minutes, 18 seconds
776: TextingBase Shares Margins, Cap Table, Valuation, More
Eric Beans. He’s the CEO of Texting Base and before that, he was the CEO of Appuix. He was also the former co-founder of Premier Mortgage Capital and the author of Changing the World Through Texting Software. He was in the production as the producer and writer of LA Style Magazine and he’s “Chef Beans” on Daytime. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? – Brett Kingstone Favorite online tool? — Gusto How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Make better choices on who I surround myself with” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:00 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:43 – Eric wasn’t really a chef and he made food for the person who was running the show 03:01 – Texting Base is a personalized, mass communication platform for texting which is similar to email 03:17 – It looks like it is personally written 03:23 – Texting Base charges monthly depending on the quantity of the messages 03:33 – Texting Base is a SaaS business 03:38 – Minimum charge which is also the average is $50 and will go up depending on the number of messages 03:55 – Customer number is almost 500 04:09 – Average MRR 04:21 – Texting Base was bootstrapped and raised $262K 04:47 – They had investors like Kimberly Partoll and Brett Kingstone who was a former CEO of an IPO company 05:29 – Gross margin is 566% 06:33 – 14% of the cost structure is Texting Base’s messaging fee 06:52 – Server costs is around $900 a month 07:14 – Processing fee is 2.5% 07:47 – Gross margin is around 79% 08:05 – The higher the volume, the lower the charge Texting Base gets from the provider 08:09 – They had a contract for volume 08:23 – They negotiated with Twilio directly 08:35 – Volume should be at least 100K a month 09:18 – Eric started Texting Base in 2012 09:21 – Eric needed the product—no one had it so he left banking and started the business 09:37 – It took 3.5 years to launch 09:49 – Team size is 5 10:12 – Target customers for Texting Base are real estate and mortgage providers 10:21 – Texting Base uses email blasts to reach their clients 10:56 – Eric has used email providers until they started building their own list 11:24 – CAC was $28 and now it’s around $18 11:47 – Current churn is about 2.87% monthly 12:23 – LTV is still a bit early 12:57 – Texting Base doesn’t have contracts with customers 13:08 – Last month, $850 was spent on PPC 13:32 – Eric gave some equity of the company to the investors 13:53 – The people who are building the product also have equity 15:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It takes time and patience to build a business, be sure that you’re prepared for it. Create your own solution to the problem and don’t be surprised if you end up solving multiple problems along the way. Your network can bring you places; nurture your relationships. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/8/2017 • 18 minutes, 41 seconds
775: FinTech Founder: I'll Never Raise Capital Again!
Andy Swan. He’s the founder of LikeFolio. The company uses social data to determine shifts in consumer behavior on Main Street before it becomes use for Wall Street. This is his third financial technology company. The second, MyTrade, was acquired by TD Ameritrade in 2007. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “A little bit more about patience” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:07 – Nathan introduces Andy to the show 02:37 – MyTrade was geared directly towards option traders and active stock traders 02:50 – The technology allowed traders to copy someone’s option trade which is very complicated 03:09 – It was sold because it was useless without a brokerage backend 03:48 – MyTrade had raised $500-600K and was sold just 3-4 months after the round 04:19 – Andy thought they had a good partnership with Ameritrade and that there was no plan of acquisition 05:06 – Andy stayed with Ameritrade for 3-4 years after the acquisition 05:30 – After 4 years, Andy and his brother spun off and created their own company 06:09 – Andy developed LikeFolio’s technology after leaving Ameritrade 06:26 – LikeFolio sells insights on consumer behavior to professional investors and companies 06:35 – LikeFolio has a partnership with Twitter where they take every tweet and analyze it 06:54 – LikeFolio can map the trends in tweets and alert their clients about the shifts in behavior 07:40 – LikeFolio has different subscription plans 07:47 – LikeFolio’s on-demand plan is $2K a month 07:56 – For extreme computing power and robust API, the plan costs $100-300K 08:11 – Most of the revenue is from the API plan 08:40 – LikeFolio On-Demand has just been launched 09:20 – Every contract of LikeFolio’s is secure and LikeFolio isn’t allowed to disclose anything 09:59 – Andy can’t disclose the number of customers they have 11:18 – LikeFolio hasn’t raised capital and Andy isn’t planning on raising a round 11:38 – “I want to own it all” 12:02 – Andy doesn’t want other people to have a say in his company and wants to be the decision maker in everything 12:36 – Andy’s first company was Daytrade which was sold to a private equity 12:55 – It helped Andy to understand how to run a business in fintech 13:13 – Andy didn’t raise money for Daytrade 14:03 – Team size is five; one in Louisville and four in Argentina 14:36 – One of toughest things LikeFolio faces is determining a tweet with the word “never”—it negates anything else in that tweet 15:01 – “I could NEVER live without weightwatcher” is missed by LikeFolio because it’s a positive-negative sentiment 15:28 – LikeFolio takes a thousand tweets per month, per company so there will always be missed tweets 17:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With technology today, consumers’ behavior can now be tracked on different online platforms—this can help businesses provide the right product or service for you. It’s OK to be the only person responsible for your business; however, there’s still a possibility that you may need help in the future. Be patient! Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/7/2017 • 19 minutes, 41 seconds
774: CreativeLive's Chase Jarvis: If Linkedin Offered You $200m Do You Take It?
Chase Jarvis. He’s one of the most influential photographers in the last 20 years. He’s also the creator and CEO of CreativeLive. He’s won awards for his images on six different continents, including his contributions to the Pulitzer Prize winning story Snow Fall—the acclaimed New York Times interactive story heralded as the “future of journalistic storytelling” and Emmy nominated for his work documenting the music scene in Seattle. In 2009, he created the Best Camera app which was the first photo app that shared images directly to social networks. It was #1 on iTunes, App of the Year on Wired and got many other awards. He's currently focused on his work as the founder and CEO of CreativeLive, the world's largest online education platform for creatives and entrepreneurs with over a thousand teachers, 1500 classes and 10K hours of classes. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Weiner Favorite online tool? — Evernote How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Chase would tell himself that mental health is the most important thing Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:48 – Nathan introduces Chase to the show 02:48 – Nathan describes his experience with New York Times 03:11 – We are now in a weird and modern era of journalism and media 03:20 – “If you’re really focused on innovating and breaking out of the norm, you can do it” 03:35 – Snow Fall is a story of an avalanche 03:40 – Chase’s friend was a victim in an avalanche so the story was extra special to him 04:01 – Feature storytelling is continuing to grow and evolve 04:10 – Physical newspaper is dying and has becoming uninteresting 04:23 – Chase believes that there will be platforms in the future that are embedded with native bells and whistles that will continue to evolve 04:45 – “Journalism is moving in the same direction as tech” 05:02 – As platforms become more templated, we’ll become more interactive and have exciting experience with our news 05:24 – “Timing is everything” 05:30 – Chase shares his experience with his Best Camera app 05:38 – Being the first was challenging 05:43 – The developer was in a legal snafu which slowed down the creation of the app and paralyzed Chase’s business 05:57 – Companies had already asked Chase if they could buy his app 06:13 – Chase has spent 10 years identifying himself as an artist and entrepreneur 06:30 – Chase was struggling with his overall identity 07:30 – Chase just shut down his app; moved on and learned from it 08:11 – “I got more juice to go help other people break through some of those problems” 08:40 – Specifically, Chase owns all the intellectual property of his app 09:39 – “We need to overcome the psychology of being stuck in paralysis and analysis” 10:05 – Chase was in his late 30s in 2009 10:27 – Chase thinks that humans are generally resilient so he didn’t dwell much on what happened 10:34 – 5 years later, Chase wrote about his failure on his blog 10:59 – It’s more about having an impact on the world rather than just getting money 11:25 – Chase got into Instagram only a year and a half ago 11:35 – Chase was trying to preserve a legal position 11:53 – CreativeLive sells content that are created by the top experts in the world 12:01 – There’s a premium model where customers can see how things are done 12:07 – There are channels that can be watched for free 12:33 – CreativeLive has a total of 10M students, paid and free users 13:12 – CreativeLive has a high conversion rate relative to peers and commerce 13:31 – Average conversion rate is 1-2% 13:39 – CreativeLive is curated to creators by creators 13:51 – It is more community focused and is not a two-sided marketplace 14:00 – Competitors’ classes can be created by anyone which is very different from CreativeLive 15:07 – Chase has no desire to limit the creators in CreativeLive 15:29 – CreativeLive designs their contract and relationship with their creators 15:50 – Chase is confident in CreativeLive and the value it brings to people 16:58 – “We make you look great” 17:05 – CreativeLive only makes the extraordinary 17:24 – The challenge that Masterclass is facing 18:44 – CreativeLive was bootstrapped for the first 2 years 18:56 – CreativeLive has raised $58.8 M in total 19:30 – Chase won’t sell CreativeLive for $200M, even if it’s from LinkedIn 20:06 – CreativeLive’s mission is for people to educate themselves and make a living 20:26 – Chase would only sell if the vision of the buyer aligned with them 22:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t dwell on your past mistakes, use them as motivation to move on and create better. Contracts are made for a reason; study and check thoroughly before agreeing to one. Stay aligned with your mission and vision. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/6/2017 • 25 minutes, 1 second
773: Can $1m MRR Company Grow Into $10m Post Money Valuation?
Venkat Nagaswamy. He’s the CEO of Mariana IQ. He brings a long and diverse background in high technology to apply artificial intelligence and deep learning to help marketers make account-based marketing at scale a reality. "Big Kat," as he was nicknamed by friends and colleagues, has led teams in creating analytics, technology and business development solutions at McKinsey, Juniper Networks and GE Plastics, among others. He's worked in enterprise and digital consumer hardware, SaaS, corporate and business unit strategy, market entry strategy, and product development. He's a proud graduate of the University of Michigan and the Georgia Institute of Technology. He holds an MBA and a Master's in Aerospace Engineering. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff and Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Calendly and Feedly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Being diligent and hard-working counts for a lot more than being smart and clever” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:54 – Nathan introduces Venkat to the show 02:54 – Venkat was in Juniper trying to implement account-based marketing 03:14 – Venkat is trying to solve the problems in account-based marketing 03:27 – People buy a monthly subscription to Mariana IQ which will allow them to run campaigns targeting the same audience across different platforms 03:37 – Mariana IQ is a SaaS business 03:43 – Average pay is $4K a month per customer 03:55 – Venkat started Mariana IQ three years ago with his three co-founders 04:02 – Venkat also uses their technology 04:16 – Venkat and his co-founders felt that marketers need more tools to be successful in the field 04:36 – First year revenue was zero 04:45 – Late 2015, Mariana IQ made $155K and $550K in 2016 04:59 – Venkat is expecting to get 5x more in annual revenue this year 05:17 – MRR in June was $70-80K 05:45 – Mariana IQ has around 20 customers 06:00 – Zendesk is one of Mariana IQ’s clients 06:13 – Zendesk wanted to target larger companies and so they gave Mariana IQ their data 06:30 – Mariana IQ used their API to find the targeted companies for Zendesk 06:54 – Venkat shares their success rate at Mariana IQ 07:27 – “We got better quality, 4x the volume while keeping the cost the same” 07:36 – Mariana IQ has raised capital 07:39 – First seed round was in 2014 which was led by Blumberg Capital 07:58 – David Blumberg owns Blumberg Capital and Bruce Taragin is who is on Mariana IQ’s board 08:05 – Blumberg Capital has been around for 34 years 08:19 – The first round was a convertible note round with $6M capital 08:47 – Mariana IQ did another round in 2016 which was a priced round 09:10 – Mariana IQ has raised a total of $4M 09:48 – Venkat doesn’t worry about growing into their valuation 12:00 – In Mariana IQ’s first year, they were only getting beta customers 12:41 – Venkat shares the unconventional way he attracted more customers; a video of him in the shower, singing 13:05 –The video was posted on Twitter and got a million views 13:38 – “I’m the worst singer on the planet” 13:57 – Gross margin is around 80% 14:10 – Gross customer churn is quite high, at 3% 14:22 – Revenue churn 14:55 – Full weighted CAC is $22K per customer 15:06 – Customer LTV is $200-250K 15:40 – Venkat is looking at increasing their CAC by spending more on sales and marketing to increase their volume 15:54 – They will add two more salespeople 16:23 – Last month, they spent $2k on marketing alone 17:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Marketers are constantly looking for alternative ways to become more effective and successful in their industry. A business shouldn’t worry about its valuation—as long as their confident with their product and continue to add value to their customers; it will work out in the end. It’s necessary for companies today to invest in their sales and marketing to increase that engagement with their audience. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/5/2017 • 19 minutes, 29 seconds
772: How Grant Cardone, Others Spend $25k To Get 100m Person Social Media Blasts
Jeremy Haynes whose company is Megalodon Marketing. He’s building all kinds of personal brands for celebrities and entrepreneurs alike. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – 48 Laws of Power What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Infusionsoft, ClickFunnels and Stripe How many hours of sleep do you get? — 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Speed is power, but power is nothing without control” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:55 – Nathan introduces Jeremy to the show 02:28 – “Real results in real life” 02:33 – Jeremy’s real life experiences have driven millions of dollars in infoproducts 02:43 – Jeremy only gives actionable advice 03:00 – Armando Montelongo is one of Jeremy’s clients 03:02 – Armando had a show that ran from 2006-2009 which was called Flip This House, by A&E 03:10 – Jeremy brands himself as the largest go-to personality in digital agency 03:20 – 16 months after Megalodon’s launch, Jeremy met Armando 03:28 – Armando explained to Jeremy how his TV show led to a business with $200M annual revenue in 2017 03:57 – $200M doesn’t include any online revenue 04:05 – The entirety of its revenue came from selling event tickets to people over the phone and up-selling them 04:18 – There were 22K customers between 2006-2009 and the majority of customers have an average transaction value of $20K or more 05:18 – At first, Jeremy couldn’t believe Armando’s story because 2017 is the year of online advertising 05:35 – Armando paid Jeremy $5K per day to come in for 3 days in total 05:48 – Armando’s business was built up on traditional media 06:05 – Jeremy did an assessment on Armando‘s business during his visit 06:15 – The business made 6-figures the first month of the launch after spending a mid 5-figures 06:30 – Armando is making a 7-figure revenue in the succeeding months 06:40 – Jeremy made 3 deals with Armando 06:48 – There was a monthly payment of $70K to pay for their social media partners 07:08 – Brandon Carter, Tai Lopez and Big Mike were some of his social media partners 07:14 – Dan Fleyshman and Branden Hampton from Elevator Studios have partnerships with big, social media brands 07:48 – $25K pays for 50 accounts to post to 100M people within 48 hours 08:38 – 33% of the social media activities is on Instagram as it’s a powerful platform 09:00 – An account with 60K views in an hour can have 2% of that traffic go to the product 10:20 – There’s a chrome plugin that helps you filter all Facebook posts 11:11 – Grant Cardone is the Number 1 sales trainer in the world 11:30 – Jeremy became a part of Grant’s business as an email marketing manager; he trained 50 of his people to use Infusionsoft 11:46 – Jeremy ended up as a digital marketing specialist 11:50 – By Jeremy’s sixth month, Grant’s business was making a million dollars in digital revenue 12:28 – Jeremy started with $50K a year to $60K a year with a bonus 13:54 – Jeremy created an omnipresent advertising model for marketing automation 14:05 – Jeremy categorizes Grant’s buyers 14:50 – Jeremy shows the buyers the ads they would want to see depending on their behavior and interests 15:21 – Jeremy shares an actual example using lead forms 15:43 – Jeremy tracks the leads from their customized URL and ads 16:29 – PlusThis is an Infusionsoft plugin where you can connect Facebook to Infusionsoft and generate an http post 16:47 – When a lead fills out a form, it will be generated to a campaign 16:51 – The first step in an marketing automation sequence will be an http post pushing the lead’s data to the target audience where the lead should be 17:03 – Then, the audience will be connected to the ad that is made for them 17:10 – The sequence won’t always be perfect 19:00 – Jeremy shares why people like him are needed to do this job 19:17 – People can hire from com 19:35 – Jeremy stayed with Grant for 13 months, then left to start his own agency 21:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Digital marketing is one of best ways to grow your revenue as a business. Know your worth and show people why you’re worth it. Leave when you think it is the best time and/or option you have; then, continue to pursue your dreams. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/4/2017 • 23 minutes, 9 seconds
771: $320M King of Mobile App Installs
Moshe Vaknin. He’s been dreaming about his company YouAPPi since he bought his first iPhone 3. After a long and successful career working in a variety of positions, Moshe founded 3 successful startups before finally starting YouAPPi. As the CEO of the company, he brings vast experience in the fields of advertising, publishing and affiliate marketing, making him adept at identify opportunities that can be transformed into profitable realities. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – My Journey to Justice by Moshe Vankin What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Whatsapp How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Never give up” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:41 – YouAPPi is a platform that enables users, publishers and developers to solve growing challenges related to mobile app development 03:19 – As an example, King, the maker of Candy Crush, is always looking for high-quality users for candy crush 03:30 – High-quality users are the ones who play and purchase virtual items 03:45 – YouAPPi will find these high-quality users 03:53 – The process of finding high-quality users is complicated 04:12 – King will have a better ROI to optimize their investment by partnering with a company like YouAPPi 04:47 – YouAPPi has an agreement with 4500 developers and publishers 05:13 – YouAPPi knows users behavior better than anyone else 05:21 – Moshe explains how YouAPPi learns the shopping behavior of each user 05:44 – By learning what to recommend to certain users, YouAPPI can better drive sales 06:50 – YouAPPi can’t track the users and other private data 07:30 – As long as the user is within YouAPPi’s publishers’ network they can identify your device ID and recommend apps 07:56 – YouAPPi is getting paid per app installation and usage 10:52 – YouAPPi pays 70% of their revenue to their publishers 10:56 – From $20, the publisher gets $14 and YouAPPi gets $6 11:05 – YouAPPi was launched in 2011 11:15 – First year revenue was $250K which is the total cut from $1M 11:44 – 2016 total cut was $80M 12:05 – YouAPPi has raised closed to $20M 12:17 – “We have to invest building the platform” 12:19 – Total number of employees is around 130 with 10 offices globally 13:05 – YouAPPi’s platform is for their own consumption 13:24 – “Our business model is our platform” 13:44 – YouAPPi is currently running hot on momentum and Moshe won’t probably sell YouAPPi before 2019 14:10 – IPO recommendations 15:04 – HQ is in the Bay Area and Moshe is currently in Israel 15:33 – Top 2 competitors are Aerosource and AppLovin 17:07 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As long as you’re on the right path, you can reach your dream. A good relationship the people in your network can exponentially expand your business. Never sell too early—if you’ve got a furnace full of momentum, to cash in. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/3/2017 • 19 minutes, 50 seconds
770: Crypto: He Has Third Largest ICO Ever With $53m Raised
Sergey Sholom. As a teenager, he was a championship-level gamer and created the first large gamer group called S-port Tournaments in Russia for Quake. After getting his PhD in mathematical modeling, Sergey founded Datcroft Games LTD in 2004. Over the past 13 years, the company has developed multiple worldwide popular games with millions of users. He continues to oversee a company with over a hundred employees and continues to bring new cutting edge games to the market. Their latest game called Pixel Wars which will be released in the summer of 2017, has already received critical acclaim and will become the game changer in mobile eSport. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Richard Branson’s What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — N/A How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Push more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 04:03 – The company was launched in 2004 04:29 – The make free games that sell virtual items—that’s where the company gets it’s revenue 04:43 – Around 5% of players buy virtual items 05:20 – Sergey had no revenue for the first 2 years of his company 05:58 – Sergey supported himself from other businesses 06:01 – His newest game has been in development for more than 2 years 06:13 – The team has 150 people with offices in 4 countries 07:34 – Datcroft Games had an 8-digit revenue in 2016 09:00 – Cryptocurrency helped Gamecredits to monetize their audience 09:20 – Sergey wants to prove game developers that more revenue can come from crypto 10:05 – Gamecredits is preparing to enter the Indian market 10:46 – Sergey believes that Apple promoting your game is just an extra advantage 11:35 – The number of followers that the Gamecredits store has 12:05 – Gamecredits is using its existing coin which has been on the market for 3 years already 12:34 – Gamecredits has been running the most successful crowd sale in the market 13:19 – Gamecredits will put 26.5 M crypto in marketing 14:17 – Sergey will have a way to exchange their coin in dollars 14:43 – Different cryptocurrencies are being put in Gamecredits 15:11 – Sergey is proud that they’re able to run a real crowd sale with almost 10K crypto investors 15:23 – Not all ICOs are able to do that 15:34 – Gamecredits was able to raise capital from 4 tokens including bitcoin, ethereum, waves and gamecredits 16:05 – Gamecredits current tokens are mobilego tokens and their own gamecredits token 16:51 – The market is tremendous and the future community will be much bigger 17:46 – Apple and Google are for profit companies and Gamecredits is a non-profit 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s possible for a gaming platform to penetrate the cryptocurrency market. The cryptocurrency market has been growing significantly, increasing opportunities for different investments. As a non-profit business, your focus needs to be on the change you can create, not the contributions you can earn. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/2/2017 • 22 minutes, 5 seconds
769: Do This To Use Your Crypto Coins to Shop At Walmart
Tran Hung. He’s one of the founders of Uquid which is the world’s first service offering debit card solutions for cryptocurrency holders. They currently support 79 of the biggest digi-coins including bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin, ripple, etc. They also offer worldwide mobile recharge support, bills payment services, grocery and pharmacy vouchers, ticketing services, and many other benefits. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Secrets of Building Multi-Million Dollar Businesses by Adam Khoo What CEO do you follow? – Richard Branson Favorite online tool? — Google Translate How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Tran wished he would have started studying code earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 03:00 – Uquid is a debit card for 79 cryptocurrencies 03:10 – Customers can get the physical card with a Visa logo that they can use to withdraw money 03:28 – The card can be loaded with cryptocurrencies 03:43 – Before getting the card, you need to have cryptocurrency 03:49 – Signup at Uquid’s website to get a card 04:04 – There’s a fee of $1 for 1 virtual card but you need the physical card to use in ATMs which is $16 04:20 – After getting the card, you can reload it anytime you want with cryptocurrency 05:10 – Uquid is using the market price of cryptocurrency 05:42 – Uquid takes 0.5% of everything spent using the card 05:53 – If Nathan spent $100 on groceries using the card Uquid will take .50₵ 07:34 – Last year, customers spent $1.6M in total transaction volume 08:09 – Uquid is growing fast in 2017 08:30 – In July, Uquid processed $900K in total transaction volume 08:50 – Uquid has already passed $3M total transaction volume on the first half of 2017 10:45 – The process of exchanging bitcoin to other currencies was complicated 11:19 – Uquid is doing $5K a month in service charges 11:30 – Uquid also offers other services where they charge 10-15% 12:05 – Uquid charges 3% from the vouchers 12:20 – In May, Tran thinks they’ll make around $50K in total transaction charges 12:58 – Team size is 5 and they’re based in UK 13;15 – Uquid is planning to release their own token 13:29 – Tran is looking to raise $4-5M 13:44 – Tran is thinking of selling 15% of Uquid to be able to raise $4M 14:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The market for cryptocurrencies is rapidly expanding. People are now finding more and more ways to mine coins. No matter what service you use, the charges can differ drastically depending on the type of transaction you’re engaging in. Resources Mentioned: Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/1/2017 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
768: In Mature Crypto Market, Who Gets Rich?
Martin Koppelmann. He is the co-founder and CEO of Gnosis, the decentralized platform for prediction markets. He has been an entrepreneur and thought leader in the blockchain space for more than 4 years. He is closely related to prediction markets and has worked on decentralized, market-driven, governance mechanisms. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Martin does not read books, but considers Reddit a good resource What CEO do you follow? – some VCs, but no specific CEO Favorite online tool? — Slack, Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— Less than 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – He wished he looked earlier into game theory and economics Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Martin to the show 01:43 – Bitcoin was the reason Martin got into the crypto and blockchain space 01:58 – This was during the time the Euro was having problems 02:09 – Martin started to evaluate how he looked at money; he learned about bitcoin and the possibility of creating different forms of money 02:35 – Gnosis has evolved 03:04 – They are assuming that Gnosis will be a decentralized platform for prediction markets; for betting, auctions and insurances 04:32 – Martin says companies like eBay, Uber and AirBnB will be replaced by a decentralized platform 04:51 – They may replace companies that go into information aggregation 05:02 – Instead of having different analysts determine the revenue of a company, markets and forecasts will be aggregated to one number 05:15 – Gnosis has zero customers and zero in revenue, but they have a team and have raised capital thru selling GNO tokens; they raised $12.5 million 06:14 – The tokens were sold for 250,000 ether, a blockchain currency, and at the time the tokens were sold, the ether was worth $12.5 million 06:55 – The token has its own value and is currently trading at $240 a piece 07:04 – Gnosis collects ether and pays their employees with it 07:33 – To convert ether into real dollars, Martin uses Kraken, Coinbase and Poloniex 08:40 – The foundation of crypto is its big vision and the vision to create something as big as the internet; however, currently, it is still just speculation 09:31 – The token itself is almost always issued in Ethereum; the consumer creates the rules so the first set of rules they made involved organizing the token sales 10:03 – Martin did the token auction and was completely controlled by the blockchain 10:40 – Compared to Bitcoin, Ethereum was easier to use for developers 11:10 – If crypto becomes the currency of the future, Martin says he hopes that people will become equally rich. He is currently working on a project where each person can issue their own currency and others would agree to accept each other’s currencies 11:37 – They are trying to democratize money 12:27 – Nathan says there is a limited supply of ethereum in the blockchain 12:46 – Personally, Martin does not follow the bitcoin model 13:02 – Martin is thinking of a new world where people are part of a new economy; each one gets to issue their own tokens and the tokens have value 13:50 – Inflation can be used to finance a public good 14:11 – For example, let’s say you want to create a platform like Uber, Uber is made to serve the public 14:35 – The operating cost is not what made Uber expensive to build, it was the spend on marketing and buying everyone on the platform 14:57 – Martin says there can be a new model where people can create value by joining the same platform 15:13 – The value creation happens when people join the platform, this is where tokens are useful and can be used as incentives 15:58 – The early adopters get more and those who join later will have to pay fees 16:12 – Nathan says this sounds like a network marketing scheme 16:25 – Martin says this is how Uber found success – in the beginning someone paid $2 billion and in the end, it’s the users that pay; but, the curve can be much flatter 17:02 – Nathan asks Martin how values go up in crypto 17:42 – Martin says value creation is made when everyone agrees on something 18:15 – The thing about competing token issuances is that people need to find a way to combine their different tokens onto one platform 18:44 – Nathan says he can see the good intentions of the people who are in the crypto space, but he is trying to figure out who will win or lose when the crypto marketplace is more mature and established 19:28 – Martin says assuming there will be a winner and loser, the difference is found in people who have control over a platform 19:49 – For example, in Uber they can change rules and raise fees, but on a decentralized platform, you can structure it in a way that makes restrictions on yourself 20:16 – If you monopolize the platform, you can still get the fee but you have no control in changing it 21:02 – Martin says there is power in making your governance mechanism into something that does not allow you to change anything 23:31 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Crypto and blockchain can be the currency of the future. You create value when people agree to join a platform together. A future where people can have their own currency may be the way to democratize our use of money. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/31/2017 • 26 minutes, 32 seconds
767: With $10M Raised Will They Be Sytem of Record for Your COO?
Nick Candito. He is the Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of the company called Progressly, championing the company’s mission towards becoming the new standard for how teams find and execute business processes. He previously served as Relate IQ’s head of user success and business operations which was acquired by Salesforce, the first automatic and intelligent CRM solution. Nick founded Progressly to address how large industries operate, innovate and share around core business processes. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Weiner, Satya Nadella, Dick Costolo, Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Hubspot tools for email, Pocket How many hours of sleep do you get?— less than 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – be patient, ask more questions and optimize by being around the best people Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Nick to the show 01:49 – Nick thinks Salesforce will win the CRM space, as well as Microsoft and LinkedIn 02:25 – Nick is impressed by Base CRM and Social Capital 02:57 – Nick stumbled into tech as he was originally a finance major 03:15 – He started by joining a small software team building technology for the pharmaceutical industry and learned about the manual system of the tech industry 04:04 – Nick then joined Crimson Hexagon and he learned how to take a company to the next level using tools like Salesforce 04:38 – With RelateIQ, Nick learned how to create a sales system of engagement 05:18 – Nick thinks the best founding duo he has ever encountered is Adam Evans and Steve Loughlin 06:29 – Progressly is the operational system of records with a focus on the Fortune 1000 CROs or contract research organizations 07:24 – The company has a mobile first strategy (people who are working outside of office) 08:01 – Progressly works with a variety of companies; big companies that include Shell Oil and those in the mid-market segment 08:25 – The highest price is $49 per user, with the IT Group of Chevron they have 60,000 employees within the company 09:31 – The company was founded in 2014 and started to fundraise aggressively in 2015; they were able to raise $10 million in the seed, series A and after 10:22 – They had a very specific profile for their seed round and focused on a large institutional investor, a micro VC, and some high value angels—it played out the way they planned 11:17 – They are looking at getting a positive net churn and at how they can accelerate the growth of their accounts; for example, from site-wide deployment to regional deployment to enterprise deployment 13:28 – They are now in the hundreds in terms of customers; the energy and utilities sector has a high network effect 14:05 – Nathan just interviewed Geoff Moore who said the more specific or weirder the sector, the better 15:24 – The utility metric depends on what the user is running on operationally 16:03 – The active number of seats are in the thousands 16:46 – The first year revenue was pretty low because they did a paid pilot offering 17:10 – They were looking into the pilot to use case expansion 17:55 – They want to have a 100% growth, year over year 18:10 – It is easier to drive a high growth rate rather than have customers who can refer you to others 19:41 – Nick will celebrate when he gets to $5 million in ARR or accounting rate of return 20:40 – Currently, they are doing less than 300 grand per month 21:16 – Having an enterprise cycle in your business is slower upfront, but has the ability to experience significant growth in the long run 21:31 – They have 30 employees with some in product design and engineering 22:31 – The payback period is significantly lower than 12 months 24:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Target a specific group for your customer base to increase the chances of referrals. An enterprise account may prove to be slow at first, but it will pay off in the long run. Ask your customers to promote your business to other people. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/30/2017 • 27 minutes, 36 seconds
766: This Company Used Evangelical Christian Mobile Data to Influence US Elections
Anindya Datta. He is the CEO and Chairman of a company called Mobilewalla, a mobile consumer, audience platform company. Before Mobilewalla, he founded a company called Chutney Technologies where he was backed by Kleiner Perkins which was eventually acquired by Cisco Systems. He has been on the faculties of Georgia Tech, The University of Arizona and The National University of Singapore. He obtained his undergraduate degree many years ago and his MS and PhD degrees from the University of Maryland College Park. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The New New Thing by Michael Lewis What CEO do you follow? – Jose Mourinho Favorite online tool? — Outlook and Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 ½ hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Drink less and study harder Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Anindya to the show 02:21 – Mobilewalla collects data for how consumers behave on mobile and processes it for mobile marketers—they have two products: mobile audience and raw mobile data 03:38 – When companies buy the audience, Mobilewalla provides the IDs and it is a one-time deal; the raw data is given on a subscription-basis which is paid monthly 04:28 – Right now the SaaS model is earning more in terms of revenue, but Anindya thinks this will change in December 04:57 – They are currently modifying the audience pricing to become a recurring stream 05:10 – They are planning to offer the data segments needed by a company and get a monthly payment for it 06:07 – Mobilewalla gets their data from different sources including the ad request system in mobile, they barter with the ad company in exchange for data 06:54 – They also put a pixel in an ad and obtain data from you as you browse 07:23 – This includes your location 07:57 – The company started with buying the information they can collect from other companies’ ads and then moved on to trading 08:32 – 2014 is their first revenue year where they got $1 million from the cut of the media buy 09:10 – 2015 was also all media buys where they got $4 million 10:18 – They stopped media buying in June 2016 and played a key role in the US presidential election—the revenue generated was $4 million: $750,000 in data and $3.25 million was from media 11:33 – The projection for this year is $5.1 million (all coming from data), but they have deals with companies that include media work 12:21 – Mobilewalla was one of the key data arms for a major party 12:33 – They created segments for evangelical Christians 13:31 – Anindya cannot share who they worked for but they can say the client was very happy with their work 14:10 – They raised their capital thru venture funding which are convertible notes worth $4 million; they have not yet raised a series B 15:50 – In May 2016, all the revenue was from data and they got $12,000. In June of this year, they hit $250,000—this is a 20x growth in 13 months 16:32 – In May 2017, they made $172,000 17:05 – On SaaS, they have 9 customers with subscription accounts and they pay from $8,500 to $41,000 a month 17:21 – The biggest chunk of audience revenue comes from Oracle, they get paid based on the segments that were sold 18:10 – In June, they were close to $100,000 from their mobile audience; there are over 250 organizations buying from them including Unilever and Procter and Gamble 19:12 – Ever since they started there are only two companies who have not continued working with them 20:01 – The company has two sellers – one in New York and one in Singapore 20:27 – The total team size is 38 with 3 focused on sales acquiring new clients; the average sales cycle for a SaaS client is 45 days 21:21 – There is zero variable marketing spend for the company 21:51 – The company headquarters is in New York and the US team is located in New York and Atlanta where the US engineering team is based 22:12 – The US team size is 10, the Singapore team size is 12, and the rest is based in Calcutta, India 24:21 – The biggest amount of money they generated during the election was the “get out to vote or GOTV” – they monitored every polling booth in a certain number of states and they were able to tell the ground team who voted and who did not 25:04 – During the election their data was acquired in real time 27:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Invest in a business that can bring in profit; this will give you the capital you need for your other businesses. Data is king. You CAN barter with other companies to reduce your spend on marketing. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/29/2017 • 30 minutes, 46 seconds
765: How This Coach Can Charge $80k+ per Year for One Gig
Cameron Herold. He’s known as the business growth guru. He’s the mastermind behind hundreds of companies’ exponential growth. He’s built a dynamic consultancy whose current clients include the big 4 wireless carriers. His clients like that Cameron only speaks from experience. He’s earned his reputation as the business growth guru by guiding clients to double their profit and revenue in just 3 years or less. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kalanick Favorite online tool? — CommitTo3 How many hours of sleep do you get?— 9 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Everybody’s insecure, everybody’s nervous and just suck it up and run with it, because everybody’s more worried about themselves and never about me” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:16 – Nathan introduces Cameron to the show 02:04 – Cameron was featured on TED Talks’ Raising Kids as Entrepreneurs and that’s where his career got started 02:13 – Cameron got into College Pro Painters 02:24 – Cameron was the COO at 1-800-GOT-JUNK 02:29 – Cameron grew the company from 14 employees to 3100 employees in 6 years 02:33 – Cameron started coaching CEOs 10 years ago 02:48 – Brian Scudamore who was in Episode 409 and he is Cameron’s friend 03:20 – Cameron shares why he chose the consultancy path 03:43 – “I don’t need to build another company to feel good” 03:50 – Cameron likes doing what he does 04:02 – Cameron shares what happened in cryptocurrency in 2000 04:04 – There were 15K companies using currencies 04:14 – Electronic currency was tied to US dollars in terms of valuation but it was backed by nothing 04:27 – They took a percentage of every transaction 05:06 – One of the companies that Cameron helped was BlueGrace Logistics 05:18 – Cameron coached the CEO, Bobby Harris, and 5 other executives 05:21 – Form $80M top line revenue, they grew to $250M 05:33 – The company is all about culture and that is Bobby’s focus 05:47 – Cameron does two 90-minute video calls with all of his clients 05:56 – It’s mostly mentoring 06:08 – Cameron teaches how to put the right systems and processes in place 06:25 – Most entrepreneurs just wake up one day with the realization that they’re clueless about what they’re doing 06:44 – After experiencing substantial growth, a company has no idea what to do next 07:04 – There are a couple of companies that Cameron has equity in 07:30 – Cameron has a couple of groups on the investment side 07:43 – Cameron’s two books, Double Double and Meetings Suck, speak to the core of what Cameron is doing 07:55 – Cameron wrote a book because he’s a paid speaker and speaker bureaus want to put out more content 08:04 – Cameron is an advisor and investor for Tucker Max’s Book in a Box 08:16 – Book in a Box does an 8-hour interview and strips the content from your head 08:40 – It costs $25K to pull the content out of your head and put it into print 08:44 – Thought leaders and CEOs need to have a book in this day and age 09:10 – Cameron shares how great Book in a Box is at what they do 09:24 – They also pulled some content from Cameron’s previous speaking events and used the copy of his first book 09:29 – They provide a format for our thoughts and they ask the right questions 09:49 – Cameron has sold around 50K copies of Meetings Suck 10:03 – Cameron targets the leaders of the meetings, participants and discusses how the meeting should proceed 10:30 – Cameron wrote Double Double 6 years ago 10:52 – Cameron’s speaking fee was $7500 before he had published his books, now it is $35K 11:11 – Cameron is one of the best speakers that we’ve had in a long time now 11:51 – “I think we’re at the very, very peak of a market right now” 12:34 – Some of Cameron’s clients have been with him for 3-4 years, some just a year and others 3-6 months 12:51 – Cameron’s starting fee is $80K annually and goes up depending on the client’s needs 13:20 – Cameron shares how he talked with Sprint’s Jaime Jones 13:46 – “I don’t understand their business and I don’t need to” 14:35 – Cameron focuses on the people side of the business 15:16 – Cameron shares where he puts his money to increase his revenue stream 15:42 – Everything is a little overpriced now in real estate 16:04 – Cameron shares where his property is and how he is managing them 19:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Some entrepreneurs get overwhelmed by their company’s incredibly, fast-paced growth and they need support in learning how to sustain that growth. Have the right systems and processes in place to carry the momentum of your business. Invest your money after you’ve done the research yourself and know exactly what you’re getting into. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/28/2017 • 21 minutes, 41 seconds
764: He Raised $5.3m in Token Offering on Etherum Blockchain to help you bet on future events
Jack Peterson. He’s the co-founder of Augur which is a decentralized, prediction market platform that runs on the ethereum decentralized network. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Handbook of Applied Cryptography What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Ethereum How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t spend too much time on impractical things” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Jack to the show 01:28 – Augur is a decentralized prediction market platform 01:34 – The platform exists on a ethereum decentralized network 02:09 – Bitcoin is the first blockchain which was initially intended for payment 02:19 – Ethereum is a blockchain that is flexible, you can upload programs where people can execute their programs 02:38 – Augur is a set of programs that run on the network of ethereum 02:54 – The founder of ethereum was on Episode 758 03:11 – Augur has a set of smart contracts on ethereum that people run 03:57 – Augur is currently finishing their beta test and it is not yet live 04:02 – Their smart contract code is undergoing security audits 04:12 – Jack shares how to use Augur 04:27 – The aim is to make the experience similar to accessing a regular website 04:40 – Augur is a venue to bet on any world event 04:49 – For example, making predictions with politics 05:40 – The market you create is where you can buy and sell shares of the event 06:25 – An example scenario: the Super Bowl 06:40 – A market is where someone can place their bet 07:10 – In a normal sportsbook, people can bet on the winner 07:19 – Who will win the Super Bowl? This is the market on Augur and people can place their bets 07:37 – You can buy and sell shares of any of the outcomes 08:17 – The people in the market set the price of the shares 09:06 – With the Super Bowl, there will be multiple outcomes 09:28 – When you set-up the market, you set-up the order book for each of the outcome 10:05 – You could place a bet by buying shares of the outcome 10:41 – When your bet wins, the value of the shares go up and if you lose, it will be zero 10:59 – “You’re betting on how likely the outcome is to happen” 11:27 – Jack shares how someone who doesn’t have any experience in crypto can participate in Augur 11:35 – First thing you need to do is get the crypto currency (you can use your credit card) 12:01 – Augur isn’t involved with any platform that exchanges dollars to crypto, so you have to get it from third-parties 12:30 – You can buy ether from Coinbase and use the ether to place bets on Augur 13:10 – If you already have ether, you can already participate in a market 13:55 – Augur has an embedded plugin similarly to Paypal which is for Coinbase and ShapeShift 14:25 – If you signed in, you will have the ether to bet 15:05 – You can create a market on the trading page 15:37 – You’re betting with whomever wants to participate in the market 15:48 – The person who creates the market will set-up an order book with actions 16:51 – Jack did a Token share 17:07 – “Our token is called rep” 17:58 – Token has raised $5.3M in August and September of 2015 18:10 – It was a $5.3M equivalent in crypto 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Ethereum is a blockchain that Augur uses to run its programs. There are multiple platforms available for dollar to crypto currency exchange. Maintain your focus on what’s important. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/27/2017 • 22 minutes, 30 seconds
763: He's Raised $18.5m To Help Banks Use Open API's, Makes Money From # of API Calls
Steve Kirsh. He’s the CEO of Token, a Silicon Valley startup company developing a modern platform for open banking. He’s pioneered several computer core technologies like optical mouse, Internet search, spam filtering, and secure identity and founded 7 high tech companies—two with billion dollar market caps such as Infoseek and Frame Technology. He received his BS and MS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT in 1980. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Like A Virgin What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — SimplyFile How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just hire good, strong and experienced people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Steve to the show 02:04 – Token supplies open banking software to banks 02:24 – There’s no real API that works with banks and this is the problem 03:00 – One of Token’s customers is Fidor Bank 03:02 – The problem is most banks don’t have an open API where you can do things like move money 03:19 – Token can get into Fidor’s API to drive its API 04:13 – Token has spent time creating an end-to-end secure architecture that is based on digital cryptography 05:24 – Steve thinks that there’s no real need for blockchain for a lot of financial applications 05:38 – “The technology for blockchain is just not appropriate” 05:48 – The Bank of England did an experiment with etherium 06:24 – Token was launched in 2015 06:50 – Steve shares how Token came to life 07:15 – Token raised $18.5M in a series A 07:26 – There’s legislation in Europe that requires banks to open their APIs and that’s when Token came in 08:07 – Token charges per API calls 08:10 – Token gets the calls for free from the banks 08:50 – The charge depends on the API calls 09:18 – Nathan simplifies how the model works 10:05 – There’s no equivalent to PSD 2 in the USA and it’s only for banks in Europe 10:20 – This can only happen in the USA if people want to be compatible with the banks in Europe 11:33 – Token’s first bank 12:11 – There are currently around 5 banks that are integrated with Token 12:25 – Team size is 25, split between San Francisco and London 14:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find the perfect timing and opportunity to pitch your business. It is easier and more secure for banks to adapt a technology that has been tested than it is for them to create their own. Hire good, strong and experienced people for your business—it just makes like easier. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/26/2017 • 17 minutes, 19 seconds
762: 4000 Developers Pay Them To Catch Bugs, $9.5m Raised
James Smith. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Bugsnag, the leading crash monitoring platform for web and mobile applications. The company helps companies like Airbnb, Lyft, Cisco, Pandora and Yelp catch and fix errors on their applications. Originally from London, James moved to the Bay area in 2009, leading the product team as the CTO of Heyzap. In his spare time, he likes hacking open source software, eating junk food and practicing his American accent. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Radical Focus What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — eShares How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “If you don’t ask, you don’t get, apply it to your life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan introduces James to the show 02:00 – If a company has a software, Bugsnag detects when the software is broken 02:22 – Bugsnag charges monthly 02:28 – The price varies depending on the company’s needs 02:36 – Price starts at $29 a month to tens of thousands a month depending on the scale of the business 03:17 – Customer cohorts 03:57 – Team size is 35 and will be 45 at the end of the year 04:30 – James and his co-founder quit their job in 2012 and started Bugsnag in 2013 04:40 – James was the CTO for Heyzap which was a Y combinator company in the gaming space 04:59 – Heyzap wasn’t able to solve the problem James had with Bloomberg 05:59 – James invested in Heyzap and learned a lot from his time with them 06:40 – Heyzap was acquired by the German company Fyber 07:06 – James’ experience entering the startup world 08:30 – With Heyzap, James had to decide whether or not he’d buy his shares before the acquisition 09:43 – James’ price was low because he was an early employee of Heyzap 10:41 – James was 29 when he left Heyzap 10:50 – Bugsnag was initially bootstrapped, then raised in 2013 11:08 – Bugsnag went with Matrix Partners 11:32 – Bugsnag raised a total of $9.5M 11:49 – Customer number is around 4000 companies 12:04 – Bugsnag has a free and premium model 12:14 – There are 60K software engineers who are using Bugsnag 12:21 – One third are organizations and the rest are using it for free 13:00 – First year revenue was $4.5K in ARR 13:27 – Bugsnag has broken $2M ARR already 13:47 – “The expansion revenue is really, really strong” 13:50 – Bugsnag is constantly in a net negative churn 14:06 – Logo churn is around 1% 14:40 – Bugsnag started with low deal sizes and grew them slowly 15:05 – People try Bugsnag for free and see its value 15:45 – Healthy net negative churn in the industry is around mid-single digit to low double digit negative churn 16:41 – The best driver of growth for Bugsnag is word of mouth 17:01 – Bugsnag also does conferences and had 18 conferences last year 17:10 – Sponsorship price per conference can go up to $10K 17:28 – Large companies go to conferences as well 17:35 – Payback period is the 12-month which is the rule of thumb 18:17 – Bugsnag is in a typical SaaS gross margin 20:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you don’t ask, you won’t receive; therefore, just get out there and ask for what you want. Small deal sizes can grow and expand to large ones once people see your value. Consider owning a part of a company—especially if it’s a company that you truly believe in. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/25/2017 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
761: With $63m Raised, 20% of Top 200 Companies Use This To Communicate With Employees
Jim Larrison. He’s the co-founder and president of Dynamic Signal, the leading, customer-employee, advocacy engagement platform. Jim has been involved in a handful of startups that were successful from within big companies to venture-funded businesses. With a couple of sold businesses and an IPO, he is set to come forward with Dynamic Signal which has already raised over $68M in funding. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Business Adventures and Into Thin Air What CEO do you follow? – Tony Hsieh Favorite online tool? — Owler How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s important to fail and not to be scared of failing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Jim to the show 01:53 – Dynamic Signal was founded 7 years ago with the mission to revolutionize how to communicate with your employee 02:03 – Big companies struggle to communicate with their employees 02:23 – Dynamic Signal focuses on simplifying this communication 02:34 – Some large companies don’t use the internet to communicate—they send snail mail, newsletters or magazines 03:09 – Dynamic Signal works with Slack which is a collaboration tool 03:20 – Dynamic Signal is a top-down communication tool 03:43 – Dynamic Signal is a SaaS business with monthly subscription plans 03:59 – Dynamic Signal goes after global businesses, enterprises and corporate businesses 04:40 – Dynamic Signal charges by number of employees 05:36 – Big companies grow faster than the small companies 05:56 – Dynamic Signal segment customers depending on the number of employees and where the employees are based 06:20 – Nestle is a global business with hundreds of companies under their brand 06:43 – Dynamic Signal has no cap in the number of employees 06:57 – Global 50 companies have 23K to millions of employees 07:11 – Global 1000 companies have 5K to 25K employees and 5K employees below are for corporate businesses 07:26 – Dynamic Signal was launched in 2010 07:30 – Jim and his co-founder sold their previous company Adify to Cox 07:43 – It was for $350M 07:52 – It was a quick exit and they’ve raised $20-30M 08:06 – The original idea for Dynamic Signal was to go after advocates and influencers 08:25 – Jim saw that the biggest advocates for businesses like Oakley and Nike are their employees 09:30 – Jim and his co-founder built Dynamic Signal because they like working together, even after their successful exit 10:06 – When they started the company, they told themselves that they wanted to build the technology the right way 10:32 – Team size is around 200, some are in the field and some are in San Francisco 10:45 – Around 80 people are engineers/technical and 40 are on sales 11:17 – First year revenue 12:10 – 2016 ARR 12:40 – Jim’s vision for the company is to go public 13:00 – Total customers is close to a couple of thousand 13:25 – Dynamic Signal has 20% of the global 200 companies 13:55 – Dynamic Signal’s costs are driven to the technology 14:03 – Gross margin is around 85% 14:23 – Jim and his co-founder had a good relationship with Cox 14:36 – Cox also funded Dynamic Signal 15:52 – Jim hasn’t seen any logo churn since they launched 16:03 – Dynamic Signal has a long sales cycle: from 240 days to years 17:15 – Jim has tried the seat bucket license but it hasn’t worked as well as their previous pricing 18:00 – “The way we drive growth is 100% based on getting more usage and that’s it” 18:35 – After the raise, Dynamic Signal is focused on expanding their business 18:50 – Paid spent is less than $500K 19:03 – Payback period 21:07 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Larger companies struggle to communicate and connect with their employees and oftentimes, need a solution. The biggest supporters and advocates of a brand are the employees. Get used to failing and don’t fear it—it’s part of your path to greater success and understanding. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/24/2017 • 23 minutes, 58 seconds
760: This Site Has Sold $3m Worth of Athletes Old Gear
Brendan Candon. He’s the co-founder and CEO of SidelineSwap, an online marketplace for athletes to buy and sell their sports gear. The company has over 100K users, participated in 500 startups and has raised $1.5M in venture funding. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Leaders Eat Last What CEO do you follow? – Jack Ma Favorite online tool? — Slack and Appear How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Brendan wished he could have been more active in entrepreneurship while in school Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Brendan to the show 01:43 – Brendan was in Episode 359 of The Top 02:33 – Brendan believes that SidelineSwap will make $5-6M in sales by the end of 2017 02:43 – SidelineSwap just launched their iOs app 03:28 – SidelineSwap is where athletes list their items for free 03:35 – You can list any new or used sports equipment 03:43 – SidelineSwap takes a 12% cut 03:49 – Their top KPI is gross merchandise volume 03:53 – They look at the number of sales they drive to the platform 04:51 – SidelineSwap currently has 15K sellers and around 23K buyers 05:22 – There are 2 sides of a marketplace: 05:30 – SidelineSwap gets supplies from the sellers which drive traffic 05:35 – There should be a balance between supply and demand 05:45 – SidelineSwap started by their search to see how many people had sports gear lying around 05:58 – They went to former college athletes, professionals and others in the industry 06:35 – They got some highly desirable gear from former known athletes 06:39 – SidelineSwap started with social media to drive traffic to the website 06:45 – They now have around 70K Instagram and Facebook followers 07:34 – SidelineSwap has marketing ads highlighting some gear that can be considered collector’s items 08:25 – Total transaction volume since the launch of SidelineSwap is around $3.5M 08:35 – 70% happened in just the first 6 months 08:57 – Brendan thinks that getting the right supplies affects their growth significantly 09:08 – SidelineSwap also educates the buyers on the items that they’re getting 09:30 – SidelineSwap tries to avoid jockstraps 09:43 – There are also different accessories that target the younger buyers 10:28 – eBay started in a similar way as SidelineSwap 11:00 – “We want to be the resource for every sports family” 11:21 – SidelineSwap wants to build the best possible shopping experience 11:45 – Average order value is $80 11:56 – SidelineSwap focuses on the number of gear listed 12:23 – In May, there were 3K buyers and 1500 sellers 12:48 – SidelineSwap has recently $1.5M in summer 12:56 – Total will be around $3.5 including a current negotiation 13:23 – Brendan shares how he pitched SidelineSwap as a marketplace 13:45 – Brendan believes there will be a sporting goods marketplace 14:19 – SidelineSwap is currently growing 30%, month over month 14:43 – Current team size is 10, some are in Boston and some are in New York 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There will be a marketplace for sports equipment in the near future. For every business, aim to achieve a balance with your supply and demand. Research where you can find the BEST resources for your supply—this will attract your target market. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/23/2017 • 19 minutes, 26 seconds
759: He Shares How He Built His Company On Top of Cryptocurrency Ethereum and Why
Eric Tang. He’s a computer programmer and co-founder of Live Peer, a decentralized video live streaming platform incentivized with the blockchain. He was introduced to the blockchain in 2014, and it’s pretty much everything that Eric thinks about now. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jerry Colonna Favorite online tool? — MetaMask How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Eric would tell himself to be more focused and worry less Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:06 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:07 – Wowza does video transcoding in a centralized way 02:30 – One of the big CDN players is Akamai 02:59 – There are two different cases for why people would use Live Peer over the other players in the industry 03:05 – Live Peer is in a decentralized world 03:11 – App developers nowadays are building decentralized applications 03:18 – The applications do not have a server 04:13 – They can duplicate their projects over the blockchain 04:17 – Live peer is the only solution for decentralized apps 05:20 – The government wouldn’t be able to figure out the IP of Live Peer 06:06 – The idea of blockchain is the participants are the stakeholders 06:16 – When you use Facebook live, you’re just a user and not actually benefiting from it 06:27 – In a decentralized world, if you’re a participant of Live Peer, you earn tokens which grow and become more valuable 07:07 – From an ecosystem standpoint, the companies building businesses around bitcoin and ethereum are early coin holders 07:28 – Joseph Lubin, Ethereum’s co-founder, is now hiring 400 people for ConsenSys to build applications around the ethereum ecosystem 07:55 – Ethereum provides a smart contract platform which bitcoin doesn’t provide 08:47 – How Ethereum and bitcoin are competitors and how they are not competing explained 09:17 – Anyone can build their own bitcoin blockchain but they won’t be always successful 10:18 – Eric thinks co-blockchains will also exist 10:50 – Eric thinks bitcoin is a great way to hold value as it has a great network now 11:11 – Ethereum has its own value and for a completely different purpose 11:29 – We use the ethereum platform to hold our tokens 11:50 – In the open blockchain world, anyone can be an investor 12:10 – There’s just more risk in investing earlier 12:44 – Can someone cheat the system by having fake miners grow the value earlier? 13:00 – Some are pumping the tokens and selling them 13:13 – When a company comes, Eric would have them hold their tokens at first 13:48 – If you have a lot miners, you’re already contributing a lot to the network 14:00 – The network will leverage the access capacity 14:12 – if you spun out a bunch of miners, Live Peers will have a large capacity in terms of amount of transcoding and live streaming work we can do 14:23 – This creates a cheaper price for the amount of live streaming 14:43 – Nathan makes a comparison using Live Peer 1 and Live Peer 2 as competitors 14:49 – When investors spend money on the 2 companies and contribute more resources, the prices of the service will go down for the consumers 15:07 – The longer they spend money, the more users they can drive 15:55 – If Nathan launches an email marketing tool, how can he create traction if people don’t understand crypto 16:18 – There’s actually a need for people to simplify the complexity of crypto 16:59 – Eric is thinking of providing incentives for individual stakeholders to get new users on board 17:23 – The big investors can put aside a big percentage of tokens and just incentivize it 17:37 – It’s like an employment equity pool 17:54 – The early participants will benefit more from the ecosystem 18:03 – The first bitcoin transaction was 10K bitcoins for a pizza 18:16 – The bitcoin price to buy a pizza is a little over $2500 (a coin) 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: More developers are building decentralized applications because of the security piece. The participants in the blockchain are the stakeholders as well. The one who will win is those who can spend more money and contribute resources for a longer span of time—this will attract more users and create cheaper prices for the consumers. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/22/2017 • 23 minutes, 21 seconds
758: The Ex-Stock Exchange Brain Behind Ethereum Blockchain
Anthony Diiorio. He’s a serial entrepreneur, venture capitalist, community organizer and thought leader in the field of digital currencies, blockchain technology, and decentralized technology. He’s the founder and CEO of Decentral and Jaxx and co-founder of the Ethereum project. He previously served as the chief digital officer of The Toronto Stock Exchange. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — LastPass How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Anthony wished he didn’t waste his time in university Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:55 – Nathan introduces Anthony to the show 01:38 – Anthony got into the industry in 2012 and thought that crypto was going to be more important than the internet 01:57 – Before, there was disruption in the internet—now, you can send value without third parties getting involved 02:21 – We’re now moving onto the age of the movement of value 02:34 – Some third party disruptions come from banks and credit bank companies 02:53 – You can remove third parties in the value chain and connect more individuals at a lower cost 03:11 – With smart contract, you can now automate on blockchain and see a reduction cost 03:38 – A blockchain is a ledger system or an accounting system that tracks entries using cryptographics 04:20 – Digital currency didn’t work before because there was no technology for it 04:48 – Since you can’t duplicate something digital, you can claim what is yours 05:33 – Decentralized ledgers track what people are sending and receiving 05:57 – The decentralized networks are replacing centralized services 06:14 – Blockchain is the technology, bitcoin is the example of that technology 06:22 – All cryptocurrencies have blockchains below them 06:28 – Bitcoin is the first one to have its blockchain 06:30 – Ethereum has a blockchain behind it 06:39 – Blockchain makes the transactions visible and transparent 06:50 – Blockchain provides trust between two individuals 07:40 – Tokens are coins but are found on other platforms 07:45 – Ethereum is a platform that is made to build other platforms on top of it 07:51 – Ethereum provides the infrastructure layer 08:05 – There are now tons of projects building coins on the ethereum platform 08:38 – Bitcoin has its own coin while ethereum is like a product that incentivizes people to contribute to the network 09:39 – Ethereum is like an SDK depending on the developers 11:03 – Anthony had a talk with someone who's in the cannabis industry 11:06 – Anthony is creating a coin card system where you can buy any coin or currency in convenience stores 11:18 – Banks don’t want to set up accounts for bitcoin companies because they’re scared 11:47 – Anthony sees the same characteristics within the crypto space and cannabis space 12:40 – Ethereum is from Decentral, the hub that Anthony made in 2013 12:55 – Anthony sees people jumping to the crypto space without even researching 13:15 – Look online before investing because scams are everywhere 13:47 – Anything that states there’s a fixed return is fishy so you should seek advice 14:03 – Do your due diligence 14:39 – Decentral is the brand and Jaxx is the product 14:48 – Anthony shares his initial experience with the industry 15:13 – Anthony bootstrapped Etherium 15:23 – Anthony left Etherium in 2015 to focus on the wallet space 15:30 – Anthony realized that the wallet is the browser for the technology 15:51 – The wallet contains the value of movement 15:56 – Anthony developed a multi-chain, multi-platform digital wallet that enables managing and receipt of valuable digital assets 16:23 –When you start your Jaxx, you’re creating a key for your transactions 16:41 – You are in full control of your wallet 16:55 – Jaxx makes money through integration partners like ShapeShift 17:09 – Anthony made $60M from ShapeShift transactions 17:50 – Jax just signed 70 partnerships in the space 18:25 – The fund that Anthony used for Jaxx 18:45 – Jaxx is currently profitable and made $150K last month 19:03 – There are exchanges globally that enable you to buy and sell cryptocurrencies rather than wire transfers to your bank account 19:13 – There’s also a bitcoin ATM and Anthony has it 19:32 – Jaxx’s goal is to become the default interface that the masses can use to understand the power of blockchain 21:46 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With cryptocurrencies, you can send value without the disruption of third parties. Do your due diligence—while cryptocurrency is a hot space for investors, the chances of getting scammed is also very high. The power of blockchain isn’t only beneficial for those who are already in the space, but for everyone. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/21/2017 • 23 minutes, 58 seconds
757: She Launched a $20m Cannabis VC Firm After Her Parents Passed Away
Emily Paxhia. She’s the founder of Poseidon Asset Management and she shifted her focus entirely to the cannabis industry, in 2013. Since that time, she’s taken her experience of researching markets, companies and strategic opportunities and turned them entirely to the world of cannabis. Her focus on understanding where the market is headed rather than where it has been, has been critical to developing a diverse portfolio of companies that span the sector. With over 15 years working with Fortune 500 companies—developing products, resolving strategic errors and addressing new target audiences—her work has been fundamental to stewarding her companies’ portfolios along the paths to success. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Asana How many hours of sleep do you get?— 3-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I had took it easier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan introduces Emily to the show 01:53 – Poseidon is a VC firm for cannabis 02:02 – Emily was from an industry where companies were looking to expand their market share 02:09 – Emily saw the cannabis industry as an opportunity—there was a demand for products 02:30 – Emily’s parents passed away from cancer and she was told by some that cannabis could have helped her parents 02:43 – A dying cancer patient is prescribed medication that has side effects, then is issued more meds to handle the side effects—which is a difficult cycle 02:58 – Using cannabis appropriately could actually help with the side effects 03:05 – More and more cancer patients are experiencing relief while using cannabis 03:38 – Emily and her brother were 16 and 21 when their parents passed 04:07 – Prior to Poseidon, Emily was with Miner % Co. Studio 04:44 – As a financial professional, Emily had to assess her risk tolerances 05:04 – It’s important to be mentally and financially invested 05:09 – Emily also had great support to bring Poseidon to life 05:53 – Current fund size is $20M going $25M 06:11 – Emily’s brother is her business partner 06:36 – Emily shares a story when her brother brought in a company that Emily disagreed with at first 06:38 – In 2015, they’ve invested in a company called Surna 06:43 – The company had gone public and was in a lot of trouble 07:00 – Morgan had the idea to buy out the founders of Surna 07:15 – Morgan joined the board and helped the company get on track again 07:40 – Emily shares a time when the reverse happened; she brought in a company that Morgan was hesitant with at first 07:48 – The company was Wurk 08:00 – Emily was interested with Keegan’s presentation 08:35 – Keegan was in Episode 735 of The Top 09:20 – There is an assumption that Emily and Morgan are always high—this is NOT true 09:44 – Emily takes cannabis for stomach pain, but it doesn’t get her high 10:26 – Emily sees the cannabis industry as a wellness industry 10:50 – Emily is interested with business technology solutions that help businesses run smoothly 11:00 – She’s also interested in agricultural technology solutions as well 12:06 – “Honestly, if I could, I would solve the banking issue in California” 12:21 – Banks are still dropping businesses and credit cards 12:35 – It gets challenging when someone loses their banking relationship 13:00 – Emily is currently in San Francisco 13:23 – Poseidon is modest in stating their expected returns 13:31 – Emily wanted to capture the growth of industry 13:59 – Poseidon has been running 40-44% IR 14:13 – Poseidon has 3 phases of diligence: 14:20 – They receive lots of emails and Emily tries to read and respond as much and as quickly as possible 14:56 – Emily meets the founders and the team as part of their due diligence 15:06 – The last phase is from getting into the details of actual financial projections to sourcing potential co-investments 15:25 – Poseidon currently has 30 active companies in their portfolio 15:28 – Over 40 in the lifetime of the portfolio 15:55 – Typical deal size is $500K to a million dollars 17:02 – Emily and her brother are talking about a company they want to launch 17:38 – Emily’s three babies from their portfolio are: 17:42 – Flow Kana: a processing center working with small farmers 18:17 – Headset is a machine-data analytics company 18:37 – Emily really likes Wurk 18:49 – Baker is also exciting because it creates market opportunity 21:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: To become successful, one must research the field in question. There’s a great demand for new product and technology in the cannabis industry as the supply is low. Carry your past experience and knowledge into your current and future endeavors—employ the skills that transfer across disciplines. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/20/2017 • 23 minutes, 22 seconds
756: Meet The 21 Year Old Who Runs His Own $5m Hedge Fund
Julian Marchese. Julian was introduced to Nathan by a mutual friend and he’s the CEO and portfolio manager at Marchese Investments in New York City. Julian is only 21 and was already featured in Bloomberg, CNBC and Dragon's Den, which is Shark Tank of Canada, where he managed to get 4 out of 5 dragons in the den that showed interest. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Market Wizards What CEO do you follow? – Peter Jones Favorite online tool? — Quantocracy.com How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Multi-strategy” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:51 – Nathan introduces Julian to the show 01:47 – Going into the hedge fund world has always been Julian’s passion 01:55 – Julian was introduced to the world of investing by his parents when he was 11 years old 02:50 – When Julian turned 18, he decided to start his own firm 02:58 – He waited until he reached the legal age 03:27 – Julian took a course in Toronto and people in press found it fascinating that he was studying trading at a very young age 03:48 – A lady took it upon herself to take Julian’s story and publish it 04:05 – Some of Julian’s first investors saw his story from the media 05:00 – Julian wanted to build a community for young learners like himself 05:10 – A lady emailed Julian because she wanted her daughter to join 05:36 – Julian met the lady and her daughter when they were in Toronto 05:51 – 2 years later, the lady invested $75K for 1% of Julian’s management company 06;11 – The management company has raised $675K with a $4M valuation 06:38 – Hedge funds usually have multiple entities who have different roles 07:28 – Julian also pays himself for personal expenses which is around $25K to $30K 07:53 – The other costs are on the management company side 08:44 – The investors make money from the GP interest accumulated 09:43 – Julian was able to raise the $6M capital through value generation 09:45 – “I’ve been managing money since October 2015” 10:07 – The best months for Julian are the months where the market is down 10:28 – Julian latest deal was an institutional money manager 11:03 – Julian isn’t doing traditional investments 11:42 – Julian explains how he does his investments 11:45 – First, they’re able to trade volatility and how much the market moves up or down 11:59 – Most people invest in the stock market, they want to benefit with the stocks are up, but they also want protection when things go down 12:21 – One of Julian’s strategies is to systematically sell insurance 13:04 – The investment return depends on the investors 13:40 – If you put in a million dollars in October 2015, today you will now have $1.2M 13:50 – You can take it all or leave any amount you want 14:09 – They now cater to different types of clients 14:36 – Julian doesn’t worry too much about what other hedge funds usually worry about 15:10 – Julian worries more about their process and how can they develop more 15:20 – The real risk for Julian is when there’s something wrong with his analysis process 15:45 – Strategies are reciprocal 17:04 – Julian has multiple strategies and none of those strategies are correlated 17:53 – Brexit can affect the volatility strategy but it’s a selective strategy and not always in the market 19:03 – “The main risk to us are not macro events like a stock market crashing” 19:40 – Julian makes money from 53-55% of their trades 19:49 – They try to limit their exposures 20:02 – “The risks are very circumstantial” 21:20 – Julian is unsure of his future positioning, but it’s completely content specific 23:23 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Having multiple strategies can help you stay on track. Start as early as possible—you are building your skills and knowledge base for the future. People desire taking risks in trading and stocks, but they also need the securities in place. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/19/2017 • 25 minutes, 42 seconds
755: Want to Invest in BitCoin But Don't Understand It? Listen to This.
Tom Kineshanko. He’s been investing in cryptocurrencies, also called digital assets or tokens, since 2013. He founded and exited the first bitcoin and ethereum fund in Canada, invested in the ethereum cloud sale and has made 10x the returns in bitcoin after ethereum classic, golem and several other tokens. He’s also the founder and general partner at First Block Capital, a digital asset fund manager where Tom leads investments in new token issuance. He’s also the founder and CEO of Walter.ai—a company that is building a distributed Bloomberg terminal—which intends to make the best supplier of market data to the cryptocurrencies market. Famous Five: Favorite crypto-related book? – Introducing Ethereum and Solidity What CEO do you follow? – Brian Armstrong and Olaf Carlson Favorite online tool? — Cryptocurrencies exchanges How many hours of sleep do you get? — 8 plus If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I understood which industries were sort of young-man game versus old-man game” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Tom to the show 02:31 – There’s a market of new old coin tokens and there’s little information about it 03:12 – “This is liquid venture capital” 03:15 – The tokens represent an exposure to startup projects 03:25 – As people know, investing in startups is about qualitative information rather than quantitative 03:45 – Tom decided to apply the distributing models in building companies 04:50 – Tom shares the common way to build companies 05:10 – Blockchain ecosystem has a technology that is a combination of 4 different technologies 05:15 – The technology allows secure transfer of value on the internet even without a third-party approval 05:28 – Blockchain is a secure transfer layer that overlays on your internet 06:06 – You can track the activity on the blockchain because it’s an open source 06:16 – The tricky part is to identify who’s doing what 06:46 – Every time there’s a transaction on bitcoin blockchain, you’re leaving clues to who you are and what you’re up to 07:43 – The best use case of bitcoin blockchain is a stored value 08:22 – The issue with bitcoin blockchain is that it’s not yet as trusted as gold 08:27 – Tom believes though that bitcoin blockchain will be as trustworthy as gold 08:38 – As an investor, you want to be diversified across multiple blockchains 08:56 – Every one of these tokens is the unit of currency within a blockchain 09:32 – Bitcoin is a unit in a chain with 21M units 09:38 – Tom uses the analogy of a train with several carts to explain bitcoin and blockchain 10:08 – Ethereum is a place you can go to build blockchains and host them 10:45 – If bitcoin becomes as trusted as gold, it can be worth billions of dollar 10:55 – “You can never prove that any blockchain is secure because there’s always a bug they might find in the future” 11:03 – The longer you wait to find the bug, the more trusted it becomes 12:07 – Tom believes that the way blockchain is built is the way companies will be built in the future 12:15 – For investors interested in technology, go to Coinbase.com which is a mutual friend of Tom’s 13:01 – Coinbase has different types of cryptocurrencies or tokens 13:05 – Tom recommends buying bitcoins on Coinbase 13:09 – Then open up a Poloniex.com account where you can buy whatever you want using bitcoins 13:54 – The people who took advantage of the gold rush didn’t look for gold, but created something that can be of use for gold 14:50 – In the crypto world, you can design a microeconomy with incentives 14:55 – The people will join your microeconomy and work for you to get the incentives 15:08 – The incentives are the bitcoins 15:51 – Walter is creating an army of people who contribute data in exchange for a reward 15:55 – The people are getting paid with tokens 16:29 – Crypto businesses are difficult 16:52 – The easiest way to get good returns in the space is to buy tokens which are units of currency in micro-economies 17:14 – Tom uses the analogy of buying Facebook IPO 19:20 – There are games where you can earn cryptocurrencies and online casinos for cryptocurrencies 19:53 – When you buy cryptocurrencies, you are already in a crypto economy where you need to do your due diligence 20:33 – Ethereum is one of the currencies that you need to run apps 21:21 – A token is like a packet (in relation to IP protocols) 21:54 – Blockchain is the protocol layer upon which tokens are transferred around 23:33 – Tokens are also called cryptocurrencies 23:15 – A miner is someone who runs an algorithm on his own piece of hardware that checks for activity within a blockchain 24:48 – The ways that you can contribute data varies 25:51 – It’s the first time in history that you can have liquid venture capital in the industry 25:58 – There’s an extreme demand, but with a limited supply 26:44 – Tom believes that now is a good time to participate in cryptocurrencies 27:31 – Tom shares to Nathan the questions that Nathan can ask a guest who is into investing in cryptocurrencies: 27:40 – What are tokens? How do you make a venture capital investment? 28:06 – Do you have a personal relationship with MetaStable and Polychain? 29:35 – What is the history of cryptocurrencies? 30:12 – Another question can be their strategy of trading 31:00 – Why people should use Walter: 31:05 – All of us in the space need to support a good project and invest in the right projects so we can all have a good return 31:21 – Walter is building a global community of contributors who are researching the space and gathering information in exchange for incentives 31:42 – “Get involved and join the conversation” 33:18 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Bitcoin may not be as trusted as gold, but it will be in the future. Building a crypto business isn’t easy, but the demand is here. Study and research an industry before jumping in, and know the RIGHT questions to ask. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/18/2017 • 36 minutes, 20 seconds
754: They've Passed $15M in Revenue Using Breakfast Meetups for Growth
Louis Jonckheere. He’s one of the co-founders of Showpad which is the second company that he’s founded. He and his co-founders founded the mobile development agency, In The Pocket, in 2010 where he still is on the board. Prior to In The Pocket, he was a strategic project manager at NetLog where he first met one of his co-founders. He also holds a masters degree in law and business and he’s currently the Chief Product Officer at Showpad. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Apps How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That you should’ve sold your first company sooner” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:21 – Nathan introduces Louis to the show 02:05 – Louis is the one responsible for product design and engineering, and he’s also in charge of the product marketing team 02:36 – Louis collaborates with their sales team 02:50 – Louis asks their sales team about the improvements they could make to the product depending on customer feedback 03:13 – Showpad is a sales enablement platform 03:22 – Showpad creates a content management system for their clients 03:47 – The marketing team uses Showpad to reach salespeople 04:14 – The salespeople are in the same company 04:27 – 90% of what marketing creates never gets used 04:47 – Showpad is used internally in businesses 05:36 – Showpad is a SaaS business 05:51 – Average contract value is $50-60K per land deal 06:46 – A customer that signed-up can grow up to an average of 140% in 12 months 07:04 – The upsell happens gradually 07:43 – Showpad uses Stripe for credit card payments 07:58 – Showpad also uses Salesforce, NetSuite and HubSpot 08:12 – Showpad currently has 997 customers 08:30 – ARR is a bit over $20M 08:35 – Showpad has a big group of SMB customers 09:05 – Showpad only has annual contracts so they’re not focused on MRR 09:15 – ARR goal this year is around $25-28M 09:48 – Team size is 220 with 30 sales people 10:00 – Showpad was launched in 2012 10:11 – Showpad was bootstrapped for 2 years 10:35 – The “bootstrapping mentality doesn’t get you to scale” 10:45 – Paid advertising spend was around $60-70K in a month 10:58 – Consists mostly of AdWords and LinkedIn ads with some Facebook ads 11:25 – Total money raised is $61M and the last round was a series C 12:15 – Showpad has been very lucky with their investors 12:58 – Showpad will be Louis’ first financial win 13:07 – In The Pocket is a profitable mobile agency 13:51 – Gross annual churn in 2016 was 6% 14:15 – As a platform matures, churn risk increases 14:42 – Net churn is around 30-35% in revenue 15:03 – Showpad has lost around 1-2 customers since they started 15:33 – CAC for the key cohort 15:42 – The golden rule for SaaS is for every dollar spent, you should get a quarter in return within 12 months 16:00 – Showpad currently has a 12-month payback 17:02 – LTV is around 5 years 17:28 – LTV in dollars is around $250K over 5 years 17:52 – Showpad is always aggressive with their targets 18:50 – Showpad has been adding dynamic mind maps to their product 19:33 – Most enterprise customers have been spending money on agencies to build a custom navigation presentation 19:48 – This is already a part of what Showpad offers 20:14 – The best marketing strategy for Showpad is events sponsorships 20:40 – Showpad has rented party buses for their customers in Europe 21:12 – Gross margin is 85% 21:25 – Revenue target by the end of 2017 is $28M to 30M 22:30 – 2016 revenue was $16.5M 24:21 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Marketing teams should coordinate with sales teams to find how they can make that successful deal. Don’t discount a marketing strategy that may seem unconventional; it could be the very strategy that works. Reach for the best—set an aggressive target for your company. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/17/2017 • 26 minutes, 42 seconds
753: With His Tool, Mobile Browsing on Spotty Wifi Doesn't Suck
Shlomi Gian. He has served as PacketZoom’s Chief Executive Officer since June of 2016. He joined the company after spending 4 years at Akamai, where he founded the emerging mobile business unit and service—the head of mobile market development. Before that, he was the general manager of mobile solutions at Cotendo that invented Mobile CDN back in 2011 before it was acquired by Akamai. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Built to Last What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Mix Rank How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Shlomi would tell himself how exciting it is to do your own thing Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Shlomi to the show 02:13 – PacketZoom helps mobile applications work better, especially when networks fail to deliver their service 03:15 – PacketZoom can make an application work in places where they don’t usually work, like in trains and elevators 03:31 – PacketZoom eliminates roadblocks and gets you on the express lane 03:40 – PacketZoom is a SaaS business 03:43 – PacketZoom charges per daily active user 04:10 – A daily active user is anyone who uses the system up to certain usage point 04:18 – Now, a daily active user is measured by the number of calls and how many megabytes have been used 04:40 – Average customer pay is $400-4K per application 05:28 – PacketZoom has raised capital through an investor round 05:35 – Total raised is around $6M 05:54 – The founder of the company started the company in 2013 06:33 – After Akamai’s acquisition of Cotendo, Shlomi was looking for a cutting-edge technology to bring into Akamai 06:43 – PacketZoom seemed to be the one that fits but doesn’t have enough commercial traction 06:51 – At the time, the investors were looking for a CEO who had a business background and could grow PacketZoom in the market 07:03 – Shlomi met the investors through a headhunter 07:18 – Shlomi fell in love with the product and he decided to leave his comfort zone at Akamai 08:06 – PacketZoom started out selling to enterprise and now they’re focusing on developers 08:26 – The headhunter was tied to the investors 08:54 – MRR was closed to none before Shlomi joined 09:20 – PacketZoom has a difficult product to built 09:34 – PacketZoom currently has 68 customers 09:59 – PacketZoom is tracking a few KPIs and the number of SDK installed 10:30 – The goal is to hit 15-20M active users by the end of the year 10:40 – PacketZoom is on track and halfway to their goal 10:57 – “We’re doubling our activity since I joined” 11:11 – PacketZoom relies heavily on partnerships 11:27 – PacketZoom is partnered with ChinaCache, a large CDN public company selling exclusively in China 11:38 – PacketZoom also has resellers and they already have 3 European resellers 11:50 – PacketZoom is expanding to Asia and Latin America 12:12 – PacketZoom is the perfect partner for their resellers because the resellers are already selling performance 12:30 – The percentage PacketZoom gets depends on the partnership’s commitment 12:45 – The partners take away the cost of operation and sales in their territories 13:00 – PacketZoom aims to work with larger partners who are willing to make greater commitments 13:17 – 2017 revenue goal is millions of dollars; they want to prepare for a series B eventually 13:46 – PacketZoom is close to passing the $88K MRR which can equate to a little over $1M in ARR 14:55 – PacketZoom just opened their office in Asia and are opening one soon in Europe 15:17 – PacketZoom has 3 sales people 15:24 – Company size is 20 15:54 – Paid marketing spend is less than $10K 16:48 – Zero customer churn for PacketZoom 18:29 – PacketZoom is a very unique product 19:21 – Assumed LTV 20:21 – The team is spread out in different states and countries 20:40 – Gross margin 20:58 – PacketZoom relies on other cloud infrastructures 21:19 – Gross margin now is 60-80% but will definitely change soon 23:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You may find the right company at the wrong time, but in order to make it work takes you making a decision. A company can definitely raise money on pre-revenue if the investors see its uniqueness and potential to grow. Start to build as early as possible. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
752: They Think Retailers Want Their Own Version of Amazon
Adrien Nussenbaum. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Mirakl which was founded back in 2012. He’s currently based at the company’s Boston office and is responsible for the business’ growth in both the business to consumer and business to business sectors. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hemingway What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Instacart How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would have helped my wife use Instacart” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:50 – Nathan introduces Adrien to the show 01:20 – Mirakl is a technology company that allows retailers, distributors and manufacturers relaunch and operate an online marketplace of third–party vendors 01:45 – Mirakl is similar to Amazon 02:10 – Mirakl is a technology solution and most of their customers are large enterprise companies 02:39 – Mirakl doesn’t compete with Amazon but allows their customers to have their own marketplace 03:05 – Mirakl’s technology would allow Best Buy to have different merchants on their website 03:20 – From the consumer’s perspective, they can purchase different products from different merchants within one website 03:28 – Mirakl currently has 125 customers in 25 countries 03:41 – Mirakl is a SaaS business 03:58 – Mirakl takes a small percentage of their clients’ generated revenue 04:24 – Mirakl provides companies a technology that leverages 12 years of experience in operating 05:13 – Mirakl’s cut depends on the revenue bracket they’ve set 05:49 – Mirakl’s charges vary per industry 06:15 – Mirakl’s customers charge retailers a certain percentage and Mirakl charges depending on those percentages 06:52 – Generally speaking, the charge is more than 5% 07:20 – Mirakl allows companies to operate a new business 08:15 – The additional earnings a company can get will be from the partnerships they have with other retailers using the Mirakl’s platform 09:19 – Mirakl was launched in 2012 09:26 – Mirakl was initially bootstrapped using the money from the previous company acquisition 09:36 – Splitgames was acquired by FNAC in Europe 10:04 – Mirakl raised $2M in the first round and $20M in 2015 10:23 – Both were equity rounds 10:30 – Adrien was the founder of Splitgames and it was initially bootstrapped, but raised later on 11:30 – Adrien is French and he thinks that they are more conservative when it comes to risk than Americans 11:48 – Adrien’s risk level when he started Mirakl was fair 11:56 – Mirakl has 2 founders 12:06 – The split was 50/50 but there’s a bit more for the one who had the idea 13:02 – Adrien’s had a background in banking prior to Splitgames 13:28 – Team size is 160 13:36 – 40% engineering and 25-30% sales 14:05 – Mirakl spends money on programs and lead generation 14:44 – Mirakl makes industry reports with people like Gardner 15:05 – Last month’s total paid ads spend was around $30-40K 15:58 – Mirakl sells something that is strategic for their customers 16:42 – Payback period is less than a year 18:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Creating relationships will not only nurture your network, but increase your opportunities for revenue as well. One can be considered radical or conservative when it comes to taking risks; choose to which degree of risk you’re most comfortable taking. In pitching to clients, you have to give them the assurance that your product is valuable to them and that they will NOT be needing any other product. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/15/2017 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
751: IoT Electricity Measuring King Raises $16m w/ $1.2 Million Revenue
Mark Chung. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Verdigris, a Silicon Valley-based internet of things startup focused on smart buildings. Previously, he was a principal engineer for Net Logic, AMD and PA Semi. He graduated with electrical engineering from Stanford University and lives in Sunnyvale, California. When he’s not building, he’s spending time with his family. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How the Mighty Fall What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Pivotal How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Mark wished that he’d be more growth minded and started earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Mark to the show 02:04 – Verdigris is an artificial intelligence company launched in 2012 02:10 – Verdigris focuses on developing technology for commercial buildings that are managing their energy 02:22 – One of Verdigris largest customers is Jabil, a large manufacturing firm 02:28 – Verdigris sensors on Jabil’s electric panels collects data from the whole facility 02:40 – Verdigris synthesizes the data into simpler and more understandable reports that facilities’ managers can review 02:49 – Then they can understand if they’re losing money on electricity or potential equipment fail 03:21 – Verdigris is a combination of software and hardware 04:05 – Verdigris has a hybrid model 04:11 – Verdigris charged on the hardware when it gets installed and a recurring fee for the software 04:21 – The hardware is the bigger revenue stream 04:47 – For a 2-bedroom house, it will cost $1K to install Verdigris 05:23 – Each clamp is $50 a piece 05:54 – Verdigris has raised a total of $16M 06:05 – The first round of funding was in 2012 and Verdigris was launched at the end of 2011 07:11 – Because Verdigris has a hardware component that enables the SaaS, it becomes a sticky product 07:29 – Churn rate is lower than typical SaaS companies and retention rate is higher 07:46 – From a cost standpoint, hardware cost doesn’t take all of equity capital 07:53 – You can also finance the hardware 08:34 – Verdigris measures the total amount of electricity measured 08:54 – Currently, they’ve measured a few megawatts—enough to power a small neighborhood 10:00 – For the SaaS side, monthly subscription fee is $50 or $80 per box depending on the level of service 10:40 – Verdigris gets their sales directly and holds their data infrastructure 10:47 – Verdigris uses Verizon as their back end for all data communication 11:30 – Verdigris is focusing on the commercial space first 12:10 – Customers pay per month is between $50-80 on data plans 12:28 - $1k a month is near average of what customers pay 12:44 – 80% of Verdigris’s customers are paying customers 12:56 – Average MRR is around $260K 13:19 – Gross customer churn is zero 14:40 – Verdigris looks for customers who spend around $10K a month in electricity 14:56 – Team size is 30 15:05 – 90% is engineering 15:15 – There are 3 founders 15:23 – The founders are all engineers, one being more business minded than the other two 16:02 – CAC 16:07 – Verdigris doesn’t do a lot of paid marketing 16:43 – Verdigris has spent around $10K in 3 months for ads 16:49 – Most people learn about Verdigris through Verizon 17:00 – Verizon’s sales people in the field talk to their Fortune 500 customers selling different IT solutions 17:19 – When the customer matches Verdigris’ customer profile, the sales team tell them about Verdigris 17:50 – Verizon found Verdigris 18:26 – 2017 revenue goal is over $5M which is 4x from last year’s 20:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With so many SaaS products available, having a SaaS product that uses proprietary hardware creates a sticky, hard to replace product. Your target market should be curated with your pricing plans. Building a partnership with an already established company is beneficial, especially if you’re a new one. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/14/2017 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
750: How to 3x Customer Revenue, Be More Than Just Document Signing
Mikita Mikado. He’s the CEO of PandaDoc, a company founded to accelerate the way organizations transact. He’s an entrepreneur, engineer, and executive focused on creating self-sustaining companies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Pitch Anything What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Mikita would tell himself that he doesn’t have to focus on making so much money and just focus on learning as much as he can Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:24 – Nathan introduces Mikita to the show 02:03 – Jared Fuller was in episode 193 of The Top and is still part of PandaDoc 02:25 – PandaDoc helps organizations the way they transact 02:39 – all kinds of transactions 02:52 – PandaDoc focuses on deals that have substantial value and paperwork 03:06 – PandaDoc can build proposals, quotes, contracts and close deals in a digital fashion 03:30 – PandaDoc’s RPU has increased since last year 03:56 – Annual deals 04:10 – Average customer pay 05:10 – PandaDoc gets most of their customers from word of mouth 05:32 – Using SEO to expand operations 06:15 – PandaDoc gives their small customers templates that they can use in their deals 06:58 – The marketing team finds keywords that are most popular and relevant to them 07:20 – They use Moz and other tools to find keyword 07:59 – PandaDoc isn’t built on top of PDF 08:03 – The templates from PandaDoc are in HTML and not PDF 08:41 – QuoteRoller was the first product that was launched in 2011 08:56 – Pivot to PandaDoc at the end of 2015 09:06 – Team size is now 106 09:23 – The last year total raised was $4.5M in cash and $2M in debt 09:41 – Currently, debt has been paid 09:50 – Total amount raised is $19.5M 10:17 – PandaDoc has more than 7K customers 10:30 – 2 different cohorts of customers 10:55 – PandaDoc has a legacy product and a new product 11:22 – Gross churn is satisfactory 11:50 – From last year’s revenue churn, it was 9% 13:21 – Some inbound marketers use PandaDoc to close a deal then will stop using it 13:50 – 5% monthly logo churn is high for Mikita 14:38 – PandaDoc has around 100 team members and 2 are focused on target customers 15:13 – CAC and LTV varies 16:00 – Mikita is trying to get under 12 months of payback period 16:29 – Fully weighted CAC can be $1200 16:48 – How Mikita assumes CAC 18:47 – The industry’s rule of thumb for payback period is 1.13 of ACV or 14 month payback period 19:05 – PandaDoc has channels with a payback period of 6 months and 2 years 19:29 – PandaDoc has an outbound sales team that is their delta force 19:54 – The outbound sales team finds the industries that PandaDoc should target 21:05 – Paid spend total is under quarter of a million 21:19 – PandaDoc is closed to hit a million in MRR 22:08 – “We want to make an impact” 22:22 – This is a horizontal product 23:47 – PandaDoc focuses on workflow and the actual collaboration on the workflow 23:58 – “We want to system of records for deals or transaction” 24:05 – PandaDoc isn’t going to the CRM space 24:18 – Mikita has been in the CRM space before 24:43 – One of the challenges of CRM now is the emergence of AI 27:12 – Mikita’s consideration on price of acquisition 30:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create a product that can serve a different market and fill the gap that the others haven’t seen. Let your goals guide you, but also keep in mind that having a business means being responsible for your employees. Multiple revenue cohorts will lead you to multiple marketing and sales strategies. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/13/2017 • 34 minutes, 57 seconds
749: He's Making $9.6m Off Those Horrible Airport WiFi Connections
Gavin Wheeldon. With over 15 years of experience working in technology led or enabled businesses, Gavin has a deep understanding of the impact of technology on the bottom line of an organization. He sold his last business, Applied Language Solutions, a global language technology and service business, and has used some of the earnings to set up a new company, Purple WiFi. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Who Moved My Cheese What CEO do you follow? – Jack Welch Favorite online tool? — InsightSquared How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I’d rather read more of finance” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:24 – Nathan introduces Gavin to the show 02:29 – Gavin travels a lot and is frequently reliant on public WiFi—that’s where the idea for Purple WiFi came from 03:02 – Gavin sold his last company for over $60M 03:20 – His last company was in the translation and interpretation industry 03:23 – They used machine learning to translate languages with incredible accuracy 03:43 – Theirs is also a human editing in between so the translation is perfect 03:59 – Gavin was 36 when he sold it 04:02 – It was completely bootstrapped 04:44 – There’s no particular single owner of the space 04:54 – Fon does domestic hotspot and other traditional utility wifi 05:38 – Purple Wifi is the next generation of wifi 06:03 - Purple WiFi is SaaS business, charging annually depending on the number of wifi points 06:14 – For a single venue, the price is $13 a month 06:22 – Purple WiFi also caters to stadiums and airports 06:45 – An airport can average a hundred access points 07:10 - Purple WiFi currently has 17K installations 07:15 – It ranges from restaurants up to a whole city 07:53 – They now have around 80K access points 08:03 – Average MRR is close to a million 08:25 – Purple WiFi offers discount for bigger venues 09:00 – Sales cycle varies every hour 09:19 – A physical venue owner is usually clueless about what is happening in the venue 09:50 - Purple WiFi is channel-based and sells through partners 09:55 – Some of the partners are Telstra and Singtel and other national carriers 10:23 – Team size is over 100 10:30 – 45 are focused on sales and partnerships 10:46 – Telcos are usually built with partners 11:09 – They can build their own access points but it takes years and a huge investment 11:40 – Purple WiFi partners with half of the service providers in the USA 12:37 – Purple WiFi partners with Cisco and Ruckus for the access points 13:06 - Purple WiFi does post visit reviews which prompt the user to review the coffee shop or hotel 13:19 – There was around 500 increase in TripAdvisor reviews 13:21 – 600-700% increase in CRM generation 13:28 – The value of Purple Wifi can be seen from day 1 13:43 - Purple WiFi was launched in 2013 13:48 – First year revenue was $200K 13:59 – 2014 revenue was around $600K 14:13 - Purple WiFi consistently grows over 100% year over year 14:34 – 2017 target revenue 14:48 – Gross margin is 80% 14:59 – One of the challenges is the location and the huge number of data 15:35 - Purple WiFi is processing around 500K data from all of their access points in a day 15:50 – Purple WiFi has net negative churn and gross customer churn is 12% yearly 17:00 – LTV is around 10 years 17:10 – Most enterprise customers are signing 3-5 years with an upfront payment 17:33 - Purple WiFi has raised $13M 17:51 – The costs usually go to engineering and sales 18:07 - Purple WiFi spends on event sponsorship too 18:24 – They track the events prior to sponsorship 18:50 – Payback period is around 12 months 19:25 – Average CAC 19:39 - Purple WiFi is headquartered in Manchester, UK and US office is in Austin, Texas 20:26 - Purple WiFi is tremendously valuable for conferences 23:04 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Public wifi solutions are becoming more and more of a necessity especially for establishments and events. Having your own wifi solution allows you to gather data more than you could otherwise. Study your business before starting your business. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/12/2017 • 26 minutes, 26 seconds
748: How to Use Open Source Project As Lead Gen from $3m+ ARR Founder
Tomer Levy. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Logz.io. Before co-founding Logz, he co-founded and was the CTO of Intigua, a company that innovated locker-like containers designed for large enterprises. Prior to Intigua, Tomer spent 6 years at Check Point, where he led its intrusion prevention system product from concept to market. He has an MBA for Tel Avi University, a BA in Computer Science, and is an enthusiastic kite surfer. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Grammarly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take it easy, you’ll figure it out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Tomer to the show 02:06 – Logz is a logins company 02:12 – Some of their customers are Kantar Media and British Airways 02:30 – Logz solves systematic problems in web servers and databases 02:41 – Logz is a SaaS business 02:52 – Logz caters to IT operations and security team of a company 03:24 – You can subscribe to Logz’ website directly and pay monthly 03:29 – Logz has 2 main cohorts 03:32 – SMBs would pay around $10-15K a year 03:41 – SMEs would usually pay annually that can grow to hundreds of thousands 03:58 – Average pay is $10K-40K in annual contract value 04:10 – Logz was launched in 2014 and the product end of 2015 04:30 – Logz has an inside sales team 04:38 – Logz offers an open source platform like ELK which is around $500K a month 04:58 – Instead of libraries, ELK will be installed in the servers and take all the data 05:12 – ELK visualizes the data and Logz offer ELK with more capabilities 05:27 – Logz is based on the open-source community 05:55 – Logz isn’t the developer of the open source 06:05 – Logz built a solution on top of the open source for log management 06:30 – ELK is like google search for all of your log data 07:02 – There are also other companies who are doing open SaaS 07:10 – Pantheon for WordPress and similar with Cloudera are doing open SaaS too 07:38 – Github just recently offered Git open source as a service 08:03 – Tomer has been writing content even before the launch of the company 08:14 – Logz is number for ELK search and they contribute the most in the open source community 08:43 – Open source has to be good and easy enough to get started so it will have mass distribution 08:51 – But it has to get to a point that it is difficult to scale and make it production grade 09:04 – Logz currently has a thousand companies on board 09:17 – Some are paid customers and some are on free 09:35 – Logz has raised money but they could have built a lifestyle business 09:52 – Logz raised $24M and the last round was $15.6M in October 2016 10:07 – Team size is 70 10:54 – Logz started in October 2014 and ran their first product by February 2015 11:05 – Logz started with 5 non-paying customers after shifting to paid model 11:38 – As your company grow, people will realizes your company’s value and be willing to pay for it 11:49 – Logz has 0 revenue in 2014 and 2015 revenue was around 6 figures 12:44 – Logz has already broken a million dollar runway 13:02 – Logz competes mostly with engineers setting up their own open source 13:10 – The commercial side, Logz competes with AWS or Amazon Web Services 13:45 – Gross margin 14:12 – Logz pays $1-5M to Amazon for hosting 15:20 – Minimum MRR 15:46 – Team is based in Telavi, Israel 15:59 – Logz also has a team in Boston where Tomer currently is 16:11 – Gross monthly customer churn 17:07 – “We’re very much a land and expand business” 17:43 – Marketing team has 8 or 9 people and 7 sales people 18:10 – Fully weighted CAC 18:40 – Payback period 19:22 – Logz also invest in paid marketing with around $5k a month 19:50 – Logz invests massively in events this year 20:23 – Logz spends a few hundreds of dollars in sponsorships 22:17 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When thinking about a business model, try and create on that is “land and expand”. Starting as a free service is fine, but you need to make sure you’re built to offer your customers more value behind the paywall. Great content coupled with great keywords builds great companies. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/11/2017 • 24 minutes, 25 seconds
747: This This Six Figure Poker Player Quit to Launch Agency
Derric Haynie. He’s the CEO of Vulpine Interactive, a social media marketing agency that helps build contagious brand and passionate fans. Nathan met Derris at Los Angeles when they were at Sean Ellis’ Growth Hacking event. Derris has an interesting story that goes from poker to social media to speaking, blogging, growth and digital marketing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – They Ask You Answer What CEO do you follow? – Neil Patel Favorite online tool? — Queue How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8-9 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished that I have been able to pursue business earlier and give up poker earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:51 – Derric believes that his agency will grow and exist on its own 02:02 – The peak of poker for Derric was in 2009-10 when he was 24 02:21 – Derric was making mid 6 figures and working 3 hours a day doing poker 03:00 – Derric had a lot of great mentors in poker 03:19 – Those that are better than Derric are really geniuses 03:27 – Derris started to feel his personal boundaries 03:57 – Derric knows that he’ll never be the grand master in poker 04:02 – The best player in poker takes all the money 04:55 – Derric didn’t pay himself for the first year and a half of his agency 05:03 – It was in 2014 05:22 – Derric got funding in 2015 of a total of $150k from his poker friends 06:06 – Derric was telling himself that he’s not focused on revenue but on learning and finding the opportunities 06:34 – Derric spent around $25K attending conferences and events 07:19 – Derris’ wife is his co-founder and they started paying themselves just last year 07:28 – They now make $5000 a month 07:51 – Derric and his wife are trying to structure a company for growth and scalability 08:10 – Vulpine now has 2 part-time employees 08:50 – Raising a child cost Derric around $3000 a month 09:06 – Derric had a lavish life that he gave up 09:31 – Derric has sold a lot of things 10:28 – Team size is 4 10:37 – Typical customers for Vulpine are ecommerce and SaaS businesses 10:48 –They also have to be thought leaders with a willingness to create great content 11:00 – Vulpine is good at repurposing great content and content should be originally from the company 11:21 – 2016 revenue is around $70-80K 11:41 – Check agency/transparency to see their financial score sheet 11:57 – Target MRR is $100K by December 2017 12:07 – If they don’t hit $50K MRR by December, they will stop the company 12:32 – Average contract size is $2K a month with 3 months minimum 13:56 – Derric has been advised too that the contract should be at least for a year 14:21 – Derric was thinking of the best value that he can provide for his client when he decided on the 3-month minimum 14:36 – Derric believes that if he can’t consistently deliver month over month, he should be fired 15:12 – Derric currently has 14 customers with some pro bono 17:27 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Poker may bring more money than your business, but sometimes it’s not about money. At a certain point in your life, you have to give up things that you’re used to and learn something new. In business (especially pricing) always have a market study and comparison first, or ask for advice. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/10/2017 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
746: Bill Gates Was Great to Work With, But This Founder Wanted His Own Thing
Hal Howard, 20-year Microsoft veteran who gave up a stable, secure position leading the Dynamics ERP development team to satiate a spark of creativity. Today, he’s the founder of Komiko, a sales intelligence tool that helps their businesses understand what engagement with customers is working. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Execution What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella Favorite online tool? — Vinfolio How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t worry man. Everything’s going to work out just fine” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:45 – Komiko is a sales intelligence tool that helps their businesses understand what engagement with customers is working 02:12 – Komiko is integrated with different sources 02:20 – A cloud-based subscription-based model 02:37 – Hal was at Microsoft for 20 years 02:59 – left Microsoft because he wanted to build something new 03:16 – “There are still unexplored technologies around business applications” 03:54 – Customer pays an average of $30-35 a month per user 04:00 – Team size ranges from 3 to 500 04:11 – There are currently 2000 paying seats across 50 businesses in total 04:33 – Average MRR is $60K 05:19 – Team size is 10 05:37 – 8 are engineers 05:48 – Hal and his co-founder are doing both sales and product engineering 06:00 – Hal is more on the design 06:30 – Komiko is now a complimentary CRM 06:38 – Partnered with Salesforce and most of their customers are using Salesforce 07:19 – CRM is in a different decision set compared to Komiko 07:40 – Komiko works with corporate clients to help them understand what engagement works and what doesn’t 07:59 – “We don’t lose customers” 08:05 – In Komiko’s lifetime, they’ve only lost 4 customers so far, 1 was acquired 08:28 – CAC is mostly inbound and Komiko was listed in AppExchange 08:44 – Hal and his co-founder alone were able to drive a lot of customers, mostly from referrals and the businesses they’ve worked with before 08:51 – Just started an outbound campaign in early 2017 08:59 – Has a partnership with GameSite 09:20 – GameSite’s focus is how customers engage with the product 09:35 – GameSite is building a platform for customer success and Komiko’s metric will help the overall customer solution 09:48 – Komiko raised some capital 10:03 – Total fund raised is around $2M 10:23 – Initial round was convertible note and then the seed round is priced round 10:37 – 2017 revenue target is at least a million dollars 11:04 – 2016 revenue is $15K 11:23 – Gross margin is around 75% 12:09 – Hal won’t easily sell Komiko, but he might consider for at least $25M 14:43 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Nurture the network that you have, it will always help you in some way down the road. You have the option leave your comfort zone, you can explore and create something new. It’s possible to not lose customer IF you consistently help the customers see value in your product. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/9/2017 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
745: At $1.5m Revenue, Is This The New PowerPoint?
Jose Cayasso. He’s a growth hacker, co-founder and CEO of Slidebean, 500 Startups alumni, and a frequent flyer miles hoarder. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup and Traction What CEO do you follow? – Josh Pigford Favorite online tool? — Amy@X.ai How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jose would tell himself that he had to quit his day job and create something for himself earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Slidebean has an office in New York City and Costa Rica 01:56 – Slidebean is a web-based tool for making presentations 02:00 – Slidebean focuses on making presentation more efficient 02:20 – Slidebean is a subscription service 02:26 – Most of Slidebean’s customers are previous PowerPoint users 02:38 – Team plans start at $49 a month 02:52 – A single presentation service is also available 03:00 – Most of the revenue are from the recurring model 03:14 – Jose started Slidebean in 2014 03:25 – Originally, it was focused on end users 03:40 – Slidebean shifted to businesses that are doing presentations monthly 03:58 – Churn went down from 15% to negative churn in revenue 04:15 – Gross customer churn is currently at 3.5% 04:42 – Jose tried different measures for Slidebean to improve the churn rate 05:09 – They changed the business model while keeping the subscription and premium value 05:28 – Slidebean caters to 2500 paying customers 05:45 – Average MRR is around $120K 06:06 – Jose is originally from Costa Rica and he’s not a fan of outsourcing 06:14 – “I still believe that office collaboration is the best” 06:38 – There’s a lot of talent in Costa Rica 08:07 – Team size is 22 08:17 – Slidebean has raised a small seed round 08:22 – “We’re in the break of profitability” 08:25 – Slidebean is burning around $25K a month 08:43 – Slidebean has raised a total of $850K on a seed round 09:08 – CAC is around $150 09:15 – It’s quite low because Slidebean competes in SEO 09:22 – Prezi is one of Slidebean’s competition 09:35 – Slidebean targets keywords through AdWords 09:56 – LTV is around $1000 or 18 months 10:39 – Total marketing cost is around $25K-35K including head count cost 11:17 – Gross margin is around 75-80% 11:53 – 2017 target revenue is $2M 12:03 – They don’t need to raise more money at the moment 13:00 – 2016 ARR is around $750K 15:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A shift in business model can allow your company to grow while still retaining its value and growth. Find the right keywords for your business and use AdWords to target them, it can help lower your CAC. The earlier you create something for yourself in life, the better. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/8/2017 • 17 minutes, 16 seconds
744: Companies Pay Her $10-100k to Text Customers Funny Messages
Jessica Lee. Nathan met Jessica a few months ago and Jessica toured Nathan in 500 Startups’ office in San Francisco. She’s the founder of Bitesize. She helps companies drive revenue with text message conversations. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – #GIRLBOSS What CEO do you follow? – Sophia Amoruso Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Everybody has the same kind of challenges and overcoming them is the REAL WORK Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – HandStack and Bitesize are the same company 01:49 – Bitesize helps brands drive revenue through interactive text messaging 02:00 – A new movie studio has a new movie and wants to reach a million movie goers 02:10 – Bitesize will reach people by text message 02:20 – The messages will be from a movie character and the approach is interactive 02:42 – Bitesize will drive the person to a download link at the end of the conversation 03:01 – Building a list for text is the challenge for Bitesize 03:25 – Bitesize uses manual texting tool 03:40 – There’s a law that’s protecting consumers where you can’t randomly message people with algorithms or without human intervention 03:56 – Bitesize helps client send text with manual human intervention 04:27 – Jessica shares how an actual message happens 04:30 – The company will create a group chat, add people, and click send manually 04:39 – People’s reply will go to your app and you can continue to interact with them 05:08 – The difference with the usual group text and from Bitesize is, you don’t get to see other people’s messages 05:34 – Bitesize charges per text and data 05:42 – Per text charge is .25₵ 06:11 – Most of Bitesize’s costs is from data 06:16 – Twilio is at .02₵ 06:45 – Data charges can go up to .16₵ 06:58 – BiteSize’s clients pay them for their marketing skills too 07:15 – For a thousand new messages, an average of 6% will reply which a lot higher than social media ads 07:45 – A lot of Bitesize’s customers will send millions of texts 08:13 – Revenue is measured by campaigns: 140 for the last 6 months 08:41 – Bitesize has raised $125K from 500 Startups 08:56 – Team size is 6 09:03 – 3 in the bay area and 3 elsewhere 09:26 – Average MRR 09:58 – 50% of the campaigns are paying quarterly and some campaigns are daily 10:20 – Each campaign pays an average of $10K to $100K for the .25₵ per text messages 10:43 – 10% of Bitesize’s customers are from referrals 10:50 – Initially, Bitesize was focused on outbound sales 11:08 – “Because our product was so unique, people like to know what it is” 11:38 – Bitesize originally started with political campaigns 11:49 – Because of Jessica’s background, most campaigns are for the democrats 12:29 – Jessica believes that Bitesize is a tool that is meant to connect people in a more meaningful way than ads 13:05 – 2013 revenue is around $250 13:17 – 2016 revenue is $300K for 6 months 13:30 – They pivoted to a more commercial use case in the final 6 months 13:40 – 2017 target 13:59 – “My hope is to grow organically” 16:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Texts can be very spammy but if done right, the return is better than with online ads. Messages should connect people in a more meaningful way. Growing organically is cheaper, and it creates more resonance, but it’s harder to do. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/7/2017 • 18 minutes, 22 seconds
743: Will 28yo Privacy.com Founder Replace Credit Cards?
Bo Jiang. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Privacy.com, a new way to transact online without showing your credit card number or pin. He previously worked on mobile products with Hatch Labs, which is the venture studio that incubated Tinder and Pixie TV, which was acquired by Samsung. He holds a BS in Mathematics in MIT. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management and Who What CEO do you follow? – Charlie Munger Favorite online tool? — Zoom How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Pay attention and see things through” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Bo has always been interested with Bitcoin and Krypto frequency where the idea of Privacy came from 01:56 – Privacy was a side project in Bitcoin 02:00 – Bo didn’t pay anything for Privacy 02:10 – Bo retained the domain as an investment for the company 02:51 – Bo shares how he made the deal of using the domain for free 03:10 – Domains are assets but the value won’t grow that much 03:28 – Bo gave the domain owner less than 10% of the company 03;40 – Privacy has a browser extension and mobile app 03:44 – It allows you to create unique card number for every purchase you make online with just one click 04:00 – You can use any name or details and set your own credit limit 04:20 – It’s actually a debit card which can be linked to your checking account 04:30 – Currently, there’s nothing that is completely unhackable 04:42 – Privacy takes the best practices and security measures to ensure the client’s security 05:25 – The cards from Privacy can’t be use anywhere else 05:38 – Privacy makes money from interchange 05:43 – Every time that there’s a transaction using a card, the merchant pays Visa, Visa shares the fee with the bank, and the bank shares the fee with Privacy 05:56 – If Nathan uses $100 on an Amazon checkout, Privacy will get around 1% 06:51 – Privacy has raised $3.5M 06:59 – Transaction volume is how Privacy’s revenue grow 07:10 – Privacy is more focused on how much people have saved from using them 08:06 – Privacy was founded in 2014 and was launched as a beta first, a year ago 08:30 – Privacy currently has 150K users 09:15 – Privacy is growing in double digits, month over month in transaction volume 09:23 – Privacy has already broken a million transactions in just a month 09:50 – Team size is 10 based in New York City with some in Florida and Oregon 10:16 – Bo is still thinking of Privacy having a premium feature 10:31 – Average MRR is around $10K 10:57 – Bo was inside of Hatch Labs 11:20 – Bo thinks that Tinder work because it was the right product at the right time 11:55 – Hatch Labs was a venture studio and had 10-20 projects at a time 12:41 – What IC puts in every project in Hatch Labs depends on the project 13:06 – Bo left Hatch Labs a year and a half ago 15:14 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: While online shopping is becoming more of a necessity, online security can still be questionable so having an alternative to paying with a credit card is something people are looking for. Focus on your company’s mission and the rest will follow. Don’t overestimate or underestimate things – see through them. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/6/2017 • 19 minutes, 32 seconds
742: This Founder Crowns Real Estate Agents "Mayors", Grows From $700k to $6.4M in Under 12 Months
Amanda Newman. When she was 26 and working as a relator in Liberty, Toronto, she created a website for local deals, events, and news. Soon, other realtors were approaching her about the website, and she realized it had the potential spread all across North America. Today, Park Bench, her company, has grown from a fun little marketing idea to help a struggling realtor, into a multi-million-dollar company with 27 employees and a rapid growth rate. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – DotCom Secrets What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — DocuSign How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-9 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To start writing down my goals” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:54 – Amanda was in episode 353 of The Top 02:11 – In 2016, Amanda was doing $80K in MRR 02:16 - $4500 from upfront payment 02:25 – They build neighborhood focused website for real estate agents 03:07 – Amanda had 215 customers in 2016 with $880K revenue in 2015 03:15 – Each customer is paying $350 a month with a total of $70K MRR 03:20 – 5% churn, CAC of $400 and LTV of 20 months 03:26 - $7000 LTV with 8 people in the team 03:31- Founded in 2014 03:38 - Park Bench builds neighborhood websites 03:40 – They have the technology that aggregates local content 03:46 – They sell the exclusive rights to the neighborhood sites which are run by 1 real estate agent per neighborhood 03:53 - Park Bench provides training and guidance on how to use the website and leverage it 04:05 – “They become a conductor of their community” 04:18 - Park Bench currently over 1000 customers 04:46 – They invested a lot on Facebook advertising 05:00 - Park Bench gets 60-100 realtor inquiries who want to be the digital mayor of their neighborhood 05:10 - Park Bench has 3000 sq. ft. office with 30 employees 05:16 – In May, Park Bench hit $628K in revenue which is their biggest month by far 05:38 – It’s the total revenue 05:38 – Last month, Park Bench sold to 150 realtors who have paid upfront of $4500-5000 05:57 – Churn is now 2.75% with 65-70% renewal rate 07:18 - $628K May revenue divided by $5000 to get 126 customers 07:38 – 75 existing customers and 50 new customers 09:00 – CAC is $676 and LTV is around $13K or 3 years 09:51 – Currently, Amanda isn’t sure where to spend their money so they’re investing more on Facebook ads 09:58 – They track the leads they get daily 10:16 – The Facebook algorithm is making it more expensive now to get new customers 10:25 – They invest more on content and wanted to drive more organic traffic 10:40 – They spend $6500 on ads monthly 11:02 – “We’re just growing our business” 11:23 – On personal wealth creation, Amanda only thinks of being happy 11:37 – “I don’t have to raise money, I don’t have to sell the company” 11:40 – Amanda loves her team and enjoys being a part of it 12:15 – Gross margin is over 90% 12:45 – The investment deal should be strategic and can be from, like Keller Williams, for Amanda to accept it 13:00 – Amanda wants to access to more real estate agents 13:41 - Park Bench has country managers who work with clients whenever they need to 13:54 - Park Bench is starting to offer realtors other things they need like in marketing 14:02 - Park Bench knows lead generation too 14:30 – Amanda’s parents sold their company to invest in real estate 14:50 – Amanda is still thinking if she will invest in real estate too 15:04 – “At this point, our best return is to invest in ourselves” 15:27 – Amanda’s dad has a foundation and is currently in Kenya 18:02 – The Famous Five 20:46 – $1.9M 2016 revenue 20:53 – 2017 target revenue is $6.3M and currently on track 3 Key Points: Have a reliable support system that will make your customers be stickier. With Facebook’s ever changing algorithms, it’s better to invest more on creating great content to drive more organic traffic and leads. Write down your goals so you can keep track of them. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/5/2017 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
741: Exited for $15m, Now Tackling Healthcare Patient Doctor Relationships
Todd Johnson, a serial healthcare information technology entrepreneur committed to building great products, teams and companies. Todd has a track record of cultivating great ideas and great business that offer incredible company cultures and attention-grabbing brands. Before his current company, HealthLoop, Todd was the founder and CEO of Salar, a Baltimore, MD-based provider of acute care physician charge capture and documentation solutions. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The E-Myth Revisited What CEO do you follow? – Donald Trump and Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Gmail, Boomerang and Inbox How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Todd wished he could have took things less seriously Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:59 – Everyone needs healthcare at some point in their life 02:30 – Salar was able to replace paper processes at hospitals 03:08 – Salar was sold to the country’s second largest medical transcription company 03:16 – It was a $15M exit 03:40 – Todd lives in Silicon Valley 03:57 – Todd has a couple of reasons why he chose to rent rather than to buy a property 04:37 – HealthLoop was initiated in 2009 and was an idea for over a year 04:51 – Todd joined HealthLoop in 2013 04:49 – The founder is a doctor from San Francisco 05:50 – He’s still part of the board 06:28 – HealthLoop is a platform that automatically pushes notifications before and after a diagnosis or surgery 06:40 – It connects patients and doctors 07:00 – 5 years ago, there’s no model around improving the quality of care 07:38 – Multiple parties benefit from an improvement in health care 08:28 – In order to retain the trust of the patients, you have to gain the doctor’s trust as well 08:46 – HealthLoop has an enterprise subscription model 09:03 – Average contract is $120K to $150K that can escalate year over year 09:21 – They pre-pay the cases that they might have in a year 10:28 – HealthLoop’s customers are very targeted 10:35 – The expansion per area depends on how the incentive shakes out 10:50 – HealthLoop is currently working with 70 groups and 20 hospitals 11:13 – HealthLoop has an older subscription model which some of their existing clients have 11:30 – HealthLoop has raised $21M 11:44 – HealthLoop is in an attractive space for competition 12:20 – They have 90% annual retention 12:43 – The institutional mindset 13:08 – Team size is 40 13:18 – 8 are in the sales team 13:53 – HealthLoop’s current enterprise sales cycle is around 6-7 months on a 120 ACV 14:16 – CAC is quite high 14:55 – There are many competing organizations in the market 15:34 – LTV will depend per organization 16:07 – Todd is seeing a 150% growth from last year in terms of ARR 16:38 – There’s so much unpredictability in the space which can be a bad thing 17:31 – Hospitals need to be thoughtful about spending cash 17:49 – HealthLoop will spend more on adapting to a new management 18:17 – HealthLoop’s gross margin is around 70% 20:33 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s not enough consumer tech that is solely dedicated to healthcare. At least once in our lifetime, we will need healthcare, and the ability to have a quick, back-and-forth communication with your health provider is powerful. Because of the aging baby boomer population, healthcare is an incredibly attractive space for investors right now. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/4/2017 • 24 minutes, 5 seconds
740: He's Helped 20,000 Land a Job, $4m Raised, $200k MRR
Chau Nguyen. He’s the founder and CEO of Hirewire, an on-demand hiring app for hourly workers. In his previous venture, Chau hired over 20K people only to realize his hiring process was broken—and that’s when he got the idea for Hirewire. To date, Chau has raised $4.1M in funding. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “There is no replacement for hard work” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan introduces Chau to the show 01:47 – Chau’s previous venture was Campus Special 01:50 – It’s an online platform for college students 02:00 – They had 4K sales representatives meeting merchants 02:11 – Chau had Campus Special for 8.5 years before selling to a public company a few years back 02:28 – Chau was 25 when he launched Campus Special and he’s 36 now 02:47 – Campus Special was doing $15M in revenue when he sold it for $25M 03:45 – The negotiation was just about what the buyers would pay for it 03:55 – It was bittersweet for Chau to sell Campus Special but still proud of it 04:27 – Chau owned 100% of Campus Special 05:00 – Chau stayed on board with the acquirer for a year 05:30 – Chau thought that he can use his past experience in hiring 06:15 – With Hirewire, Chau saw the need to invest heavily on the product and technology, hence the fund raise 06:29 – Initial raised was $2M and the next round was $2M as well 06:36 – Both rounds are convertible note 06:47 – Hirewire is a marketplace where employers and job seekers can connect 06:52 – It is a mobile app to speed up the process 07:00 – There’s chatting with images and videos 07:06 – Next release will be focused on on-demand hiring 07:25 – Hirewire has a monthly subscription for employers and free for applicants 08:10 – Hirewire has a pay as you go model for small businesses 08:20 – The monthly subscription is usually for big companies like McDonalds 08:40 – Hirewire’s core customer based are the recurring customers 08:48 – Hirewire focuses on the restaurant industry which has the highest turnover 09:08 – Hirewire charges per location per month, starting at $50 to $100 depending on usage 09:53 – Hirewire was first launched in Atlanta and was on beta for year 10:00 – They launched with nothing 10:24 – In one year, Hirewire got 4K employers to sign up, over 100K job seekers with around 1K people hired 10:56 – Hirewire has 2 drivers that allowed them to grow quickly 11:00 – First is hitting a pain point 11:44 – Second is doing the application online 12:14 – Hirewire is in 4K locations with 5K hiring managers 12:30 – Some locations can have at least 2 hiring managers 12:40 – Average MRR is a little over 200K 13:06 – Hirewire has been and is still testing pricing 13:31 – Gross customer churn 13:40 – A restaurant’s churn could be 100-200% like losing an entire team 13:56 – Prior to launch, Chau was really afraid of what will happen but still think that they make the hiring process easier and faster 14:19 – Ultimately, people will stay where they’re happy and making money 14:31 – Hirewire is retaining 95% of the employees which makes the churn 5% 14:50 – Team size is around 15 based in Atlanta 15:07 – Hirewire does paid acquisition 15:17 – 50% of the job seekers are from organic traffic 15:23 – Hirewire also uses social media channels to drive users and has spends $10-25K monthly 15:54 – Freightos has a marketplace model plus SaaS 16:38 – Chau’s goal for Hirewire is to be very sticky with high retention on the employer side 17:19 – Hirewire is not making money on the marketplace aspect and just on the SaaS aspect 19:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can’t stay at where you are forever, change is constant so move on and start anew. Leverage what you’ve learned in the past to create something that can refine the system. Always test your product first. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/3/2017 • 22 minutes, 28 seconds
739: How Has She Has 3x'd Revenue to $700k MRR in Just 11 Months?
Mathilde Collin. She’s the CEO of Front, a SaaS company working on redesigning email for teams. She started with Y Combinator in the summer of 2014, and today has 20 employees and 1700 customers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Patrick Collison Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 and a half If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “People that are struggling should be super motivated because that’s what everyone go through” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan introduces Mathilde to the show 01:33 – Mathilde was in Episode 413 of The Top 01:43 – Back then, they had 1200 customers, $13M raised, around a million in revenue in 2015 01:53 – An average customer pays 200 a month leading to an MRR of $240K 01:58 – Gross churn was 3% 02:10 – Front now has 40 team members 02:13 – “We tripled our revenue” 02:15 – The number of customers didn’t triple because they had bigger companies using Front 02:43 – Current MRR is around $750K 03:02 – Front still has 80% of what they’ve raised last year 03:13 – Total capital raised was $14M 03:45 – Front is burning $250K a month 03:50 – Mostly from head count 04:29 – Churn has always been low 04:35 – Net churn has always been negative which -10% monthly 04:50 – User churn is around 3.5 - 4% 05:04 – MRR churn is low 05:30 – The teams that are paying Front more per month tend to be very sticky 06:10 – Gross margin is 88% 06:22 – Front APP is the easiest way to manage a shared inbox as a team 06:29 – A sample of shared inbox is support@contact or a social media account 06:37 – Front simplifies everything in one place 06:54 – For Front’s growth, they lend it and extend it 07:00 – Net negative churn is coming from existing customers 07:04 – Existing customers have been upgraded to new plans or added teams 07:10 – HubSpot started with 1 team and now they have 13 teams with Front 07:26 – Front now has a marketing team with 3 people 07:35 – Front has now done more advertising and content 07:41 – The most effective for Front is AdWords 07:52 – Monthly CAC is around $15K 08:03 – Front tracks sales qualified leads 08:26 – It takes 7 trials to get 1 new paying customer 08:38 – After the trial, the customer will be categorized as an enterprise or SMB and mid-market companies 08:50 – The goal is for the sales people to get the trial set up 09:02 – The sales cycle is 3 weeks 09:20 – 95% of the customer is going through 3 weeks than the offered 2 weeks 09:26 – People are using Front than Slack because Slack is usually for before synchronous communication 09:34 – Front is for a synchronous communication 09:40 – A synchronous is every communication that is done externally should have an upfront 09:49 – Slack messages can also be distracting with the team 10:13 – Front competes more with Intercom than with Slack 10:25 – Intercom is usually better for customer communication while Front is for general communication 10:43 – Front is an email client 11:40 – Customers are buying Front to replace email 11:46 – In other cases, Front replaces helpdesk solutions like Desk, Zendesk, Freshdesk, Help Scout, etc 12:12 – Mathilde won’t sell Front now even for $95M 12:25 – “I think I will sell when I’m not as confident as today” 12:37 – Front makes Mathilde happy 13:04 – Mathilde is now 28 13:15 – Front was launched in early 2015 13:29 – Mathilde wanted people to be happy at work so she made Front 15:07 – Mathilde has always been happy and confident that they can do a series B 15:56 - “I do have some inbound” 16:30 – Mathilde was part of an article in Entrepreneur.com 19:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Growth can be measured by several different metrics—the important thing isn’t the metric, it’s the important thing is consistency. Stay with what makes you and other people happy. People love reliability—if you can deliver that in a product or service you’re on to something. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/2/2017 • 21 minutes, 23 seconds
738: Is He The Future of Design Collaboartion? 1200 Customers and $3m in Revenues Say Yes!
Mariano Suarez-Battan. He’s the founder and CEO of MURAL, a digital whiteboard for exploring complex challenges visually. Global 2000 companies like IBM, Intuit, Steelcase, and Autodesk have deployed MURAL at scale to enhance collaboration in their digital workplace. A former startup in residence at IDEO, Mariano also founded Three Melons, a game studio that designed and published online games like Bola, which was acquired by Playdom and Disney in 2010. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Purple Cow What CEO do you follow? – Aaron Lewis Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – To trust in your gut always Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:12 – Bola has created games for large brands like Lego 02:23 – Back then, the social games industry was moving fast with Zynga, Playfirst and Playdom 02:31 – Mariano thought that, strategically, it made sense to grow bigger with those companies 02:45 – It was also a great decision, financially and professionally 03:00 – Mariano started Bola in Argentina 03:24 – Acquisition price was with stock and equity 04:12 – The cash was $4-5M 04:26 – $600K was the payback for the investors 04:44 – MURAL was a startup in residence in IDEO 05:03 – IDEO brought in Collaborative Fund as a funder for MURAL 05:10 – MURAL’s vision is to make every designer share their design thinking globally 05:36 – IDEO was like an incubator 05:49 – Prior to IDEO, MURAL has raised closed to $1M 05:59 – Collaborative Fund invested money on MURAL while IDEO made MURAL known to big companies like IBM 06:33 – Some of IDEO’s DNA are in MURAL 07:00 – MURAL’s pricing 07:02 – $12 per member per month and billed annually, $16 billed monthly 07:10 – The pricing on the website is for online customers 07:23 – A quarter of their customers are online and the rest are enterprise costumers 07:46 – MURAL is a SaaS business 08:22 – MURAL has over 40K active users monthly 08:58 – MURAL has no free plan but has introduced a free education plan to help kids 11:00 – MRR is around $280K 11:11 – Average ARR 12:06 – Currently, MURAL has raised a total of $2.4M 12:16 – Team size is 35 12:45 – Most are in product development and engineering 12:55 – Office is located in San Francisco 13:30 – Gross monthly churn 14:17 – Some of the customers are entrepreneurs selling to multiple departments 15:23 – MURAL churn on online customers is quite high 15:38 – Average cost per new customer 15:55 – One of MURAL’s new customer is from an event they’ve sponsored 16:04 – The cost of the sponsorship with other expenses was $3K 16:29 – What Mariano does is split up general cost with the number of new customers 16:50 – Gross margin is around 85% 18:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The investment in your company doesn’t always need to be cash. Before going into an acquisition or partnership, go on a vacation and think about it with a clear head. Having different revenue sources leads to different churn sources—focus on where churn is the least. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/1/2017 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
737: 3000 Hotels Are Paying Them to Optimize Pricing, Investors Put in $50m
Patrick Bosworth. They launched in 2012 with 3 co-founders and are now at 105 people. They help hotels—specifically, they help hotel locations better optimize their pricing. They raised $51 million serving over 3000 individual hotel locations paying on average 17 grand per year. They will very soon be doing about a $50 million run rate, 75% gross margin which they tripled over the recent future. This is incredible how they worked that fixed cause structure to drive more growth and bring the margin up over time. They spend about $20,000 on CAC; so there is a super healthy payback period at about 14 months. They are based in San Francisco and Las Vegas. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Matthew Prince Favorite online tool? — Gnome How many hours of sleep do you get?— trying to get 8, but is getting 7 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – I wish that I had believed that it was okay for me to be happy back then Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Patrick Bosworth to the show 01:23 – Patrick is the co-founder and CEO of Duetto Research, his focus is driving vision and growth at a company 01:50 – Patrick thinks his MBA from Harvard is crucial in the building of the company; a friend of Patrick’s convinced him of the opportunity to build a tech business and introduced him to co-founder Craig Weissman, who was at Sales Force at the time 02:15 – In the fundraising process, his MBA created credibility as well as his co-founder’s MBA from Cornell. Another co-founder also went to Harvard and they were all able to maximize their networks 03:01 – Patrick did the two-year program and it helped him get a grounding in business terminology considering his background was in the arts and in politics 03:37 – If the network is the main concern, there are short term programs, but they are expensive 04:02 – Nathan says he is willing to spend money for people who enter the program to get access to the network 04:23 – Duetto is a hotel software company leveraging on medium data to help hotel managers make smarter decisions on pricing optimization 04:47 – Duetto gets the demand from a particular hotel and picks the price for each customer segment, channel and room type for the next 13 months 04:57 – This has increased the revenue of the hotels from 6.5 to 8.5% which increases their profit from 75 to 100% 05:15 – Duetto gets revenue from the subscription payment that is paid annually based on the product they are buying and number of rooms in the hotel 05:42 – Patrick is surprised that companies are not taking advantage of the performance kicker 06:41 – Last month, 5% of the revenue came from the flat SaaS model 07:10 – The target customer varies – if it is a strong brand like the Marriott, they need to go directly to them rather than the real estate owner; in smaller brands including independent hotels, they need to go to the management company 08:32 – On a per property basis, they are getting $17,000 to $18,000 per hotel per year and it varies according to the number of rooms and products they are buying 08:50 – The company was founded in 2012 09:17 – Patrick and Marco worked on the business idea for about a year and met with Craig in September 2011; it took them 5 months to court him 09:52 – While Patrick and Marco were fundraising, they were only getting $1 - $2 million valuations but when Craig joined, it jumped up to $10 million 10:49 – Craig has more equity than Patrick 10:58 – They have raised four rounds of capital amounting to $58.3 million 11:33 – The payback period is 14 months and they are spending around $20,000 to acquire new customers 11:51 – They have literally not lost a customer in 5 years 12:55 – Selling to the lodging market is difficult because it is an old school industry that does not embrace technology quickly 13:17 – The company tried to spend more on additional sales reps or demand gen but the cash got spent inefficiently 14:12 – Duetto can grow by expanding their reach geographically 14:31 – By the end of the quarter, they are close to 3000 hotels in 98 countries 15:04 – There is a lag in gross and deferred bookings, but the current run rate is a fraction of Nathan’s calculation of $50 million 16:10 – The company has a larger services organization than most and they grew from 30% to 70% gross margin in the past year 17:06 – They staffed up sales globally and the services organization with the platform growth margin north of 95%, but the blended gross margin including the onboarding services dips down in the 70s 18:26 – They had a fixed cost structure 18:41 – Patrick says they did spend a million bucks a month during the early years and it was partly due to naiveté 19:56 – The investors have big expectations and they were the ones that reassured Patrick of the capital and growth 20:34 – In the last round in 2015, they were able to raise $30 million 21:55 – The investors changed their mindset in 2015 and in 2017 22:06 – They currently have 105 people based in San Francisco and Las Vegas 23:14 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An MBA degree can give you a leg up in terms of the network it provides you. Know your market well, including all its idiosyncrasies. Study the changes in your investors’ expectations and work with them. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/31/2017 • 25 minutes, 47 seconds
736: How Mobile Analytics Company Went $0 to $4 Million in 12 Months
Sunil Thomas. He’s had a ton of experience working in tech companies and decided in 2013 to take the plunge himself and go all in with his 2 co-founders. They’ve since raised a total of $9.6 million – $1.6 million seed and $8 million in series A. They launched revenue in 2016, broke $1.5 million in total sales and this May 2017, broke $400,000 in MRR out of about $5 million ARR. He wants to double that by the end of the year, amounting to $800,000. They have a team of 45 based between California, New York and India—again, making it easier for mobile applications to understand what the heck users are doing in their apps. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Play Bigger What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella of Microsoft Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-8 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – I wish I knew as much as my kids knew at 13, I had no clue what I was doing at 20 Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Sunil Thomas to the show 01:32 – Sunil Thomas is the co-founder and CEO of CleverTap 01:46 – CleverTap combines people-based analytics with user engagement, it can be used in your mobile app and website and you get to understand what they are doing 02:23 – It is like a combination of Mix Panel plus App Boy for mobile apps and websites 03:17 – The average customer pays them $2500 – $3000 a month based on event data 03:37 – The top cohorts pay $10,000 to $20,000 a month 04:21 – CleverTap is one of the few companies that has both Accel and Sequoia as their funders and they have raised a total of $9.6 million dollars with a seed of $1.6 million and $8 million in series A 05:18 – CleverTap started in 2013 and has 3 co-founders—Suyin has had various work experiences in the tech industry 05:56 – CleverTap came about because of the need to engage users 06:47 – Nathan says there are only a limited number of apps a person engages with on a daily basis 07:02 – Sunil says their business is targeted on the companies and not the consumers 07:28 – There are more than 10,000 apps that go into the app stores every day 07:53 – The pricing starts at $1000 a month 08:23 – An average monthly active user does 15 to 20 events in your app 08:54 – They currently have 200 paying customers and 2000 apps that are sending them live data 09:13 – A plan of the company is to cover 10 million events a month for their free plan in 3 years 09:31 – The conversion rate is 30% for those who are using the free plan to a paid plan 09:44 – Nathan computes the revenue is at least $400,000 a month 10:05 – In terms of competition, there are three sets of apps: apps that get app data for sales, attribution provider apps and the one about user engagement and app analytics where CleverTap is 11:19 – Their growth churn is very low with everyone on the less than 1,000 plan who are still sticking around 11:51 – The company started to monetize just a year ago and has a 400,000 growth rate 12:15 – They have 45 people globally – 11 are in the US and 32 are in India with the core engineering team in India 13:10 – To acquire new customers, they have marketing qualified leads from websites and they hit bigger accounts on the outbound, focusing on direct sales rather than marketing and advertising 14:41 – The biggest expense is in the hosting 15:18 – It was hard during the early days, but it has now come to a point where they are benefitting 15:55 – In 2016, they broke $1.5 million in revenue and are targeting to get to $10 million by the end of the year 17:04 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for a need and fill the gap in today’s current technology. Know your target market well! You may start slowly at first, but it will pay off in the end. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/30/2017 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
735: Sell Cannabis? He's Raised $3m To Be Your Payroll Management System
Keegan Peterson. Keegan is a technology entrepreneur blazing a trail in the legal cannabis industry. He has worked for many software and services companies. He founded Wurk which helps cannabis businesses pay their employees while adhering to the Federal and State Regulations. Keegan is also a former division one athlete from Florida Atlantic University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Stealing Fire What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Asana How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 to 6 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I would have started something earlier in my lifetime” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:19 – Nathan introduces Keegan to the show 01:53 – Cannabis is a fascinating industry that is a great place for technology to play a big part in it 02:31 – For a year, Keegan financed Wurk but they’ve now raised $3M from venture capital (VC) 03:09 – Cannabis businesses include growing, selling, and extracting the plant 03:29 – “Marijuana” and “Weed” have a negative stigma, unlike “Cannabis” 03:46 – Wurk makes profit by selling a service to their clients 03:56 – Wurk ensures cannabis businesses’ taxes are paid correctly and calculated correctly 04:33 – Payroll companies being backed by national banks cannot touch cash made from cannabis 04:54 – Wurk is a SaaS company and is in 17 legal cannabis states 05:17 – They sell their services directly to business owners 05:30 – They have hundreds of users on their platform 05:39 – Keegan launched Wurk 2 years ago, in August 2015 06:10 – They currently have 18 employees in 3 offices 06:28 – It’s NOT a requirement to smoke cannabis to work for Wurk 06:40 – They do look for people who believe in cannabis as a progressing industry 07:13 – Wurk provides a whole difference face to the industry 07:30 – “We are not the traditional cannabis business” 07:45 – A large portion of Wurk’s clients are in cannabis, but there are some clients that are not 08:12 – Most business owners in the business pay their employees in cash 08:27 – “We’re trying to help solve that issue” 08:42 – The average client payment per month ranges from $10 to $30 09:03 – Number of employees and number of states the business is in are factors in a client’s metrics that determine how much they pay to Wurk 09:55 – Wurk doesn’t charge per customer; they charge per employee 11:00 – They don’t have a lot of competition 11:16 – They have a low churn of 2 customers in 2 years 11:41 – Currently, they don’t have an average Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) because they mostly get referrals 12:01 – They have 5 full-time sales reps with 1 chief revenue officer and other employees are on implementation 12:18 – Their sales reps earn through salaries and incentives 13:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are still industries that are not saturated. If there’s hole in an industry, there’s a market for a business that can fill that hole. Referrals or word of mouth is still one of the best ways to get a customer. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/29/2017 • 15 minutes, 44 seconds
734: Ex Finance Dad of 3 Wants to Own Your Home
Tye Schlegelmilch to the show. Tye is the founder of Hinged following a 16-year career in finance, and most recently as co-CIO for Fortress Investment Group which has about 70B assets in their management. Prior to that, Tye was with a variety of different finance firms including Goldman Sachs. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Snowball What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Skype and GoToMeeting How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 to 6 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I’ve been more measured with certain things in my life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan introduces Tye to the show 01:48 – Tye has a lot of friends who entered the entrepreneurial space 01:58 – As an engineer, he’s always been curious about how he can make things work better 02:13 – He moved out to Connecticut and bought a house 02:17 – Tye saw an opportunity in being able to get things done, understanding what needed to be done, and when it needed to be done in a home 02:37 – Diving into entrepreneurship was just a result of his curiosity 02:55 – Hinged is a holistic online platform for homeowners to better understand, manage, and control all aspects of home ownership 03:43 – Hinged’s business model is providing a full software solution for the service providers 04:05 – Hinged is highly selective with who they want (service providers) on their platform 04:20 – They take 5% of the revenue that goes through the platform to the provider that’s providing the maintenance or repair 04:39 – Hinged is a marketplace 05:23 – They have several hundred homeowners on the platform 05:43 – Across Fairfield and Westchester Country, they have a few hundred service providers in 50 different categories 06:57 – On an average user basis, there are 20%-40% who have spent money on the platform 07:31 – Hinged launched in Feb 2017 08:32 – Appliance repairs are the hottest category on their platform 09:40 – The average price of services done on Hinged is about $1500 10:19 – Tye funded everything on Hinged 10:54 – Internally, they just discussed capital-raising 11:13 – The industry Hinged is in is a “land-grab” so they’re looking into raising capital to expand 11:47 – Today there are 5 full-time employees and a development team from Cogniance 12:48 – They started with a sales team for service providers 13:02 – Teams are continuing to ramp on Hinged 13:35 – Hinged was very well thought out before Tye put money into it 14:05 – Tye’s salary in finance ranged from back office administration to major league baseball players 16:06 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There will always be better ways to do things—keep on brainstorming. Don’t hold yourself back from your own curiosity. Be selective with who you work with; this will affect the quality of your product. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/28/2017 • 19 minutes, 23 seconds
733: With $50M Raised, He's Leading Cargo Container Software Space
Zvi Schreiber, founder and CEO of Freightos – the internet marketplace for the trillion-dollar international freight industry. Zvi was previously the CEO for Lightech which was acquired by G.E., and was also the founder and CEO of Unicorn Solutions which was acquired by IBM. Additionally, Zvi was the founder of G.ho.st, a predecessor of DropBox, which ended in a fire sale. He’s spoken widely and was in many articles and patents. He has a PhD in Computer Science and he’s the author of Fizz: Nothing Is as It Seems, which tells the history of physics as a novel. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Mixmax How many hours of sleep do you get? — 7 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s okay for startups to take on a big conservative industry” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan introduces Zvi to the show 02:23 – Freightos is targeting the world of international freight 02:45 – 90% of the products sold in the West are imported – the entire lifestyle is dependent on international freight 03:18 – The biggest cost components in the freight industry is the trucking, ocean liners, port handling, and airlines 04:38 – “This big industry is very inefficient” 04:52 – Asking for a quote from a big freight forwarding company can take about 3 days 05:45 – Freightos is the “Expedia” for freight 06:09 – Freightos makes money by taking a cut of the transaction 06:24 – They basically do the marketing for the seller 06:40 – Freight forwarders are companies that arrange freight like Expeditors and H. Robinson 06:59 – Some more known forwarders are UPS and FedEx 07:24 – The buyers in this marketplace are the import/export companies 08:46 – Freightos helps with importing/exporting and not door-to-door deliveries 09:15 – Freightos only takes 2% from the freight forwarders’ transactions 09:35 – They don’t take any percentage from the buyer’s end 10:02 – Many freight forwarders are using Freightos’ software to automate their own pricing 10:23 – Freightos is a SaaS business 10:33 – They’ve recently raised $25M from an investment round led by G.E. 11:21 – In 2016, 90% of their revenue came from SaaS because they’ve just launched the marketplace that year 11:35 – Without the SaaS, freight forwarders are not able to do instant pricing 11:54 – The SaaS platform is serving about 1,000 freight forwarders all around the world 12:04 – Freightos is the market leader for the SaaS 12:22 – There are only a few thousand freight forwarders that matter and Freightos has 1,000 of them as customers 12:35 – January 2012 was the launch date of Freightos 12:43 – Freightos’ team size is about 150 people across the world 13:17 – Every shipment involves 2 countries 13:26 – Their biggest office is in Jerusalem and Barcelona 14:07 – Their customers pay less than $1K/month to tens of thousands per month for the subscription 14:43 – The reason why most marketplace startups fail is because of the chicken-and-egg problem 15:06 – Freightos spent 4 years selling SaaS to companies 15:40 – Freightos’ first year revenue was 0 15:45 – Their first revenue came in 2013 16:25 – It was in 2015 when Freightos earned their first million 16:56 – Each month, there are about several hundreds to a thousand transactions in their marketplace 17:33 – Freightos is starting to educate freight forwarders and importers/exporters that they don’t need to wait anymore for pricing 18:16 – There are thousands of buyers already using their software 20:03 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Our lifestyle is heavily dependent on imported goods. Find an industry’s pain point and start from there. Don’t be afraid to create a startup in a big and conservative industry. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/27/2017 • 23 minutes, 25 seconds
732: Why AirBnB Is Using Jumio Along With Many Other Unicorns
Stephen Stuut. He’s the CEO of Jumio.com. He brings more than 25 years of experience fueling corporate growth and leading technology businesses. Before Jumio, he served as a CEO of TruePosition, a leader in location-based service technology. Prior to that, he was a president and CEO of Broadband Innovations delivering digital interactivity services to cable TV providers. During his 10 years, he has raised over $30M in equity from venture capital firms and strategic investors and ultimately sold the company to Motorola in December of 2005. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – A Book from McKinsey What CEO do you follow? – John Mallone and Greg Maffei Favorite online tool? — Outlook How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Travel just a little bit less when your kids are young” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Stephen to the show 02:10 – Jumio is a SaaS business, particularly, trusted identity as a service 02:18 – Jumio does identity verification and document verification 02:35 – Jumio will validate the ID, making sure it isn’t fraudulent 02:40 – Jumio does biometric facial comparisons from the selfie picture and ID picture for identity verification 03:11 – Jumio’s customers are merchants who need to know the identity of a person 03:19 – Airbnb is one of Jumio’s customers 03:29 – Jumio caters to airlines, bitcoin companies and banks that have money-laundering requirements 04:13 – “The world is moving to the internet online clamors” 04:17 – Walking into a building and flashing your ID is quite inconvenient 04:58 – Some, like Nathan, don’t bother to change their license ID even if it’s unrecognizable 05:35 – Customers typically pay 1 year worth of transactions in advance 05:49 – Average contract price 07:17 – Stephen isn’t the founder but is a CEO who came in later 07:23 – The founder started Jumio after he argued with a credit card about his identification 08:15 – Jumio was founded in 2014 and Stephen came in 2 years after they launched 08:32 – Stephen was brought in by the investors 08:48 – Jumio has raised $60M to date 09:14 – Jumio just broke in 150K identity verifications in a single day 10:02 – The investors of Jumio 10:48 – Jumio has processed 26M verifications in 2016 10:55 – 2017 verification number 11:21 – The team in 2015 was around 90 and now it’s around 110 in the west and a thousand in India 12:01 – Jumio is a hybrid blend of computer vision, facial recognition and human integration into one 12:27 – Stephen is an optical engineer and has designed laser weapons 13:14 – Jumio is well-known in the fintech and economy space 13:25 – Jumio has a sales force direct with a team of around 20 13:50 – Jumio does trade shows in the marketplace 14:28 – Jumio has the top 4 unicorns as customers 15:34 – Different markets have different value that they see from the pricing activity 16:51 – “This is very much a grab the market share and its transactions” 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s a relief to know that verifying your identification can be easily done. Pricing value affects different markets greatly. Spend more time with your kids while they’re young. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/26/2017 • 21 minutes, 46 seconds
730: How Two JP Morgan Men Sell $600k+ In Baby Clothes
Cam Miller and Akin Onal, the founders of MORI/BabyMori.com. Cam is the chief growth officer and co-founder at MORI. He is responsible for building out their essential babies’ brand and the creative use of marketing and technology. This summer, he represented the brand as one of the 500 startups at Mountain View Accelerator. Prior to MORI, he studied an MBA at London Business School, had various roles in Australia, France and the UK, and studied engineering business development finance and event management. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup (Cam) Most recent read book – Bhagavad Gita Favorite online tool? — Slack (Akin) How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-7/5 (Akin) If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I got into entrepreneurship a bit sooner” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan introduces Cam and Akin to the show 01:47 – Cam and Akin met at JP Morgan 02:12 – There are a lot similarities between what they were doing at JP Morgan and what they are doing now 02:19 – MORI is a direct-to-consumer business model 02:33 – MORI has over 10K customers over 50 countries acquiring 1000 additional customers per month 02:57 – The non-subscription model is what MORI have on most countries 03:05 – MORI has really high repeat orders per month 03:13 – MORI is looking to relaunch a new and improved subscription model 03:31 – The sleeping bag has been their bestseller for the last 6 months 03:51 – A repurchase is when the same customer buys the same item, but a bigger size 04:35 – Half of the revenue per month comes from repeat customers 05:15 – The sweet spot on sales for repeat customers ends around 2-2.5 y/o 05:45 – Average cart price is $100 06:26 – MORI uses Klaviyo and MailChimp for their upsell 07:21 – The website’s product recommendation is manual 08:35 – 2016 topline sales was around $500K 09:00 – 2017 goal is $4M topline 10:03 – Cam and Akin have pivoted over 1 and half years 10:09 – MORI had a subscription model before the e-commerce 10:24 – After launching the latest collection in an ecommerce platform, sales went up 11:32 – The subscription is only for a specific product 13:20 – A repeat customer is the one who goes to the site to buy again 13:33 – The subscription model is almost phased out 14:22 – A lot of the products on the site are bundled, but they’re not part of the subscription 14:45 – The customer cohort of MORI outgrows them 15:53 – Paid acquisition last month was $50K 16:14 – They’ve recently launched a retargeting program 17:00 – MORI just closed a $2M round which was an equity round 17:28 – LTV 18:14 – LTV is measured on the growth trade and not on revenue 18:31 – Pre-money valuation 19:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The right model for your business can be proven by an increase of revenue. Keep in mind that your revenue growth is NOT the only basis of your LTV. Start entrepreneurship as early as possible. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/24/2017 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
729: Will Edelman Digital Creator Lead New AI Marketing World?
David Dunne. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Velocidi, a marketing intelligence company that harnesses data for leading brands and agencies. In the 7 years since founding Velocidi, it enables marketers to make data-driven decisions that optimize marketing spend. David is currently leading the firm’s next chapter into artificial intelligence. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Selling the Invisible What CEO do you follow? – Richard Branson Favorite online tool? — Tidal How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Hurry up, things are changing fast, you have to move faster” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces David to the show 01:41 – Velocidi focuses on how AI can speed up insights 01:48 – Velocidi’s technology has always been enabling the process of analysts driving the insights 02:22 – The analysts are Velocidi’s customers 02:39 – Velocidi is a SaaS business selling licenses 03:01 – Pricing starts at $3K a month 03:23 – Average monthly RPU is around $6K 03:44 – Velocidi charges by the amount of data streams 04:20 – Velocidi uses API calls to bring in the data 04:42 – Velocidi was launched in 2010 05:19 – There are people who are with David in building Velocidi 05:44 – David was a part of a global business 06:11 – David was happy with Edelman, but he wanted to reinvent himself 07:46 – David was 43 when he started Velocidi 09:26 – Every entrepreneur takes risks 09:51 – David has always separated personal assets with work 10:15 – Velocidi was capital intensive for the first few years 10:56 – Velocidi has initially raised $3M from friends and families 11:01 – Velocidi just closed a $12M round 11:18 – David has ambitious plans for growing the business 11:49 – More capital allows you to have more options 12:10 – CAC 12:21 – Most of Velocidi’s customers are large global agencies 12:31 – Velocidi is expanding into other industries 13:45 – LTV to CAC ratio 13:58 – David tries to look at some of the classic businesses for comparison 15:19 – Velocidi focuses on what they can give to customers 16:04 – Velocidi keeps their customers for at least 5 years 16:54 – Some of Velocidi’s customers have thousands of customers and there’s a lot of room to grow 17:39 – Velocidi is innovating their product at a much faster rate 17:55 – The innovations depend on the customer's’ needs 18:21 – Velocidi is expanding their automated self-serve platform this year 18:40 – Velocidi has hundreds of customers 19:19 – Self-service means different things 20:08 – Analysts have been using excel and powerpoint 20:42 – Velocidi delivers the core-data and the clients tailor the data 21:11 – The quality of the data alongside a creative makes Velocidi’s clients standout 23:01 – David believes that data with creative is a better creative 23:55 – Average MRR 25:36 – David won’t sell Velocidi 26:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Entrepreneurs will always take risk—what matters is how big of a risk you’re willing to take. Focus on what you CAN commit to your customers. Things change faster than you think; so KEEP moving and don’t get left behind! Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/23/2017 • 29 minutes, 57 seconds
728: With $24m Raised, Why is He Buildling FinTech On Back of Advisors?
Aaron Klein. His career has largely been in the intersection of finance and technology. As co-founder and CEO at Riskalyze, he led the company twice to being one of The World’s Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in Finance by Fast Company Magazine. Today, over 150 riskalyzers served thousands of advisors. Aaron has served as a Sierra College trustee and in his spare time, co-founded a school project for orphans and vulnerable kids in Ethiopia. Investment News has honored him as one of the industry’s 40 Under 40 executives. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Extreme Ownership What CEO do you follow? – Ben Horowitz Favorite online tool? — Twitter, Evernote and Uber How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The most important skill that you will ever have in starting a company is making great hiring decisions” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Aaron to the show 02:07 – Riskalyze’s mission is to empower the world to invest fiercely 02:20 – An average consumer struggles to invest and understand the concept of investing 02:39 – Warren Buffett said “Stock for the one thing the American consumer refuses to buy when they were at their cheapest and only wants to buy at their most expensive” 02:48 – Riskalyze invented risk numbers that they can create for short-term 03:06 – Riskalyze’s focuses on the short term 03:43 – The harm usually comes from short-term decisions 03:58 – Riskalyze needs a context to understand how to make a good short-term decision 04:11 – Investors who don’t use Riskalyze would normally ask if the 2% down on their portfolio is still okay 04:18 – 8% of that portfolio is actually normal 04:56 – “We tend to stereotype people based on their age” 05:12 – The typical questions in the industry would often base on the age of the investor 05:41 – Riskalyze has a team of academics who delve into the data and methodology behind the risk number 06:00 – Riskalyze’s technology helps the advisor assess how much risk they can handle in a quantitative-objective way 06:27 – Riskalyze works with financial advisors and helps their investors become more successful 06:45 – Riskalyze is a SaaS business 06:48 – Riskalyze is launching their auto-pilot platform 07:19 – Pricing starts at $145 a month 07:36 – Riskalyze was launched in 2011 07:41 – Prior to Riskalyze, Aaron was in a brokerage firm and saw firsthand how poorly average investors thought about risk 07:54 – Aaron told his financial advisor friend about the risk and they founded Riskalyze 08:07 – Equity was 50/50 at first 08:27 – They’ve raised and brought in investors along the way 09:03 – Investors have seen a good return of up to 10X 09:48 – Riskalyze is currently focused on going to financial advisors first 09:59 – Riskalyze was capital efficient 10:02 – First round of funding was around $420K all equity 10:23 – Riskalyze is a substantial business and their ARR was a multiple of the capital deployed 10:40 – Total funds raised to date is $24M 11:10 – Team size is 175 from 90 last October 11:24 – Based in Auburn, California 12:21 – Riskalyze currently serves 19K advisors 12:25 – There’s no free plan 12:42 – Advisors are known to be money efficient 12:59 – Riskalyze tried a free version 13:23 – The plan was originally $99 a month 13:40 – After they tested to push the price up, their conversion rate tripled 14:10 – Gross annual churn 14:32 – Riskalyze typically loses an advisor to retirement or death 14:48 – Riskalyze found a solution for retirement 15:33 – Aaron doesn’t have the number for their net expansion RPU yet 15:50 – Riskalyze rolled out their advisor product in March 2013 15:53 – Then, they went into hyper-growth mode, from 380 customers to 2000 16:24 – They lost track of the data with only 4 people 16:50 – Cost to acquire new customers 17:10 – LTV 18:00 – Nathan recommends Klipfolio as a dashboard for Aaron 18:15 – Aaron rolled out a premier tier of Riskalyze in February which is $225 19:18 – Average MRR 21:30 – Aaron shares why Warren Buffett recommends investing in Vanguard 21:31 – Vanguard fits the people who are in their 70s and 80s 22:04 – Buffett also said that going to an advisor isn’t necessary 22:18 – Aaron believes that Vanguard should still be a part of a person’s portfolio; but what about someone who is a risk 45 and Vanguard is a risk 78? 24:45 – Nathan never went to an advisor as he found them fishy 25:15 – Aaron doesn’t have any financial advisors at the moment but he will in 2-3 years 25:20 – Aaron believes that an advisor can help him maximize the money that he has for the future 26:08 – The reason to use an advisor 26:32 – Riskalyze wants people to get risk aligned with the risk they can handle 26:48 – Advisor charges a flat fee based on the investor’s asset 27:34 – The value of human vice 29:14 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If an average consumer knows his risk number, he will be more confident to invest. An advisor will not only help you manage your money, but show you how you can grow it. Focus on your hiring—this will contribute to a fast-growing company. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/22/2017 • 33 minutes, 5 seconds
727: Why People Pay Him $10m+/year or $4 on Every $10 in Ads Managed
Andrew Fischer. He’s a seasoned entrepreneur with extensive business development and sales experience in digital media and enterprise software or SaaS. He’s recently launched Choozle, a simple and digital marketing platform in the fall of 2012. Based in Denver, Colorado, Choozle is the world’s fastest growing digital advertising platform. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Green Favorite online tool? — Evernote How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I will probably reinforce the message of focus” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 01:35 – Choozle is the fastest growing digital advertising platform because of Inc Magazine’s annual ranking 01:45 – It will be Choozle’s first year in Inc 02:02 – Choozle became profitable last year 02:16 – Choozle was launched in 2012 02:25 – Revenue is between $5-10M 02:29 – Team size is around 32 02:36 – Choozle raised a small round 02:54 – Choozle is a SaaS that installs on an agency level 03:07 – The lowest level of subscription is $99 for an agency with one client and up to $2K a month for unlimited accounts 03:21 – Average pay per customer is $300 a month 03:25 – Choozle has 250 clients 03:30 – Choozle offers hybrid-managed services 03:51 – Choozle is also an ad-tech company, so they take a percentage of media 04:03 – Media shares start at 40% 04:17 – Choozle is a premium player in the space 04:53 – 2016 revenue 05:00 – 2017 target revenue 05:34 – Majority of Choozle’s revenue are coming from Q3 and Q4 05:51 – Choozle has raised $8.5M to date 06:02 – Choozle’s grace capital is from non-traditional services like a family office 06:29 – The goal when they had a raise was to build a sustainable company 06:51 – The raise was an equity-based investment 07:02 – Average churn is 5-7% per month 08:03 – Andrew is currently happy with their churn rate 08:32 – LTV to be 08:52 – CAC 09:22 – Average payback period 09:34 – Choozle has 10 full-time salespeople, total team size is around 30 11:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The digital advertising space is quite saturated and the churn rate of a SaaS businesses is quite high. Aim for your company to not just be profitable, but sustainable as well. Don’t limit who you allow as investors in your company. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/21/2017 • 13 minutes, 19 seconds
726: This $500k/mo+ Entrepreneur Says Key is Minimizing Expenses
Heather Marie. She’s the founder and CEO of Shoppable, a technology company that helps media companies, brands and retailers bring the checkout experience to anywhere a consumer discovers or engages with their products. While with Shoppable, she won the 2013 Women in Digital Award from L’Oreal, was named 1 of the 10 Most Powerful Millennials in Manhattan by Gotham Magazine, and 1 of the 11 Tech Gurus Changing the Luxury Game by Refinery29. The company was a 2014 Webby Award Honoree for Online Shopping, a 2016 Webby Honoree for Technical Achievement and named one of the 100 Brilliant Companies by Entrepreneur Magazine. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Never Eat Alone What CEO do you follow? – Jennifer Hyman Favorite online tool? — Boomerang for Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just how long everything takes” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Heather to the show 02:07 – Shoppable creates a technology that helps people buy what they see online 02:37 – People see products in every place 02:50 – Shoppable created a patent pending technology that provides different locations to shop that is outside the traditional retail shop 03:20 – Heather started the company in 2011 03:36 – Heather pitched Shoppable to a number of different retailers 03:49 – Shoppable launched a technology with The Wall Street Journal 04:00 – The Wall Street Journal branding was able to bring in a bunch of retailers and advertisers 04:40 – Shoppable has grown to under 30M products across the whole platform 05:28 – Shoppable brings the technology to where the consumers already are 05:40 – com uses Shoppable on their website and customers can buy directly from the website 07:24 – Shoppable brings the technology to different types of companies 07:40 – Shoppable is also integrated with publications such as WSJ, Condé Nast and others 07:58 – Shoppable is a SaaS company and charges annually for licenses 08:20 – Average customer pay is 5 figures 09:11 – Prior to Shoppable, Heather was at post acquisition of com 09:26 – Heather was a founding member of Affinity Labs 10:21 – Heather got into Affinity right after college 10:39 – The exit with Monster was all cash with an additional incentive 10:49 – Heather made it for 2 years after the acquisition, doing research on Shoppable 11:45 – Heather had to make Shoppable work 12:01 – Heather knew that she would start her own company 12:21 – Heather had debt that she was able to pay off after the acquisition 12:55 – Heather kept a part of the money for Shoppable 13:40 – Heather also had to downsize her condo to keep her expenses low 15:13 – There are ways you can increase your buffer 15:33 – Heather had to change her habits 16:22 – Shoppable has raised $5M 16:33 – The last round was a year ago 16:43 – Heather isn’t selling to Shopify 16:55 – Shoppable is above breaking even 17:24 – Team size is 20 and they are all based in New York 17:53 – Heather went on a business trip to NY and on her second day, she thought that Shoppable was made for NY 18:31 – Shoppable has around 438 merchants and 2000 brands 18:38 – One merchant could have hundreds of brands 19:15 – Average ARR 21:13 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As an entrepreneur, you need to know how to manage money well. Building a company requires research and an action plan—especially if that company is your first and last shot at building one. Be aware that things in business and in life may take longer that what you’re expecting. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/20/2017 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
725: How This $3.5m Real Estate Guy Jumped into Group Coaching
Charlie Gaudet. He’s the best-selling author of The Predictable Profits Playbook. He’s a keynote speaker and creator of predictable profits methodology—the most reliable way to systematically generate predictable profits for small businesses. He’s been an entrepreneur since the age of 4, creating his first multi-million dollar business at 24 and has helped others generate millions through his strategy. He’s received a lot of awards, recognitions and has given business advice around the world including INC, Forbes and Fox Business as well on podcast and radio. He was named one of the American Geniuses Top 50 Industry Influencers. He’s a crossfitter, Brazilian jiu-jitsu fighter and 3-time wrestling state champion. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife, 3 adorable kidpreneurs, and 1 badass dog. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Losing My Virginity What CEO do you follow? – Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Infusionsoft How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Charlie would tell himself to stay in line and pick one particular craft to master Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:53 – Nathan introduces Charlie to the show 02:08 – Charlie is no longer in real estate 02:38 – Charlie grew his real estate company to $3-4M before getting out of it 02:46 – They built 2 roads and 30 homes 02:54 – Charlie was in Episode 343 03:21 – Charlie wasn’t having fun in real estate so he shifted 03:32 – Charlie has always been growing businesses 03:48 – Someone came to Charlie asking him to help grow his business and paid him $500 an hour 03:54 – It was in 2009 04:18 – Charlie went to $500 from hour to $2500 an hour 04:36 – Charlie realized that there is value in coaching 04:49 – Charlie ended up making 1.1M when he changed his model 05:35 – In 2016, 90% of Charlie’s income was percentage-based 06:05 – Charlie is going to a more scalable model in 2017 06:34 – Having the business that is dependent on Charlie won’t be good in the long run 06:53 – Charlie can build a system around his coaching model 07:40 – Charlie had a client in the financial space 07:44 – Charlie created 4 emails in the financial space for a 12-hour promotion that made $212K 07:56 – The client is a small business company 08:12 – Charlie had a client who was selling to lawyers who also brought in $200K from the 4 emails that Charlie curated 08:32 – In some cases, Charlie would get a percentage of top line revenue and for others, he would still get paid per hour 09:20 – The baseline payment will still depend on the client 09:38 – Charlie is highly recommended by his clients 10:26 – Charlie will also bring outside expertise to help him 10:53 – When Charlie got into a marketing promotion, they controlled the whole promotion 11:30 – Something is always bound to happen and Charlie tries to have a contingency plan 12:00 – Charlie has made most of their money from the incentive-based model 12:20 – Recently, Charlie found out that lost $75K from the incentive-based model 13:33 – Most of Charlie’s clients are using Infusionsoft 13:39 – For every email that they blast out, they have built in tracking 14:331 – Nathan is confused as to why Charlie would switch from the real estate to incentive-based coaching, which is hard to predict 14:37 – Charlie’s company is named Predictable Profits for a reason 15:26 – Charlie has different coaches delivering value 15:56 – Group coaching can work on a scalable format 18:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you lose interest in what you are doing; decide if it’s time to take the leap and pivot to something new. Something is always bound to happen, so a contingency plan is necessary. If you focus on just one craft, you can grow consistently and exponentially. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/19/2017 • 20 minutes, 27 seconds
724: The $70m+ Recruiting Company You've Never Heard Of
Colin Day. He’s the chairman and CEO of a company called iCIMS which he founded in 2000 with a vision to deliver applicant tracking software, emphasizing easy-to-use, unparalleled, customer service. iCIMS is the largest stand-alone provider of talent acquisition software in the industry and stands among Forbes top 100 fastest growing private cloud companies in the country Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella and Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Office 365 How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Trust your gut and trust your instincts” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan introduces Colin to the show 01:47 – iCIMS know they’re winning by customer base 02:02 – iCIMS is next to Oracle 02:37 – iCIMS has a bedrock product that is their applicant tracking system 03:07 – iCIMS is a SaaS business 03:39 – iCIMS has multiple products, but the main product is the tracking system 03:52 – It handles compliance around data 04:14 – Pricing varies 04:21 – Recruitment becomes an important part of a company when they reach 100 employees 04:37 – iCIMS has price buckets that fit the smaller market, mid-sized and high-end markets 05:10 – How Colin started a SaaS business in 1999 05:17 – Colin graduated from Cornell with a degree in Psychology 05:23 – Colin wanted to do something entrepreneurial 05:38 – Colin’s first client was from New Jersey 05:56 – Colin was logged into Comrise's proprietary system 06:21 – Colin then thought to buy the rights to Comrise’s proprietary system to start his own company 06:48 – Colin started as a recruiter in 1997 07:36 – The CEO of Comrise believed in Colin 08:43 – Colin saw an opportunity and bought the system 08:57 – The CEO of Comrise loaned Colin the capital for iCIMS 09:40 – When Colin was working as a recruiter, they couldn’t find enough technology to work 09:55 – It was a “hey day” when Colin spun out 10:20 – The capital was called a payroll loan 10:48 – Colin will call the CEO every time he needed money 11:11 – Colin didn’t negotiate equity upfront 11:37 – iCIMS was charging monthly 12:23 – Current team size is around 650 12:33 – In November, they’ll be moving from New Jersey to Old Bell Labs HQ 13:06 – iCIMS has grown without any outside money other than the loaned capital 13:17 – iCIMS has brought in a private equity company 14:14 – The money from the private equity company went directly towards the equity and not on the operational side of the company 14:29 – Besides getting an outside investor, it is also a good choice to get a private equity company 15:22 – Colin has a desire to win 16:12 – iCIMS’s mandate is to convince the world to be contrarian 16:51 – Colin wants iCIMS to be the definition of winning 17:30 – Colin tries to always stay focused 18:18 – CAC 18:43 – Average annual contract price is around $30K 19:50 – Average MRR 20:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to ask someone about their business plan. Always desire to win and stay focused – it works. Trust your instincts; don’t doubt yourself. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/18/2017 • 23 minutes, 37 seconds
723: He Sold His Company to Richard Branson, Then Oil Tanked Him
Scott Duffy. He’s the co-host of Business & Burgers and a contributor at Entrepreneur.com. He’s also listed as one of the top 10 keynote speakers of Forbes and Entrepreneur. He started working for bestselling author and speaker, Tony Robbins. He’s been a part of early stage exits and worked with big brands like CBSSport.com, NBC internet, Fox.com. He sold his last company to Richard Branson’s Virgin Group. He’s the best-selling author of the book called Launch!. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – You Are a Badass at Making Money What CEO do you follow? – Dave Meltzer Favorite online tool? — Skype How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5.5 to 6 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You don’t win by hard work alone” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:02 – Nathan introduces Scott to the show 01:51 – Scott wants to tell The Top tribe that it is all about being real and integrity 02:01 – Scott is doing a lot of work regarding mindset 02:05 – Scott has a new book coming out called Breakthrough 02:26 – It is being published by Entrepreneur Press 02:30 – Scott was working on the timeline 02:54 – Scott shares a story about failing 02:58 – Scott had a business called Smart Charter 03:04 – Scott was looking for distribution and ended up making a deal with Virgin 03:16 – Scott was putting in $10K-15K of his personal money 03:33 – Scott closed a deal and they moved to their new office 04:12 – Scott is now officially a part of the Virgin Group 04:42 – Scott wasn’t paying himself nothing before he sold the company 04:54 – Prior to Smart Charter, Scott was a part of Sports 1 USA 05:20 – Majority of Scott’s savings went to Smart Charter 05:51 – Instead of taking money out out Smart Charter, Scott decided to go all in 06:18 – Scott now has equity with Virgin 06:57 – Scott sold Smart Charter in 2008 07:10 – Scott learned that the biggest job of an entrepreneur has nothing to do with business 07:19 – The most important job for an entrepreneur is to protect himself 07:44 – Smart Charter had an equity pool prior to Virgin 08:22 – The possible deal from Virgin 09:17 – In a matter of weeks, everything changed with Virgin/Smart Charter 10:05 – On Scott’s first day with Virgin, he knew that if he messed up, there wouldn’t be another chance 10:28 – Scott’s superpower is in getting distribution for early stage companies 10:51 – As a small company, dealing with big companies does not make you better 11:19 – The deal with Virgin didn’t turn out the way Scott thought it would 12:26 – As an entrepreneur, Scott thinks he was played 12:53 – Entrepreneurs have to know how to repackage the things that have happened to them 13:09 – Business & Burgers is a search for the best burger in America and offers a side of great business advice 13:14 – They hit the best restaurant and talk to the top local entrepreneur 13:35 – Next episode is Daymond John from Shark Tank 15:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be discouraged; sometimes, you just have to learn things the hard way. Entrepreneurs need to know how to protect themselves. Take time building relationships – relationships are everything. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/17/2017 • 17 minutes, 37 seconds
722: This Machine Learning Agency did $800k Last Year
Michael Segala. He’s the CEO and co-founder of a company called SFL Scientific, a data science consulting firm that specializes in big data solutions. He’s for leveraging machine learning in analytics techniques to arrive at insights to numerous industries— from healthcare to stock market predictions. Before founding the company, Michael worked as a data scientist in some of the well-known companies such as Compete Inc., Akamai Technologies and he also holds a PhD in Particle Physics from Brown University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Challenger Sale What CEO do you follow? – Larry Page and Sergey Brin Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Diversify my education, learn more than just science from the early set, it will help you out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan introduces Michael to the show 01:56 – The founding members of SFL Scientific are particle physicists 02:41 – They have a deeper understanding of the problem—from the academic and business perspective 02:58 – SFL Scientific is completely bootstrapped with $2K as their initial funds 03:07 – SFL Scientific got their first client only a few weeks after their launch 03:24 – The first client was a group of people from Stanford studying sleep apnea 03:30 – Sleep apnea is a disease that makes you stop breathing for a couple of minutes while sleeping and can lead to death 03:46 – The group’s idea is to take the sound and record it through an iPhone app at night 03:59 – The group hired SFL Scientific to build an entire suite of AI machine-learning product solution 04:04 – SFL Scientific also got an FDA resolution for the product 04:30 – SFL Scientific is a complete professional-based consulting firm 04:40 – They write specific algorithms for the clients depending on their needs 05:18 – SFL Scientific got their first client in 2015 05:24 – Michael is now 31 05:44 – The pricing depends 06:17 – For a high-level R&D-based projects, the charge is hourly 06:34 – SFL Scientific does R&D-based projects with minimum requirements 07:10 – Most clients don’t understand the scope of the project so SFL Scientific asks business questions or strategy 07:45 – SFL Scientific provides the possible end result 08:08 – First year revenue is low 6 figures 08:27 – SFL Scientific has 3 co-founders 08:38 – Michael does more on the sales stuff such as talking with client, one handles the technical and the other handles the implementation of behind-the-scenes coding 09:14 – Equity is almost equal with Michael getting 34% 09:37 – The first 2 years, they invested back into the company most of what they got 09:53 – They had some very low salaries 10:27 – SFL Scientific almost broke a million in 2016 10:42 – 2017 revenue might go over and above a million 10:57 – Team size is 10 11:30 – SFL Scientific currently has a dozen clients 11:38 – One of the clients takes up around 20% of the revenue and Michael knows that it is dangerous 12:00 – SFL Scientific has no churn yet 12:08 – SFL Scientific mitigates a couple of ways the employees can work on multiple projects at a time 12:24 – SFL Scientific doesn’t invest only in one problem—go vertical to diversify the risks 13:12 – Looking at data science in general, the challenges are unanimous 13:34 – SFL Scientific is capable of understanding and solving cases from different industries 14:07 – Nathan just finished Thinking in Systems 15:48 – If you don’t have decent data to support a model that is accurate to a certain degree, you’re not going to get anywhere 17:03 – SFL Scientific looks at the potential of a project 17:16 – Michael is most excited with the health industry in terms of AI and machine learning 19:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Consider yourself lucky when you’re completely bootstrapped and you end up getting your first client only after a few weeks of launching. It’s quite risky to only solve one problem as a company; diversify your services so you have a greater chance of surviving. Study different fields and see how you can solve cases from these different industries. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/16/2017 • 20 minutes, 51 seconds
721: 543 Upvotes Got Him on HackerNews Front Page
Owen Sadeghpour. A year ago, he was the technical employee or founder at an earlier company and has raised over $50M. Now, he’s working at a successful company. He’s also got a different project called You Exec. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Blue Ocean Strategy and How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Squarespace How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-10 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The older you get the more you realize that human relationships are 50% of your work” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Owen to the show 01:46 – You Exec is a community of professionals that are looking to improve their careers or the way they have relationships with people 01:57 – You Exec creates incredible resources for free and for paid members 02:13 – The paid members have the advantage of more features than the free members 02:26 – Paid members pay $4/month 02:43 – You Exec also takes insightful books, like The Lean Startup, and summarizes them 03:30 – You Exec’s content is usually posted on many different channels 03:35 – Some of these channels include Medium, LinkedIn and Facebook 03:56 – You Exec has a mailing list that people subscribe to 04:25 – You Exec used to be something else 04:33 – As a technical person, Owen would write technical articles which were posted on Hacker News, a Y-combinator news stream 04:43 – Owen’s article landed on the front page 04:59 – Owen’s first article was Google and Facebook Ad Traffic is 90% Useless 05:20 – Nathan shares how he found Owen and what piqued his interest in him 05:50 – Owen has been a follower of Hacker News 06:02 – The first article wasn’t intentionally made to blow up 06:49 – When Owen submitted the article, it got 30 upvotes only after a few minutes 07:03 – The readers were mostly looking at the tools that Owen featured 07:16 – By the time Owen got 50-60 points, Owen noticed that it wasn’t getting on the front page which was supposed to happen 07:27 – Owen got some coffee and after 6 hours, he got tons of emails and the article was on the front page 08:20 – Owen’s objective in creating the article was to share with engineers that they’re wasting their money 09:10 – The article got a total of 30K views 09:47 – Owen wants people to see You Exec’s value; that’s why they sign up 09:51 – Owen doesn’t share You Exec’s numbers 10:40 – You Exec has around 1k signups on the paid membership 11:11 – Owen has Google Analytics on while working so he saw where the referrals are coming from 11:56 – The first article still gets around 10 readers a day 12:20 – Owen focuses on insights to bring traffic 12:50 – Owen is passionate in improving patients’ lives 13:08 – Owen believes that a media company is great, but his passion lies in helping individuals 13:44 – You Exec also pays for resources 14:25 – When You Exec pushes out a weekly newsletter, they include references to the creditor 14:50 – The article should save You Exec’s members hours of work 15:25 – You Exec pushes out all the sources of things 16:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create something of value and people will stick with you. More and more people are finding ways to shave hours off their workload WITHOUT sacrificing their quality of work. Relationships with your colleagues are KEY to having a great work experience. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/15/2017 • 21 minutes, 30 seconds
720: How Wealthy People Put On a Conference
Steve Olsher. He’s the chairman and founder of Liquor.com. He’s a New York Times best-selling author of What Is Your WHAT?: Discover The One Amazing Thing You Were Born To Do. He’s also hosted the number 1 radio show, Reinvention Radio, and is a national keynote speaker and creator of the New Media Summit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The $100 Startup What CEO do you follow? – Giovanni Marsico Favorite online tool? — io How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I would have trusted myself more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces to the show 01:35 – Steve was in Episode 342 02:02 – Steve is still in the process of selling Liquor.com 02:14 – Liquor.com is on ad revenue but is moving into the monetization strategy in Q3 and Q4 02:20 – Monthly impression is currently $3M 02:32 – There’s nothing in the bottom line revenue because it just goes back to the business 02:45 – Gross margin varies 03:51 – The company’s valuation 04:07 – Average open rate 04:14 – Depending on the promotion, the click rate varies 04:41 – People are more interested with contests than new products 05:26 – Steve has been doing events 06:24 – Liquor.com was like a family business 07:04 – New Media Summit does live events for different types of viewers 08:00 – The idea is to connect with people who have high-visibility platforms 08:34 – New Media Summit is bringing in icons and influencers to events 09:06 – Most people are podcasters 09:25 – The people in New Media Summit are focused on understanding the value of teaching and sharing their knowledge 09:47 – New Media Summit takes care of the podcasters hotel accommodation and meals 09:57 – The event will accommodate only 150 people 10:17 – There will be an influencer and mastermind on the last day of the summit 10:49 – Attendees can pay in full which is $4997—the early bird price 11:10 – The marketing just started and they have sold 2 tickets for the early bird 11:17 – There are some who invested in Steve’s products and services and paid a seat deposit to attend the summit 11:30 – Minimum price to attend is $1300 plus the seat deposit 12:28 – Part of Steve’s revenue comes from buying stage time 12:44 – Steve can easily pay $10K for a highly-curated event with 100 people 13:19 – An event should have a revenue model or plan of action in order to recoup 14:44 – There are some events that people don’t want to go back to because they are just pitch fests 14:49 – Steve doesn’t speak at events where 1-10 people are selling 15:22 – Steve’s call-to action during his speaking is to sign-up on an order form which has a lot of bonuses 16:34 – An event venue is quite expensive which can average to about $150K for a whole day event 17:00 – Steve is also making money from the events 17:28 – They’ve got everything covered before the event starts 17:38 – There will be services and products offered during the event 18:03 – Steve will also pitch to future speakers 19:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An event should be well-planned and have a revenue model where they can recoup expenses. The main challenges in having an event is ensuring people attend and to have speakers who will NOT just sell during the event. Ad open rates always vary depending on the promotion. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/14/2017 • 22 minutes, 46 seconds
719: Question Based Advertising is The Future, $40M In Sales Doesn't Lie!
Stephan Goss. He’s the entrepreneur and technology executive behind his first company, Zeeto, which he started at the age of 22 and is still running today. He’s led the company in expanding from a team of 3 people to 70 in just under 5 years and with the launch of the ad network, he plans on continuing the company’s growth story in 2017. Previously, he founded Samples.com & Getitfree.us, which is the biggest free samples property on the internet. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Power of Habit What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack and Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8.5-9 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Keep going for it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan introduces Stephan to the show 01:56 – Stephan bought Samples.com 3 years ago and Getitfree.us for 6 figures 02:31 – Everything started with Samples.com 02:48 – Stephan left Switzerland when he was 19 and spent 10 months living in tent 03:31 – Stephan and some of his friends were running ad campaigns on the internet 03:55 – Everything is lead generation with Samples.com 04:03 – They acquire users for $1 and they get $1.25 in return 04:30 – Stephan was making a 20-30% margin at first 04:59 – One of their large clients called and asked for more targeted leads who offered $8 05:46 – Stephan came out with a decent approach to find targeted leads 06:22 – Stephan was spending $10K for ads 06:51 – Stephan had a business partner and they had some cash flow to begin with 07:14 – The model of Samples.com was good because they can get their ROI fast 07:34 – Samples.com is still running 07:55 – Stephan continued the question asking model for the targeted market and scaled it 08:26 – The lead value is more of a composition of all the answers 08:46 – 2016 total top line revenue was $39M and total ad spend was around $20-25M 09:18 – Samples.com currently has 25 people 09:25 – Stephan spent the bottom line money on investing on the Zeeto site 09:42 – Stephan is currently breaking even with Zeeto 09:55 – Stephan still gets his salary from the company 10:23 – Zeeto’s model is taken from Samples.com’s question-model 11:10 – Zeeto is similar to Google Adsense 11:20 – Regular CPMs from Adsense range from $5-20 11:33 – Zeetos’ CPMs range from $400-2200 12:00 – From Nathan’s research, podcasters earn $15-20 CPMs 12:11 – Nathan shares how he asks his advertisers about their CAC and his audience 12:44 – With Google Adsense, there will be around 3 ads per page 13:27 – The technology around Samples.com and Zeeto is considerably pretty hard 14:43 – Facebook and Google has all this data regarding leads that other big companies don’t have 15:13 – Zeeto’s goal is to help publishers have a better revenue model 15:21 – Zeeto’s product has just been launched 16:32 – Stephan sees Zeeto as an additional feature to the paywall 17:01 – Zeeto is incremental 18:18 – It will be more complicated for Zeeto to write questions for each of the articles rather than by being an addition to the paywall 18:24 – “Questions are built to be more broad” 18:59 – Stephan doesn’t know what is really going to work yet 19:25 – Stephan’s goal this year is to see where they’re going to fit in 19:50 – Anything that will drive people to the web will work well 20:19 – Stephan’s sample call-to-action 20:34 – You can make custom questions fitted to the website 20:46 – The goal is to optimize questions for the best response rate 21:22 – Zeeto was built from scratch 21:54 – Nathan struggles with which of his advertisement he should show to his new subscribers 22:00 – Nathan sends them an email autoresponder 22:27 – Zeeto has a user group that has interesting attributes 23:07 – 3 advertisers are not enough to do it efficiently 23:14 – Zeeto now has 200 advertisers 23:37 – Zeeto is completely free and they’ll send a check for the revenue share 25:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s easier for people to give out their details in exchange for something free. To collect your targeted leads, you need to have focused questions. Stay encouraged and Just keep going for it! Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/13/2017 • 27 minutes, 27 seconds
718: Air Pollution is Deadly, How Isralei Entrepreneur Is Cashing In
Ran Korber. He’s the CEO and founder of BreezoMeter. His ambition is to improve the health and quality of life for billions of people across the globe by providing accurate and actionable air quality data. It’s truly the leading air quality analytic company and one of Israel’s top 10 promising startups in 2015 with millions of daily users. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack and HubSpot How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Keep going, you’re doing well” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Ran to the show 01:57 – BreezoMeter helps companies to increase user engagement 02:38 – BreezoMeter makes the invisible visible by providing highly accurate, location-based, air quality which includes data that can be integrated to any device or technology 03:08 – Using BreezoMeter’s data, the Dyson air purifier turns on whenever the air quality outside is substandard 03:16 – A notification will be sent to the Dyson app as well 03:29 – Dyson is BreezoMeter’s customer and BreezoMeter tells Dyson’s customers about the air purifier 03:58 – The air purifier turns on automatically and, as an owner, you want to make sure that the product you bought is working 04:37 – BreezoMeter provides a license to their APIs 04:53 – Customers pay on a monthly basis 04:58 – BreezoMeter is data as a service 05:14 – All of BreezoMeter’s customers are enterprises 05:23 – The customers use BreezoMeter’s data in big volumes 05:49 – Average monthly RPU is higher than $1K a month 06:04 – Ran just read Jason Lemkin’s From Impossible to Inevitable 06:29 – BreezoMeter broke a million in sales last year 06:34 – Ran hopes they’ll break $10M in sales this year 06:54 – Ran is an environmental engineer 07:05 – In 2012, Ran was searching to buy a house for his family 07:10 – Ran’s wife has asthma and Ran knows how air pollution can have severe health effects 07:45 – We all want to protect our families 07:51 – Ran asks the bureau of protection and environment in Israel about the place with the cleanest air and they don’t have any data that can answer the question 08:08 – Together with Ran’s colleague, they built the app 08:19 – BreezoMeter was founded in 2014 08:26 – Team size 08:39 – BreezoMeter has raised $5M 08:48 – The last round was in July 2016 08:57 – The first round was a seed round with $2M 09:54 – All of BreezoMeter’s investors are approachable and they share the same vision 10:12 – Total number of users 10:46 – Dyson has an air purifier and you can download the Dyson link app that will show the air quality data 12:00 – Customers pay depending on the combination of the features they use and the volume of API calls 12:20 – BreezoMeter earns more from their features 13:03 – BreezoMeter doesn’t disclose their pricing because of their enterprise clients 13:48 – BreezoMeter caters to different industries 14:13 – CAC 15:51 – BreezoMeter raise funds to expand and increase their revenue 16:21 – For every sales rep, the revenue is $500K to $1M in annual revenue 16:37 – BreezoMeter has 4 sales rep 17:01 – The churn is due to some of the companies having medical devices 18:30 – BreezoMeter’s customers are paying at least $3K a month 19:32 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Air pollution directly impacts our health—therefore, knowing the air quality around us can inform our decisions regarding what products to use. A SaaS company that serves mainly enterprise businesses has a possibility of scaling faster. Keep on going and believe that you’re doing well. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/12/2017 • 26 minutes, 42 seconds
717: Why Moving Her Team to Brazil Was Genius
Emília Chagas. She’s the CEO of Contentools.com, a company that helps over 700 companies plan, create, distribute and analyze content. As a content manager for over 8 years, she has led video, book and web-based strategies at both enterprises and SMBs. She’s a 500 Startups entrepreneur and part of the Endeavor Promises Program. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hooked and The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Eric Santos of Resultados Digitais/RD Station Favorite online tool? — ProfitWell and ChartMogul How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How great life was” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Emília to the show 01:58 – Emília is currently in Florianópolis, Brazil 02:21 – Emília’s average salary 02:54 – Emília currently has 30 people 03:03 – Average headcount expenses 03:24 – Contentools is a SaaS model 03:31 – Contentools offers a content marketing platform for companies with marketing teams 04:04 – Everything that a marketing team needs are converged into 1 software 04:13 – Average customer pay per month varies 04:46 – Contentools does scheduling and the processes of the content workflow 05:08 – Contentools has 300 customers, 700 companies are using the platform 05:21 – Some pay through their agencies 05:35 – Average MRR 05:48 – Around $70K per month 05:58 – Contentools has raised an Angel round and will raise a seed round next year 06:08 – Total funds raised was $500K 06:19 – Contentools was launched in 2015 06:30 – Emília has been working with startups and enterprises and they have the same problem dealing with content 06:53 – Contentools went beta in July 2015 07:11 – Emília has a big dream for Contentools 07:24 – SMBs need content solutions but no one is offering them one 07:39 – “Content is the beginning of marketing” 07:55 – The 4 founders still own 80% of the company 08:43 – All of Emília’s ideas are currently focused on Contentools 08:55 – Contentools wants to create more business intelligence features and content that are targeted more to the customers’ needs 09:42 – Emília won’t sell the company at the moment 10:01 – Contentools is growing 10-20%, month over month in revenue 10:13 – Churn is usually around 2% and last month was net negative churn 10:49 – 3% gross churn 11:12 – Contentools is up selling their number of users and projects 11:58 – CAC 12:35 – 4 people on the team are focused on inbound marketing and there are also remote people 13:08 – Contentools doesn’t have paid acquisition 13:47 – Contentools is adding 20-30 new customers a month 14:07 – The Angel round was in May 2017 14:24 – Contentools is updating their leads for their fundraising next year 14:40 – Valuation won’t be out of the market 16:04 – If you fail updating one status, it’ll all be gone 17:13 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Content solutions are often offered to enterprises, but SMBs need them too. One of the cheapest forms of marketing is your content. It’s not easy for a content manager to handle the processes and workflow, so a good content management tool is necessary. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/11/2017 • 20 minutes, 54 seconds
716: Putin is Making This Man $50 Million Per Year
Stu Sjouwerman. He’s a serial entrepreneur and currently the founder and CEO of KnowBe4.com. He’s a big Shark Tank fan. He’s based in Tampa, Florida. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Positioning What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — SurveyMonkey How many hours of sleep do you get?—6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished that my 21 old self knew that Bill Gates was going to go into Windows server, in about 1995” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:21 – Nathan introduces Stu to the show 01:46 – KnowBe4 is a new school IT 01:51 – KnowBe4 focuses on modern security and awareness training 02:08 – KnowBe4 is a SaaS company 02:46 – Average pay per user is $15/year 03:01 – The charge is annual upfront which is easier and most people prefer that 03:26 – KnowBe4 focuses on organizations with 50 users and up 03:36 – Average seat size varies 03:52 – Average seat size for SMBs is 200-300 and for enterprise 1500-3000 seats 04:21 – Stu sold his anti-virus company in 2010 04:35 – It was called Sunbelt and Stu’s 4th startup 04:56 – “We are growing like crazy” 05:01 – KnowBe4 did $7M in 2015, $24M in 2016 and is targeting $50M this year 05:26 – KnowBe4 does inbound marketing and they send newsletters to their list of 1.2M people 05:40 – The list was built over several years 05:57 – KnowBe4 was bootstrapped for 5 years and Stu spent around a million building the company 06:07 – In December 2015, they took $8M from VC 06:47 – Total fund raised was $13M 07:11 – It was easy for Stu to let go of 20% of the company 07:25 – Stu’s told Kevin Mitnick that he would give him 50% of his company in exchange for Kevin’s 30-year experience in hacking 08:34 – The cap table 09:10 – Stu is confident that KnowBe4 will earn $50M this year 09:20 – Churn is 15% annually 09:33 – It is relatively easy to predict whether a SaaS model will be profitable 09:43 – KnowBe4 serves 9500 companies 09:55 – Average ARR 10:22 – March revenue 10:58 – Enterprise sales come in March 11:10 – Team size is 290 11:27 – CAC is around $2600 11:39 – CAC to LTV ratio is 7 12:02 – CAC payback is instant 12:17 – Average selling price per year 12:42 – Stu likes Vladimir Putin 14:03 – Eagles programs are state-sponsored programs that are offensive cyberattacks 14:49 – USA also has offensive cyber weapons, same with China and Russia 14:58 – Hackers go after the weak link in IT security, which is the human 15:15 – It comes in the form of an email 15:33 – KnowBe4 sends frequent phishing attacks that are similar to legitimate ones 15:43 – This will make the team aware and cause them to be on top of their toes in case they receive an attack 16:02 – KnowBe4 has a phish alert button 16:30 – KnowBe4 trains people with the real stuff 16:41 – Stu used to play soccer and is very competitive 16:49 – Stu has 2 reasons why he wants to go public: 16:52 – First, because he has never gone public before 16:57 – Second is to expand further and faster 17:12 – KnowBe4’s biggest competitors are PhishMe and Wombat 17:26 – Stu gets their competitors’ information from Owler 17:45 – There’s a possibility of Stu acquiring one of their competitors once they go public 18:11 – Stu got $10M from his previous exit and he’s NOT doing KnowBe4 for the money 18:57 – The biggest problem Stu had with his previous company was social engineering 19:08 – “Nobody is really taking care of the human IT security” 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s a big gap in human IT security and more and more people aren’t even aware they’re being hacked. Going public can help a company expand further and faster, and perhaps even acquire the competition. There is no such thing as retirement. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/10/2017 • 22 minutes, 56 seconds
715: This CEO Doesn't Care That VC Has Him By Throat
Ryan Sevey. He’s the CEO of Nexosis, an artificial intelligence and machine learning startup focused exclusively on developers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Aha! How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Learn how to be true to yourself” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Ryan to the show 01:55 – Nexosis was launched in 2015 01:59 – Nexosis offers a solution that big retailers are forecasting 02:24 – Nexosis has 300 developers who use their APIs 02:56 – Nexosis has developers from the retail space who have their point-of-sale data 03:11 – Nexosis will take the developers data and give out a result 04:13 – This result can help in the decision making for the future 04:34 – Nexosis gets people to be more proactive than reactive 04:52 – Nexosis found out how companies are using their historical data 05:14 – Nexosis adds more features to training 05:23 – Nexosis’s add-on layers 05:41 – With sentiment analysis, one good example is Wendy’s Twitter account 06:00 – You can use the number of tweets as a numerical value that can go back to your data 06:39 – One huge case involves a Wendy’s beside a convention center; Nexosis can predict future revenues 06:51 – Nexosis can predict future revenues and can understand the real impact of an event 07:23 – Nexosis focuses on the developer ecosystem 07:38 – Nexosis charges .10₵ per 1000 predictions 08:17 – Nexosis makes money once the developer talks to the enterprise and shows the API 08:43 – Nexosis charges the developers by consumption 09:24 – Average pay per customer depends on the data that they have which usually starts at $10K 09:42 – Nexosis was founded in 2015 09:53 – Ryan and his co-founder have been looking at machine learning since 2012 10:09 – Nexosis was originally considered an information security company 10:21 – Team size is 15 and they’re based in Ohio 10:38 – Nexosis has millions of API calls per month but their focus is on the number of developers 11:30 – Ryan’s vision is for developers to enjoy Nexosis, be it as a hobby or use in a professional way 11:55 – Nexosis is currently serving 100 different enterprise type of developers 12:26 – What Ryan sees is when a developer signs up, he’ll make 1-2 projects then invite his friend to try Nexosis 12:57 – Most of the developers are already in a company 13:10 – MRR 13:20 – Nexosis has raised a little less than $7M 13:39 – The long term goal for Nexosis is to raise more 13:56 – Twilio has survived their early days with VC funding 14:26 – Nexosis measures expansion rate rather than the churn 15:37 – Nexosis aims for 100% month over month growth and at the moment, they’re hitting it 16:30 – Consumption in terms of the number of predictions is over a million 17:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are companies who rely mostly on raising funds to scale. Knowing the data for your FUTURE can help in your decision making TODAY. No matter what—be true to yourself! Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/9/2017 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
714: You Won't Believe What This Divorced Mom Raised $7 Million For
Sheri Atwood. She’s the founder and CEO of SupportPay. She’s also a former Silicon Valley executive and a child of a bitter divorce who also went through her own divorce a few years ago. She’s created SupportPay when a search for a better way communicate about child support systems with her ex-husband proved totally fruitless. SupportPay is the first-ever automated child support payment platform poised to transform the complex, time-consuming & stressful process that impacts nearly 300M parents exchanging more than $900B in child support & child expenses worldwide. With SupportPay, today’s modern families can spend less time managing and arguing about child support, and more time focused on raising happy, healthy children. Prior to starting SupportPay, she was a former vice-president at Symantec and also has been named #5 of 50 Women in Tech Dominating Silicon Valley and Top 40 Under 40 Executives in Silicon Valley. She’s energetic, resourceful and lives by the motto “don’t talk about it, be about it.” Famous Five: Favorite Book? – What Got You Here Won’t Get You There What CEO do you follow? – Sheryl Sandberg, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk and Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Stack Exchange How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Enjoy the path, enjoy the lessons as you go” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan introduces Sheri to the show 02:37 – Sheri is going to lower the divorce rate by showing people that divorce just gets worst 02:49 – Millennials aren’t getting married but are having babies 03:10 – Sheri uses SupportPay and invented it because she didn’t have a solution 03:16 – Child support is made up of 2 things: a base payment that covers basic daily living expenses and then there’s other additional expenses 03:34 – The argument is about where the money is going and if it is enough to raise a kid 03:46 – While doing an expense report in Symantec, Sheri thought of the idea of SupportPay 04:04 – SupportPay started in 2011 04:38 – Sheri was raised by her single mom who was an alcoholic 04:48 – Sheri was one of the youngest VPs in Symantec and she was able to save money from her salary 04:57 – Sheri had multiple houses, cars, boats, gave his ex-husband a house and 2 years worth of salary in the bank 05:24 – Sheri bootstrapped SupportPay at first and she learned to code 05:40 – SupportPay has raised $7.1M total 05:49 – The series A was for $4.1M 05:59 – Sheri has talked to people and there was nothing to support parents 06:13 – Sheri also received calls from vendors thanking her 06:35 – SupportPay is a SaaS business 06:40 – Pricing starts at $9.99 a month 06:51 – There’s also a free version 06:55 – Each parent pays independently 07:05 – Average pay is $10 a month 07:28 – Sheri started hiring people in 2013 07:39 – Sheri learned to code the basic html, css and php by starting her own website 07:50 – Sheri self-studied from books that she found in Barnes and Nobles 08:08 – Team size is 25 and they just relocated to Sacramento, California from Silicon Valley 08:30 – Team has 14 engineers 08:39 – After raising $3M, Sheri realized she couldn’t sustain a business in Silicon Valley 08:45 – Sheri was burning $95K a month 09:08 – Sheri’s equity table is a mess now because of her tech people switching to another company for a better offer 09:16 – Sheri would have focused on revenue a little bit earlier 09:48 – Sheri didn’t have revenue until July of 2016 10:08 – SupportPay was processing $3M in child support 10:19 – SupportPay currently looks at processing $4M a month in child support 10:30 – SupportPay has over 43K customers with 2K paying customers 11:03 – MRR is close to $100K 12:12 – SupportPay has a free 30 day trial 12:27 – The value of the product is the history, which can be used in court 12:46 – SupportPay also provides certified report records 13:31 – Churn on active users is 3% annually 13:57 – Conversion rate from visitor to paid user is 12% 14:50 – The bigger valuation for SupportPay is how it solves the problem of child support 16:00 – After getting into fundraising, SupportPay focused on their revenue 16:25 – 2016 revenue 16:41 – Sheri has talked to Salesforce to get them involved in SupportPay 17:10 – Salesforce is trying to move government applications into the cloud 17:15 – SupportPay will get Salesforce into the government space quickly 17:30 – SupportPay is built on the salesforce platform 18:00 – Tim Draper invested in SupportPay as he saw the value 18:17 – Sheri’s goal for building SupportPay 20:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: More millennials are having babies, but are not getting married—this leads to more parents having problems with child support. Having one less argument regarding child support will alleviate stress for the whole family unit. The divorce rate isn’t getting any better, it’s just getting worst. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/8/2017 • 22 minutes, 59 seconds
713: You'll Never Guess What Salary They Gave Up To Launch Their Startup
Ryan Hungate. He’s the co-founder of Simplifeye, it’s the number one technology experience for healthcare providers, patients and their businesses. The company’s platform of software solution health care providers improve productivity, efficiency and profitability. Ryan is an orthodontist and previous Apple retail strategist and Zach is a previous founder and Wall Street alum with a background in Tech MNA. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup (Zach) What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Calendly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 (Zach) 3 (Ryan) If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How difficult business can actually be” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan introduces Ryan and Zach to the show 01:54 – Ryan’s dad was a doctor 03:00 – Simplifeye tries to make doctors’ lives easier 03:28 – Simplifeye provides the patients’ information before they walk in during checkups 04:03 – Ryan and Zach are VC buddies 04:07 – They’ve raised money from their hedge fund friends 04:12 – They applied at AngelPad 04:35 – Simplifeye was a halfway project and they thought it would be big 04:52 – it was in 2015 when they got into AngelPad 05:02 – Zach gave up hundreds of thousands in a salary when he joined Simplifeye 05:14 – Ryan gave up his $500K salary 05:34 – They rationalize building a startup by getting validation from different capital companies 06:01 – They also know that they can be in every doctor’s office 06:17 – Simplifeye has raised $3.5M 06:24 – Angelpad’s terms 06:50 – It was September 2015 when Ryan and Zach came out to NY and ended up coming out with AngelPad strong 07:21 – Simplifeye’s customers are healthcare practitioners who pay on a monthly basis 07:25 – Simplifeye tries to involve everybody—to teams of doctors, nurses, dentists and others 08:18 – Average pay is $2400 a year 08:39 – Expansion revenue is based on the size of the practice 09:08 – Simplifeye is also HIPAA compliant chat 09:28 – Simplifeye started with the Apple watch 10:00 – Nathan had Laurence Girard on Episode 575 who talked about the HIPAA compliant chat 10:16 – Being HIPAA compliant is a huge advantage for you 10:20 – Doctors communicate with each other in an insecure manner 10:35 – The limited standard 10:56 – Doctors will pay a fee if they break the standard 11:29 – Simplifeye always tries to be transparent 11:46 – Having Simplifeye can make doctors feel better in their daily processes 11:53 – Simplifeye just passed 1000 office signups 12:03 – MRR 12:44 – Simplifeye has 90% annual retention 13:24 – Team size is 13 14:42 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Doctors feel more comfortable using HIPAA compliant products and services. You have to trust your product in order to take that leap from the corporate world. Enjoy what you’re doing and believe that you WILL be successful. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/7/2017 • 18 minutes, 13 seconds
712: How To Use a Distribution Channel to Get 200 Customers Paying $15k per Year
Seymour Duncker. He’s the co-founder and CEO of a company called iCharts, the leader in cloud business intelligence and analytics and a seasoned entrepreneur who has been both a consumer and developer of visual analytics. Before founding iCharts, Seymour assisted SAP’s senior management in driving the company’s product strategy and was an early team member at 2 enterprise software startups before that. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Inevitable What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — NetSuite and Salesforce How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Spend a little more time outdoors” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:26 – Nathan introduces Seymour to the show 03:12 – iCharts is a cloud-based business and intelligence analytics solution platform 03:24 – iCharts is a SaaS model 03:36 – iCharts partners with NetSuite which is a cloud-based EOP 03:48 – NetSuite uses iCharts as an embed BI (Business Intelligence) engine that powers iCharts for NetSuite’s customers 04:05 – iCharts is like an app inside NetSuite 04:55 – iCharts can take any kind of data and visually represent it so that people can interact and analyze the data 05:16 – The analogy of iCharts is like the car's’ navigation system which is separated from the car’s build 05:55 – iCharts considers SaaS businesses as an ecosystem and NetSuite is a large ecosystem 06:05 – iCharts has a mixed business model 06:24 – iCharts is also looking into exclusive partnerships with a SaaS platform to distribute iCharts 06:55 – Pricing starts at $15K per annum depending on the number of users on a platform 07:54 – Seymour arrived in the USA, in 2010 08:10 – Seymour is from Germany 08:50 – When Seymour had an idea for a cloud-based business intelligence platform, he was thinking about where to build it 09:27 – Back then, it was easier to sell in the USA than in Germany 10:10 – Being in California was also a great idea for Seymour’s wife, so they built iCharts in the USA 10:37 – Team size is 60 10:56 – Sales team has 20 people 11:35 – The majority of iCharts’ market 11:49 – iCharts will know the pain points of the users of NetSuite 12:53 – iCharts will already have an idea of the customer’s needs 13:45 – iCharts has around 200 customers 14:04 – iCharts started focusing on various markets 14:25 – iCharts has raised $23M to date but they were initially bootstrapped 15:07 – Churn is around 5-7% 16:20 – CAC 16:32 – iCharts is highly profitable from the initial time they closed a deal 17:04 – There’s an advantage of growing faster and burning yourself as you grow too fast 17:44 – At the end of the day, it’s all about having a high-functioning team that produces quality 18:04 – Average ARR 18:21 – iCharts also offers additional services for their larger customers 20:13 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Build your business wherever you’d like to—even if it means leaving your home country. Having a well-functioning team that produces QUALITY will drive your revenue and contribute to the success of your business. Make time for rest and vacations; this will relax and regenerate you. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/6/2017 • 23 minutes, 25 seconds
711: Bootrapping into Silicon Valley
Daniel Fagella. He started a mixed martial arts gym when he was an undergrad and sold it after getting a UPenn graduate degree in cognitive science. He did turn his grad school thesis on skill development into an ecommerce business that grew for 4 years, reaching $4.2M in top line sales and recently sold it for a million dollars with 90% paid upfront. He’s now using his funds for TechEmergence.com in order to influence global AI policy for the better. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Plutarch’s Lives What CEO do you follow? – Last bio he read was Marcus Aurelius’ Favorite online tool? — Asana How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Daniel would tell himself that dealing with the existential human condition could be done by contributing to a much bigger world Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Dan to the show 02:08 – Dan was studying skill development and goal setting science in psychology for his undergrad 02:17 – Schooling was expensive; Dan decided that he’d rather use himself as a skill development guinea pig than a pizza deliverer 02:40 – Dan started teaching and making money at the back of a carpet store 03:11 – Dan’s jiujitsu gym was the smallest business back then 04:03 – Dan sold the gym after 3-4 years with $250K ARR 04:14 – Dan was 25 when he sold the gym 04:41 – The membership fee was $157 05:07 – Dan sold it for over $100K with 10% upfront to his right-hand and friend 05:45 – The business ran for over 2-3 years after that 06:05 – Dan took $30K from the $113K 06:36 – Dan was also making $20K a month selling martial arts instructional resources online 07:09 – Dan was using Infusionsoft for his e-commerce business, Science of Skill 07:56 – The e-commerce was doing around $200K top line 08:42 – The biggest cost for Science of Skill was on merchant processing, customer acquisition, advertising and affiliates 09:26 – Dan likes to spend half of his CLV (Customer Lifetime Value) on acquisition 09:42 – The CLV for membership programs were around $100 and affiliates $50-60 10:00 – One of the affiliates was Survival Frog of Byron 10:23 – Byron drove Science of Skill into 6-figures 10:44 – Dan was paying affiliates upfront 11:15 – Byron of Survival Frog was on Episode 395 11:44 – There are agencies who get onto their email list by paying 12:14 – One of the agencies is com 13:02 – Finding the right people to advertise and won’t tag you as spam 13:11 – Dan will find firearm sites in com—go through the website owners and email them to find the right people to target 14:11 – Dan sold Science of Skill in February 2017 for a little over a million dollars 14:22 – Science of Skill was valued by the multiple of net 15:11 – Science of Skill revenue in 2016 16:27 – Dan’s ultimate goal 16:31 – The buyers are a private group of 2 buyers in Ohio who previously ran SaaS businesses then sold them to the government 17:05 – Science of Skill should be at Inc 500 for 2016 17:13 – Dan sold Science of Skill because he believed he has better and bigger things to do in life 17:25 – Dan’s core objective involves the global conversation of neuroscience and AI 17:48 – TechEmergence focuses on the business applications of AI 18:08 – TechEmergence is not making money, but will make money primarily through advertising 19:09 – The goal now is to scale and make traction 19:21 – Current cash burn 20:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can start your business literally anywhere. Focus on your goals and objectives, even if it means having to burn cash. The future will probably evolve around n_euroscience and AI. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/5/2017 • 22 minutes, 44 seconds
710: How This SaaS Company is Using $20 Million to Scale
Allan Willie. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Klipfolio, a software-as-a-service dashboard company with over 8500 paying customers including Jet.com, Zendesk, Aviva and Ikea. He previously co-founded a company called Espial, an internet device software firm that is now publicly traded on TSX. He lives in Ottawa with his wife and 2 daughters. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lead by Greatness What CEO do you follow? – Tobias Lütke Favorite online tool? — SEO Plus Chrome plug in and Owler How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5-7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Listen, build something of value and then see if you could raise money” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Allan to the show 01:50 – All of the meeting rooms in Klipfolio’s office have different wallpaper 02:12 – Klipfolio is an online, cloud-based, dashboard vendor 02:18 – Klipfolio works with mid-sized businesses who use them for everything 02:40 – Nathan uses Klipfolio quite aggressively, especially for his Facebook live streams 04:17 – When Allan was last on The Top, he was passing 7K customers—now he has 8500 customers 04:36 – In January, Klipfolio announced a $12M raise which was an insight round from existing investors 05:14 – The initial round was to raise an external round 05:43 – “We did use market to validate” 06:12 – Klipfolio had verbal offers that were lucrative 06:40 – The valuation were multiples for some of the terms 07:00 – Klipfolio also had some acquisition discussions 08:08 – Allan won’t call the acquisition discussions offers, because it would still have to go through a lot 08:59 – In every acquisition discussion, you want to layer how much information to present to another company 09:35- Customers usually get the $70 plan for the first month, then move up to $150 in a year 10:10 – Some of the customers are partners who can pay directly or pay as a partner 10:24 – 30% of Klipfolio’s income come from their partner channels 10:35 – Last month revenue was $500-600K 11:16 – Klipfolio’s valuation was between $700-800K 11:25 – Some of the VCs that Allan has talked to are putting terms in place with a higher valuation 11:47 – You have to sustain your valuation to get into the next round 12:34 – Anything on Klipfolio is being tracked 13:15 – The weirdest use case 13:25 – There are NGOs who use Klipfolio to push some of their metrics out 13:34 – Red Cross uses Klipfolio for flooding, zika virus and other stuff that is happening in Africa 14:11 – Churn has gone up slightly 14:35 – Klipfolio started paid ads for $120K a month 14:41 – Klipfolio has a blog about the lessons they’ve learned from Facebook Ads 15:24 – One of the cons of ads is that the conversion rate drops and churn goes up—which is normal 15:40 – CAC 15:54 – LTV 16:05 – LTV to CAC is still relatively healthy 16:26 – Team size is around 90 16:47 – The team is moving to a new space in November 18:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Maintain your valuation in order to get into the next round. Not all acquisition talks are considered offers. A company of great value has a better chance of raising money and getting acquired down the road. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/4/2017 • 22 minutes, 22 seconds
709: 17,000 Using This To Manage Wardrobe Efficiently
Blake Smith. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Cladwell, a clothing company that doesn’t sell clothing. His goal is to fight for sustainability and human labor practices by enabling people to buy fewer, but better clothes. Blake was at The Top a year ago where he articulated that they passed 11,500 customers with each customer paying $6/month; so, they were doing about $70K MRR a year ago. They were at about 5% churn, monthly spending and at $17 to acquire new customers. They’re based in Cincinnati and they’ve raised about $1.8M and $100K in revenue. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Wooden on Leadership What CEO do you follow? – Ben Horowitz Favorite online tool? — Calendly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 2 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Blake would tell himself the importance of following your curiosity as opposed to having a strategy or a plan Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan introduces Blake to the show 01:59 – Cladwell’s current customers is around 17K in number 02:06 – Cladwell is an everyday styling app 02:50 – When you go to the Cladwell’s website, you’ll click “buy” 02:58 – Cladwell is also downloadable in the App store 03:12 – Cladwell is doing pricing tests 03:45 – Cladwell looks at other SaaS products that customers are paying for 04:02 – Cladwell also looks at other workout apps 04:21 – Cladwell is looking into charging $9 04:41 – “We’re going forward unless proven otherwise” 04:47 – Pricing tests never end, especially with SaaS 05:31 – Last month total revenue is around $60K 05:41 – Cladwell used to bill quarterly 05:49 – Cladwell is around 900K ARR 06:17 – 80% of Cladwell’s customers are using the web app on their mobile devices 06:42 – Last year’s revenue in the same month 07:19 – Marketing spend last year 07:32 – Cladwell has recently raised a $1.2M round 08:07 – 2016 total sales is $760K 09:35 – Blake explains how the app works on a daily basis 09:40 – Every morning, the Cladwell app gives a recommendation of what to wear 09:53 – Cladwell recommends 3 outfits basing on what’s in your closet and the daily weather 10:18 – Cladwell will also know what you wore for 3 days 10:55 – The more that you use the app, the better the experience is 11:35 – Majority of Cladwell’s users are working millennial moms 12:18 – People have tried Cladwell’s ideas before and onboarding was the biggest issue 12:33 – Cladwell did something similar to Google venture’s sprint design process 12:56 – Cladwell provides a feed of all the potential items in a person’s wardrobe 13:34 – A female customer will have an average of 60-70 pieces of clothing in her wardrobe 13:58 – The onboarding process is now easier for customers because of the feed 15:30 – Team size is around 15 16:02 – Cladwell’s currently spending is still TBD 16:18 – Churn rate is a bit high 16:50 – From the 17K customers, around 5K has downloaded the app 18:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Onboarding is one of the biggest challenges for a styling company, customers lose interest using the product. More and more millennial mothers are finding it hard to manage their time; having an app that will save them time daily is heaven sent. Follow your curiosity—it can lead you to something GREAT. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/3/2017 • 20 minutes, 35 seconds
708: $35M Raised to Tell IT Departments What Alerts Are Important
Assaf Resnick. He’s the founder and CEO of BigPanda, an algorithm-make IT operations platform that turns IT alert noise into insight, unifies fragmented operations and enables digital enterprises to attain dramatic or pretty high service levels. Prior to founding the company, he was an investor for Sequoia Capital where he focused on early stage companies across enterprise software, SaaS and the internet sector. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Goal What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Salesforce How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Start a company early” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:17 – Nathan introduces Assaf to the show 01:52 – Sometimes, Assaf would still ask himself why he left Sequoia 02:00 – Assaf spent 6 years in Sequoia and it was an opportunity of a lifetime 02:19 – Assaf started in Sequoia when he was 29 02:36 – Assaf was bitten by the entrepreneur bug, so he left Sequoia 03:30 – Assaf’s stayed in Sequoia for personal career growth 03:43 – Sequoia is different from other VC firms 04:31 – For Assaf, Sequoia expresses the combination of opportunities in the market 05:33 – Assaf is proud of the deals that he had made with Sequoia 06:00 – Assaf found Snaptu to be an interesting deal they invested in 07:00 – BigPanda automates the ability of human-beings and IT operations to keep up with data centers that are radically evolved 07:50 – The big part of IT spending usually goes to the engineers 08:00 – In the data centers, they have to keep the software and infrastructure that is radically transforming running 08:40 – A data company needs to have a handful of tools, data centers and servers 09:15 – One of BigPanda’s clients is a Fortune 50 and a large networking company 09:30 – The company now has SaaS offerings and gives the SLA (Service Level Agreement) that they promise to companies 10:15 – The company has teams of engineers in Ukraine, California and India that use 15 monitoring tools to see what is happening 10:37 – The company has 70K data points they need to keep track 11:05 – The amount of data engineers they need has become an issue 11:27 – The problems in the war room can be both preventative and reactionary 11:45 – BigPanda uses a lot machine learning and dynamic classroom instruction to get through the noise 12:10 – An alert can be a problem with the server and something that you can just leave out 13:31 – One should examine if the “if/then statements” are dynamic 13:45 – The “if/then statements” vary day by day, then variables change quickly 14:13 – BigPanda was launched in 2012 14:20 – BigPanda is a SaaS company which charges annually 14:45 – Pricing average 14:51 – BigPanda caters to very large companies 15:20 – Team size is 60 15:28 – BigPanda has raised almost $35M 15:46 – BigPanda has done a regional series B 16:08 – BigPanda partners with Sequoia, Mayfield and In Battery 16:28 – At the end of 2015, people started devaluing some unicorns 16:59 – When Assaf saw rain clouds forming, he thought it made sense to get a winter coat from a capital perspective 17:40 – BigPanda had plenty of pipelines 18:02 – Half of the company is based in Palo Alto and half is in Tel Aviv, Israel 19:03 – Half of the people are in engineering and product, the other half is marketing 19:49 – BigPanda is very disciplined with their model 20:39 – BigPanda has around 25 companies from Fortune 500 22:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’ve committed to always being there for your client, you better follow through on that. No matter how many engineers you have, there’s always a chance of them missing a lapse in the data. Start your business as early as possible. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/2/2017 • 26 minutes, 57 seconds
707: Government Gives Him Power to Let Non-Accredited Investors Invest
Manny Fernandez. He’s a Stanford University educated Angel investor, serial entrepreneur and best-selling author featured on CNBC’s Make Me a Millionaire Inventor premier episode. He’s been successfully investing his own ideas as well as taking companies from startup to exit. Recently, he was named by INC magazine as one of the 33 entrepreneurs to watch in 2016. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? –“Wisdom and experience beats, no matter how [many] great talents you have” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan introduces Manny to the show 01:51 – Manny’s first company was an investment property 02:10 – It was a 6-figure transaction 02:21 – Manny decided that he wanted to go from 1 investment to 10 02:39 – One of Manny’s most notable investments is TaskRabbit 02:58 – Manny is the founder of SF Angels which has 32 members 03:08 – The deal flow comes from others 03:30 – The funds for an Angel round is $250K per year 03:46 – As an Angel, you’re looking for the deal flow 04:46 – One of the members of SF Angels is an early investor of TaskRabbit and SF Angels was invited 05:00 – Angels can invest as an individual or as a group 05:32 – Everyone has different preferences 06:31 – Some of the investors in SF Angels are successful enough 07:01 – The potential of investing in SF Angels is different from real estate 07:11 – If you’re investing in something that is really working well, results are astronomical 07:47 – Manny suggests to invest only what you can afford to lose 07:56 – Everyone has different financial workflow and abilities 08:31 – Manny has put in greater than normal in angel investing 08:49 – Normal is around 2-5% 09:19 – DreamFunded allows everyday Americans to invest as small as $1 into a company 09:35 – DreamFunded is the first platform in Silicon Valley to receive the approval to allow non-accredited investors to invest, so they’re accepting accredited investors and ordinary people 10:03 – Manny has been on the screening community of TiE Angels 10:11 – Manny is good at doing his due-diligence 10:29 – DreamFunded applied as a registered funding portal 11:15 – Manny has personally vetted on the deals on DreamFunded 12:06 – DreamFunded has a legal disclosure where investors can see the minimum amount they have to close to in order to close the transaction 12:33 – The information is not readily available on the website 13:02 – Investors will get an email telling them the closing dates 13:23 – DreamFunded gets 5% upon closing and the 2%the company is offering 13:50 – There are over 30 companies that have closed deals in DreamFunded 13:56 – Over $35M total funds raised 14:07 – The non-accredited investor is still new 14:16 – DreamFunded has not released their total funds raised from non-accredited 14:36 – The first approval for non-accredited was received by DreamFunded in July 2016 14:54 – DreamFunded was launched fall 2014 15:01 – Average team size is 10 15:16 – DreamFunded’s model changes overtime 16:02 – A company can raise its target and at the same time, receive an investment from a big company 17:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Invest only on what you afford to lose. Investing in a company that is already working is smart, but venturing into other investment streams requires your due diligence. Listen to your mentors, they are mentors for a reason. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/1/2017 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
706: This 31 Year Old Raised $1.3M To Help You Be More Efficient
Vinay Patankar. He’s the CEO of Process Street, the simplest way to manage your teams’ recurring processes and workflows. Vinay sets up new clients, onboard employees and manages content publishing with his tool. He also co-host the podcast Business Systems Explored where he deep dives into business systems with industry experts. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk, Zach Nelson and Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — io How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That you can make money on the internet” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:50 – Nathan introduces Vinay to the show 01:28 – Process Street is a tool that helps companies build and manage their workflows and processes 01:34 – Process Street is a SaaS product, charging on a monthly or yearly subscription based on the number of users one has 01:44 – The vision is to make workflows easy 02:28 – Process Street is from an intuitive perspective 02:53 – Average customer pay 03:42 – Process Street has options for pricing and incentives for annual contracts 04:04 – Process Street was launched in 2013 as a side project 04:10 – Seed round was raised a year and a half ago 04:20 – Team size is 21 04:30 – Total raised was $1.3M 04:47 – Process Street went through Angel Cloud 05:10 – Nathan thinks that the one who will win the space is the one who is better at distribution 05:42 – Distribution is the key in finding a scalable sales process and getting the pricing right 05:57 – The space is very fragmented 06:34 – Vinay thinks they don’t need to beat the competition, they just need to grab enough volume of shares 06:52 – Process Street focuses on SEO 07:04 – They measure their rank from targeted keywords 07:28 – Process Street has a marketing team that helps with distribution 08:13 – SEO is cost-effective 08:35 – CAC from the SEO efforts 09:06 – MRPU 09:17 – Process Street doesn’t spend in other marketing channels 09:26 – Process Street invests in sales deeper into their funnels 10:00 – Expansion rate varies depending on the size of the customer 10:28 – Process Street has a healthy expansion revenue 11:26 – 15 of the team are focused on marketing 11:35 – Process Street is still working on their headcount expenses 11:56 – Process Street will adjust and optimize pricing 12:29 – Average number of customers 12:41 – MRR 13:03 – Process Street’s goal is to raise an A round at the first or second quarter of 2018 13:20 – Target MRR by the end of 2017 13:35 – Process Street has no paid acquisition 14:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The one that will scale in the project management space is the one that is better at distribution. You don’t always need to beat your competitors, just gain your shares and increase your volume. There is real money that can be made on the internet. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/30/2017 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
705: With $8.8M Raised, Is This The Ultimate Machine Learning Tool?
Scott Clark. He’s the co-founder and CEO of SigOpt, a Y-Combinator and Andreessen Horowitz backed, optimization as a service startup. Scott has been applying after-learning technologies in industry and academia for years. He holds a PhD for applied mathematics and an MS in computer science from Cornell University and a BS degree in mathematics, physics and computational physics from Oregon State University. He was chosen as one of Forbes' 30 under 30 in 2016. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz and Phil Knight Favorite online tool? — Gmail and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Scott would tell himself that it doesn’t get easier, so set up habits and processes to make things sustainable when you have the time and ability to do it because that will definitely help once things ramp up Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Scott to the show 01:25 – SigOpt is optimization as a service 01:27 – SigOpt helps companies build different, complex AI and machine learning pipelines 01:41 – SigOpt is a SaaS model and the subscription is based on the number of models per month 01:53 – Pricing starts at $2500 a month and enterprise starts at $10K a month 02:13 – Average monthly RPU 02:33 – SigOpt usually engages at the executive level 02:38 – People wanted to use AI for their businesses but couldn’t find the right person to do the work so they go with SigOpt 03:23 – One of SigOpt’s client is Prudential 03:31 – Insurance companies are augmenting their traditional methods to the new data that is being collected 03:48 – As their data increases, the need for the best possible performance increases 04:26 – What SigOpt does is different from the traditional machine learning as a service companies 04:41 – Scott shares a specific example of how SigOpt works with credit card companies 04:44 – Fraud detection has been around for decades 05:28 – SigOpt fine tunes different knobs and levers in the configuration parameters that makes the machine model work 06:15 – SigOpt focuses on black box optimization 07:45 – SigOpt relies on the domain expertise of the person at the specific firm to build a deep learning model 08:31 – SigOpt applies an ensemble of global optimization techniques to the problem so they can efficiently configure the system 09:20 – SigOpt suggests different curvatures 09:58 – SigOpt has raised $8.8M to date 10:30 – SigOpt never sees the underlying data 11:11 – The entire system is designed to be hands-off 11:43 – SigOpt was launched end of 2013 11:51 – Number of paying customers is around a dozen 12:18 – Average MRR 12:25 – SigOpt prefer annual deals 12:54 – No churn yet 13:14 – Team size is 13 13:35 – The capital raised was spent on the team and the enterprise sales efforts 13:54 – 3-4 of the team are in sales 14:05 – CAC 14:22 – They sometimes visit their customers 14:55 – Investors like to make big bets on the new technologies 15:33 – The goal for the series A money 16:33 – Average expenses 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The need for AI and machine-learning is growing fast and there’s not enough people who are qualified to develop these products. The headcount can eat up most of a company’s expenses—especially in the technology industry. Optimization services make a business more efficient leading to a less to none churn rate. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/29/2017 • 20 minutes, 49 seconds
704: A Son Saving His Mom With Health Tech Product That Recognizes Seizures
Eric Dolan. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Neutun. He has 5 years of startup experience and business management experience. He also has data science experience with a focus on product development and management. In 2014, his team received an award for Best Smartwatch App in the Hack the North Competition in Canada. Recently, Eric was named INC’s 30 under 30, a list that recognizes the best young CEOs in America. He received his bachelor in business administration from University of Western Ontario and his post graduate specialization certificate from the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, New York University School of Business and John Hopkins University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Mixmax How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Go more towards your business and tech side, that’s where you’re going to make more money” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:50 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 01:42 – Eric is a Canadian and has been in US for 1.5 years 02:11 – Eric is currently in Canada during the interview 02:35 – Neutun is a software that makes it easier for patients to keep track of chronic diseases 02:44 – Eric’s mom has epilepsy and it was difficult for them to manage the seizures and medications 03:06 – Neutun keeps track of the seizures and manages the medications on time 03:28 – Neutun is device-agnostic 03:37 – It allows users to use their existing smartphone to track 03:45 – Neutun makes money through lead generation 04:17 – Eric is looking at a million dollar runway for 2017 05:09 – Neutun’s revenue is predictable for a SaaS business 05:56 – Neutun’s initial model was a lead generator for pharmaceutical companies 06:02 – In the long term, Eric wanted Neutun to transition to a market-intelligence company 06:14 – Neutun wanted to address all chronic diseases 06:30 – Neutun has 10K organic users 07:15 – Neutun was launched late 2016 07:47 – People find Neutun mainly from word-of-mouth 08:18 – There are also doctors who are recommending Neutun 08:38 – Neutun makes money through scripts or prescriptions 09:08 – Average amount per script 10:23 – Neutun tries to benefit the user as much as possible 10:46 – Neutun also suggests sponsored medication 11:06 – Average medication expenses of a patient 11:42 – Neutun is almost similar with tracking steps 11:53 – Through Neutun’s algorithms and AI, it can detect a seizure 12:11 – Then the recording will start 12:44 – Tracking the seizure is important for doctors 12:58 – With Neutun’s data, doctors can prescribe more accurate medications 14:10 – The only way to prevent seizures is to do what doctors tell you to do and take the medications 14:37 – Neutun was initially bootstrapped 14:56 – Neutun has raised a million on a kiss convertible note 15:33 – Team size is 7 16:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If patients can track their seizures accurately, doctors can prescribe a more appropriate prescription. The advancement in technology is benefitting the health industry in many ways. Go where you can earn well. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/28/2017 • 19 minutes, 50 seconds
703: The "Accidental" $10k/mo Side Project
Paul Tyma. He’s the founder and creator of a tool called Mailinator which is an email system. He’s also a startup veteran and has focused on 4 Silicon Valley startups including Preemptive Solutions, Manybrain Inc which owns Mailinator, Home-Account.com which was acquired by Bills.com, and Refresh Inc which was acquired by LinkedIn. He’s a frequent speaker, writer and author of one of the original books on Java called Java Primer Plus. Dr. Tyma has received his PhD from Syracuse University focused on Java/.Net performance. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Amy Errett and Bradley Kam Favorite online tool? — Linode How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How to talk to girls” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:53 – Nathan introduces Paul to the show 01:48 – Paul started his first company during his PhD 01:56 – After getting his PhD, Paul worked for Google 02:12 – Paul is still part of the board for Preemptive Solutions 02:18 – Refresh had a very visible exit and is currently at LinkedIn icebreakers 02:37 – The acquisition was in 2015 02:45 – Acquisition price 02:54 – Refresh was a consumer application 03:10 – Refresh has raised $10M in total 03:20 – The first round was a priced round 03:53 – Refresh had 100K users 04:30 – Refresh built its own identity from scratch 04:40 – The technology of Refresh 05:40 – Home-Account.com was built prior to Refresh 05:59 – Paul was a minor founder 06:15 – Option pool 07:23 – Selling a company and staying with the company who acquired it is a cliché in Silicon Valley 08:19 – Mailinator was a side project Paul built 13 years ago 08:30 – It was a receive only mail service 08:50 – Mailinator lets you create a disposable email 10:17 – Mailinator had some ads which paid for the server 11:30 – Mailinator now makes money from affiliates 11:47 – Mailinator’s brand became strong 11:56 – There was a high usage from QA departments who tested their signups process and welcome email 12:11 – They asked Mailinator for additional features 12:40 – Hundreds of QA teams now are using and paying Mailinator 13:16 – Mailinator also has a private paid domain 13:40 – Pricing is $29 for single user and $129 for a team 13:56 – Average RPU is $35 14:31 – Average MRR 14:57 – Paul is now turning Mailinator into a business 15:21 – Churn is pretty high 15:48 – Less paid advertising 16:16 – Mailinator has 45K unique users a day 16:44 – 25K new inboxes are set up everyday 16:58 – “This is not a DAU product” 17:21 – Mailinator has not raised money 18:09 – Team size is 3 18:30 – Gross margin 18:59 – Server cost 19:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A side project can definitely turn into something more—don’t underestimate its potential. An email does NOT reflect one’s identity. There are thousands of emails being made and sent every day—having a disposable one is almost a necessity. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/27/2017 • 23 minutes, 24 seconds
702: With $5k Left in Her Bank TheMuse Was Launched, 50m Visit Annually and 600 Companies Pay
Kathryn Minshew. She’s the CEO of founder of TheMuse.com, a career platform that is used by over 50M folks to find jobs, learn professional skills or advance in their careers. This platform is also used by hundreds of companies looking to grow their employer brand and to hire. Kathryn is a Harvard and Wall Street Journal contributor and she’s spoken at MIT in Harvard along with the Today’s Show. She’s been named The Smart CEO’s Future 50, INC’s 35 under 35 and a Duke alum. Kathryn worked at Rwanda and Health Access Initiative and before founding The Muse, she was previously at McKinsey. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things and Traction What CEO do you follow? – Jennifer Hyman, Elon Musk and Jeremy Johnson Favorite online tool? — Boomerang and Pocket How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Kathryn wished she knew it was okay to be different and everything that is worth doing is hard Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:42 – Nathan introduces Kathryn to the show 01:35 – The Muse was founded to be the most trusted and beloved place for people to navigate their career 01:42 – The Muse is a marketplace with over 50M people who uses the site annually 02:00 – The Muse has over 600 companies which they help in hiring and employment 02:25 – “If you want really great people, you have to compete for them” 03:00 – The companies can reach more candidates through The Muse 03:19 – The Muse is a SaaS-enabled marketplace 03:31 – The Muse somehow competes with LinkedIn Recruit and Glassdoor 04:05 – Most companies in The Muse sign up for an annual subscription 04:24 – Average pricing is $20-30K but enterprise is higher than the mid-market businesses 04:54 – The Muse works with every business size in every industry 05:04 – The businesses are categorized by team size 05:25 – Companies that are subscribed have access to different tools on the website 06:11 – The marketplace on TheMuse.com is where companies can post their profiles and job listings 06:21 – The Muse has also developed more products 06:41 – One of The Muse’s client has 50K to 150K employees 07:29 – The Muse also assists their Fortune 100 companies on their existing channels 08:12 – The Muse started targeting individual users 08:24 – The Muse was launched in 2011 having career related tools and content for individuals 08:31 – The Muse rolled out their first company profile after hitting 100K website visits per month 08:41 – The Muse have never had advertising on the website 08:58 – The Muse had their first 100K users in 6 months 09:05 – The initial cash for The Muse came from Kathryn’s savings 09:39 – When Kathryn left McKinsey, she had $25K in savings 09:50 – Then Kathryn got an offer to work at Rwanda 10:28 – Kathryn was 25 at the time 10:56 – Kathryn has always thought that savings equate to freedom 11:34 – When Kathryn came back from Rwanda, she started a business similar to The Muse 13:02 – Kathryn spent $20K on her first company 13:23 – With only $5K left in savings, Kathryn together with her co-founder started The Muse 13:45 – Kathryn tried to keep her expenses low 14:24 – Kathryn started The Muse because she had all the questions and wanted answers 14:29 – The community then gave Kathryn the answers 15:02 – The Muse initially had 50 articles giving career advice and providing resources 15:10 – The first job listing was posted after a month as a test 15:29 – The Muse used to get paid for the job listing but it doesn’t work that way now 16:17 – Kathryn shares how the conversation happened between her and the co-founders 17:11 – They wanted to work and make it happen 17:25 – The equity between them is almost even 17:54 – The Muse raised a round for $100K in 2012 and got into Y-combinator 18:41 – The Muse raised $10M in a series A in 2015, and $16M in a Series B: Q1 of 2017 19:12 – The Muse is closed to breaking even 19:31 – There are different ways in building a business and there’s no one perfect path 19:53 – The Muse has 600 active businesses 20:10 – Some companies just closed or got acquired 21:35 – Average revenue 23:05 – The Famous Five 23:32 – Kathryn’s book The New Rules of Work 3 Key Points: You can start a business with minimal means and still grow it into a profitable one. There is no one perfect path to building a business. If a task or venture is hard, that’s a good sign it’s worth it. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/26/2017 • 28 minutes, 27 seconds
701: Smart Desk King Sells $10,000,000+
Duy Huynh. He’s the founder of Autonomous.ai which builds smart office products to help people work smarter. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Stewart Butterfield Favorite online tool? — Google Analytics How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Focus on and build something really helpful to people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:50 – Nathan introduces Duy to the show 01:20 – Subscribe to Youtube to see Duy using a smart desk 01:32 – Smart desk helps work smart the whole day 01:48 – “We don’t care much about the money” 02:02 – Autonomous’ mission is how they can help companies’ work smarter 02:51 – Autonomous wants to reinvent every single item in an office 03:15 – One of Autonomous’ products is the Cardboard 03:30 – It is created for people who want an affordable standing desk 04:05 – It sells for $19 04:17 – Cardboard is a fairly new product 04:42 – Autonomous was founded in 2014 05:10 – Autonomous has shipped around 100K units 05:16 – The best-seller is the SmartDesk 05:38 – It can keep you healthy and stay active in office 05:50 – Some of Nathan’s friends have bought the Smartdesk 06:07 – Autonomous has raised $200K 06:18 – Prior to Autonomous, Duy really liked smart products 06:46 – Duy started Autonomous with his co-founders in a small apartment 08:25 – The seed money has helped Duy make the prototypes 09:00 – Duy has spent $100-200K on the products before raising the seed round 09:09 – Duy traveled to find the best suppliers 09:30 – Team size 09:43 – 4 are working in the NY office 09:46 – 10 in California and some in Vietnam and China 10:10 – Total of 40 people 10:22 – Autonomous is currently cash flow positive 10:35 – Duy isn’t looking at raising another round at the moment 11:00 – Monthly expenses 11:40 – Autonomous is doing over $10M annually 12:18 – Most of the customers are founders 12:37 – Autonomous currently relies on word-of mouth 12:49 – Autonomous had a Kickstarter campaign 13:05 – Autonomous made $250K from their Kickstarter campaign 13:20 – It was for a thousand units 13:58 – Duy wanted to maintain a fair margin in the supply chain 14:36 – “They pay for what they get” 15:00 – Competitors’ margin 15:19 – Gross profit 16:04 – The second and third best-selling products are the chair and stool, respectively 16:38 – Duy wouldn’t take a deal from Herman Miller at the moment 16:41 – Autonomous isn’t a furniture company 17:19 – On paper, Duy is the single founder but the co-founders have equity as well 18:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Smart products shouldn’t just offer convenience, but make your life healthy and active too. Price your product fairly—the value of the product should match the price. Create something that will be really helpful for people. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/25/2017 • 22 minutes, 9 seconds
700: With $3,000,000 in Projects Completed, Will He Take Down Upwork and Toptal?
Connor Gillivan. He’s a 27-year old serial entrepreneur and published author. He started his first company out of his college dorm room and built it to sell over $20M in products on Amazon.com. After he became an expert on hiring online, he co-founded FreeeUp, an online hiring marketplace focused on connecting the top 1% freelancers with business owners. He’s the author of Free Up Your Business: 50 Secrets to Bootstrap Million Dollar Companies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Shoe Dog What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Jira How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I knew to stay focused on what I do best” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:47 – Nathan introduces Connor to the show 01:32 – Connor makes 20% to 30% of the gross margin of a product on Amazon 01:38 – Net profits end up being from 5%-15% 02:04 – It was 6 years ago when Connor started his business 02:15 – Connor earned on the first year of the business 02:51 – Connor has scaled up his first company 03:00 – The company still operates with $1-2M in revenue per year 03:08 – The team is composed of freelancers who are based around the world 03:27 – The 3 founders, including Connor, are getting their pay quarterly 03:40 – Connor now spends his time on his second business FreeeUp 03:52 – Connor’s first company is Portlight 04:05 – Average price point was $75-100 04:25 – FreeeUp was launched in 2015 04:29 – Connor and his co-founder learned about hiring freelancers through Odesk and Elance, which merged and is now called Upwork 04:36 – They didn’t like the process of posting job ads and going through every applicant 04:46 – FreeeUp has a better solution where the business owner doesn’t have to do the upfront work 04:58 – FreeeUp finds the top 1% candidates for the business owners 05:18 – Toptal is more focused on top developers and designers 05:23 – FreeeUp’s freelancers are specialized on e-commerce business operations 05:35 – There’s no upfront free 05:43 – FreeeUp has a standard markup that they charge on their clients for hourly rates 06:06 – The minimum charge is $2 and 20% for the higher price 06:55 – There are over 500 freelancers on FreeeUp 07:28 – FreeeUp’s system can measure the amount they’re paying their freelancers 07:37 – The biggest metric is the hours billed to the client 08:01 – Average billing per hour is $10 08:18 – FreeeUp is keeping $60K-80K in revenue per month 09:11 – FreeeUp has around 1500 signups on the platform 09:16 – FreeeUp bills between 300-500 people who are utilizing their workers 09:45 – 2000-2500 people have been billed since FreeeUp started 09:58 – FreeeUp has a referral program where clients can refer other people who would want to use FreeeUp and they receive $0.50 for every hour that has been billed 10:28 – FreeeUp is more hands on with their client 10:56 – Most clients start slow and when they see FreeeUp’s benefits, they’ll use it more 11:10 – Team size is 20-25 part-time people 11:51 – Connor is currently in Orlando, FL 12:11 – Both of Connor’s businesses are bootstrapped 12:21 – Total transaction volume for 2016 is a bit over a million 12:33 – 2016 average revenue 12:44 – 2017 projected transaction volume is $3-4M 13:20 – Connor puts his money back into his businesses to scale them 13:47 – Connor splits the 20% from FreeeUp 14:32 – Since April, FreeeUp has grown 1000% 15:20 – FreeeUp started winning in the ecommerce industry 15:58 – FreeeUp now offers digital marketing as well and try to find different areas that will interest more clients 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are more business owners relying on outsourcing for their needs and share with others just how beneficial outsourcing is. Ensure you have backup funds for your company. Focus on what you do best. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/24/2017 • 21 minutes, 1 second
699: The Fired ConvertKit Co-Founder You've Never Heard Of, Father Made Me Feel "Not Worth Enough"
Dan Gamito. He now leads partnerships and B&D for a company called ManyChat. Formerly, he led the customer success team for ConvertKit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Des Traynor Favorite online tool? — Calendly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just chill out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:47 – Nathan introduces Dan to the show 01:16 – ManyChat is marketing automation platform for Facebook Messenger 01:28 – ManyChat is a SaaS business 01:38 – Nathan uses ManyChat and struggles with the emotional factor 02:11 – Users struggle with emotion because of the automation side of ManyChat 02:14 – Think about how people use messenger 02:29 – Dan suggests in keeping your messages informal, straight to the point and write what people would find valuable in EVERY sentence 02:49 – People are now shifting to Messenger from email marketing 02:57 – Messenger is different from email 03:05 – Nathan shares how he struggles figuring out what messages to set 03:54 – How can people use ManyChat in a simple way? 04:04 – Dan challenges us to look at our phones and see who we want to talk to at that moment 04:17 – Build the interactions up from the bottom 04:19 – The goal is to make people want to have a live chat conversation with you 04:51 – ManyChat can be part of your funnel 05:49 – ManyChat has a partnership with Sean of Soul Space Media 06:04 – Sean’s wife had a case study of ManyChat on their podcast 06:10 – DigitalMarketer did a case study, as well 07:05 – For 0-500 subscribers, pricing is $10 07:18 – Average customer pay 07:51 – ManyChat has been around for about a year and a half 08:38 – ManyChat has raised a seed round from 500 Startups 09:02 – ManyChat has raised around a million 09:19 – ManyChat has over 40K bots 10:26 – Dan on leaving ConvertKit 10:33 – Dan was Nathan’s first hire at ConvertKit 10:45 – Dan did everything to add value to the company, more specifically in customer success 10:56 – Dan has launched his own software product prior to ConvertKit 11:27 – Dan saw Nathan trying to compete with Infusionsoft 11:41 – Dan was like a silent co-founder 12:12 – Dan ended up not being a good fit for ConvertKit 12:54 – Both Dan and Nathan are both headstrong and their communication broke down 13:16 – Nathan terminated Dan on short notice 13:50 – Dan was naïve and inexperienced during that time 14:19 – “I walked in completely unprepared” 15:01 – Nathan gave an offer to Dan 15:30 – Nathan explains how equity works in startups 16:16 – Dan thought he didn’t value himself very much 19:10 – Dan is now almost 30 19:31 – Dan was pursued by ManyChat’s CEO Mike 19:55 – “He believed in me” 20:13 – Dan approached ManyChat with what he could add to it and the structure that he could build 20:21 – Dan knew he could do it by heart 20:36 – Team size is over 15 20:49 – Dan still has no equity 21:03 – Dan joined ManyChat in November of 2016 22:38 – “Time-boxing things and putting expectations around things is never going to work” 24:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: In new work opportunities, know your contract by heart. Know your worth—don’t undervalue yourself. Automation can sacrifice the emotional and interpersonal interaction with your customers. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/23/2017 • 28 minutes, 24 seconds
698: How this Sales Training Tool Went from $600k to $1.2M in Revenue in 1 Year
Sam Caucci. He’s the CEO of Sales Huddle, a training and development team that is using game technology to help organizations better prepare their people for the workforce. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Meditations What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — GrowBots How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Sam is a big believer that you have to over-network Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:52 – Nathan introduces Sam to the show 01:30 – Sales Huddle is a mobile game platform for employee training 01:43 – Sales Huddle has everything a business needs to learn 02:04 – Sales Huddle is a subscription business 02:10 – Pricing is from $5K to $15K 02:13 – There’s a monthly recurring fee based on the number of employees on the platform 02:20 – 2016 revenue closed out at $1.2M 02:29 – MRR is around $800K 82 subscribed clients on the platform 02:58 – Sales Huddle has an initial integration fee for converting a client’s current content into the platform 03:18 – Most companies pay Sales Huddle an upfront payment 03:36 – Sales Huddle tries to get companies to pay upfront first 04:03 – Sales Huddle has 100% retention 04:37 – Sam credits their 0 churn on the product not infringing on the customer's current learning stack yet 05:10 – Sales Huddle started as a part-time consulting company 6 years ago 05:26 – The development of the product was in middle of 2014 05:27 – Selling started in 2015 05:40 – Team size is now 20 06:05 – Sales Huddle is currently raising and has raised $400K 06:33 – The round was a kiss convertible note 06:41 – A kiss convertible note converts to an equity and is similar to safe note 07:44 – Many startups don’t think of their sales pipeline 08:08 – Sales Huddle is currently in a strong position 08:40 – As a founder, Sam believes it is his responsibility to drive the shift with his team 08:58 – Sam can definitely raise money through sales, but they have to think of the worst case scenario 09:12 – Sam sees his company running a 100m dash; once they get to 200m, they will think about how to get to 300m 09:30 – ARR goal is around 100m and they’re currently at 50m 10:16 – Sam just had a daughter 10:49 – Sam is building a team that is going to have your back in a bar fight 11:12 – Sales Huddle’s competitors 11:43 – Sales Huddle just started to spend money on paid acquisition 11:59 – Sales Huddle is almost always breaking even 12:16 – Sales Huddle is burning $40K-60K a month 12:41 – The hardest shift for Sam 13:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A great retention rate could mean you’re not charging enough or your product is just that good. Be the founder that your team trusts—even to the point of trusting you that raising funds is not necessary. Always invest in growing your network! Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/22/2017 • 17 minutes, 30 seconds
697: How $1m in Personal Guaruntees Led to $500M IPO 15 Years Later
Scot Wingo. He’s the CEO of Spiffy. He’s also a 4-time serial entrepreneur and industry thought leader in ecommerce and on-demand economy realm. He’s appeared on CNBC’s Today’s Show and contributed his expertise to The Wall Street Journal, New York Times along with many other publications. He previously founded Stingray Software which he sold to Rogue Wave Software, AuctionRover which was sold to GoTo/Overture, and ChannelAdvisor that went public in 2013, under the stock symbol ECOM. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To trust your instincts and invest even more in your own companies” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Scot to the show 01:29 – Spiffy is an on-demand car wash and detail company 01:33 – Customers pay for car washes and Spiffy is full-stock 01:59 – Spiffy is a pay-as-you-go model 02:02 – Some customers would request to have their car cleaned on a regular basis so they’re currently working on a subscription plan 02:30 – Having your car cleaned is addicting 03:02 – Spiffy started in 2014 03:17 – Scot was 46 in 2014 03:26 – Scot loves building a company 04:00 – In 1999, AuctionRover started 04:14 – AuctionRover is a search engine for auction sites 04:16 – Scot always had a plan to develop software for sellers 04:20 – After getting acquired, they developed the software which turned into ChannelAdvisor 05:43 – They’ve raised $3M for AuctionRover 05:53 – AuctionRover started to get acquisition offers 06:16 – Scot was a fan of Goto 06:45 – Stingray put Scot in a position where it had to work 07:32 – Scot had accumulated personal debt to run Stingray 07:55 – Scot was 25 when he founded Stingray 08:03 – Scot had Stingray for 3 years before selling it to Rogue 08:11 – Acquisition price was around $7M 08:27 – It was software and Scot had a 30% margin 09:07 – Scot added $3M through fundraising 09:55 – Tim Draper was on Episode 129 10:17 – AuctionRover’s acquisition price was $20-50M 10:43 – The negotiation with Goto to buy back AuctionRover 11:18 – Scot bought back AuctionRover for around $1M 11:37 – They bought it back in 2001 12:00 – When Scot IPOd ChannelAdvisor, everything was new to him and he had never taken a company that big before 12:07 – Scot’s dad was a business person and was on Fortune Magazine 12:58 – Scot always has a higher goal 13:37 – “If you’ve raised a venture capital, you’re going to have an exit” 13:47 – Scot wanted to see what an IPO process looked like 14:02 – Scot raised capital for ChannelAdvisor 14:14 – ChannelAdvisor helps retailers and brands sell on eBay, Amazon and other channels 14:26 – ChannelAdvisor raised a total of $90M before the IPO 15:08 – ChannelAdvisor’s market price on Day 1 16:03 – Scot brought in a COO to help him 16:11 – After going public, the COO was promoted to president 16:20 – Scot felt he wasn’t learning much more and the president wanted to step into the CEO role 16:27 – Scot felt it was a great time for the president to mature and take on the CEO position 16:47 – Scot just simply sent a letter to the board about him leaving 17:35 – Scot is more of a tactical entrepreneur 17:47 – “I just really like solving hard problems and scaling businesses” 17:55 – Everytime Scot would have a career change, it was in a different space 18:05 – Since Spiffy is consumer oriented, Scot believes he can scale it faster than ChannelAdvisor 18:27 – Scot’s goal for Spiffy 19:35 – Scot had 2 physical car washes after selling his 2nd company 19:44 – Spiffy was an MVP in 2014 when it was launched 20:09 – There are reasons why customers don’t like detailing 20:40 – 70% of Spiffy’s revenue is from out-work consumers 21:11 – Spiffy just crossed the $200M runaway and is growing annually north of 100% 21:33 – Team size in the office is around 20 and around 60 technicians 22:06 – Spiffy has raised $7.5M on their series A 22:18 – Scot still gets excited raising funds 22:38 – Scot’s aspiration for Spiffy is bigger than his checkbook 23:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Always aim higher when it comes to your goals. Going through multiple exits boosts your learning and experience. Always trust your instincts. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/21/2017 • 27 minutes, 9 seconds
696: The Debate: Are Patents "Entrepreneurial" Or Unfair?
Dimitris Giannoccaro. He founded IAMIP, in 2013, after an extensive career in engineering and intellectual property together with some of the strongest leaders and inventors at ABB. The urgent need for digitizing an intellectual property world and maximizing the potential of intellectual property successfully has been felt during his work at his company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – n/a What CEO do you follow? – Björn Lilja of Kundo Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would never do this again” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Dimitris to the show 01:31 – IAMIP is a typical SaaS company 01:56 – IAMIP is where users can collaborate in real-time in order to access all the patents 02:49 – IAMIP has 3 target groups: small startups, medium-size companies and corporations 03:06 – Small startups still need to know how to protect their solution 03:22 – Medium and corporations are big companies and they want to make sure no one is infringing on their rights 04:12 – If you want to get acquired later on, you want to make sure you don’t infringe on other’s rights 04:42 – Patents are important for product 04:58 – Patents are also filed on services 05:32 – As a consumer, the focus is on the usability of the product or service 05:40 – If you want to make money right and keep growing, you want to have your IP 06:08 – Team size is 14 06:19 – IAMIP was launched 3 years 06:23 – Average MRR is $60K 06:38 – IAMIP currently has 500 users 06:54 – There are 62 paying customers 07:18 – IAMIP raised 2 years ago, but it was initially bootstrapped 07:34 – Dimitris was 37 when he launched IAMIP 08:05 – IAMIP managed to have their first client after a few months 08:22 – IAMIP has 2 founders and the split is 50/50 08:59 – Dimitris regretted not inviting more people 09:55 – IAMIP has raised $1M on the first round 10:01 – IAMIP is in the process of raising an equity round 10:27 – Dimitris based the valuation on the future number of customers 11:08 – IAMIP didn’t give a discount on their first round which is an equity round 11:44 – Gross customer churn 12:16 – Dimitris’ tactic on having 0 churn 12:46 – 2016 revenue 13:08 – 2017 goal 13:16 – IAMIP has recently been accepted by the UCLA Amazon program 13:33 – CAC 13:59 – Everybody is part of the sales team 14:30 – All of the people on the team are engineers and the 7 spend additional time in sales 14:51 – LTV 16:17 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Patents are important for growing businesses in order to protect your solutions. Having co-founders has its advantages and can be much better than doing it solo. You CAN acquire new customers without an expert salesperson. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/20/2017 • 20 minutes, 32 seconds
695: When You Deploy Software Product, Use This to Keep Hackers Out with Detectify CEO
Rickard Carlsson. He’s the CEO of Detectify, a Stockholm-based security startup selected as one of Sweden’s super talents, in 2015, by the Swedish business publication, Veckans Affärer. He has lived and worked in Sweden, USA and India and holds an MSc of applied physics and electrical engineering. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Home Improvement Books What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Know more about how to build a great team” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:43 – Nathan introduces Rickard to the show 01:35 – Detectify integrates security testing into the development workflow 01:49 – Detectify makes sure that the safety testing is brought to development 02:08 – Pipedrive uses Detectify as a part of their security 02:25 – Security is important for Pipedrive so they use Detectify to automate a large part of their security detecting 02:54 – Average pay per customer is €80 03:10 – Detectify was launched in 2014 03:50 – Rickard’s co-founders who worked for the biggest tech companies had the idea of Detectify 04:44 – Rickard met his co-founders at his previous job and they were Angel investors to Detectify 04:58 – Rickard was a business consultant for McKinsey 05:54 – Rickard started a startup to learn new things 06:21 – Detectify has 4 founders and the split is not the usual 25% each 06:41 – Detectify has now raised €2.5M 06:49 – The last round was a priced equity round 07:13 – Rickard does everything except coding including sales 07:42 – Detectify managed to get 1-2 important Angels on board 08:09 – Detectify is currently serving 350 customers 08:20 – Majority of the customers are the long-paying customers 08:45 – There’s an increasing number of larger customers 08:55 – MRR is around $30K 09:10 – Nathan has released interview videos on Youtube 09:45 – Team size is around 25 10:09 – Salaries in Europe are much smaller than in the USA 10:18 – 2/3 of the team are full-time engineers 11:17 – Gross customer churn 11:26 – Detectify has no paid acquisition 11:30 – Detectify has 2 outbound sales people who just started 12:00 – The team is based in Sweden 12:17 – LTV 12:47 – Detectify has a few enterprise customers 13:00 – Deals are usually a year contract with an upfront payment 13:25 – Rickard won’t disclose what the salespeople get for every $10K deal they close 15:36 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An eagerness to learn new things is a great motivator to start one’s own business. Security is simply a necessity. Having different brackets of customers allows for more growth. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/19/2017 • 18 minutes, 44 seconds
694: Why 1 Year Payback Period is Important From $50M Funded CEO
Don Mal. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Vena Solutions which was established in 2011 and is the fastest growing provider of cloud-based corporate performance management software. Prior to Vena, he’s owned several executive tech positions along the way with companies like Clarity Systems and IBM. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Who Moved My Cheese What CEO do you follow? – Satya Nadella Favorite online tool? — Dropbox How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew that sales cures all” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Don to the show 01:21 – Vena was the fastest company to acquire a hundred customers 01:29 – Vena is growing a 100%, year over year 02:05 – CPM or corporate performance management is budgeting, planning and forecasting financial performance 02:28 – A fastfood chain can use Vena’s service to capture the sales of their burger 02:55 – CPM is about measuring results in a couple of different dimensions 03:16 – The Top had Glen Coates of Handshake and they’re an inventory management 03:31 – Vena is more horizontal based and vertical industry based 04:20 – Vena doesn’t compete with Bill.com and Expensify.com 04:31 – Annual RPU is $50K 04:53 – Vena was launched in 2011 05:02 – Team size is almost 200 05:18 – Vena has raised capital with equity rounds 05:49 – Don was running sales for a company in the same space that Don sold 06:02 – Don has already built credibility, so he was able to convince families and friends to invest 06:21 – Don has raised over a million to launch the business 06:50 – Don’s process of closing 07:06 – Don was able to raise $3M from other sources 07:30 – If your friends and families can’t write a $25K check, a $1k check will do 07:42 – Don has now raised a total of $50M 08:35 – Having the right kind of partner is important in raising a round 09:17 – Vena is approaching 350 paying customers 09:38 – Average MRR is $1.4M 09:47 – Vena finds new customers with a combination of inbound and outbound marketing 10:04 – Vena also nurtures their prospects through drip campaigns 10:22 – Total spend on paid acquisition is a couple of hundred grand a month 10:40 – Vena has a team that does the testing for new channels 11:05 – Don wants to keep their CAC below a 12-month cost of the revenue 11:38 – Don is looking at a 12-month payback 11:55 – LTV 12:05 – A customer stays with Vena up to 10 years 12:48 – Don sees the significant expansion of their platform 12:55 – Client starts with 2 user cases and can end up having more than 20 13:28 – Gross churn 13:39 – Vena has hit their net negative revenue churn 14:05 – Vena’s dollar will turn into $1.20 with their current system 15:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Before a big round of fundraising, master your pitch and start with your friends and families. Make your product stick to your customers and you’ll experience amazing growth. Have experts in your sales and marketing team; trust and release them to do their job. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/18/2017 • 18 minutes, 25 seconds
693: How to 3x SaaS Revenue in 8 Months from $25k to $85k
Victor Levitin. He’s the CEO of CrazyLister and last time he was at The Top was in late 2016. His company, Crazy Lister, has passed 2K customers, about 600K raised and about 30K in 2015 revenue. Each customer pays about $15 in monthly revenue. They’ve passed 25K in MRR with about 3% gross customer churn each month. They are based mainly in Tel Aviv with their team of 8. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About The Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Intercom How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Start with SaaS, everything else does not compound” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Victor to the show 01:25 – CrazyLister is the easiest way to create high-converting, mobile-optimized product listings for eBay 01:36 – Investors call CrazyLister, the Wix for eBay 01:49 – CrazyLister closed the door on their Tel Aviv office and focused on just working 02:14 – CrazyLister has recently hit $1M in ARR 02:38 – CrazyLister just passed 3.5 paying customers 03:13 – CrazyLister’s growth is a combination of several tactics and strategies 03:26 – CrazyLister now nailed paid acquisition 03:47 – CrazyLister managed to get their CAC to LTV ratio to 1:8 04:01 – CrazyLister is spending $15K a month for paid acquisition 04:10 – To acquire a new customer costs $80 04:29 – CrazyLister is trying every paid acquisition 04:41 – CrazyLister is now focused on Google AdWords which is working quite well for them 04:58 – CrazyLister couldn’t make it on Facebook 05:31 – CrazyLister targets specific customer needs in retail 06:15 – Victor has been in California for 2 months to discuss the future of CrazyLister 06:40 – Victor came to the conclusion that with the growth that they have experienced, raising a big VC round wouldn’t be healthy for them 07:06 – Victor now focuses on making e-commerce easier for retailers 07:17 – CrazyLister will first prove traction beyond eBay then raise a not-so-big round to sustain growth 07:35 – It will be between $1-2M 07:40 – Current team size is 10 07:53 – CrazyLister just hit cash flow positive in March 08:03 – CrazyLister doesn’t really need capital, but wants to grow beyond eBay 08:48 – CrazyLister now has 3 plans: $9/month, $25/month and $45/month 09:04 – The best customers for CrazyLister are the highest paying ones 09:35 – CrazyLister tries to understand their customer even before they upgrade 10:24 – As CrazyLister adds more features and updates, they increase their pricing 10:56 – CrazyLister has developed a feature that is beneficial for businesses 11:37 – Victor has 2 co-founders 11:51 – There are 3 main pillars in CrazyLister 11:55 – Victor and Max, the co-founder, are the business pillars 12:06 – The second pillar is the CTO 12:25 – The third pillar is the paid acquisition expert 12:45 – The paid acquisition expert is a full-time employee 14:00 – When CrazyLister began with paid acquisition, their budget was only $5K 14:08 – As the data becomes better, they’ve raised their budget as well 15:34 – CrazyLister now wants to replicate what they did to eBay to other channels 15:50 – 2016 total revenue 16:40 – As a seller/business, you constantly need to add listings on eBay, so there’s a considerate need to use CrazyLister 17:03 – Gross churn per month 18:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus in on your goals, then see if you can raise a bigger round. Paid acquisition, if done well, can get you new customers consistently and help grow your company. Let your pricing reflect the valuable updates and developments you make to your product. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/17/2017 • 22 minutes, 12 seconds
692: With Microsoft Deal and $225k MRR, Will He Win CRM Space?
Jon Ferrara. He’s been recognized for pioneering innovation in the customer service management category for many years. Prior to founding Nimble, he was the creator and co-founder of the award-winning customer management product GoldMine. In 1999, Goldmine got acquired by FrontRange and he left to pursue other interests. During those years, he continued to watch the CRM market grow. He saw that most CRMs in the industry that were serving small businesses moved up market and became way more expensive and more complex—leaving the small business market totally underserved. It was at that point that Jon decided to create the next generation CRM product for small businesses called Nimble. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Buffer App How many hours of sleep do you get?— Around 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Start a business earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Jon to the show 01:42 – Jon was on Episode 643 of The Top 01:55 – Nimble has around 10K paying customers with a monthly RPU of $20 02:08 – 3% monthly churn 02:14 – CAC is around $5 02:24 – Team size is 25 02:43 – Nimble has recently closed a $9M round 03:07 – Acquiring SMBs is the exact same way they’ve scaled Goldmine 03:20 – The problem with most CRMs today is that only sales and marketing people use these systems when in fact, everyone in the company should use it 03:56 – Jon cold called every Novel reseller in the country when Goldmine was just starting 04:00 – “People sell what they know and know what they use” 04:15 – When Jon started Nimble, no one knew that social media would be the way to grow a business 04:30 – Jon looked around for influencers for Nimble’s launch 04:48 – Nimble is the early pioneer of influencer marketing 05:08 – Nimble was getting 100K website views with 0 marketing spend 05:25 – As a company scales up, it should also touch the customers in different ways 05:43 – Nimble doesn’t pay influencers 05:45 – To find influencers, you have to know the core influencers around your product 06:00 – You find ways on how to build a relationship with influencers 06:32 – Nimble will now try to get around with ad spend 06:41 – Jon always believed that there was another way to get access to customers 06:44 – Jon is going to replicate the strategy they used with Goldmine by partnering with people similar to Microsoft and Google and get their VARs to use Nimble and start recommending it 07:01 – Nimble just signed a deal with Microsoft where they can be a reseller of Nimble 07:12 – Microsoft can now give their VARs Nimble so their VARs can be better, smarter and faster in sales and marketing 07:33 – Nimble will work on top of Office 365 as the operating system of a business 07:57 – Microsoft is currently passing their revenue to the VARs 08:11 – The VARs are the one making the MRR which is 20% 08:30 – Nimble’s average RPU is now around $30 08:41 – If you can help a business person with their sales and marketing needs, you’re now opening yourself up to other functionalities for that customer 08:53 – Every business struggles with sales, marketing and relationship management 09:20 – Nimble just rolled out new pricing and marked on automation add-on 10:13 – March MRR is around $225K 10:25 – Nimble now has around 10.5K customers 11:31 – Without relying on the VARs, it’s going to be a long term strategy for Nimble 11:48 – Microsoft has bundled Nimble inside of Outlook mobile, Office 365 and Outlook desktop 12:07 – It is like a free acquisition 12:32 – Jon won the deal with Microsoft because of their relationship 12:42 – In every business relationship, you want to know how the other person answers and what success looks like for that person 13:21 – Nimble is now a free plug-in with Office 365 13:37 – Users can use Nimble for free without paying $30 a month 13:42 – Nimble is like Rapportive on steroids 13:48 – Nimble has a limited feature for free users 14:14 – Business people are the ones who usually convert to paid users 14:33 – The market of Nimble is a very fragmented market 14:37 – Nathan mentions the people in the same market that were on The Top: 14:39 – Hatchbuck 14:55 – Pipedrive 15:02 – Close.io 15:08 – Contactually 15:29 – In a fragmented market, you need to be top of the line with your customers, influencers and with business products that people use 15:52 – Nimble continues to be rated as No. 1 17:00 – The way Nimble wins is how it executes the distribution channels 17:13 – Team size is currently 32 and based in Santa Monica and Ukraine 17:44 – You don’t go to raise with a particular value in mind 17:53 – Let the market determine the value 18:06 – The last round raised was a series A 18:22 – Nimble has talked to a number of VCs and with this deal, they’re bringing in a seasoned CEO 19:18 – What people are vetting for Nimble is the future 19:41 – “We’re definitely going for a large exit with Nimble” 20:14 – Office 365 is now dominating the email cloud productivity space and they’re just starting 20:48 – “And Nimble, I believe, is positioned today to dominate in this space” 22:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: In a fragmented market, you need to be TOP of line—a product that people will always recommend. You have to know how a potential client answers a question and how they define success when making a deal. Nurture your business relationships—this is KEY to your success. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/16/2017 • 24 minutes, 55 seconds
691: King of Amazon Pricing Raises $33M, Helping 500 Sellers Make More Money
Victor Rosenman. He’s the CEO and founder of Feedvisor. Before founding Feedvisor, he was the founder of an innovative marketing startup and a senior R&D manager at Sun Microsystems. Victor holds a BSc in computer science and an executive MBA from Kellogg Northwestern. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Black Swan What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Whatsapp How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Whenever you make a decision, you need to think a little bit longer” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:47 – Nathan introduces Victor to the show 01:24 – Feedvisor is a decision support system for large ecommerce vendors that sell through marketplaces 02:57 – Most of the e-commerce that joins Feedvisor has significant business on Amazon 03:06 – Before joining Feedvisor, they will be doing marketplace management through Amazon 03:32 – Feedvisor makes the numbers on the marketplace right 03:50 – Feedvisor looks into a load of various numbers so they can tell which price is right 04:05 – Stock is almost similar to Amazon where there’s competition in prices 04:20 – To look into the numbers and make decisions is tough 04:42 – Feedvisor decides more on pricing, replenishment and assortment 05:02 – Feedvisor charges a monthly subscription 05:15 – Average customer pay is $2-3K a month 06:06 – Undercuts is getting information and automated price adjustments 06:20 – For every revenue Undercuts gets through the system, they pay a rev share 06:40 – Not going through Feedvisor’s system will not make sense for the clients 06:49 – “There’s no way you’ll be fast by doing things manually” 06:55 – The rev share is a portion of the entire fee 07:20 – Average rev share percentage 07:38 – Majority of Feedvisor’s revenue is coming from their fixed revenue stream 07:45 – Feedvisor was founded in 2011 07:55 – Feedvisor was initially bootstrapped for a year 08:00 – Feedvisor got an initial seat funding in 2012 08:03 – It was for $500K 08:11 – It was all equity 08:15 – To date, Feedvisor has raised $33M 08:34 – Feedvisor’s funding experience wasn’t easy but it was fair 08:46 – Feedvisor was initially from Israel 09:12 – Israel has a powerful VC ecosystem 09:18 – It’s not different than Silicon Valley 09:48 – Feedvisor’s revenue just before raising a round 10:00 – When Feedvisor raised a seed round, Victor didn’t know about the e-commerce business 10:16 – Feedvisor was primarily rev share when they started 10:47 – Feedvisor raised funding in Q4 11:45 – Victor pitched to the investors slowly 12:00 – In the end, Angel investor is much more of a personal business 12:55 – The series B was done with a common valuation 13:09 – The common valuation for series B is 60%-150% 13:30 – Team size 13:40 – Feedvisor has around 500-600 customers 14:12 – Average MRR 14:57 – Churn is quite low 15:50 – Feedvisor is close to net negative revenue churn 16:10 – Feedvisor focuses on value 16:57 – By optimizing Feedvisor, they create an ROI 17:58 – Feedvisor is charging a fair amount and they understand their customers 18:55 – Feedvisor finds customers through brand building initiatives and content marketing 19:02 – Feedvisor invests a lot on brand building 19:10 – “When you think Feedvisor, you think it’s a reliable solution” 19:34 – Feedvisor does their own conferences 19:47 – Feedvisor creates an environment where people can learn 20:21 – Feedvisor has paid $3-4K for content marketing 20:57 – It is about investing into everything that can help you position yourself, not just content marketing 21:44 – LTV 22:23 – CAC 23:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: People want their businesses not to just be automated, but also precise at the same time. Building your brand creates a great reputation and image for your business. Making big decisions requires careful consideration and time. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/15/2017 • 28 minutes, 20 seconds
690: MarTech Chart Gets 1m+ Uniques, Future of CRM, Passive Monetization with CEO Scott Brinker
Scott Brinker. He publishes the chief marketing technologist blog known as ChiefMartec.com and is the program chair for Martech Conference Series. He’s the author of the book Hacking Marketing published by Wiley. He’s also the co-founder of Ion Interactive, a provider of interactive content marketing software to many of the world’s leading brands. He has a degree in computer science from Columbia University and Harvard University and an MBA from MIT. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – Brian Halligan Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That software can rewrite the rules of the world” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Scott to the show 01:36 – There are over 3600-3800 B2B SaaS companies that Scott has worked with 01:57 – Scott was researching the companies all by himself 02:22 – Scott is a co-founder/CTO of B2B SaaS company, Ion Interactive 02:32 – There’s also the ChiefMartec blog that Scott started 8 years ago 03:00 – Scott is into how technology changes the way one manages one’s marketing 03:14 – Scott is also looking at the toolsets that enable the technology in marketing 03:35 – Ion Interactive is a SaaS company 04:44 – Chief Martec got millions of impressions in 2016 05:30 – Chief Martec’s Alexa ranking 06:03 – If you can create something of value, you can succeed 06:53 – Scott gets paid for most of his speaking gigs 07:28 – It’s not an easy path when you’re just starting to pitch to conferences 08:08 – Scott started his chart because of a speaking engagement at a conference 08:40 – The first significant paying gig that Scott remembered was when a SAS hired him for a Southeast Asian tour to present the hybrid art and science of marketing 09:23 – It was for 2 weeks 09:35 – Martech Conference was launched in 2014 in partnership with Third Door Media 09:51 – It was actually Third Door Media’s event and they just contacted Scott for content 10:08 – Scott took care of the speaker side and everything that involved content 11:00 – All the sectors in the space excite Scott 12:27 – Scott doesn’t agree that the CRM space is going to zero 13:15 – There’s so much innovation and value 13:30 – The CRM companies who have been in The Top 14:00 – The CRM space is still a hot space 14:52 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The marketing space has never been better because of the limitless potential of technology. If you can create something of value, you CAN succeed. Software can rewrite the rules of the world. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/14/2017 • 18 minutes, 5 seconds
689: Barbara Corcoran from Sharktank is Looking For These Deals with Partner Phil Nadel
Phil Nadel. He’s the co-founder and managing director of Barbara Corcoran Venture Partners, one of the largest and most active AngelList syndicates where investors can invest alongside him and Barbara on the same terms in promising high growth startups. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Laughly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Savor the moment, be in the moment” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:55 – Nathan introduces Phil to the show 01:24 – Barbara and Phil believe in the syndicate model 01:32 – It is a great opportunity for investors who would like to invest but don’t have a lot of money to put into each deal 01:49 – Barbara Corcoran Venture Partners on AngelList 02:08 – The syndicate was launched 3 years ago 02:16 – They have syndicated 38 deals 02:34 – Barn and Willow is a company they’ve recently syndicated 02:51 – Barn and Willow deal with window treatments 03:18 – They have a direct manufacturing supply chain 03:24 – It’s an innovative company 03:45 – The companies that Barbara invests on Shark Tank are separate from the companies in the syndicate 04:05 – The value of doing the syndicate is the deal flow that Barbara gets from her exposure in Shark Tank 04:20 – Each of the syndicate backers have the option to opt in or opt out of any investments 04:33 – The most likely exit scenario is an acquisition and that’s how an investor makes money 04:47 – IPO is also another route 04:53 – There was no exit yet from the syndicate portfolio 05:38 – There is paperwork in backing a syndicate 05:45 – The AngelList platform is handling all the investor details 05:51 – The structure of the deal can have a few different formats 06:04 – It’s either a convertible note that converts into equity or straight equity 06:30 – All backers are combined into 1 entity 06:56 – The LLC is managed by an independent third party company called Assure Fund Management 07:05 – Assure will consult the syndicate if there will be a major decision 07:40 – The AngelList is managing the risks for the syndicate 08:00 – The syndicate has put in $7.5M 08:28 – The syndicate is very true to Barbara’s mission 08:44 – Barbara wants people to invest with her, share their ideas with her, and bring their knowledge 08:56 – “Our backers are fantastic in terms of their networks” 09:38 – With a VC, what you have is strictly financial investors 10:40 – People love Barbara 11:15 – The deals are only available to accredited investors 11:23 – To be an accredited investor, you need to meet some of the criteria including net worth or income 12:00 – The syndicate is very clear that there is a chance of losing money for each investment 12:06 – The idea is to build a portfolio 12:37 – Phil has been to different platforms like FundersClub and OurCrowd 12:53 – The reason why Phil and Barbara chose AngelList 13:35 – The picture behind Phil was a picture frame from one of their portfolio companies called Meural 13:54 – They have thousands of art pieces from different museums around the world 14:32 – It retails from $600 15:27 – The syndicate does equity and note and only invests in post-revenue companies 15:43 – At least $15-20K a month in revenue 15:52 – “We are focused on companies that are capital efficient” 17:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Syndicates is a great option for small investors and it will help them get into the investing game. Investors need to be responsible with their investments—meaning research the deal and own their decisions and the consequences of saying yea or nay. Savor the moments in life and be IN the moment. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/13/2017 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
688: W/ 4 Kids, He Quit Job to Launch Leather Briefcase Company Breton with CEO Joseph May
Joseph May. He’s the founder of the Breton Company. He launched his company in 2016 by running a Kickstarter campaign for a modern day briefcase. Prior to Breton, he worked as an attorney at a couple of different law firms and was director of operations and in-house counsel at a company called Freshly Picked. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Shoe Dog What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Grum How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Keep going” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces to the show 01:19 – Joseph left the legal company because there was no fun 01:23 – When Joseph was at Freshly Picked, he found out that he really liked to create products and be part of the design process 01:33 – Joseph had the idea of Breton when he was in Italy 01:59 – Joseph was 33 when he left Freshly Picked where he was getting $70-80K 02:28 – Joseph had kids when he started Breton 03:28 – Joseph is showing Nathan an example of the briefcase 03:45 – On Kickstarter, Joseph did $240K and $280K for Indiegogo 03:54 – Kickstarter is the biggest website to start and Indiegogo has Indiegogo on demand 04:29 – The total for both campaigns was 1200 units 05:00 – At Freshly Picked, Joseph learned a lot about Instagram marketing 05:38 – Zach from Episode 178 had his hand on the Kickstarter campaign and has a network which has done over $60M in funding campaigns 06:00 – Zach worked with Joseph 06:38 – Joseph had a lot of manufacturing contacts from Freshly Picked 06:44 – Joseph got a quote from overseas and moved their manufacturing to Asia, switched up their whole campaign and changed the price point 07:14 – Breton is totally bootstrapped 07:47 – Total sales as of today is $400K in revenue and 1900 units 08:06 – Goal for 2017 is to launch more Kickstarter campaigns 08:37 – The bestseller is the modern day briefcase which is $199 08:54 – It takes around $65 to produce a bag 09:04 – The leather is from Italy 09:16 – Jeremy really wants to have a high-quality bag 09:26 – $20-30 dollars is spent on marketing per bag 09:58 – Average profit per bag 10:28 – Jeremy had dark traffic on ly 10:42 – There’s no exact influencer who has driven the most sales to Instagram 10:51 – Mollyblogger has sold 17 units within an hour 11:07 – Mollyblogger is Joseph’s friend 11:25 – For every $500 per post, Jeremy expects to get 5 sales 11:33 – Breton now has 40K followers 11:50 – It’s difficult to calculate the return because it takes time before a customer purchases 12:21 – Joseph had a campaign in Fall where he had help, but now he’s doing it on his own 12:40 – One of Joseph’s growth strategy is to get people on their email list 12:44 – The main focus now is to make people aware of Breton and aggregate the information 13:40 – The bags are made with wax cotton which is water-resistant 14:03 – Customers often look for the look 14:30 – The bags are made to last 14:38 – Team size is 2.5 14:51 – Joseph won’t give up a part of the company 15:49 – “I don’t know exactly what we’re doing” 16:48 – Chubbies Shorts is effectively using Instagram 16:55 – Breton’s Instagram 17:24 – There’s a big percentage of women buying the Breton bags, too 18:58 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Choose a job where you can earn and have fun at the same time. Nurture your connections and network. Don’t give up a part of your company if you’re not confident doing so. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/12/2017 • 22 minutes, 33 seconds
687: Monaco Bored Him, Now Places Ads on DIgital Billboards with VistarMedia CEO Jeremy Ozen
Jeremy Ozen. He’s the president and co-founder of Vistar Media. He was previously a Goldman Sachs European Special Situations in London monitoring a portfolio of venture investments. He also has a BS in Material Science Engineering and a BSc in Finance from the University of Pennsylvania. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Sam Walton’s Biography What CEO do you follow? – 3G Capital Founders Favorite online tool? — Gmail Calendar How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jeremy wished he had not taken life so seriously and not every day is the end of the world Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:43 – Nathan introduces Jeremy to the show 01:15 – Vistar Media connects a technology to a software that runs digital billboard 01:35 – Vistar Media makes money by selling the technology or ads to the advertisers or agencies 01:52 – Vistar Media pays the media to access the platform then charges advertising agencies to use their technology 02:18 – VistarMedia doesn’t have a financial risk because the system is a real-time system 02:28 – There is a real-time buying of ad inventory 02:53 – VistarMedia’s technology can adjust to digital ones 03:06 – VistarMedia uses data for telecoms especially the location data of consumers to analyze where the consumers are within a day 04:20 – Jeremy started with Goldman Sachs in London 04:45 – Goldman had 2 groups, one is in stocks and the other is the special situations 05:20 – Jeremy stayed with Goldman for 2 years 05:22 – Jeremy then went to a hedge fund based in Monaco 06:12 – Jeremy became friends with people in Monaco 06:30 – There was a guy who has a very successful business in Poland 07:31 – Jeremy accepted and liked the concept of knowing something that is already working 08:10 – Jeremy has a friend who was working for a company that was founded by Google in 2010 08:23 – They’re one of the first to do programmatic advertising 08:59 – Jeremy then realized that what this company was doing for online advertising would eventually be the way for every type of advertising 10:54 – When Jeremy started, they knew the out-of-home advertising space was growing in terms of how much is digital 11:19 – Vistar Media needed to work with different media outlets explaining to them how to integrate into their system 11:28 – The idea of programmatic advertising was totally foreign to them 11:39 – Vistar Media was launched in 2012 12:48 – Team size is 55 12:52 – Vistar Media raised in 2013 a convertible round 13:15 – Vistar Media hasn’t raised a series A and will not raise one 14:01 – The biggest expenses of Vistar Media is the cost of media 15:20 – Jeremy has thought of buying Upfront 16:01 – Vistar Media has a difference in capital with the billboard guys 16:43 – Jeremy would describe themselves as the biggest billboard company in the USA 16:46 – They have all these big partners that work with them 17:29 – Vistar Media is bringing the billboard companies new money 18:02 – Vistar Media is the only player of programmatic advertising out-of-home 18:15 – $7B has been spent on billboards annually 18:27 – Jeremy is now 31 18:51 – Personally, when Jeremy started Vistar Media, they thought they were building a VC tech like business 19:12 – Jeremy built a business to have an exit at some point 19:48 – The best way to grow your value is by growing your business 20:05 – Jeremy is paying himself $50K a year 20:35 – Goal for 2017 21:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Going from one field to another is not that difficult if you really want and need a change. You grow your value by growing your business. There’s a time to work hard and a time to play hard. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/11/2017 • 25 minutes, 46 seconds
686: $225M Raised by Data Focused Ex-Isralei Fighter Pilot, is Kaminario Next IPO? With CEO Dani Golan
Dani Golan who oversees strategy, a go-to market, and overall company operations at Kaminario. Previously, Dani served as president and general manager of Performix technology which was acquired by Nice Systems in 2006. Prior to Performix, he served as an executive responsible for leading new ventures at EMC. He holds a BSc of electrical engineering, summa cum laude at Technion – Israel Institute of Technology and an MBA from The Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Prior to his professional career, Dani served as a fighter pilot and officer in the Israeli Air Force. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Goal What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Skype How many hours of sleep do you get?— Quite inconsistent If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Dani would tell himself to focus on what’s important Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Dani to the show 01:33 – Being a fighter pilot and an entrepreneur are similar things for Dani 01:57 – Kaminario is an infrastructure for the cloud 02:47 – Kaminario brings efficiency to data sets, data centers and data bases 02:50 – Kaminario is the development of net generation data storage infrastructure 03:02 – Most of Kaminario’s customers are net generation business models 03:13 – They needed a completely different data infrastructure that can grow with them 03:37 – Legacy enterprises generates more data 03:51 – Kaminario has raised a total of $280M including their latest round of $75M 04:30 – Kaminario is dealing with 2 of hottest markets in IT: flash and cloud 04:42 – Flash created the opportunity for Kaminario to be in the greatest revolution for IT 05:40 – If you’re pushing your valuation to perfection, there is no perfection in IT 06:05 – Make sure you have a fair valuation for your company 06:24 – The sentiment of investors is that they appreciate the growth in the past but now they’re asking for real businesses, especially when it comes to IT 06:49 – Investors want to see pass the profitability 07:09 – Kaminario is closed to profitability 07:30 – Kaminario’s past investors have also participated and shared significantly 09:00 – Businesses should protect their employees 09:44 – When you are getting money for the company, 3 means you have to get $3M to the investors 10:40 – “Valuation is bullsh*t if you have crazy terms” 10:50 – Employees are far more important than actual valuation 11:05 – Kaminario was launched in 2008 on April fools’ day which is the same as Apple 11:57 – Kaminario now has thousands of customers 12:21 – How fast a specific customer is going to buy more is one of the metrics that Kaminario measures 12:51 – Kaminario is doing serve and apply which is software, hardware and service 13:30 – Kaminario sells to cloud providers or to the SaaS companies 13:44 – The SaaS is the larger revenue source 13:57 – By 2019, the total cloud market will be 175B 14:03 – Around 120B are SaaS companies 15:32 – SaaS companies charge their customers monthly 15:37 – SaaS companies pay Kaminario a one-time fee for infrastructure 15:46 – There is an on-going payment for maintenance 16:20 – The expansion revenue 16:28 – If a SaaS company started with $300K, they will go over $1M by the end of 12 months 17:45 – Team size is 250 but the inside sales team isn’t that big 18:17 – Kaminario has a presence in the market 18:57 – Data grows exponentially every year 19:23 – Normally, customers would start cautiously and would just eventually gain trust in Kaminario 19:55 – First metric to measure the 3x growth is by capacity 20:45 – Kaminario is the most scalable product in the market 20:50 – Kaminario can fit roughly 12 terabytes of 400K iPhones 21:48 – Kaminario has never lost a customer 22:00 – Kaminario is a big funnel 22:12 – Kaminario’s revenue stream is 50% from new sign-ups and 50% from existing 24:04 – Kaminario’s last round was closed in Q4 of 2016 24:41 – When you are in Kaminario’s business, it’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon 25:00 – Kaminario’s number one competitor is EMC 26:06 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Valuation is useless if you’re aiming for perfection, there will always be flaws. Focus on keeping your employees and customers happy. A customer won’t easily trust a product at first so you have to earn that trust, ensuring they stay longer. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you’re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/10/2017 • 30 minutes, 26 seconds
685: He Loved A Product, So Acquired Whole Business with Doc Signing Signix CEO Jay Jumper
Jay Jumper. He’s the founder, CEO and President of SIGNiX. As a highly regarded entrepreneur, Jay has worked to establish the company as the leading cloud-based digital signature solution which is a hot space. He has more than 20 years in financial services and technology management experience. Additionally, Jay graduated from University of Tennessee in 1985 with a BS in marketing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Trump: The Art of the Deal What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett and Mark Cuban Favorite online tool? — Email How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jay would tell himself that hard work and perseverance outdoes anything else Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:45 – Nathan introduces Jay to the show 01:33 – SIGNiX is the only cloud-based digital signature company in North America 01:44 – SIGNiX is an independent e-signature solution 02:00 – Jay shows Nathan a visual of a cloud-based digital signature 02:08 – Put a signature on the overlight, not on the document 02:48 – You depend on the e-signature vendor to be around forever so they can validate the signature 02:56 – On the overlight is a hyperlink that redirects the person to the e-signature provider 03:38 – With SIGNiX, every signature is embedded onto the document 03:52 – SIGNiX is a SaaS model 04:08 – SIGNiX focuses on security 04:32 – 80% of SIGNiX is sold to software partners 04:37 – SIGNiX enables software partners to capture the e-signature market that is sitting on their software 05:05 – Software partners can privately label SIGNiX so they can rebrand it according to whatever the product is 05:25 – SIGNiX does a revenue share with their software partners 05:32 – SIGNiX gives their software partners a highly robust digital signature solution 06:08 – SIGNiX’s pricing on their website 06:10 – $240 per seat equals to 240 transactions a year 06:22 – SIGNiX’s emphasis is on supporting their partners 06:54 – SIGNiX goes to different industries and tries to match pricing based on the industry 07:37 – SIGNiX has very robust APIs which is the core of the business 08:11 – The key things that SIGNiX offers: everything is embedded in the document and documents can be deleted from SIGNiX 08:18 – A dependent e-signature always has 2 copies, one for the company and one for the customer 09:04 – What SIGNiX is doing is much more difficult 09:30 – Team size is 50 10:00 – SIGNiX was launched in 2002 and was acquired from another company 10:12 – ProNvest is a robo advisor that Jay also owns 10:45 – SIGNiX is a bigger revenue stream for Jay 10:57 – The market for e-signature is very large 11:35 – ProNvest provides management counseling to the 41K marketplace 11:47 – In 2007, more people in 41K are taking their money out rather than contributing 12:06 – Jay really wanted a tool set to work with their 41K providers to help them retain their assets 12:17 – Jay wanted the providers to retain their assets through electronic signatures 12:24 – SIGNiX called Jay 12:40 – The company was struggling and Jay became an investor in the company 12:52 – Jay invested around 50% of the company 13:05 – There was an offer from a public company to buy the company after Jay invested 13:22 – The offer was 5x what Jay paid for 14:00 – In 2001, it was good to have a “.com” but in 2002, Jay needed to have revenue 14:23 – Jay saw the need for having SIGNiX regardless of its previous company struggles 14:33 – Jay really bolted SIGNiX and passed it on an incubator 15:04 – The previous company just spent money on the technology and was burning cash 15:43 – SIGNiX now has 670K customers 15:52 – It is a combination of seats and customers 16:30 – Average MRR 16:57 – SIGNiX gives discounts to their partners 17:18 – If you’re working with a software company, you have to figure out a number that works for their customers 18:02 – The number that Jay gave was an annual number 18:20 – SIGNiX does not focus on their competitors because they have a very different product 18:48 – SIGNiX wants to go and find the top software developers in every industry and partner with them 19:03 – First thing that SIGNiX looks for in a software partner is their position and role in their particular industry 19:10 – Ziplogix partnered with SIGNiX and named their solution, Digital Ink 19:25 – SIGNiX has a large portion of realtors in their network 19:35 – SIGNiX doesn’t mind being behind the scenes 19:55 – SIGNiX is not a reseller and it becomes the key feature of the product 20:18 – SIGNiX doesn’t have a standard percentage split because it varies per company 20:49 – Jay did a lot of self-funding for SIGNiX, but has also raised capital which is an 8-figure total 21:18 – ProNvest is the largest investor in SIGNiX but they needed outside investors to scale 21:38 – The funding rounds SIGNiX had in 2016 had a total of around $90M 23:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Develop and scale your product until you become a totally different product from your competitors. A business that is struggling does NOT mean that it will struggle forever; decide if the company is worth acquiring and if you can grow it into a profitable business. It’s okay if you’re not in the limelight—so long as you’re getting paid and revenue continues to multiply. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/9/2017 • 28 minutes, 3 seconds
684: How to Raise Your First Round of Funding with Healthcare API, Redox Founder Niko Skievaski
Niko Skievaski. He’s the co-founder of Redox, a modern API for healthcare. He also used to do some work at Epic. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Moments of Magic What CEO do you follow? – Judith Faulkner Favorite online tool? — Calendly How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Niko would have asked himself to start something rather than working in a big bank Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:40 – Nathan introduces Niko to the show 00:59 – Redox connects applications to software developers 01:04 – Redox’s business model is licensing connections to various healthcare systems 01:25 – Niko deals with healthcare because he believes it is important 01:33 – Niko has also talked to developers that made an impact on patients’ lives 01:46 – “From our perspective, we really see a technology innovation healthcare something that is absolutely needed” 02:20 – Redox charges software developers and software developers charge the healthcare system 02:38 – Redox initially becomes a sub-contractor of software vendors 03:21 – Redox charges per the number of connections a developer has in the healthcare system which is a monthly model 03:48 – Depending on the interface, the charge changes a bit 03:52 – It is a SaaS model 04:08 – Most developers connect to 1-3 healthcare systems 04:15 – Each connection system is around a thousand dollars 04:25 – Redox was founded in 2014 04:34 – Niko was in the corporate world and was working at Wells Fargo 04:46 – Niko went to Epic to get his hands on data because he studied Economics and wanted to understand what he could do to improve the healthcare data 05:07 – When Niko got to Epic, they didn’t actually have the data 05:17 – Niko learned a lot from Epic about the provider workflow 05:29 – Since healthcare is digitized, the challenge is how to get the data out of the cloud to software developers 05:43 – Niko’s CTO and co-founder, James, was helping startups hook up with various healthcare systems 05:59 – The idea of Redox is to make an engine that can scale across multiple health systems 06:16 – Redox was bootstrapped and has raised capital 06:30 – Niko and his co-founder have started different companies until they decided to do Redox 06:50 – They brought in another co-founder to round up Redox 07:00 – Niko and his co-founders worked in a co-working space and saved some money from their consulting gigs 07:21 – Redox raised a small seed round of $350K in 2014, then they hired some developers 07:40 – The co-founders were only getting $35K each when they were starting 08:05 – They made sacrifices in order to start Redox 08:51 – They have to convince themselves that if things don’t work, they just have to get a job 09:11 – Entrepreneurs can easily get a job 09:30 – Redox has raised a couple of rounds 09:40 – The first application they had can determine the amount of blood loss by taking a picture 10:06 – It took Redox 10 months to get live with their first customer 10:17 – Redox raised their round A early 10:29 – The developer community was really excited and was supportive of Redox 10:52 – Redox was getting 1K MRR from their first customer 11:00 – The first round was a priced round 11:11 – You can raise based on your traction or based on potential 11:28 – Redox was based on potential 11:38 – Redox’s pitch to their investors 11:40 – Digital health is one of the fastest growing spaces for venture capital 11:44 – There are too many companies trying to start something innovative in the healthcare space 11:47 – The common problem that they have is sharing data with the legacy system 12:10 – Redox really has a great team 12:30 – It’s not about the MRR, it’s about the potential of working with the army of software developers who are innovating in this space 12:53 – Redox’s marketing strategy is getting the developers first, then the developers will drag Redox to the healthcare system 13:10 – Valuation 13:24 – Redox has closed another $9M with their series B round in January 13:40 – Total amount raised is $14M 13:48 – The new additional investor is Intermountain Healthcare System 14:20 – Redox currently has 100 healthcare systems across USA 15:13 – Redox has around $400K MRR 15:45 – Customer churn 16:13 – CAC 16:44 – Team size is 35 who are mostly developers 16:59 – Redox is a developer platform 17:06 – Most are based in Wisconsin and some are based around USA 17:46 – Niko won’t sell Redox even if they already had an acquisition offer before 18:08 – Niko didn’t think that the company acquiring Redox would be able to solve the problem as fast as Niko and the team 18:32 – Niko will accept an acquisition offer only if the company will be able to do it faster than Niko and the team 19:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The continuous innovation in the healthcare space needs a data source that is stable. Stick with your principles and be focused on where you want the company to go. Raising capital can be based on your traction or the potential of your business. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/8/2017 • 24 minutes, 14 seconds
683: These 4 pHD's Choose Entrepreneurship, Raise $75M for Data Indexing Tool Collibra with CEO Felix Van De Maele
Felix Van de Maele. He’s the CEO and one of the co-founders of Collibra which he took the idea of funding to more than years of record growth and industry leadership. He’s responsible for the company’s global business strategy. Prior to Collibra, Felix served as a researcher at the Semantics of Technology and Applications Research Laboratory at a university in Brussels where he focused on the technology crawlers on the semantic web and semantic data integration. He holds a masters in computer science and software engineering from that university and masters of general management from Vlerick Business School. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – n/a Favorite online tool? — Evernote How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I won’t change much” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:39 – Nathan introduces Felix to the show 01:33 – Collibra is a SaaS company helping larger organizations to better find, understand and control their data 01:47 – Collibra started in financial services 01:53 – Every bank needs data governance, which is what Collibra does 01:58 – Data governance is needed for regulatory compliance 02:16 – Collibra now covers different industries 02:25 – Collibra was launched in 2008 02:31 – Collibra raised capital 02:40 – Collibra raised a seed round of €800K as Felix’s first company 02:48 – They bootstrapped after their profitability tripled every year 00:57 – They’ve raised their first bigger round which is a series B of $20M in 2014 03:14 – In December 2016, they did a $50M series C round 03:27 – Felix is now 32 and has been focusing on Collibra for almost a decade now 04:00 – Felix uses the analogy of the library and the index card that is used in a library to elaborate data governance 04:09 – A library card with all its information is similar to an organization with all its data 04:27 – Collibra wants to get to the Amazon of the notifications of data 04:46 – Collibra is similar to a search engine for data sets 04:59 – Now everybody does data and it’s chaos 05:14 – Collibra has close to 200 customers 05:25 – RPU is $200-250K annually 05:41 – Average customer pay per month is 20K 05:46 – Collibra has annual plans with cash upfront 06:13 – Collibra started with a perpetual model which is a licensing fee upfront, then they have the software 06:29 – There’s an annual maintenance fee which is 20% of the initial fee 06:46 – ARR is $10-30M 07:00 – The idea of Collibra 07:13 – Felix had 4 options after graduation 07:23 – Felix was inspired by a book he read and thought that he could start his own business 07:57 – Collibra has 4 founders 08:25 – The equity is just 25% 08:55 – The founders split the shareholders from their management 09:06 – “We try to separate the 2 as much as possible” 09:40 – The investors own a different range in Collibra 09:55 – The percentage of the company that they give away during the series C depends on the trajectory and how much money is raised 10:12 – The biggest round for Collibra is the series B 10:39 – Collibra’s trajectory is to have $100M ARR as quickly as possible 10:59 – The picking of investors is mostly because of the valuation, but there are other factors involved 11:27 – Collibra picked Matthew of Iconic because he clicked well 12:00 – Customer churn is 3-4% 12:30 – Net revenue expansion 12:52 – CAC 13:30 – Some of Collibra’s customers have been with them for several years 14:08 – Collibra looks at their sales efficiency and their marketing efficiency 04:13 – The marketing dominance they’re spending to generate $1 of ARR is around 0.8-0.9 14:30 – It costs $1 in sales and marketing to generate $1 in ARR 14:42 – Payback time is around 12 months 14:54 – Team size is 210 15:00 – Biggest team is in New York, engineering team is in Brussels and sales and marketing in London 15:30 – The HQ transferred to New York because most of the customers are in USA 16:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are so many data sources available and it’s difficult to know which one has the most accurate data. You need to find a way to govern the data that you have—this helps in regulatory compliance. Sometimes, ignorance IS bliss—it can cause you to take more risks. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/7/2017 • 19 minutes, 22 seconds
682: Why Tech Companies Are Opening Salt Lake City Offices With CloudCherry CEO Vinod Muthukrishnan
Vinod Muthukrishnan. He was first a sailor then a strategist and now an entrepreneur. He was fortunate and has worked in diverse and challenging environments starting with the Merchant Navy, a high energy mobile first financial technology startup where he had a strategy and global sales. Now, he currently serves as co-founder and CEO of a company called Cloudcherry, a tech startup based in Pleasanton, California with offices in Singapore, India and a new location Vinod will show. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – Nick Mehta Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4.5-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Vinod wished he knew programming back then Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:46 – Nathan introduces to the show 01:22 – The new location is in Salt Lake City 01:36 – Cloudcherry has 74 people 01:40 – They are based in India and Singapore 01:47 – Cloudcherry has raised $7M with a total of around $9.5M raised 01:56 – Cloudcherry is a custom platform for millennials 02:13 – Millennials have complicated journeys with the brands they work with 02:21 – In 2017, if you want to understand your customers, you have to be in all the platforms 02:47 – Cloudcherry is a feedback platform on speed across all platforms 03:07 – Cloudcherry has an inspirational wall in their office where employees can post things they find inspirational 03:18 – “You need to walk into your office every day and be inspired on what you believe in” 03:40 – Whoever visits their office can put their names on the wall 03:50 – Cloudcherry has the 6 pillars of their culture: freedom, ownership, smart work, passion and some more 04:03 – Vinod introduced Nathan to some of the people in the office 04:40 – The office is 2000 sq. ft. 05:05 – Vinod shows Nathan the view from the office 05:27 – Cloudcherry was launched in 2014 05:34 – Cloudcherry is a SaaS business 05:48 – Cloudcherry had their last fund raising September 2016 05:58 – Cloudcherry has close to 100 customers 06:05 – “The massive push now is to grow the business in North America” 06:37 – The team in America targets mid-market and enterprise businesses 06:47 – Average customer pay per month is a couple of hundred from SMBs 06:57 – Mid-market and enterprise average a thousand dollars a month 07:23 – Cloudcherry has a complex mix of customers 07:58 – They are doing more than 88K per month 08:13 – Cloudcherry has almost zero customer churn with SMB at the moment 08:35 – Cloudcherry’s enterprise churn is higher than SMBs 09:00 – Most of Cloudcherry’s customers are with them for 18-20 months 09:33 – Cloudcherry ran out of the market in 2015 09:48 – SMBs are customers whose ARPU is south of 20K 10:18 – Cloudcherry currently has 35% of mid-market and enterprise customers and 65% of SMBs 11:10 – Cloudcherry ‘s time to recover CAC is around 12 months 12:09 – Average CAC is $7K-12K 12:25 – LTV is around $36K 12:35 – “Some amount of the optimism needs to be weighed with intellectual honesty” 12:45 – The greatest predictor of LTV for Vinod is the churn 13:10 – Cloudcherry focuses on customer delight 13:22 – Cloudcherry got feedback on how delighted their customers are 13:45 – If a customer stays with you, it will impact your churn and LTV 14:11 – Cloudcherry is still burning cash at the moment 14:34 – “We have money to burn from growth” 14:47 – December 2017 goal MRR 15:32 – SaaS business should continuously grow in numbers 16:57 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Make your employees look forward to going to the office every day. When your customers are satisfied with your business, the numbers will just follow. SaaS businesses should constantly track their numbers. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/6/2017 • 20 minutes, 14 seconds
681: Tai Lopez, Gary V Paid Him To Grow Instagram with Classy Savant CEO Eduardo Gonzalez
Eduardo Gonzales. Two years ago, he started working on Instagram as a broke college student with a vision to become one of the largest influencers with literally zero dollars in investment. He learned the game and began growth hacking on different Instagram pages. Today, he stands with over 5M followers combined across multiple different niches on Instagram. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think, Grow, Prosper and The Alchemist What CEO do you follow? – Jack Dorsey, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — com How many hours of sleep do you get?— At least 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I would have studied more programming” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:40 – Nathan introduces Eduardo to the show 01:26 – “The power of social media is absolutely limitless” 01:30 – You can have a more intimate relationship between brands and consumers 01:56 – Social media is a great way to target people on mobile devices 02:05 – There’s now a geographical private system where you want your followers to be 02:44 – Eduardo helped Tai Lopez with social media marketing 02:50 – Eduardo was one of the first people to help Movement Watches 03:00 – Movement Watches approached Eduardo when he was still on Tumblr 03:04 – Eduardo started growing on Tumblr as a luxury blogger and was able to grow a couple hundred thousand followers there 03:13 – Movement Watches was a small startup; Eduardo stayed with them and now they’re at Nordstrom 03:40 – Eduardo was getting 15% for every affiliate 03:50 – When Movement Watches moved to Instagram, they paid Eduardo per post 03:59 – Eduardo charges per post depending on the page, the content of the post, and the type of following they want to engage 04:20 – For 380K followers in a luxury niche, it will $125-150 per post that will last a day 04:38 – The page’s visual team will create content and then Eduardo will pick the one that matches his page 05:03 – One of Tai Lopez’s marketers is Eduardo’s friend and they approached Eduardo 05:26 – Tai Lopez did a lot of giveaways and online marketing courses 05:37 – He wanted to add value to people 05:57 – During giveaways, Tai had a large list of influencers that he reached out to 06:15 – The marketing team would ask Eduardo for a consultation regarding the strategy 06:32 – Eduardo also has a team who make content so they can make the content and reach out to Eduardo’s influencers 06:55 – Tai Lopez does social media growth and he likes to grow his followers 07:00 – Tai targeted to have 10K followers when he came to Eduardo 07:10 – Tai now has around 500K followers 07:31 – Eduardo created the visual content for Tai 07:36 – Eduardo figured out the best schedule to post Tai’s content 07:42 – Eduardo was able to track all the analytics 07:46 – As the following grew, Tai was able to know the best time to post, where the followers were coming from and where the most engaging followers come from 07:54 – They weeded out non-performing pages and created a list of pages that performed well until they reached 10K 08:07 – It took Eduardo a week and a half to reach 10K followers 08:10 – Tai paid Eduardo $5K 08:24 – The one page Tai is getting more followers is Big Toys 08:39 – The age groups on the page are 18-24 and 25-34 and mostly are in USA 08:54 – Because of the large age group, a lot of them are interested in the online courses that Tai offers 09:04 – Sometimes people would actually come to Eduardo and ask him if they should buy a page 09:12 – People do buy pages, but when you rebrand a page, you lose some of the following and it isn’t as organic 09:24 – You can buy a page that is as close or as similar to the message that you want to convey 09:45 – Eduardo has worked with Gary V on his social media growth 09:58 – The work was almost similar with what Eduardo did for Tai 10:20 – Eduardo has worked with Secret Entourage 10:28 – They wanted to promote their online marketing sources 10:46 – Eduardo is also in the process of working with Rolls-Royce 11:17 – Eduardo has a lot people who have a large number of followers 11:26 – Eduardo has 5M and with co-founder, Goodlife, they’ll have 10-11M followers combined 11:42 – Dan Fleyshman and Branden Hampton are some of the people they’ve worked for 12:13 – Dan and Brendan grew their own networks and pages and they acquired some 12:31 – Eduardo started working with small campaigns 13:15 – Eduardo launched his consulting company, Classy Savant, in 2016 13:25 – 2016 revenue was around $40K 13:30 – 2017 goal is at least $100K 14:00 – Eduardo collaborated with Mr. Goodlife and he has another partner 14:12 – Eduardo also has a few interns and photographers 14:37 – One of the most well-known tools that Eduardo uses is com 14:48 – You can check a public account’s statistics and what they use for their posting 15:02 – com is where you can pull all sorts of information 15:24 – You can know who your top followers are, your most recent, and your first followers 15:55 – It works well too when you switch your Instagram from public to business account 16:27 – You can always Google the top hashtags 16:46 – You have to keep your hashtags from 5 to 15 18:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Dream BIG even if you have to start small. It is now easier for brands to reach out to their target consumers because of social media. Gaining followers in Instagram isn’t that simple—you have to have a goal and a planned strategy to reach that goal. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/5/2017 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
680: How to Start SaaS Company with Very little Savings, with Reply.io CEO Oleg Campbell
Oleg Campbell. He was born in Ukraine and starting working as a programmer at the age of 19. He moved to Canada when he was 22 and founded his first startup at 24 successfully. Then at 27, he founded Reply.io and he’s currently living between Ukraine and San Francisco building this company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Losing My Virginity What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Chart Model How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be more fearless” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:45 – Nathan introduces Oleg to the show 01:28 – Oleg is a programmer and read Kawasaki’s, Rich Dad Poor Dad, and Tim Ferriss’, 4-Hour Work Week, which influenced him to build a software for himself 01:58 – Oleg found out that his first business was a lifestyle business when they failed to grow it 02:02 – The technology was built on top of QR code 02:22 – The highest revenue the company reached was $150K annually 02:32 – Oleg put the business in autopilot, took the money and invested in a new venture 02:28 – Oleg has never saved any money, but just invested it into businesses 03:21 – Oleg founded his first startup while he was working full-time 03:37 – With Reply, Oleg invested what he took from his salary from his previous startup 03:45 – Initial investment was around $30K 03:55 – Oleg hired 2 developers to build the product and Oleg started working on marketing and sales 04:08 – The developers are in Ukraine and it cost Oleg only $2000 per month 04:46 – Oleg found the developers through online job postings 04:58 – There are websites in Ukraine where developers hang out 05:18 – Reply focuses on replacing routine sales tasks with AI and automation 05:25 – Reply now automates sending emails, follow-ups and initiating phone calls 05:44 – The development team is building more features to automate more sales tasks 05:53 – Reply is a SaaS business 05:57 – Plans start from $25 to $120 per user 06:03 – Average pay per user is $90 per month 06:14 – Reply was launched in 2015 06:18 – Current team size is 34 06:28 – There’s a sales team in Canada and the development and marketing teams are in Ukraine 06:50 – There are 15 developers 07:20 – Reply spends an average of $4K for developers 08:04 – Reply has 1000 customers right now 08:15 – Average MRR 08:21 – Reply just hit $100K in monthly revenue 08:42 – Reply raised capital a year ago with a small $400K seed round 08:54 – One of the investors reached out to Reply and to raise a round 09:13 – It was on a convertible note 09:17 – It was in March 2016 09:24 – Reply is now close to closing a big round of funding 09:34 – Oleg decided to find out when it would be a good time to raise money 09:42 – Oleg reached out to some investors and used his software called Outreach 10:03 – In 3 weeks, Oleg met 15 investors 10:11 – Oleg then found out that they were still early for a round A 10:32 – The sample email Oleg sent to the investors 11:26 – Reply has been profitable for the last 4 months 11:38 – Oleg has been operating at right around zero 12:08 – Most of Reply’s money is spent on headcount and they’re just starting with advertising 12:18 – They are now spending on AdWords 12:43 – Churn is, in terms of numbers, would be close to 5% and in terms of revenue sharing, it would be closer to 3% 13:12 – Reply’s customers are adding more seats 13:39 – CAC would be around $200 but will still varies and organic is definitely lower 14:03 – LTV is if you just take all our customers, it would be close to $100 14:19 – But in terms of bigger accounts, it will be much lower to a few grand at least 14:36 – Reply launched in Product Hunt some of their free products as lead generation tools 14:59 – They have a great number of fans in Product Hunt 15:09 – Reply also creates content and promotes it 15:16 – Reply recently interviewed a lot of sales experts and they created articles 15:43 – After the launch in Product Hunt, Reply had 10K visitors and 600 signups 16:02 – In terms of LTV, it will be close to 60K which is added from the Product Hunt launch 16:25 – Oleg won’t sell the company for a million 16:32 – Oleg’s valuation is around $20-30M 16:47 – Oleg has a co-founder and the split is around 60/40 17:27 – Reply provides equity to employees who have been with them for a year 19:12 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you want to put your money to use, you can continue to invest in different businesses. Outsourcing developers from other countries is more cost-efficient. Be more realistic and be fearless. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/4/2017 • 22 minutes, 6 seconds
679: Mobile Majority $25M raised, Acquires Qualcomm's Gimbal To Lead Mobile Ad Attribution Using Beacons w/ CEO Rob Emrich
Rob Emrich. He’s a serial entrepreneur, currently involved in his latest venture as the founder and CEO of The Mobile Majority. He’s founded and served as chief executive at 6 startups in social ventures including Road of Life, which distributed as $70M dollar curriculum; BULX, which was acquired by Dealyard in 2011; and Boundaryless Brands, which was acquired in 2011 along with SpeakerSite. Know more about Rob at his website. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Goal What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Spark Email Client How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Have fun” Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:40 – Nathan introduces Rob to the show 01:26 – Rob just bought Gimbal and will use that name 01:55 – They’re taking the name most especially because of the .com in Gimbal’s website 02:15 – Rob believes that what drives success in online marketing is data 02:58 – Most of Rob’s previous companies were in the ecommerce space 03:22 – Mobile phone ends up being the bridge between the online world and the offline world 03:31 – Rob was missing data regarding targeting and attribution 03:46 – There’s no way to know if an offline campaign is effective 04:36 – The technology Rob bought that has the data can now run campaigns and know that you were on that campaign 05:05 – Offline behavior ends up becoming an incredibly strong signal of intent and is an accurate way to measure attribution 05:21 – Gimbal uses Beacon 05:37 – Beacons are usually a 2-flow energy and Qualcomm invested around over a hundred million dollars for the technology 06:01 – Beacons are precise when working with GPS 06:53 – Qualcomm spun out beacons in 4 other companies to develop the culture of innovation 07:28 – When they spun out in 2014, it became a challenge for big companies to innovate 08:20 – The valuation 08:44 – The deal structure that Rob had with Qualcomm was a mix of different things: cash, debt and equity 08:57 – Total funding from Mobile Majority was around $25M 09:03 – Mobile Majority was launched in 2012 09:38 – Rob has gone through things after his first exit 10:05 – “I’m going big at this point” 10:16 – Rob is currently 37 and has no kids 10:33 – Team size is around 100 11:20 – Primary line of business is essentially acting as a media and advertising operating system for large media companies 11:41 – They target individual people 11:44 – “We understand identity very, very well” 13:09 – They were getting revenue share 13:42 – When CBS creates content, that content generates users and Mobile Majority exposes them to more user data and will sell their operated properties 14:30 – Mobile Majority is different from Outbrain because Mobile Majority’s ads are more targeted 15:10 – Mobile Majority now has 10K end customers 16:00 – Total advertising purchase range is between $10M-100M 16:15 – Average percentage taken by Mobile Majority varies 17:08 – Instead of charging towards content, Mobile Majority will only hit specific people who are on the list 18:46 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s a lot of missed data in the offline world that is still not easy to track. Knowing and understanding your target audience is more effective and cost-efficient for you. Just go on with your life and have fun, create businesses while you still can. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/3/2017 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
678: Creative who needs work? Try Zooppa with $8m Raised and $4m+ In Creative Projects in 2016 with CEO Alessandro Biggi
Alessandro Biggi. He’s the CEO at Zooppa, the first open-source creative agency. Previously, he was the CEO and founder of a company called 20lines, an app to share leading short stories acquired by HarperCollins Publisher, in January 2016. He’s also worked for JP Morgan, The Boston Consulting Group, and as an adjunct professor in Venice. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Ricardo Donadon Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Alessandro wished he would have studied some hard skills like engineering Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:46 – Nathan introduces Alessandro to the show 01:22 – Zooppa relies on technology to engage with over 400K creatives around the world 01:58 – Zooppa is like a marketplace, connecting creatives to people who need a project done 02:02 – Zooppa has 2 models in creating content 02:07 – First is the open model which is open to everyone to show their creativity 02:18 – The second one is the VIP which is only offered to top producers on the platform to participate and win the project 02:46 – Average project size depends on the creation needed 02:56 – An open model can go from $50K-150K 03:12 – Average can be $40K 03:18 – Zooppa was launched 10 years ago, in Italy 03:25 – Zooppa expanded to New York, Seattle, Venice, Milan and London 03:42 – Alessandro just joined Zooppa 1 month ago after selling 20lines 03:50 – Alessandro was also an investor in Zooppa 04:20 – Zooppa was founded by H-Farm’s founders 04:41 – Zooppa has raised around $8M 04:50 – Alessandro joined Zooppa after the last round 04:57 – There’s a plan to develop more revenue streams for Zooppa 05:21 – Zooppa’s vision is to inspire people use their creativity for a purpose 06:00 – Alessandro accepted Zooppa as a challenge 06:07 – Alessandro feels that there’s more that he can do 06:48 – Zooppa is now planning to distribute a big part of their equity to new and old employees 07:07 – Alessandro does other things aside from Zooppa like investing in a restaurant 07:36 – Alessandro’s first company was inspired by Zooppa 08:05 – Zooppa’s average total transaction volume is $4-5M 08:14 – Zooppa usually runs 50-60 projects a year 08:28 – Zooppa takes care all of the projects and campaigns 09:15 – Zooppa takes a percentage for every project 09:43 – It is 50% 10:09 – Zooppa just opened their New York office 10:15 – Zooppa still continues to expand 10:48 – Creatives can go to Zooppa’s website and see if there are projects that they can take on 11:17 – Zooppa works with big brands 11:39 – Zooppa has 25 people on the team 11:46 – Zooppa is cash-flow positive 12:00 – Zooppa currently focuses on sustaining themselves on their own 12:30 – Alessandro is now 29 and he was 27 and a half when he sold 20lines 12:50 – Alessandro was working at 20lines for a couple of years 13:02 – The publishing space is a hard space to be in 13:05 – The team decided that they’d grow better with a bigger group 13:10 – They had a talk with HarperCollins for about a year 13:33 – It was a soft landing 14:54 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t stick with a company where you don’t see growth happening—sell it and move on. You can always learn something from someone who is older much more experienced. If you can sustain your company on what you currently have, don’t raise a round. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/2/2017 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
677: Talkdesk Passes 50,000 Seats, $25M Raised To Be Your More Efficient Call Center with COO Gadi Shamia
Gadi Shamia. He’s the chief operating officer at Talkdesk, the world’s leading call center software platform. It’s backed by DFJ, Storm Ventures and Salesforce Venture. Talkdesk has grown 8x over the past 2 years and has over 250 employees along with their thousand customers including Box, Shopify, Dropbox and Weather.com. Prior to Talkdesk, Gadi founded a company that was acquired by SAP and now generates $5M in global business. He was also a senior VP at SAP and a general manager at ReachLocal. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Gmail and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Gadi wished he knew that he would be fine so that he could stress less about it Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:44 – Nathan introduces Gadi to the show 01:26 – EchoSign was acquired by Adobe 01:31 – TopManage was acquired by SAP 01:53 – Talkdesk is a cloud-based call center solution 01:58 – It is fully-integrated 02:26 – Talkdesk charges users per license fee 02:44 – Talkdesk is a SaaS company 02:54 – Average pay per customer varies 03:01 – A company with 50 users would pay $5K-7K a month 03:28 – Per seat cost is around $65-125 depending on the subscription 04:02 – Gadi joined Talkdesk 3 years ago 04:16 – The call center space is an interesting market 04:22 – It is still dominated by all players such as Avaya, Cisco and Genesis 04:35 – Talkdesk already has a proven product 04:41 – Talkdesk has a couple of hundred customers who like the product and has been using Talkdesk for years 04:53 – Tiago, Talkdesk’s CEO, was one of the reason Gadi joined Talkdesk 05:14 – Tiago is the co-founder and his co-founder left Talkdesk after 4 and a half years 05:50 – Gadi believes that co-founders leave because they might not feel as excited as they were in the early stages 06:01 – Co-founders staying is also devastating for the company 06:10 – When a co-founder can say that he’s leaving and he has done his job, it’s a healthy company 06:44 – Talkdesk has broken the million ARR 06:57 – Talkdesk had 50 people when Gadi came in 07:17 – Tiago was the only salesperson at Talkdesk when he started it and he was able to get remarkable brands to use Talkdesk 07:43 – Gadi met Tiago through Gadi’s friend from Storm Ventures 08:06 – Gadi and Tiago met in 2014 several times 08:38 – Talkdesk currently has 1200 customers 08:48 – There are around 50K seats 09:06 – Average MRR 09:43 – Alot of Talkdesk customers are e-commerce customers and they are seasonal 10:32 – Talkdesk is at a net negative churn 11:00 – Talkdesk talks to their customers about their seasonal needs and adjusts the annual licensing fee 11:42 – Talkdesk respects Workday, Salesforce and works with ServiceNow 12:48 – The best companies will get 110-120 in aiming net revenue expansion 13:03 – Most companies that have worked with Talkdesk benefit from it and grow 13:10 – DoorDash grew from 40 seats to 800 13:38 – Talkdesk currently has a team of 250 people 14:40 – Talkdesk’s growth is mostly from new sign-ups 14:56 – Talkdesk has raised a total of $24.5M 15:01 – The last round was in 2015 15:15 – Talkdesk is neither raising rounds or talking to Salesforce 15:34 – Talkdesk focuses on building a real business 16:24 – Talkdesk is still burning cash 16:53 – Most of Talkdesk’s customers pay annually upfront 18:13 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When a cofounder leaves, it means he’s done his job and the company is healthy Be in a company where you believe in the product and know that you can accelerate its growth. Building a real business is about the service you provide your customers in helping them achieve growth. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Hotjar – Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where people are clicking and scrolling on the website Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/1/2017 • 23 minutes
676: $30M raised, will DroneDeploy create first Trillionaires w/ Drones + AI and Machine Learning? w/ CEO Mike Winn
Mike Winn. He’s the CEO and founder of the company called DroneDeploy, the leading cloud-software platform for commercial drones and he’s on the mission to make the sky successful and productive for everybody. The company focuses on the agricultural and construction industries, but its large customers are from almost every industry across 130 countries. He has collected more than 8M acres of aerial imagery. Prior to joining Deploy, Mike worked at Google and was a RC helicopters hobbyist. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Effective Executive What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You can pretty much do whatever you set your mind to” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Mike to the show 02:20 – DroneDeploy has raised $31M from VCs 02:26 – DroneDeploy had 3 rounds and the last one was in July 2016 03:00 – DroneDeploy was launched in 2013 03:05 – It stated in Edinburg, UK and was moved to the USA 03:25 – Mike got married in the middle of the incubator program 04:03 – Mike’s wife, Carrie, has always been supportive 04:15 – Mike was an account manager and selling AdWords at Google 04:30 – After 18 months, he moved to another team 04:56 – Mike was 27 when he started DroneDeploy 05:24 – Mike had £100K grant money to back him up 05:39 – Mike was paying himself £1500 05:53 – DroneDeploy’s Twitter has unbelievable aerial imagery 06:05 – DroneDeploy make software for drones 06:13 – Primary industries are agriculture and construction, but they also touch other industries that exist 06:43 – DroneDeploy only focuses on software 06:56 – DroneDeploy is a SaaS business 07:08 – Customers can try DroneDeploy for free 07:12 – For commercial use, pay is $100 a month 07:26 – DroneDeploy has 2 channels 07:34 – To get more accurate data and large 3D plans, try the business plan which is $300 a month 07:44 – The other channel is to expand by the number of seats 08:21 – One seat is $100 08:30 – DroneDeploy has over a thousand paying businesses 08:56 – The drone market is still young, but growing really fast 09:52 – Team size is 60 10:15 – Nathan publishes on Youtube—Check it out! 10:36 – Mark Cuban predicted that the first trillionaire will be from the AI space 11:00 – Mike’s co-founders have PhDs in machine learning 11:10 – Mike sees the path of DroneDeploy becoming a trillion dollar business 12:03 – In the future, you don’t only want drones to collect data but to take action as well 13:07 – DroneDeploy currently works with B2B 13:32 – What is interesting about drones is the technology community 13:50 – Drone provides the bird’s eye view for the farmers 14:23 – One of the farmers who used DroneDeploy found a fungus when he saw that a certain part of the land was different in color 15:02 – In construction, it easier to work around with a drone especially when there’s a disaster, like an earthquake 15:47 – CAC 15:55 – DroneDeploy has a successful blog 16:17 – DroneDeploy has an NPS of around 40 16:52 – 6 people in the team are on sales and the rest are engineers 17:15 – Churn 17:45 – The use of a drone is seasonal 18:01 – DroneDeploy is looking at what the customers want to do and how they can get consumers to use drones throughout the whole year 18:36 – MRR is around $100K 18:58 – DroneDeploy still burns cash monthly 19:30 – DroneDeploy can still manage until 2018 without additional capital 20:27 – Mike would bet on DJI winning the drone hardware space 21:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The drone market is still very young, but is growing rapidly. The future of the AI industry is promising and it’s very likely that the first trillionaire will be from the AI space. You can turn your hobby into a business, just put your mind to it. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/31/2017 • 26 minutes, 38 seconds
675: Would you acquire Mattermark? Artesian $700k MRR, $40M Raised w/ CEO Andrew Yates
Andrew Yates. He’s the CEO and founder of Artesian and they want to make sellers more effective at engaging with buyers using smart data and new techniques to create the right impact. He’s been involved in the sales and marketing for the past 25 years and is aiming to make a difference to people by creating software companies that make a meaningful dent in the universe. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Escape Velocity What CEO do you follow? – Godfrey Sullivan Favorite online tool? — Microsoft Outlook, GeckoBoard, Salesforce How many hours of sleep do you get? — 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I knew more how money and leverage finance works” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 01:46 – Artesian provides a sales acceleration platform 01:56 – With Artesian, you can track every single customer, prospect and competitor every day and manage your pipeline risk 02:11 – Artesian’s phrase is “customer curious businesses” 02:44 – Artesian combines thermographic data with the real-time contextual intelligence 02:50 – You can ask Artesian to find you a company that fits a certain profile 03:15 – Artesian has natural language processing science that scans over 10M sources of structured and unstructured data 03:47 – Artesian started providing their service in 2010 03:54 – Artesian currently has 30K paying subscribers with 100 large enterprise customers 04:09 – Artesian covers a broad sector 04:20 – Artesian’s customers are in high value, relationship-oriented, sales engagement 04:30 – Team size is 60 04:38 – Artesian’s goal is to accelerate more in 2017 04:50 – Average pay per customer is $10K to over $2M per year 04:59 – Artesian licenses to software per user, per month basis 05:04 – 68% of target ARR for 2017 has been contracted 05:38 – Before, Artesian’s licenses were cheaper 06:08 – The 30K customers are the number of seats from 120 enterprise customers 06:43 – Artesian made the decision to take down their cash burn in terms of investment 07:04 – Artesian was burning $300K-400K a month 07:15 – Artesian has raised $40M in equity and debt 07:50 – MRR is $700K 08:24 – Customer retention is around 93 and 120 in terms of net 09:10 – Artesian is now number in the GT crowd ranking in terms of the most popular and most intelligent platform 09:59 – Artesian uses a team of researchers to build deep and cool data sets 10:39 – Artesian also invites users to define their own sales triggers 11:40 – Nathan had Danielle in Episode 318 12:00 – Andrew thinks that a market consolidation practice is inevitable 12:26 – A scenario where companies could join forces to give broader reach and greater depth—a better customer experience is definitely more valuable 12:47 – Andrew also drives growth for Artesian 12:58 – It is important to spend time speaking with other companies that are active in the same space 13:14 – The companies can be quite different and quite complementary 13:29 – The last round was a bridge round 13:49 – Artesian is currently equipped to keep going, without investments, for the next 2 years 14:08 – By the middle of 2017, Artesian will be in a cash flow, breakeven profitability state 14:40 – CAC 14:41 – Artesian was tracking 1x in Year 1 15:08 – Artesian uses great people to drive adoption 15:13 – Artesian has 5 methods inside the platform 15:25 – Artesian uses customer relationship management and what the system is telling them to do 15:42 – Running 89% daily user engagement 16:15 – Artesian launched a way to build a smart calendar for each user every day 16:29 – Artesian is partnered with FullContact and others that provide social profiles 16:56 – Artesian is spending $60-70K on acquisition depending on the segment 17:20 – LTV is 5.2 years 17:30 – Artesian tracks this by looking at the average of customers they’re holding on to 17:40 – HBC is one of their customers 19:28 – Andrew would be interested in talking with Salesforce to share the value 19:38 – 50% of Artesian is owned by institutions 19:46 – Andrew has 2 co-founders 21:27 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Companies in the same space should talk more—they can find out how they’re different and how they complement each other. Being transparent shows that you want people to see your value and learn from it. Handling your finances and controlling what you burn wisely will help your company manage without additional capital. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/30/2017 • 27 minutes, 33 seconds
674: Sumo Logic Passes 1300 Customers, $140M+ Raised, Flirting W/ $100M ARR with CEO Ramin Sayar
Ramin Sayar. He’s currently the president and CEO of Sumo Logic, an industry-leading SaaS-based company backed by some great VCs and he has an impressive list of customers and partners. Previously, he was the senior VP and GM at VMware, where he developed the product and business strategy and led the fastest growing aspect of that business. Previously, he had multiple executive roles with leading companies such as HP Software, Mercury Software, Tibco software, iPlanet Software, AOL and Netscape. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Tom Reilly Favorite online tool? — Twitter and LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— Around 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Ramin would tell himself that the flow and steady path will pay off in the long run Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:22 – Nathan introduces Ramin to the show 03:32 – Sumo Logic helps customers build, run and secure modern apps in a simple and easy to consume service of profitability 03:57 – Sumo Logic is a SaaS business 04:04 – Priced and licensed depending on the data ingested and the duration of retention 04:25 – Average RPU varies 05:35 – Sumo Logic has a mass of service for their customers 05:45 – Sumo Logic has some free services 06:18 – Customers’ buying pattern is consistent 06:43 – $15K-150K is the average contract price 07:34 – Sumo Logic has over 1300 paying customers 07:42 – 51% is enterprise and the other half is midmarket and SMBs 08:22 – Sumo Logic was capitalized through 5 rounds 08:34 – Total amount raised is over $160M 08:52 – Nathan had Tim Draper at Episode 129 from DFJ which Ramin mentioned 09:14 – Sumo Logic is 7 years old 09:33 – Sumo Logic’s founding roots came from the security roles 09:38 – Not all users have access to data being generated 09:48 – The founders believed that there should be a simpler way for more users to access data 10:32 – The team initially felt that there was a competitive advantage in technology and an innovative way to deliver data analytics as a service 11:03 – Sumo Logic currently has 30K users 11:17 – Their vision was to democratize machine data 11:50 – Visa has been with Sumo Logic for a few years now 12:04 – Visa started with their fraud detection cases 12:23 – A few years ago, Visa launched a service with Apple 12:32 – Visa uses Sumo Logic for business insights such as activation and patterns regarding how users use multiple credit card applications 12:58 – Medidata is trying to disrupt the pharmaceutical industry in the clinical trial process 13:23 – Medidata used Sumo and decided they’re going to transfer to the public cloud infrastructure service 13:42 – Medidata is an example of a different, non-tech company using the technology that Sumo Logic provides 14:10 – Sumo Logic assimilates, collects, ingests and analyzes different sources of data 14:25 – Sumo Logic then purposely tailors the analysis through their machine learning algorithms to address 3 distinct use cases 14:52 – Sumo Logic helps in continuous development 15:07 – Sumo Logic provides one single platform that analyses information and puts it into context so that developers and other teams can get the 360 degree, holistic view of the information 15:39 – Sumo Logic analyses a lot of patterns 16:34 – Ramin joined Sumo Logic 2 years ago 17:06 – In choosing a CEO, it comes with understanding the core values and culture of the company and how they relate to what the founders want 17:20 – If there are odds, make sure to address them 17:25 – Second is to make sure that there’s an alignment syndicate in founding members in terms of what the outcomes would be 17:36 – Some CEOs are brought in to scale the company and in other cases, they are brought in to turn over the team or change the company’s direction 18:10 – One of the 2-3 founders of Sumo Logic is still on the team 19:00 – Average ARR 19:30 – “We don’t try to make consumers consume what they can’t initially” 19:40 – SaaS companies often have to prove their value and constantly fight to earn the business 19:56 – More customers are now signing multimillion year deals with Sumo Logic 20:09 – The customers are seeing Sumo Logic’s value 21:12 – The enterprise segment for Sumo Logic is broad 21:26 – When Ramin first came to Sumo Logic, the focus was security 21:43 – Ramin realized that most of their customers are development ops, tech ops and liability engineers, so they pivoted a bit 22:25 – For a SaaS company, the LTV to CAC that modern investors look for are the payback period and the magic number has to be 3.0 and more 22:50 – The other metrics that Sumo Logic tracks 24:09 – Sumo Logic’s payback period is between the 1-2 year mark 25:13 – The enterprise, midmarket and SMBs have different payback periods 25:39 – Team size is 250 27:33 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create guidelines when it comes to looking for your CEOs—they should align with the company’s cultures, beliefs, and goals. SaaS companies often have to prove their value and are constantly fighting to earn business. Users’ access to data can be very limited and complicated; however, simpler and more innovative ways are being discovered as technology continues to advance. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/29/2017 • 32 minutes, 42 seconds
673: Getting Your First 100 Customers with Salesflare CEO Jeroen Corthout
Jeroen Corthout. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Salesflare, the intelligent CRM that startups and small businesses love to use. Prior to Salesflare, he was helping companies to implement their new CRM, marketing and sales. Salesflare kicked off when he and his co-founder, Lieven, found a way to automate their CRM data. Salesflare’s mission is to automate everything in sales, but the irreplaceable human contact. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Alchemist What CEO do you follow? – Jeroen has been reading the biographies of Tony Hsieh, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs and Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Zapier How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jeroen wished he had started these bigger projects earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Jeroen to the show 02:16 – Salesflare helps mostly startups to make their sales consistently productive, to have the right data, and to communicate and manage the pipeline better 02:28 – Salesflare sells licenses 02:40 – Salesflare’s price point is $30/month when you pay annually and $35 if monthly 02:58 – Salesflare started halfway through 2013 03:04 – Jeroen and Lieven were working in a software company 03:20 – Jeroen knew there was no solution to keep files automatically 03:28 – Salesflare basically pulls all the CRM data for you 03:49 – On top of a lot of data, Salesflare is building automation and intelligence 03:52 – There’s an automatic to-do list and body temperature indicator 04:12 – Salesflare is largely self-funded, some from accelerators 04:24 – Telenet Kickstart and iMinds are the accelerators from Belgium 04:37 – Salesflare got $25K from one accelerator without equity and the other one had a convertible loan of $50K 05:10 – Salesflare has raised a total of $700K 05:28 – Jeroen was in the consulting field 05:49 – Salesflare is currently building a convertible round with investors and has raised $250K; the target is $350K 06:57 – Salesflare has over 100 customers 07:14 – Jeroen believes that people don’t usually trust small companies, even if they have great products 08:00 – Average revenue 08:19 – Salesflare is based in Antwerp, Belgium 08:24 – Team size is 6 08:30 – 3 are building the product and the other 3 are sales and customer service 08:55 – Jeroen likes people to think that they are bigger than they are 09:02 – Nathan believes that some people like small companies because of their flexibility 10:40 – Nathan tells Jeroen that his assumption of “it’s not good if it’s free” is a completely false assumption 11:28 – Most people stick to Salesflare after the trial period 11:40 – There’s currently a big market of CRMs 11:46 – Salesflare is aiming at sales automation and there’s very little competition in that space 12:12 – Salesflare is moving faster than their competition 12:17 – Hubspot's distribution channel is huge and Salesflare won’t be able to compete with that 12:23 – But Salesflare can compete on the profit side 12:37 – Salesflare has a low churn 13:12 – Salesflare got their first customer at the end of 2015 14:00 – Salesflare has a blog, does outbound emailing and builds their online presence for customer acquisition 14:36 – Salesflare does content distribution through Facebook’s paid advertising 14:47 – Most of Salesflare’s recent customers are from Product Hunt 15:23 – Jeroen has no idea of the number of trials they’ve had since the launch 15:45 – Jeroen tracks the conversion, instead 16:05 – In the past week, there were 250 new trial signups 16:15 – The conversion to paid customer is around 10-15% 16:30 – Salesflare tries to show its value as quickly as possible 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’re still unsure of starting a new business, find other ways to get involved in that space to understand how it works. Some businesses offer a free product to show their value to the customer right away. Competing with a free product with a large distribution channel isn’t easy, but you can generate a higher profit margin. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/28/2017 • 21 minutes, 50 seconds
672: How to Use Your Agency to Launch a SaaS Product with Leadberry CEO Adam Jankovits
Adam Jankovits and his goal is to become an outstanding marketing technologist. He is a person who brings together strengths in marketing, technology and social interaction. He’s got an MBA and consultancy background, but also has a strong interest in technology and social-networking skills. His focus right now is on his company, LeadBerry. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Founders at Work What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— Currently 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Adam would tell himself to take networking very seriously Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Adam to the show 01:45 – LeadBerry is a B2B lead generation software that converts website visitors to sales leads 01:58 – The basic idea is that there’s no code needed and you just connect LeadBerry to Google Analytics 02:09 – LeadBerry does 2 things: aims to identify B2B visitors and provides real-time valuable data 02:50 – LeadBerry is still currently on pre-revenue 03:05 – LeadBerry’s free beta was launched in October 2016 03:15 – LeadBerry just recently removed the free beta and launched the paid version on the third week of April 04:10 – LeadBerry’s idea 04:31 – LeadBerry was first built in-house 04:40 – Since October, LeadBerry already had over 2K subscribers 04:47 – Most of them are companies 04:59 – LeadBerry has generated over 2M leads 05:03 – “The numbers and the feedback kept us pushing” 05:17 – LeadBerry doesn’t have a guarantee that their customers will convert to the paid version 05:36 – Adam has a plan on how they can possibly convert their customers to paying ones 06:16 – Adam is the CEO and founder of the agency, Brandlift 06:26 – Brandlift generates signups through PR, marketing and performance campaigns 07:00 – The amount Adam and Brandlift have invested in LeadBerry 07:17 – LeadBerry currently has 3 people in the team who are also working Brandlift 07:24 – Brandlift agency has 20 people 07:36 – LeadBerry currently spends $3-4K a month into their performance channel 08:25 – Adam is spending around $50K total in pre-revenue 09:04 – Nathan talked to a lot of agencies where they build solutions in their agency and spin out the solution as a SaaS business 09:25 – Adam has used LeadBerry in Brandlift 09:35 – LeadBerry is completely bootstrapped 09:52 – Brandlift was launched in 2010 10:00 – Brandlift is a full-service digital agency 10:45 – LeadBerry is using different sources like FullContact, Hunter and Clearbit to generate leads 10:56 – LeadBerry always tries to explore new and unexplored options in generating leads 11:10 – Brandlift’s first year revenue 11:29 – Adam was 28 when he launched Brandlift 12:25 – Net revenue is around $150K 12:41 – Topline revenue is around $1M 12:51 – Brandlift is based in Hungary and Los Angeles 13:36 – Adam shares how LeadBerry is different from other lead generation software 14:00 – LeadBerry has absolutely no development work that needs to be done if you want to get started with LeadBerry 14:28 – LeadBerry integrates with Google Analytics 15:10 – LeadBerry won’t need the Google Analytics code 15:32 – You can connect your Google Analytics’ profile with just 2 clicks 15:48 – Google Analytics helps in the identification part 16:34 – LeadBerry pulls out the leads for you which saves you time 17:10 – You can use LeadBerry’s online interface on a daily basis or connect your CRM and it will automatically sync data 17:36 – Adam won’t sell LeadBerry for $100K and is not currently thinking about it 18:57 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Most lead generation businesses made the software for their own use, saw its value, and then spun it out as a SaaS business. Lead sources often verify their leads with each other. Starting as a free software for a couple of months may lead customers to see the value in your product and convert into paid customers. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/27/2017 • 23 minutes, 50 seconds
671: Predicting The Future of FInTech with Steve McLaughlin, CEO at FT Partners
Steve McLaughlin. He’s one of the founders and CEO of Financial Technology Partners. He is a former senior banker at Goldman Sachs, covering fintech for over 20 years. He was recently named Investment Banker of the Year, ranked number 2 banker in Silicon Valley by The Information, and he’s top ranked on Institutional Investors. Online Finance 35 listed him as one of the most influential people in fintech. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Jack: Straight from the Gut What CEO do you follow? – Jack Dorsey Favorite online tool? — Uber How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I knew where all the stocks are going” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Steve to the show 02:27 – Steve’s company advises firms across the entire fintech landscape on raising capital and M&A—they’re on the sales side helping people figure out where to get money, how to get money, what the valuation is, what the structure is 02:53 – Total transaction volume you were involved with last year 02:58 – Financial Technology Partners transaction volume was around $10-15B 03:09 – Which of these 3 industries are you most excited about, like where your most interesting deals would be in? 03:34 – It’s really across the board, anywhere from the B2B payments to consumer payments to online lending companies like Prosper or GreenSky and the payment space like Marketo 04:08 – Any other players you see in the space besides those two, Betterment and Wealthfront? 04:11 – Steve appreciates Riskalyze who are behind the scenes providing the same kind of technology to RAAs and other advisors or someone like BlackRock who he advised last year 04:45 – FutureAdvisor is a startup going initially after the consumer side, they pivoted a little bit to be a B2B player 05:23 – Blackrock acquired FutureAdvisor for a $150M back in August 27, 2015 06:32 – FTP generally gives advice for doing large transactions and are paid on success 06:47 – It’s either commission or a percentage based on the value of the deal 07:38 – Deal size varies. On a multi-million dollar deal, it can be a percent and a $100M deal, it can be 7% depending on the scale and deal size 08:02 – Nathan asks: How do you value a wealth technology company like Betterment? 08:29 – Steve looks at start the factors affecting Wealthfront or Betterment and what they think the companies will look like in 7 or 10 years 10:08 – Andy of Wealthfront was in Episode 498 10:20 – The growth of Wealthfront and Betterment are the ETFs in their assets and management 10:37 – Steve would use ETFs as a metric to try to predict what Wealthfront and Betterment are going to look like in 5 to 10 years 11:03 – Steve personally thinks that they can have a lot of winners—there are a lot of companies in the mutual funds industry that didn’t win and a lot that are dead 11:15 – So there’s no saying that the guys who invented the popularized robo advisors are going to be the winners 11:28 – Steve also thinks that Wealthfront and Betterment are going to do quite well and he sees them from afar, he’s a big fan and he anticipates they’re going to be winner 11:34 – Wealthfront and Betterment have already proven that at some extent, they’ve outlasted lots of other guys 11:55 – Steve thinks Wealthfront and Betterment care a lot about the consumers behind the platform and they realized that their people actually manage their money correctly over the course of time 13:05 – Riskalyze has various risks tools and robo advisor tools that they sell into RIAs 13:15 – RIA stands for Registered Investment Advisor 13:55 – All the models could succeed, there’s hundreds of mutual fund companies that did incredibly well 14:17 – These are fintech companies 14:59 – Nathan is a big fan of Warren Buffett who goes to all the annual meetups and just sticks to his advice 15:09 – “I’m not going to be active. I’m never going to beat the market. I’m never going to do this stuff and just going to put it in a passive, low exchange ratio, Vanguard, SMP and 500 index and that’s what I do” 15:19 – Nathan was hoping that Andy or Jon could convince him to take a shot at one of them, throw $10K in both rooms, see what happens over a few years and do a comparison 15:45 – Why isn’t Warren Buffett recommending Betterment and Wealthfront? 15:47 – Steve thinks that Warren Buffett probably doesn’t know much about Betterment and Wealthfront 15:52 – What Steve likes about Betterment and Wealthfront is they’re going to have really forensic case studies on stats of the population 16:21 – There will be perfect comparable data on which is better 18:36 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Wealth tech companies are becoming more difficult to valuate, thus a need for case studies and empirical data. Empirical data can help inform your decisions, but the FINAL decision rests on your judgment. How do you value a company? Look at the factors affecting their growth over a period of time. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/26/2017 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
670: Betterment Vs. Vanguard, Betterment Passes 200,000 Investors, $8B in AUM with CEO Jon Stein
Jon Stein. He’s the CEO and founder of Betterment. With his passion about making life better and his career experience advising banks and brokers, he founded Betterment in 2008. Jon is a graduate of Harvard University and Columbia Business School. He holds a Series 72463 and he’s a CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst). His interests lie in the intersection of behavior, psychology and economics. What excites him most about his work is making everyday activity and products more efficient, accessible and easy to use. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Greenhouse How many hours of sleep do you get? — 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jon could have taken risks a bit earlier in life Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Jon to the show 02:05 – Betterment is the largest independent investment advisor online 02:10 – Betterment manages your money in the way old institutions can’t 02:19 – Betterment automates the best practices of investing and the same technology drives the cost down for you 02:32 – Betterment is leading in their industry 02:45 – Betterment charges a fee that is the percentage of the asset finder management 02:50 – It is 2.5%, which is the lowest in the industry 03:15 – “We have to put our customers’ best interest first” 03:30 – Betterment currently manages $8.2B 03:50 – Jon studied economics and behavioral biology as an undergraduate 03:58 – When Jon graduated from Harvard, 80% of the graduates took to the finance industry 04:47 – Jon didn’t want to follow the people he knew in finance 04:31 – Jon wanted to help people so he thought he’d study medicine 04:50 – Jon found himself back in New York, consulting banks 04:58 – It was 2001-2002 when Jon got his pre-med from Harvard 05:13 – Jon was 23 when he went back to New York, in 2003 05:45 – The banks were not paying attention to what their customers wanted 06:58 – Jon realized that the industry was fundamentally flawed 07:12 – There was no scaled advisor that served the market and the people like Jon could 07:28 – Jon started at Columbia Business School in 2008 and he already the idea for Betterment even before he started there 08:10 – Jon didn’t know how to code when he started and just learned in business school 08:46 – Jon didn’t have student debt while he was in business school and he saved some money from his consulting 09:14 – During the early days, Jon and his co-founders didn’t need a lot of money 09:30 – Jon and his co-founders have invested their own money into Betterment 09:39 – Their initial investment was less than 400K 10:14 – Betterment has raised a total of $205M 10:34 – “I always wanted to build a company that would impact the lives of millions of people for the better” 11:04 – From Day 1, Jon knew that Betterment would be a capital intensive business 11:20 – Team size is 220 11:26 – About half of the team are engineers and product managers 11:31 – Most of the team is involved in building the business 12:14 – Most of Betterment’s customers are from word-of-mouth 12:46 – Betterment’s paid acquisition 13:03 – Betterment’s goal as a company is to make noise 13:11 – There’s now a better way to manage money 14:11 – People should put their money in Betterment rather than in Vanguard because they’re burning money 14:18 – Betterment can make them more money on their assets 14:39 – Warren Buffett is an active investor himself 14:45 – Jon thinks that Warren Buffett’s advice was great during his time, but the technology has moved forward 15:11 – Betterment will make you more money than you would make in a single fund 15:27 – Betterment’s website has all the information about how they work 16:00 – Betterment’s role is to maximize people’s money 16:07 – Vanguard is a fund company that sells you funds 16:10 – Betterment is independent from their funds 17:17 – “We are growing faster than any firm in the history of this space” 17:42 – People are becoming aware of what Betterment is doing 18:21 – 240K customers have invested in Betterment 18:44 – There’s no minimum amount to invest 19:24 – “We’re building an institution for the next century and we’re not interested at selling right now” 19:35 – Betterment’s revenue is driven from their 2.5% of the asset management finder 19:48 – Average revenue 21:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Just because it has worked in the past, does NOT mean it will still work today. There are better ways to manage your money, especially with the new advancements we have in technology. Take risks as early on as you can. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/25/2017 • 25 minutes, 54 seconds
669: How to Do First Real Estate Deal at 18 Years Old, Now $400k/mo In Rental Income with Best Seller Dean Graziosi
Dean Graziosi—he knows how to create success. From extremely humble beginnings, he started with a firewood business in high school to a collision repair shop and his first real estate deal before he turned 20. From there, he created a multi-million dollar real estate business, became a New York Times best-selling author multiple times, and is one of the most watched real estate and success trainers of our generation. He maximizes his success and profits on each of his endeavors along his evolution and his businesses have generated nearly one billion dollars in revenue. He’s obsessed with sharing his success along this journey with the world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Untethered Soul and The Surrender Experiment What CEO do you follow? – Ernest Shackleton Favorite online tool? — N/A How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t believe your thoughts, they lie to you most of the time. If you could just observe your thoughts and throw away the shit that doesn’t serve you, man, you could just go a lot faster” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Dean to the show 02:28 – Dean skipped college 02:42 – When Dean was 16, he would buy wrecked cars and flip them in his garage 03:00 – He has bought some of the cars for $500 to $5000 03:11 – Dean got his first real estate deal at 18 with no money down 03:17 – Mrs. Laprezzti gave him a deal with no money down 03:20 – Dean paid Mrs. Laprezzti monthly and he renovated the place 03:49 – Dean’s social studies teacher who was also a real estate agent gave Dean leads of people who had houses that were not selling 04:45 – Dean gave Mrs. Laprezzti $2500 a month for a 4-unit apartment, for 3 years 05:05 – Mrs. Laprezzti needed $2K for her expenses for the condo 05:31 – Dean didn’t care that he may be paying more 05:48 – Dean promised that he’d pay her in 3 years 05:55 – At the end of 3 years, Dean had the room fully rented and he was able to get a bank loan and pay Mrs. Laprezzti off 06:10 – Dean was making $4200 when he rented out the place, then he sold it 06:24 – Dean still owns around 400 houses, right now 06:56 – Dean’s dad was born during the Depression 07:20 – His dad was a mechanic and a collision repair shop guy 07:26 – Dean evolved by maxing out on the equity he could gain from each of his houses 07:38 – After the condo, Dean got an old, rundown mansion and turned it into 10 apartment units 07:53 – Dean refinanced the apartments and bought more apartments 08:00 – It was the late 80s and early 90s when Dean transferred to upstate New York 08:09 – Dean bought some land and went into the process of subdividing 09:10 – Back then, Dean was just hustling for the next property, taking the cash, and making a creative deal 09:30 – “There’s always a creative deal” 09:45 – It’s about buying off-market deals 10:21 – Average revenue from all of Dean’s properties is $380K 10:45 – The market value for 380 units is around $20M 10:54 – Dean is half leveraged in all of the units 11:45 – Dean authored a couple of books because he is obsessed with marketing and sales 12:10 – Dean’s last 2 books are self-published 12:21 – Dean’s first book was with a publisher 12:24 – Dean didn’t want an advance deal from his first book 12:31 – Dean used to get 35-40% of gross sales 12:43 – Dean’s first book is Totally Fulfilled 12:46 – Dean’s latest book is Millionaire’s Success Habits 13:01 – Most of the publishers don’t market your book and rely on you to market your own book 13:07 – Dean sold a million copies of his second book 13:10 – Dean had an infomercial running everyday, offering the book on TV 13:25 – “You definitely need a marketing mechanism if you need to write a book” 13:38 – Dean’s most effective marketing strategy is giving away free books 13:42 – Dean has an incoming infomercial with Larry King, who has impacted Dean’s life 13:56 – Dean met Larry King through mutual friends 14:01 – Dean told Larry that he made an impact on Dean’s life, gave his book to Larry and asked Larry if he can interview him 14:09 – Larry came to Dean’s studio 14:22 – 8 years ago, Dean watched Larry interview Joel Osteen 14:59 – Dean did the first interview show on TV without scripts, teleprompters or voiceovers 15:09 – The show broke a hundred million dollars in sales 16:05 – Dean only negotiated for a bigger share in book sales because he knew that his books would sell 16:25 – Millionaire’s Success Habits is a hardcover book and still ships that way, there is no ebook 17:00 – com is for people who have the ability to find success trainers that are qualified 17:10 – They have courses and high-performance coaching 17:25 – It’s a step-by-step on how to become a high achiever 17:33 – They just broke $220K in sales 17:55 – 100% of the money is going back in 18:10 – “It’s a feel good, it’s a legacy thing” 18:13 – They might sell Growth in 3 years 18:19 – Dean and his 2 co-founders split Growth equally 19:08 – Dean started a $100K year mastermind with Joe Polish 20:13 – When you go and share one of your greatest strategies, others will shares theirs. too, and it multiplies 20:35 – “Mastermind has been the greatest lift of anything I’ve ever done” 22:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Persevere and be patient, the right time will come. Sharing your strategies for success doesn’t create more competition; instead, it gives others permission to share how they became successful as well. Don’t let your thoughts stop you—observe them and throw out the shit that doesn’t serve you. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/24/2017 • 27 minutes, 45 seconds
668: Will Bill.com and Intuit Lead Small Business FinTech Space?
René Lacerte. He’s the founder and CEO of Bill.com, the leading business payments company. He’s a fintech industry vettor and has been working to simplify business payments since 1999, when he founded PayCycle, which was later acquired by Intuit in 2009. Bill.com is now working to help bridge the digital divide between banks and businesses by partnering with 3 of the top US banks and 45% of the top hundred accounting firms. He believes that banks play a critical role in the advancement of fintech. While technology advancement since Silicon startups are divided by or driving much of the industry change, René believes that banks are and will remain the center of the financial universe for quite some time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Advantage What CEO do you follow? – Pete Kight Favorite online tool? — Dropbox How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t stress over the hard decisions” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces René to the show 02:07 – Andy from Wealthfront disagrees that banks will remain to be the center of the universe 02:27 – Bill.com makes close to $40B a year 02:32 – The average transaction is $1700 to $2000 03:16 – “We make doing business really easy” 03:17 – Bill.com automates the back office of businesses 03:24 – They take all the paperwork, workflow, payments and integration with the accounting software 03:40 – Bill.com charges per seat, per subscription and transaction fees 04:15 – The subscription model is their main revenue stream 04:36 – Bill.com charges .49 cents for every electronic payment and $1.49 for paper 05:30 – The fintech space is a natural viral coefficient space 06:00 – Bill.com had $110M from venture capital 06:12 – René was 32 when he started PayCycle, in 1999 06:20 – René worked in Intuit prior to PayCycle and stayed there for 5 years 06:34 – René had some experience innovating products from Intuit 06:54 – René grew up in a family of entrepreneurs 07:04 – One of René’s grandfather’s businesses is an automatic data processing company 08:26 – René’s father went back to college to understand more about business 09:16 – The idea of Bill.com is that there’s a better way to take advantage of technology to make payroll easier 09:58 – Bill.com helps define and automate the back office 10:06 – PayScale does online payroll and started with household payroll, which Intuit doesn’t want to do 10:47 – PayScale raised $150K 11:23 – PayScale was acquired by Intuit for $170M 12:21 – Average number of paying customers of Bill.com 13:16 – “If we get customers active and get them using it, they don’t churn” 13:26 – They’re active when they already have paid for Bill.com 14:04 – Average customer pay per month is $100 14:15 – You can try it for the first month, for free 15:00 – Bill.com automates some of their tools to make the customer feel that they need the product 15:18 – Bill.com does A/B testing to check how they can get their customers engaged 15:52 – Bill.com is adding thousands of new businesses a month 16:56 – René tracks how many months the payback will be when it comes to CAC 17:23 – Payback target is 10-13 months 18:07 – LTV is around 5 years 18:48 – René has raised $50M 19:39 – René’s strategy is to maintain a strong relationship with VC 19:53 – Team size is 225 20:10 – Bill.com was launched in 2008 21:07 – Bill.com isn’t selling anything and not partnered with anybody, today 22:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It is important to engage your customers. Banks are and will remain to be the center of the financial universe. Hard decisions and their consequences will pass, so don’t let them bother you too much. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/24/2017 • 29 minutes, 20 seconds
667: PayU Passes $180M Revenue, New Risk Assesment Product To Grow Financial Services Arm with Ex PayPal CEO Laurent Le Moal
Laurent Le Moal. He brings extensive knowledge of digital payments in emerging markets to PayU where he serves as the CEO. He culminated an 11-year career at PayPal as general manager for continental Europe, Russia, Middle East and Africa, leaving a billion dollar development vision across diverse geographies. Prior to PayPal, he founded an Italian startup called Talent Manager. He built a 40-person team there and now the startup has expanded to France and Spain. He also has experience in McKinsey and Antal International. He leads PayU’s strategic direction and development and is currently building on the company’s position and high-growth markets all around the world. Given the company’s focus on being an expert in a local market in which it operates, Le Moal leads the creation and implementation of payment methods which best suits PayU’s customers all around the world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Chris Skinner Favorite online tool? — The Top Inbox How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just go and experience more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:19 – Nathan introduces Laurent to the show 02:22 – PayU is a payment gateway which is basically serving merchants 02:43 – PayU has their own original platform 02:53 – “I believe that payments are extremely local and regional” 02:58 – Since Laurent joined PayU, they moved from pure payments to actual financial services offering credit solutions 03:22 – Payment is still the bigger market for PayU 03:34 – Laurent thinks that financial services is strategic move for payment companies 03:56 – Nathan had Monish Anand in Episode 617 who talks about data science 04:25 – “The ability to offer credit is the ability to manage risks” 04:38 – All banks are using the same credit score model 04:48 – If you go to India and want to address 90% of the population, then have the means to repay their debt 05:16 – If you have a technology that does credit scoring, then the rest of credit is just mechanics 05:40 – Talent Manager is Laurent’s first company 05:54 – Laurent started small in Milan 06:39 – Laurent was 25 when he started Talent Manager in 1997 06:56 – It was easy to get consumers 07:20 – Laurent raised around €5M for their first round 08:01 – It was growing fast 08:22 – Laurent goes to India and sees companies with a high burn rate, which is a couple of hundred million rupees a year 09:26 – Talent Manager was able to have a couple of million in revenue 09:36 – Talent Manager’s software was sold 10:29 – Paypal started in 2004 with 3 people in Europe 10:35 – They were looking for someone to do a market study about the potential for PayPal outside of eBay 11:00 – PayPal expanded outside of eBay 11:22 – When you go to a high-growth market like India, most of the companies are still trying to increase the engagement of consumers 11:47 – Laurent had different stock options with PayPal 13:01 – PayU is part of Naspers, which is a diversified group and one of the biggest technology investors for the high-growth market 13:28 – PayU has their payment business and a fintech arm which is investing in interesting startups 13:56 – For PayU, the opportunity is not to just be an operator, but an investor 14:04 – Laurent believes that in fintech, it is difficult to scale your business 15:08 – Laurent invested Monese who is building the new bank for “unbanked” people 16:11 – Laurent shares how he got into PayU 16:30 – Laurent join Naspers and PayU on the basis that he’d manage the business and transform it into a financial service company 16:53 – In 2016, PayU ‘s total payment transaction was around $18B 17:12 – Growth rate is around 40% year over year 17:20 – PayU forecasts to maintain their growth rate 17:24 – PayU sees a really big push in India where the growth is around 70% 17:30 – Laurent sees India as the most exciting market in the world 17:50 – Laurent sees their financial services to be continuously building in the coming years 18:10 – Laurent wants 10% of their revenue to come from credit 18:24 – Credit is the consumer credit where you give money to people and make money based from the interest rate 18:38 – “What is important is when you start credit from scratch, it’s actually to build your portfolio in a very consistent way” 19:06 – PayU takes 1-3% per transaction 19:35 – Team size is close to 1500 from 4 main regions and they have 16 offices 20:54 – In fintech, there are regulations including money laundering regulations 21:53 – Average ARR in 2016 22:24 – PayU just launched LazyPay in India 22:35 – The concept is to give you the possibility to buy something online then pay your debt later 23:43 – The merchants love it 24:08 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The payment gateway space is expanding and more startups are giving people easier access to credit. Regulations are necessary, especially when it comes to managing those who try to take advantage. Just go out there, gain more knowledge, and experience MORE. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/22/2017 • 29 minutes, 38 seconds
666: Sentient $100M+ Raised, A/B Testing With Artificial Intelligence with Exited Founder and SVP Jon Epstein
Jonathan Epstein. He’s the current senior VP for international at Sentient Technologies, the maker of Sentient Ascend, the first conversion optimization solution that is powered by evolutionary artificial intelligence. Epstein has been in many companies at the forefront of technology and media including GameSpot, which he’s the founding CEO, and Omek which was sold to Intel and GameSpy which was eventually sold to IGN. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hire With Your Head What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — BuiltWith and SimilarWeb How many hours of sleep do you get? — 5-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished I had stepped on entrepreneurship early” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Jon to the show 02:18 – Jon’s good exit range is from tens of millions to the hundreds of million dollars 02:39 – Jon helped the founding CEO of Gamespot turn it around 03:18 – Jon has worked in an actual gaming company 03:29 – Jon started at IDG as magazine publisher 03:49 – GameSpot was the first professional online review site for games 03:56 – GameSpy had an editorial element and Jon published some of its software 04:35 – GameSpot was launched in 1995 04:45 – Jon launched the magazine Digital News and Multimedia World 04:53 – Jon was working for IDG when he launched the magazines under their brand 05:28 – Jon had great partners when he started GameSpot 05:55 – The initial idea came from the 2 co-founders 06:20 – It was clear that the internet thing was happening 06:30 – The problem, then, was that the release of the magazine came out way too late for newly released game reviews 06:55 – Having the magazine online is a better way to update the gamers 07:13 – GameSpot took in external investors 07:34 – GameSpot was sold for stock in ZDNet 08:09 – Jon had an international role and wanted to gain experience in dealing with other countries 08:16 – ZDNet had joint ventures and Jon had been with them for a while 08:34 – Jon had invested from ZDNet to GameSpy 09:04 – Jon had 8% of GameSpy 09:28 – Jon joined GameSpy in September 2001 09:32 – GameSpy was sold in March 2004 10:01 – Jon made around $61M cash from GameSpy’s exit 10:21 – Jon stayed with IGN after the exit and stayed there for a while 10:30 – Jon joined Double Fusion, which is a venture-backed startup 10:55 – Sentient had been around for 9 years and was one of the best funded companies 11:21 – Jon fell in love with Sentient because of their goals 11:29 – Sentient was built with a powerful AI platform 11:34 – It focuses on AI at scale and is able to run AI problems across millions of GPUs 11:58 – Sentient does multiple types of AI 12:00 – One is deep learning or neuron-network which is used for handwriting, voice recognition and image analysis 12:12 – Another product of Sentient is the evolutionary computation which is an AI that mimics natural selection 12:38 – Sentient ran a hedge fund using their products 12:51 – The fund size is growing rapidly 13:14 – Big investors invest to hedge funds in order to achieve stable, good returns 14:16 – Sentient is a SaaS business disrupting the world of AB testing 14:48 – Using the evolutionary AI approach speeds up AB testing 15:41 – Sentient currently has 25 paying customers 15:52 – Average contract price is $3K-30K a month 16:12 – Zero customer churn 16:24 – CAC 16:52 – Sentient is also doing paid advertising 16:56 – Sentient attends conversion conferences where they spend $5K-10K for sponsorship 17:40 – Sentient has raised a total of $143M 17:52 – Sentient has around 110 employees 17:58 – There are still 15-20 open positions 18:24 – Sentient was founded in 2007 18:57 – “We think it’s too early to sell” 19:15 – Mark Cuban said that the first trillionaires will come from AI 20:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Never be scared about exits – it just means new doors are opening for you. Be in a company that you’re really interested in—where you can align yourself with their goals. Start as early as you can when it comes to entrepreneurship. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/21/2017 • 25 minutes, 27 seconds
665: Blessed or Gutsy? CEO Turns Down $400k Salary to Launch Own Agency
Joe Koufman. He’s responsible for introducing at least 3 married couples in countless contacts to establish business relationships. In early 2014, he parlayed his passion for connecting people and founded a company called AgencySparks, which is essentially a dating service for brands and marketing agencies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Challenger Sale What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Hilimire Favorite online tool? — Lucky Orange How many hours of sleep do you get?— “I try to get 7” If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would have invested even more in relationships. They will absolutely pay off down the road” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:36 – Nathan introduces Joe to the show 02:29 – AgencySparks focuses on making connections for brands and agencies 02:34 – AgencySparks is paid by the agencies to help them with their business development and outreach to potential clients 02:50 – In many cases, AgencySparks can help subvert the RFP and the client will hire the agency directly 03:15 – One of AgencySparks’ clients tells them about Coca-cola’s water sustainability efforts and that they need the story to be everywhere 03:46 – AgencySparks was able to make a connection with one of their agencies that focuses on public relations and they made a deal 04:13 – AgencySparks is shifting their model now 04:20 – AgencySparks is traditionally paid by agencies to get them through a thorough, upfront, vetting process 04:27 – AgencySparks is getting paid through monthly retainers and a percentage of the deal 04:34 – The monthly retainer is $5K per agency, which is 12-month deal 04:50 – AgencySparks was launched in early 2014 04:58 – Joe spent years with KnowledgeStorm which was acquired by TechTarget 05:05 – TechTarget went public and bought KnowledgeStorm for $58M 05:26 – Joe spent 6 years building marketing and business development in Engauge 05:31 – Engauge was then acquired by Publicis 05:56 – When Joe left Engauge, he had job offers from 6 different agencies and that’s when he had the idea of AgencySparks 06:21 – Joe’s highest offer from one of the agencies was $400K and he said “no” 06:55 – AgencySparks is Joe’s first entrepreneurship stint 07:11 – Joe didn’t have any equity in KnowledgeStorm 07:45 – Joe made a big transition while he was at KnowledgeStorm 07:47 – Joe started as an account manager in 2000 08:05 – Joe moved to sales and realized that he was just going to have the same exact salary 08:23 – Joe did well in sales and had grown big accounts 08:50 – Joe’s last salary was $210K, in 2007 09:20 – By the time Joe left, he was making around $300K in 2013 09:43 – When Joe started AgencySparks, he knew that we wouldn't have much revenue, at first 09:52 – First year revenue was $270K 10:03 – Year 2 was $370K and Year 3: $430K 10:13 – 2017’s goal is to double 10:25 – To achieve their goal, they have to change their model a bit 10:45 – The client is asking AgencySparks for different options 10:59 – They want to have multiple agencies in one category 11:27 – AgencySparks currently has 11 clients 11:40 – AgencySparks has other revenue streams 11:48 – The commission percentage is 10% 12:10 – AgencySparks offers other services like info-product 12:40 – March 2017 revenue 13:00 – Team size is 4 and all are in Atlanta 13:18 – Greg Crabtree’s labor efficiency ratio is the idea of hovering between 2 and to 3.5, so for every dollar spent on payroll, you should be bringing in $2.50 - $3.50, in terms of revenue 13:47 – As a CEO of a company, if you’re not pulling out the salary that you would be making as a hired CEO, then your business isn’t profitable 14:00 – Nathan’s computation within The Top’s 600 interviews done with SaaS companies 15:04 – AgencySparks’ net margin 15:27 – Joe is the guy who would re-invest his money into the business 15:33 – Joe isn’t a family business guy 15:44 – Joe is looking into 5 years, then selling his business 15:52 – AgencySparks already has interesting offers 16:14 – AgencySparks has a method that is a repeatable and sustainable as a business development process—which is part of what they’re teaching 16:57 – “The challenge is that this is a very relationship-focused business” 18:28 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As a CEO of a company, if you’re not pulling out the salary that you would be making as a hired CEO, then your business is NOT profitable. Continue to grow your business as much as you can, but be mindful of the interesting offers that come along the way. Invest in relationships. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/20/2017 • 22 minutes, 50 seconds
664: How Agency Did $750k First Year, Now $100k+/Month with Webris CEO Ryan Stewart
Ryan Stewart. He’s a digital marketing expert with over 8 years of client facing experience. He currently owns and operates Webris, a Miami-based digital marketing agency specializing in SEO and content marketing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Attached What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — SEMrush How many hours of sleep do you get?— 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just self-awareness things about who am I as a person, where I want to go and how I want to live my life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:17 – Nathan introduces Ryan to the show 01:39 – Webris is an SEO agency which does a lot of digital marketing and link building 01:48 – They specialize in generating organic growth for any sort of clients 02:00 – Webris has a retainer model of 5K-6K a month depending on the work 02:15 – They require a minimum of 6 months 02:22 – Webris currently has 22 clients 02:30 – Webris is doing $100K minimum MRR 02:38 – Webris was launched March, 2016 02:52 – In Webris’ first year, they earned 750K 03:00 – Webris also has a training program 03:11 – Ryan is doing concept marketing for himself 03:32 – Ryan had link building training where he taught how to build links at scale 03:44 – Ryan also did blogger outreach PR stuff 04:18 – Ryan didn’t do any advertising on Youtube, but he has a good content 04:30 – He has a good email list and a Facebook group with 10K people, a Facebook page and Twitter page 04:42 – Ryan uses concept promotion on the videos with more views 05:30 – Ryan uses automation in Google Drive Suite 06:14 – Ryan launched a video regarding using Google Suite for automation 06:50 – Ryan thinks that YouTube is more powerful than the blog 07:09 – YouTube is much easier to use for engagement purposes 07:22 – Ryan also does mini-checklist processes for their clients 07:26 – If you have an email list and you can get 100 engaged views on your videos, it is more than enough to set you on the right direction 07:37 – Ryan’s email list is 10K with 30% open rate 07:49 – Ryan would get 500 views in 12 hours after sending his content out to his email list 08:02 – Ryan uses SEO for his YouTube video titles 08:22 – They’ll go after the keywords on their blog 08:31 – “People aren’t really using the same keywords on YouTube” 08:37 – For YouTube, you need to grab attention from the titles 09:07 – Team size is 7, in Miami and some are remote 09:30 – Webris is doing a lot of content creation and they pay per article 09:57 – Webris can also negotiate with other people for content 10:06 – They pay $100-200 depending on the client niche 10:20 – Ryan posts job ads on Upwork and on the Facebook group Cult of Copy which is run by a copywriter, Collin Theriot 11:01 – Webris has an in-depth content generation process 11:12 – Webris mitigates the process with the research upfront and by building a really good outline for the writer 11:35 – Webris will also just google for bloggers in a specific niche and pay them around $500 to write 11:54 – Content is dependent on niche 12:28 – You just got to go out and pay writers the right amount 12:50 – Prior to Webris, Ryan was doing his MBA and realized he hated everything about that life 13:59 – What Ryan made last year is less than what he did when he was 20 14:21 – Ryan’s #1 goal is that his people are happy 14:33 – Ryan spends $4K a month on their office space 16:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you hate doing something – just quit. Paying your writers the right amount will lead to great content. In every decision you make for your business – consider your people. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/19/2017 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
663: How He Gets Mega-Brands to Pay Him $5,000 To Test Their Ads Before Going Live with Delivv.io CEO Trevor Wolfe
Trevor Wolfe. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Delvv.io. He started his career in New York, where he held product innovation and marketing positions for Kantar and TNS. He also led the marketing for New York brands, Gerson Lehrman Group, along with Moveline—which is a tech startup in NYC Company and Morgan Stanley. Throughout his career, he’s launched over a dozen analytics and research products and is an active advisor to investors in market research, adtech, and media tech startups in New York, Vegas, and Africa. He holds a BBA in international business from Hofstra University and is an aspiring sailor. His cat’s name is Junior. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Tracy Kidder's books and The Power Broker What CEO do you follow? – Scott Belsky Favorite online tool? — The Top Inbox and Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5 and half to 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Trevor would tell himself to go find his fiancée so that he could spend 5 more years with her Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Trevor to the show 02:06 – Delvv is a platform that allows advertising and marketing professionals to get a peer review on creative campaigns before using them as paid ads 02:22 – Delvv has 2 models: the marketplace, where they go to agencies and brands, and the subscription model, where you can use Delvv’s own organization 03:05 – Delvv was launched in March, 2016 03:29 – The subscription model has just been launched and is already being used by Ogilvy 03:31 – The subscription model is per license fee 03:48 – Delvv packaged a panel of 30 professionals to start an organization 03:57 – The panel processes the feedback and turns it into a report 04:17 – The 30 professionals are paid depending on campaign feedback 04:32 – If Ogilvy pays 5K for a campaign feedback, $1500-2200 will go to the 30 professionals 05:12 – Trevor and his co-founders have spent more time in advertising campaigns 05:39 – Delvv is doing more digital now, but most of their revenue comes from TV and radio campaigns 06:00 – Delvv has worked with 17 different brands and they’re working with Delvv in 10 different countries 06:16 – Delvv did $180K since May 2016 in marketplace sales 06:30 – Delvv has paid 700-1200 professionals to do the campaign feedback 06:41 – Some of them are from agencies and would spare 30-60mins for the feedback 07:10 – Delvv is getting $4000-6000 per contract 07:23 – Delvv has 8 full-time workers and a few contractors and interns 07:30 – The team is based in Johannesburg, South Africa 07:45 – There’s an advantage to having a team in South Africa 08:11 – The disadvantage in South Africa is the electricity, but not the internet speed 08:21 – Once a week, the power in the whole city goes out for a few hours 09:05 – Trevor and his co-founder funded the business for $10K 09:37 – They have raised $300K from Angel investors 09:49 – Trevor was 32 when he launched Delvv 10:29 – Trevor has kept his expenses down to $2K to save up for the business 10:41 – “I’ve traded my shoebox of an apartment in New York for a 4-bedroom house, here, with open garden and a pool” 11:18 – Delvv has 80K in contract for the month of March 11:33 – “We really wanted to push the SaaS based platform” 12:08 – Delvv will start their seed round of about $1M on an equity round 13:12 – Delvv has a UK investor, a local fund and VC in South Africa as their investors 15:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Campaigns are significant to any company and having feedback can help you save more money. There are pros and cons in having a business in another country – try to find a way to work it out if you really want a change of environment. You can enter the world of entrepreneurship by saving up and making your expenses as low as possible. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/18/2017 • 21 minutes, 15 seconds
662: $425k Per Month With Software Product Helps With Sales Leads with Corporate360 CEO Varun Chandran
Varun Chandran. He’s the founder and CEO of Corporate360, a big data marketing software startup. He bootstrapped the company in 2012, grew the business into multimillion dollars in revenue with international clients and 40 employees across 5 countries. Prior to Corporate360, he worked for some of the leading technology companies like SAP, Oracle, Dell and Netapp in 3 different countries. He’s a college dropout and a national footballer. He loves data science and travelling. Under his leadership, Corporate360 became the first international startup from Kerala, bringing IT jobs that foster social empowerment. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Apps How many hours of sleep do you get every night?— 4 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Build something that changes lives” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Varun to the show 02:00 – Corporate360 is a sales intelligence data company for B2B enterprises 02:08 – Corporate360 is a SaaS business that sells their software through subscription 02:30 – Corporate360 has standard pricing 02:38 – Typical deal size would range from 20K onwards, annually 02:48 – They have some monthly contracts, too 02:57 – “We are evangelizing data as a service model as opposed to buying a marketing list” 03:33 – Corporate360 was launched in 2013 03:40 – Team size is almost 70 in 5 countries 03:47 – Corporate360 is totally bootstrapped and they’re reenlisting profits back to the business to grow it 04:00 – Varun was 30 when he started Corporate360 and it was his first take on entrepreneurship 04:14 – Varun spent 8 years in the corporate world 04:26 – Varun had sales development and marketing roles 04:43 – Varun started the company with minimal capital of less than $10K 05:02 – Varun used the capital to learn data science and hired contractors from India and the Philippines 05:22 – The initial investment was for building the application, launching the website, and a basic outreach email campaign 05:55 – Customers use Corporate360 differently 06:01 – There’s inside sales, analytics, campaigns, marketing and for sales operations 06:18 – One of Corporate360’s customers is from Japan—they wanted to run a competitive attack and get competitive intelligent software 06:30 – The company from Japan started a subscription and they gave reference to teams in China, Singapore, and eventually to the Europe and US market 07:08 – Corporate360 is currently serving 300 customers 07:22 – They currently have 40K seats 07:28 – Seats per user license is sold only for inside sales 07:35 – Analytics and marketing are based on data and not per seat 07:58 – Corporate360 average deal size will be per user 08:04 – Varun shares how an inside sales deal works 08:52 – “We are not part of a data syndicate” 09:00 – Corporate360 source their data from their own algorithms 09:37 – FullContact focuses on getting data from syndicates 10:27 – Varun shares how they differ from other data sources 12:06 – When you subscribe to Corporate360, you can get a 360 degree viewpoint of 7 modules 12:22 – Corporate360 provides detailed information about the leads that they have and why they are the best fit for your company 13:30 – Average ARR 14:00 – Gross customer churn 14:16 – Corporate360 designs their services based on client feedback 14:46 – Churn is less than 10% annually 15:12 – Most of their customers are startups 15:51 – CAC 15:58 – Corporate360 doesn’t have field sales and just 7 account managers 16:20 – They tried LinkedIn ads as paid ads 16:34 – They spent $200K on LinkedIn last year 16:47 – The budget for paid acquisition will go down this year 17:15 – LTV can be from $45K to a million 17:36 – Corporate360 headquarters in Singapore 17:40 – They have a large BPO center in India and Philippines 19:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Small capital can go a long way—don’t be discouraged if you are beginning with little. THe data space is quite saturated—have something that sets you apart from the data syndicate. Build something that changes lives. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/17/2017 • 23 minutes, 47 seconds
661: How Unbounce Hit $12M/Year In Revenue, 14k Customers, Very Little $$ Raised with Co-Founder Oli Gardner
Oli Gardner. He’s the co-founder of Unbounce. He’s seen more landing pages than anyone in the planet. He’s a prolific international speaker and he’s on the mission to rid the world of marketing mediocrity by using data-informed copywriting, design, interaction, and psychology to create a more delightful experience for marketers and customers alike. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Deliver a TED Talk What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — UsabilityHub How many hours of sleep do you get? — Maybe 3 hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Learn how to make decisions” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Oli to the show 01:49 – Unbounce is a SaaS business and a conversion platform for marketers which started as a landing page platform 02:00 – They just expanded to convertibles that have overlays that captures more leads and signups on the website 02:17 – Unbounce was launched in August 2009 02:33 – Unbounce has 6 co-founders 03:11 – Oli was broke and filed for bankruptcy 03:26 – Unbounce was initially funded by friends and family with $15K CAD 03:38 – Unbounce had a seed round and Angel round and has raised a total of less than 1 million CAD 04:12 – The 6 co-founders are all equal 04:22 – All are working full-time 04:50 – They’ve figured out a rough valuation 05:25 – 5 of the 6 co-founders are still active 05:41 – Team size is 184 05:49 – Members are based all around Canada and some in South America 06:14 – RPU is $93 CAD a month 07:05 – Unbounce lets anyone in for at least 2 years 07:11 – Their plans have been restructured in a way that is most beneficial 07:38 – Their $10-plan has been removed 07:57 – Unbounce now has professional marketers 08:10 – As Unbounce continues to grow, they’re trying to scale with their customers 08:33 – Unbounce currently has 14K active users 08:42 – You can create a demo account but you can’t get your own domain with demo 09:13 – Average MRR is just under $1.4M 09:47 – Unbounce had a problem with churn, like what most SaaS businesses have encountered 10:03 – “We know that you need landing pages for everything you do” 10:55 – 5% is the problem churn with Unbounce 11:30 – If Salesforce or Marketo have been integrated, the company is a larger company 11:47 – Overlays have been successful and there’s so much traffic and data 12:09 – Overlays are called overlays because they are similar to popups 12:20 – “We’re trying to be responsible with the technology because technology is not the problem, we are” 12:52 – Oli respects Bounce Exchange when it comes to the overlays world and they’re doing a lot with machine learning 13:06 – The biggest difference in using Unbounce is you will feel that you’re not using templated overlays 13:40 – Unbounce’s value is different from SumoMe and their targeting is getting smarter 13:55 – Most services like Unbounce charge $250-5K a month and Unbounce starts at $99 14:06 – There are cheaper ones in WordPress, but they’re not really good 14:21 – Oli is primarily a public speaker now and spends most of his time on the road 14:25 – Oli was actually scared to start public speaking years ago 14:33 – Nathan recommends watching Oli speak in public 15:15 – The rest of Oli’s time is spent with Unbounce’s marketing team and data scientists’ team 15:48 – Unbounce just got engaged with a new marketing agency 16:03 – LTV 16:14 – Unbounce had one marketing guy and he left, so they switch to a 5 digital local agency 16:33 – CAC 16:43 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Being broke should NOT hinder you from starting a business. A great product with a reasonable price will always attract more customers. Learn how to make decisions and don’t hold back. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/16/2017 • 22 minutes, 29 seconds
660: Will Farmers Decide First Drone Company Trillionaire?
Martin Garcia. He’s the CEO and founder of FLYX.Systems. He’s also a mechatronics engineer and co-founder of Ilumexico, a solar power lighting company for rural communities in Mexico. He’s got an MSc in drone design at University of Southampton and is an alumni of Singularity University at NASA Ames California, USA and later, a teaching fellow for space and robotics. FLYX.Systems is a company that develops technology for industrial UAVs that aim to improve the productivity of many industries. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Noun Project How many hours of sleep do you get? — About 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Martin would tell himself to finish every project he started, then move on to the next one Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Martin to the show 02:17 – FLYX.Systems develops technology that encompasses both hardware and software algorithms 02:33 – There are 3 UAVs in history: the military UAVs, the drones that are popular nowadays, and the industrial UAVs 03:22 – Industrial UAVs are going to be the biggest game changer in business 03:31 – Industrial UAVs will be completely autonomous 03:48 – 70% of UAV crashes are caused by human errors 03:55 – Martin wants to develop a company that aims to build industrial UAVs for different applications in different industries 04:25 – Martin wants to build a combination of both the UAV hardware and the UAV software or the brain of the drone 04:33 – VJA is a company that uses UAVs mainly for photography, but the drones can’t be modified easily 04:59 – When Martin develops software in a computer that can be used in autopilot, it results to an amazing UAV with a high level of intelligence and algorithms that differentiate themselves from other UAVs 05:24 – FLYX.Systems currently has 2 main projects 06:09 - FLYX.Systems provides services to solar companies 06:26 – FLYX.Systems is still in the preoperative phase 06:34 – They’ve raised $100K 06:39 – They’ve used the funds for the UAV’s prototype and the landing platform 06:48 – The landing platform is one of their biggest projects up their sleeves 07:17 – The landing platform will be applied to the solar companies 07:32 – Team size 07:46 – Based in Mexico, but thinking of expanding to Columbia 08:03 – FLYX.Systems was launched early 2016 08:21 – Prior to FLYX.Systems, Martin was working as a CTO, developing technologies for solar applications 08:28 – Martin went to Singularity University’s summer camp where he met people in the same field 09:06 – Martin got his masters in UK and it was about the foundation and core of FLYX.Systems, which is the automation of the UAV system 09:27 – Martin was 28 when he entered Singularity 09:51 – One of the advantages in having an UAV business in Mexico is that the regulation for flying UAVs is not that harsh or strict compared to USA 10:18 – There’s less competition in Mexico, too 10:20 – The people in Mexico are talented and the salary range is lower than in the USA 10:42 – UAVs are not expensive when you know how to build them 11:27 – There’s a possibility for DJI to move to industrial in the future 11:40 – Martin wants to work on localized applications as quickly as possible 11:55 – Martin knows his market and wants to build something that is suited for their specific needs 12:13 – Martin also wants to combine technologies that DJI isn’t developing 12:30 – AI is one of the tools that Martin wants to harness 13:00 – Martin doesn’t want to depend on companies that sell UAVs 13:23 – People usually buy drones, then think of the vale 14:00 – Martin’s prototype will be launched next month and will be sent to different states in Mexico 14:14 – You pay for the service of the drone, the drone is not yet for sale 14:30 – The pay will depend on the size of the land but it will be around $15-20 per hectare 16:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The UAV market is currently a very hot market – if you can combine both hardware and software, the better. Starting a business in other countries has its advantages – in this case, less competition, less cost, and fewer regulations. Don’t start multiple projects at one time; finish one before starting another. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/15/2017 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
659: He's Winning In Home Fitness Wars: $3+ Million Monthly Revenue, $45 Million Raised
Eric Min. He’s the CEO and founder of a company called Zwift.com. Eric is a tech entrepreneur, a lifelong cyclist and is now spreading fitness through virtualization and gamification. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Max Levchin Favorite online tool? — Slack How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Taking risks earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:47 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:11 – Zwift is creating a virtual space where cyclists can interact with each other in real time 02:31 – Eric is trying to solve one of the most common problems of cyclists 03:26 – Zwift is a pure SaaS company 03:29 – Zwift charges $10 a month 03:36 – “We’re an asset-like company” 03:38 – Zwift works with partners who have all the different equipment available in the market 04:08 – The most basic setup to use Zwift is an iPad; a trainer that can be attached to your traditional bike to make it stationary 04:32 – Based on your weight and how you’re pedaling, Zwift can put you in the game 05:08 – Zwift was launched in January 2014 05:18 – Eric and his co-founder committed a couple of million dollars to build Zwift 05:36 – Their friends and families had raised around $7M 05:47 – Zwift just closed their series A and they have a total of $45M raised 06:07 – Prior to Zwift, Eric and his co-founder built a trading platform 06:28 – Eric and co-founders wanted to build something out of their comfort zones 06:41 – Eric was 30 when he launched the trading company 07:08 – “Enterprise business is tough” 07:45 – Eric and his co-founder had a $100M contract and spent 5 years extracting the contract 08:18 – Initial capital was $3M 09:17 – Eric and his co-founder are set out to be category leaders, so they made a new category 09:51 – Zwift currently has over 300K accounts created 10:07 – Zwift has 5M rides and 5M hours of pedaling 10:16 – The average ride is 1 hour 10:28 – Zwift also has 88M miles recorded 10:36 – The engagement is fairly high 10:38 – People log in to Zwift to watch other people 10:44 – 202 hours of people logging in just to watch 11:07 – People are also broadcasting their experience with Zwift 11:42 – Zwift doesn’t have free users and what they have is a trial period 12:00 – Zwift doesn’t have year-long contracts at the moment 12:02 – Eric wants to understand the behavior of the customers 12:10 – Most of the customers are outdoor cyclists 12:33 – Eric believes that over time, Zwift will be a year-round overtime preposition for not just cyclist but fitness enthusiast too 13:11 – Almost all consumer businesses are seasonal, like gaming 13:20 – People spend less time playing games in the summer 13:34 – Zwift makes it easy for people to consume fitness 13:42 – “Our belief is that everyone is chasing fitness and everyone would like to consume fitness in the most efficient way” 13:53 – The solution enables you to be at home and it’s cost-effective 14:55 – Zwift has 70% of the people stay with them every year 15:10 – Eric calls them “pause” and not churn 15:27 – As the social network expands, it’s gaining more interest 15:40 – Zwift also crowdsources content 15:54 – Zwift has a community of users who want to volunteer their services 16:17 – 97% of Zwift’s user acquisition is organic 16:54 – Zwift targets cyclists and most cyclists belong to a tribe or a team 17:29 – Zwift does a little on the digital advertising side 18:00 – Eric has invested in Zwift Academy which is modeled after GTA Academy 18:11 – GTA Academy is a marketing advertising program between Gran Turismo and Nissan 18:50 – Zwift took GT Academy’s model and made Zwift Academy 18:55 – Zwift Academy called out ladies around the world to join and 1200 ladies joined the program 19:03 – Zwift had a public PR in different media channels to announce Zwift Academy 19:15 – There were 3 finalists and they had to go through numbers of different tests 19:29 – The 3 finalists were taken to Majorca, Spain where they trained for 10 days with a professional team 19:37 – The professional team tested the finalists and offered a professional contract to one of them 19:45 – One of them is now a professional rider who was a former series marathoner 21:12 – Eric doesn’t worry about the valuation 23:07 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get out of your comfort zone – you’ll never know what’s in store for you until you get there. A large, initial fund that was raised should NOT affect your valuation if your company is doing well. Take risks...the earlier the better. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/14/2017 • 28 minutes, 12 seconds
658: Startups, $120 Million Up For Grabs! As Close to "Free Money" as You Can Get.
BJ Lackland. He has spent over 15 years as an investor in startups. As an investor, he’s been in VC and Angel and is now the CEO of Lighter Capital, where he oversees over 200 alternative investments in early stage tech companies. As an executive, he’s been on the executive team of 3 companies including CFO of a public tech company called Power Efficiency Corp. He’s raised and uploaded over $150M worth of capital. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Cirrus How many hours of sleep do you get? — 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just keep seeking” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces BJ to the show 02:05 – BJ was at VC in the early 2000s for 5 years and focused on energy technology 02:58 – Lighter Capital is a fintech company that revolutionized as a startup finance 03:06 – They are using technology to improve entrepreneurs’ access to capital 03:14 – Lighter Capital’s model 03:23 – An entrepreneur spends 8-10 hours with them before they write a check 03:30 – The revenue-based financing tends to be the best aspect of equity 03:58 – On average, Lighter Capital provides companies $250K and can go up to $2M 04:28 – Pay multiple is 1.5 to 2 times and paid typically over a 3 to 5-year period 04:53 – If the company grows quickly, they can pay in a shorter time period 05:00 – “We have every incentive of trying to help them grow” 05:07 – Lighter Capital is really betting on the entrepreneurs 05:20 – Lighter Capital has raised a total of $120M 05:23 – The initial fund was $20M 05:45 – Lighter Capital is raising from traditional LPs 06:44 – Lighter Capital makes money like a bank does 07:35 – Most lenders are worried about payment defaults 07:44 – Lighter Capital focuses on helping companies grow long-term 08:40 – Lighter Capital has a minimum threshold of $15K a month 08:55 – Lighter Capital looks into 2 different audiences 08:58 – One is their customers 09:01 – The other one is their capital partner 09:14 – Lighter Capital is funding 10-12 companies a month 09:40 – Lighter Capital has a group of 9 developers and data scientists 09:49 – Lighter Capital has 90% accuracy for predicting revenue 10:45 – Lighter Capital still goes through several different factors for approving a company 11:56 – In Episode 421, Nathan had Ceterus who worked with Lighter Capital 12:17 – The payment can or cannot accelerate depending on the company 12:44 – Companies can pay lighter capital earlier with a lesser amount 13:56 – Lighter Capital funded companies that are just by themselves 15:00 – Lighter Capital is also funding similar companies 15:36 – In Episode 542, Nathan had HipLead and on Episode 560, Badger Maps, and they both worked with Lighter Capital 17:34 – Lighter Capital worked with 101 companies last year 17:54 – Lighter Capital closed a lot of deals last Christmas 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Thousands of new businesses are coming out every month; having easy access to capital is a huge advantage for them. Predicting one company’s future revenue is beneficial, both for the investor and the company. Keep seeking, stay curious, and always find new things to learn about. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/13/2017 • 24 minutes, 26 seconds
657: Is OnFleet New King of Delivery Economy with 300 Customers Paying $500/mo?
Khaled Naim. He’s the CEO and co-founder of the company called Onfleet, a software company that makes it easy for businesses to manage local delivery operations. He holds an MBA from Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and studied computer engineering at The University of Michigan. He grew up between London and Dubai. He’s currently residing in San Francisco. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Venture Deals What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Gusto How many hours of sleep do you get? — 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Khaled would tell himself to do something that he’s really passionate about Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan introduces Khaled to the show 01:47 – Onfleet is a B2B software product that helps delivery companies manage and analyze their local delivery operations 02:18 – Onfleet provides apps for drivers, dispatching dashboards for the dispatchers, analytics and write-up optimizations and algorithms 02:29 – Onfleet charges monthly depending on the delivery volume 02:35 – The larger the business, the more deliveries they do 02:42 – Onfleet is a SaaS business 03:30 – Blue Apron is different because they don’t deliver locally, but ship using FedEx 03:42 – Onfleet’s focus is on companies who deliver their goods locally 04:16 – Onfleet was launched in April 2015 04:46 – Team size is 15 and all are in San Francisco 04:40 – Onfleet has raised $4.5M in total funding, so far 04:55 – If you can bootstrap, it is a good option 05:13 – There are factors that lead to the decision to raise funds 05:18 – If you’re not generating enough money to support the team, then raising capital is a good option 05:45 – It was 30 years ago when Khaled launched Onfleet 05:51 – Khaled, together with his co-founder, started Onfleet while he was still at Stanford—this is also where they met their CTO 06:28 – Khaled, with his co-founders, attended Stanford’s Accelerator Program in 2012 07:17 – Onfleet raised a convertible note round and an equity round 07:38 – Onfleet offers a 30-day free trial for new customers 07:48 – After 30 days, they need to enter their credit card information 07:55 – Onfleet’s pricing is very transparent and can be easily calculated on their website 08:30 – The telephone services are the call and text messages that run through Onfleet 08:38 – The customer receives notifications automatically regarding the driver’s status 09:16 – The cost varies primarily on the market 09:53 – Onfleet is currently serving 300 customers 10:10 – Onfleet’s pricing page is really nice and easy to navigate 10:34 – Onfleet’s average customer is between the standard and premium tier 11:06 – Some of the customers are paying the north of 10K a month 11:13 – Average customer pay per month is $400-500 a month 11:56 – Onfleet doesn’t track the number of tasks during the free trial 12:38 – Onfleet helps businesses to scale their business 13:10 – Onfleet’s net MRR churn is more negative than negative 5% 14:10 – Everything in Onfleet is pay-per-use or pay-as-you-go 14:40 – There are customers who start using Onfleet, then leave 15:27 – Onfleet doesn’t have much customer churn 16:05 – CAC is around $1500 per customer 17:08 – LTV is around 18 months 17:37 – Onfleet’s customers are categorized 17:47 – Onfleet is slowly moving to more larger accounts 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can start a business without a capital – just find a way to it. If you’re not generating enough money to support the team, then raising capital is a good option. No matter what, follow your passion and you’ll be alright. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/12/2017 • 24 minutes, 45 seconds
656: How to Win VR Gaming Space, $500k Raised, Team of 12, First Release This Year with CEO Peter Kortenhoeven
Peter Kortenhoeven. He’s a creative person with a great deal of experience in the gaming industry. He started after graduation at the Academy of Arts as an animator at Coded Illusions. He became a lead animator at Triumph Studios shortly afterwards. One of his key successes has been the successful Overlord series. As lead artist, he worked on many different, yet, unreleased games. From a need to gain more business experience, he decided to focus on applied games. He became an art director at Bright Alley and later on at Ranj. During his period within the serious gaming industry, Peter kept working on small game projects during his spare time. One of those projects, Pillow Willow, helped him start his first company, Pillow Willow VR Studios. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Story of Whole Disney What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Trello How many hours of sleep do you get? — 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take it easy and make sure you focus on the right thing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:22 – Nathan introduces Peter to the show 03:43 – Pillow Willow works on two flavors of games 03:47 – First is non-violent dreamscapes which are completely filled with liveliness 04:11 – They also work on active, full-body, VR games which stimulate players to move actively within the games 04:38 – Pillow Willow hasn’t released a game yet and is still working on 4 titles, at the same time 04:47 – The first game, Drako, will be released within June and is a dreamscape game 05:13 – Drako’s demo will be released for HTC Gear and Oculus 05:39 – The goal is to have a multi-player option in the future 06:05 – Pillow Willow won Best Dutch VR Game at the Bright VR Awards, in 2016 06:17 – It was for a demo game 07:00 – Pillow Willow has a seat funder which is Lumo Labs 08:00 – Pillow Willow has currently raised $500M 08:07 – Pillow Willow was launched in March 2016 08:23 – Team size is 12 08:46 – Pillow Willow will charge for their games and will create high end content 09:20 – Mobile VR is the Samsung S series combined with the Gear VR 09:38 – You have to have the proper phone and headset to play the games 09:52 – Average number of people who have VR gear 10:13 – Pillow Willow’s first game will be an hour long and priced at $499 11:10 – Pillow Willow will try to create those dreamscapes games in a virtual universe 11:40 – Nathan thinks of the dreamscapes games like Neopets 14:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The VR space is a hot space at the moment and the games are getting more and more interesting. If you have a seat funder, your company can continue developing a product even without recurring revenue. Take it easy and make sure you focus on the RIGHT goal. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/11/2017 • 18 minutes, 55 seconds
655: Expensify 450k Customers Paying $9/mo for Expense Reports that Don't Suck with CEO David Barrett
David Barrett. He started programming at the early age of 6 and has been inspired to become an expense reporter ever since. He attended the University of Michigan where he worked in a virtual reality lab before moving to Texas to write a 3D graphic engine for the industry. Then, he moved to California to join a name that is probably familiar to many of you, Travis Kalanick, in building a peer-to-peer file transport technology called, Red Swoosh, which was acquired by Akamai in 2007. In 2008, David left that company to start Expensify—where he is today—and he’s trying to figure out the world’s frustrations, one expense report at a time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kalanick Favorite online tool? — G Suite How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I had dropped out of college” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces David to the show 02:36 – David was working on a debit/credit card idea and the banks weren’t happy with it 02:50 – Expensify is the corporate card for the masses 03:08 – David got into the space when there was so much room for disruption and pain points 03:40 – Travis’ first company is called Scour, which is an early file sharing network that got sued 04:06 – When David got into Red Swoosh, Travis was the only guy there 04:48 – David thinks that Travis is very articulate in communicating his vision 05:12 – David had equity from Red Swoosh 05:31 – Red Swoosh didn’t have a big exit 06:14 – Expensify charges $9 per active user per month 06:20 – Expensify is a mobile app—you take a picture of your receipts and the app will read all the details on the receipt, automatically 06:29 – The information will then be categorized, sent to your account, and you’ll get reimbursed the next day 07:10 – The company is only paying the active users 07:29 – Expensify’s price points are $5 and $9 07:40 – David started Expensify’s idea after Red Swoosh’s acquisition 07:56 – David left Akamai in 2008, then he worked on Expensify 08:00 – Expensify’s official launch is 2008 08:05 – Expensify’s team size is around 110 08:18 – Expensify has raised capital 08:27 – Expensify has raised a total of $25M 08:36 – Expensify has been a break even business for a long time 08:39 – “We grow primarily through revenue” 08:52 – The vast majority of Expensify’s growth is through self-finance 09:54 – The business itself is breaking even, but they’re always raising and experimenting on big experiments 10:31 – There are about 25K companies who use Expensify 11:03 – There are millions of individuals who use Expensify, too 11:32 – 10% of Expensify’s user base are paying customers 10:43 – 10% of 4.5M are paying customers 12:12 – “Churn is complicated” 12:33 – Expensify has a net negative revenue churn 13:05 – Expensify doesn’t advertise and they have 100% organic traffic 13:37 – Expensify had a few fundraising rounds 13:41 – In 2008, they had their first $1M round 13:43 – They did a few more in a couple of years 14:25 – David doesn’t talk with investors and hasn’t talked with them in years 15:27 – Expensify is something totally different from Salesforce 15:53 – Expensify doesn’t have salespeople 16:16 – Expensify’s primary revenue generator is their support team who follow up on deployments 16:43 – Pricing has been difficult and Expensify is still working on it 16:53 – Expensify was originally free and customers didn’t understand why 17:18 – David thought they needed a reasonable price point 17:31 – After choosing a price point, people became more comfortable and trusting 17:51 – Expensify’s competitors followed their pricing 18:37 – Expensify’s focus is on mastering the dynamics 19:06 – David thinks that, realistically, their pricing should be much higher 19:34 – David is planning on increasing their pricing 19:52 – “Because we don’t need the money, we’re focused on something else” 19:58 – “Maintaining an incredibly low price right now for the industry actually helps keep the competition out” 20:29 – People find Expensify through word-of-mouth 20:51 – “All of our emphasis is on building a product in a brand that generates an incredibly strong word-of-mouth” 21:34 – 99% of Expensify’s traffic is people searching for us 21:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Adding a paid option to your product can actually make your customers more confident in your product. Word-of-mouth is one of the best and cheapest ways to grow your traffic and client base, but your business has to be valuable for people. A college degree is NOT the only road to success. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/10/2017 • 26 minutes, 9 seconds
654: $100k at Age 19, Now $1.2 Million From 16 Best Selling Books and New Smart Business App, Brin with CEO Dale Beaumont
Dale Beaumont. He’s an award winning technology entrepreneur, international speaker and author of 16 best-selling books. He started his first business at age 19 and has been building companies ever since. One of those companies is now a multi-million dollar enterprise which enabled Dale to become an investor, philanthropist, and has given him the opportunity to set foot in over 70 countries. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Seven-Day Weekend What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Voxer How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Dale would tell himself to really have fun and just enjoy the journey Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Dale to the show 02:00 – Dale’s first book was published in 2001 02:23 – Dale published a total of 16 books and sold 250K copies 02:26 – All of the books that Dale published were on best-seller list in Australia 02:42 – A best-seller book in Australia sells 5K copies on physical bookshelves 02:57 – Dale was 19 when he started his first company 03:05 – One of Dale’s challenges was being so young in business 03:27 – Dale thought that needed to create credibility and the one way to do that was to publish a book 03:45 – Dale’s first book was The World at Your Feet which is a personal development book for teenagers 03:50 – When Dale wrote a press release, it got him on national TV, newspapers and magazines 04:23 – Dale’s first company’s revenue went up after they released his book 04:59 – The book became their launch pad 05:16 – Dale’s first company’s revenue increased to $500K 05:28 – Dale published a series called Secrets Exposed, which has 15 books—he wrote the series in two and half years 05:43 – The books are interviews conducted by Dale 06:16 – All of the books are self-published 06:39 – Dale worked on the series from 2007 to 2009 06:49 – Publishing this series is one of Dale’s most successful ventures 07:10 – In self-publishing, the cost per book goes down when you have 5K copies 07:31 – Dale had a pre-sell for his books 07:48 – Dale also had partnerships with companies, associations and organizations and they pre-purchased his books 08:28 – There was no requirement for the interviewee to purchase a copy of the book 08:38 – When Dale was about to print the copies, he sent messages to people offering a discounted price for bulk orders 08:58 – After 4 books of his series came out, more people approached Dale to be interviewed, so Dale had to set requirements 09:08 – Dale was able to fill out the next 11 books by making people commit to buying 1K copies 09:40 – Brad Sugars is an example of someone who approached Dale 10:21 – Dale started a company called Business Blueprint 11:04 – The company teaches small business owners across Australia and New Zealand how to use technology to improve their business 11:11 – The company started from the ground up and has continued to grow for 7 years now 11:16 – It is doing more than $5M in revenue 11:26 – The company does live events, webinars and membership sites 12:05 – Dale’s goal is to provide business education and support 12:30 – Less than 1% of businesses have a business coach or advisor 12:33 – Dale thought that it would be cool to create a product that would give everyone a chance to have a business advisor 12:46 – Dale started to build the world’s first AI business advisor and his name is BRiN 12:54 – “BRiN is like the Siri for business” 12:56 – BriN is a smartphone app and is currently on free download in iOs and Android 13:50 – Dale shares the benefit of using BRiN rather than searching your business questions through Google 14:21 – BRiN has had 21K downloads in the past 6 months with 4K weekly users 15:00 – BRiN, overall, has had 164K user sessions 16:10 – Dale self-funded BRiN from the funds he got from his previous company 16:20 – Dale has also been approached by different companies who are trying to talk to small business owners 16:39 – BRiN now offers partnership packages 18:52 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: One way to “manufacture” credibility is by publishing your own book. It is good to know that you’re on the right path in business – and business advisors can help guide you on that path. Work hard, live your life, but make sure you are ENJOYING the journey. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/9/2017 • 22 minutes, 36 seconds
653: She Invests $120 Million Into Financial Tech Companies, 39 Graduates, 6-8 New Per Year with New York Partnership Fund CEO Maria Gotsch
Maria Gotsch. She’s the president and CEO at the Partnership Fund for New York City, which is the investment arm of the Partnership for New York City. In addition to leading the funds operations, Maria has spearheaded the creation and operation of a number of fund strategic initiatives including The Fintech Innovation Lab. Prior to joining the fund in 1999, Maria was a managing director at a company that is now part of Deutsche Bank, providing strategic and financial advice related to mergers, acquisitions, dispositions, joint ventures and the development of business strategies. Maria worked for LaSalle Partners in the New York area and Merrill Lynch Capital Markets, in both New York and London. She graduated with an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA from Wellesley College. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – “A book on the Iranian negotiations with the US around the treaty” What CEO do you follow? – Henry Kravis Favorite online tool? — MyCity Bike app How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7 and a half If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be bold, be bold, be bold!” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan introduces Maria to the show 02:15 – Partnership Fund is the corporate sector at the table that is trying to grow the NYC economy 02:21 – Henry Kravis of KKR has raised funds in the late 90s and raised from major corporations and individuals, in NYC 02:32 – The investor list is the “who’s who" of the private equity 02:36 – Partnership Fund was structured as an evergreen fund 02:48 – “We can do things that are a little bit riskier and take a little bit longer than a traditional private sector investor” 03:02 – “We often work with government, but we’re privately funded” 03:13 – Partnership Fund is like an interest-free loan for 45 years 03:33 – All of Partnership Fund’s gains just go back to their funds and they reinvest it 03:41 – “We have the investors’ money for 45 years and if we make returns, it comes back to us to fund new projects” 03:58 – The Fintech Lab is currently in their 7th year and has 75 graduates 04:08 – It is an elite program and takes 68 companies a year 04:18 – It is structured as a civic program 04:32 – The goal of the program is to help reduce the pain and agony of a small emerging company trying to get into and get attention from large financial institutions 05:06 – “Because it is competitive to get in, it’s a shark tank to get in, but once you’re in, it’s a dolphin tank” 05:18 – They get 150-160 applications a year 05:28 – Companies are selected by their financial institution partners 05:34 – A company’s technology has to rise to the level of addressing a major pain point for major financial institutions 06:10 – In some cases, it’s not about an acquisition, it’s about using 06:15 – The fact that they are a non-profit civic organization is important 06:29 – CTOs and CIOs will come to the table as a civic program, partly to help grow the fintech community in NYC, to create jobs 07:23 – They invest in some of the graduates’ post programs 07:30 – The lab is laser-focused in solving problems 07:41 – They are not doing any direct-to-consumer programs 08:20 – The big 3: data, security and risk management have been on the top of the CIOs list from the beginning 08:43 – However, new things are coming 08:47 – Disruptive talent management has been added as a new category 08:58 – Blockchain has gone through an interesting cycle 09:14 – This year, there’s much less interest in blockchain and distributed ledger 09:52 – Maria predicts that in 2 years, there will be an increase of interest in enabling technologies that fit around the distributed ledger 10:31 – In data, Digital Reasoning came into the program with an interesting technology that is able to read unstructured data, and they’re working for the government 11:03 – They were advised to focus on compliance 12:04 – In security, Centripetal Networks has a perimeter defense technology and they’re gaining traction from people who have a lot of retail locations 12:34 – In risk management, Quarule automates some of the processing of regulatory tracking and flagging operations against the regulations 13:23 – In blockchain, Digital Asset Holdings has raised a significant amount of money and has been involved in some major projects 13:50 – Maria shares how they are telling companies to create more jobs in NYC 14:02 – The companies will also realize that they need to have people on the ground in NYC 14:20 – Some have moved to their headquarters in NYC 14:46 – “We’ve not raised money since the late 90s” 14:50 – The initial fund size was $120M 15:46 – New York is starting to be seen as a center for fintech 16:34 – There are some smaller companies that are trying to go after pieces and as they scale, the acquisition cost is increasingly expensive 17:05 – LearnVest is a good example 17:40 – The small business lenders come to a market that the banks aren’t servicing 18:00 – There are companies who are an exception to the rule 18:17 – Most of the companies end up partnering with large institutions 18:54 – What the large financial institutions have is expertise and compliance 20:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The trend in the fintech space is constantly changing. Creating more jobs in New York City means more opportunities for companies and for the people of New York. Be BOLD—don’t shrink, don’t hesitate—just go for it. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/8/2017 • 23 minutes, 21 seconds
652: SnapLogic Raises $136M, $70M+ ARR Helping 750 Customers ($138k ACV) Connect Data Streams with CEO Gaurav Dhillon
Gaurav Dhillon. He’s an early investor in a company called SnapLogic. He joined in 2009, when he saw the potential of how companies integrate applications data and devices for digital business. He spearheaded SnapLogic’s rapid growth and overseas strategies, products, and operations. He’s previously the co-founder and CEO of Informatica. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Power of Habit What CEO do you follow? – Andy Grove Favorite online tool? — Gmail How many hours of sleep do you get? — Close to 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish he knew more that opportunity knocks often” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Gaurav to the show 02:04 – Gaurav and his co-founder had a $75K SBA grant when they built Informatica 02:25 – They have raised a total of $13.5M 02:57 – “11-12 years is a long time and it’s time to go” 03:32 – Gaurav is a company builder 03:47 – When Gaurav did an IPO, he sold some of his shares in a secondary public offering 03:53 – There was no lock-out 04:24 – They made $400M in secondary public offering 04:32 – Their initial raise was less than $100M 04:49 – In IPO, you are also trying to build a brand for yourself 05:23 – Gaurav left Informatica in July 2004 05:28 – Gaurav spent a year doing things on his bucket list 06:10 – When Gaurav went back to the valley, he joined a couple of boards 06:25 – Gaurav was in a board meeting when they talked about business internet, which is now cloud computing 06:37 – “People aren’t just going to buy books from the web, they’re going to balance books on the web” 06:58 – Gaurav invested in SnapLogic 07:05 – Gaurav wrote a couple of men a check saying that if there’s a business, prove it to him, and he will provide capital 07:16 – The initial check was $1M 07:26 – Gaurav structured it as convertible debt 08:06 – SnapLogic has raised a total of $136M 08:10 – Initially, it was from Venture 08:23 – Most recent round was led by Vitruvian Partners 09:04 – Gaurav built Informatica to hook up those products with each other 09:21 – SnapLogic is connecting the new cloud application to what is now Legacy, which was a new application 20 years ago 09:46 – They’re expanding out the product set in SnapLogic and providing all kinds of connections 10:12 – Is SnapLogic the unsexier version of Zapier, but more important? 10:26 – Zapier is a consumer place and Gaurav doesn’t dislike it 10:32 – There have been companies, like Bump, who try to do certain kinds of things 10:56 – The problem of overt strata in business 11:05 – What they’re solving on Zapier is on a personal level 11:20 – If you’re trying to connect your human capital system with your SAP financial system and you are a big company, you will need something like SnapLogic 11:44 – SnapLogic is the industrial version 11:58 – SnapLogic is a PaaS (platform as a service) model 12:04 – SnapLogic is a cloud product and is like Google Chrome 12:33 – SnapLogic’s average customer pay is $136K a year 12:57 – SnapLogic currently has 250 employees and is still growing 13:20 – SnapLogic’s LTV 13:32 – “We’ve got many customers in 7-figures, already” 13:50 – “You can always buy that you can sell” 14:07 – SnapLogic has inside qualification people or SDRs for customer acquisition 14:24 – SDRs ratio 14:43 – SnapLogic has less than 20 SDRs 14:56 – CAC 15:49 – “We’re a buzz company, customers love us” 17:15 – Gaurav looks at incremental growth 18:44 – Nathan thinks that it is so wrong for founders who focus on the LTV-CAC ratio 19:09 – “You don’t want to be too conservative, right, because the early market share you get is the best market share” 19:26 – Gaurav shares the business metrics 19:46 – Try to do a 6-figure deal and try to have more customers than employees 20:06 – Average ARR 20:47 – SnapLogic hasn’t broke the 9-figure ARR rate yet 21:05 – A company that can double its revenue has nothing to fear 21:34 – “What we’re doing is building a robust business which, no doubt, is growing aggressively, but also has its feet on the ground” 22:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If your company can double its revenue, it’s a strong indicator that you are in good shape. The early market share you get is the best market share. Don’t fret—opportunity knocks often. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/7/2017 • 27 minutes, 21 seconds
651: Pipl Indexes 3.5B People, How Contact Data Really Works with Advisor Garth Moulton
Garth Moulton. He’s invested and has advised a number of technology startups and was responsible for revenue growth for the channel for Pipl Inc. After 11 years of sales experience in the Bay area, Mr. Moulton had the perfect startup journey with Jigsaw, which was drawn up from 2 guys with a whiteboard to a $175M exit, in 2010, to Salesforce. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Speed of Trust What CEO do you follow? – Tim Ferris Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That time is not boundless” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Garth to the show 01:58 – Garth didn’t get depressed after Jigsaw’s exit 02:23 – Garth and Jim stayed at Salesforce for a year and a half, after the acquisition 02:43 – Pipl was running together with Jigsaw 02:48 – Garth met Pipl’s CEO during the early days of Jigsaw and they partnered together 03:03 – Pipl would drive traffic to Jigsaw 03:51 – Pipl was a typical search engine, driving traffic to partners 04:31 – In the last 3 years, Pipl was more of a data company that sold API access and basic search tools to access data and profiles to 3 channels 04:46 – First channel is a search app like Spokeo and Instant Checkmate where Pipl supplies them the data 05:19 – Second channel is fraud alert and ID validation 05:44 – Pipl checks if the email is real 05:56 – Garth overlooked the companies that were going to use the data for sales and marketing 06:18 – Pipl is partners with Full Contact 06:39 – Nathan has been trying to find the mother of data sources 06:52 – “Jigsaw was the source of the data” 07:12 – LinkedIn is still the biggest source of data for B2B 07:50 – There’s a LinkedIn private channel 08:26 – LinkedIn has gotten more and more aggressive in making the data available 08:58 – There have been CEOs who received a cease and desist order from LinkedIn 09:24 – Some of the companies are wholly dependent on LinkedIn 09:56 – Garth shares the same sentiment as Nathan that there’s no mother data source 10:31 – The Data Dinosaurs’ data accuracy is horrendous 12:30 – An average of a hundred corporations have bought the API access of Pipl 13:14 – Pipl’s business solution average price point 13:21 – $1200 a year for unlimited searches, per person 13:37 – Team size is 40 13:47 – Team location 14:15 – Pipl is bootstrapped 14:27 – Garth became interested in Pipl, because it was completely bootstrapped 15:15 – Garth had an agreement that he would come on for a couple of years and expand the channel for Pipl 15:37 – Garth is on the cap table 17:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Data sources are sharing each other’s data to grow and verify their own data—there is no mother of data sources. A company that is bootstrapped definitely has more freedom and control of their company. If you can start your business as early as you can, do it. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/6/2017 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
650: TREX FinTech $15M Raised, Breaks Down Securitized Loans From Renewable Energy Orginators So Investors Can Buy with CEO Benjamin Cohen
Benjamin Cohen. He’s the CEO and leading T-REX, with a strong vision for the future of enterprise financial technology and its impact on marketing and making markets more transparent and efficient. He’s built the T-REX team and the T-REX software platform by combining the most sustainable elements of finance with modern SaaS technology. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn How many hours of sleep do you get?— Between 6 and 7.5 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished that I knew that not everything was of the utmost consequence for my entire life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:24 – Nathan introduces Benjamin to the show 02:55 – T-REX is a fintech company that makes complex capital markets more liquid by making them more transparent and efficient 04:04 – T-REX provides a familiar framework where their clients can slice and dice everything 04:15 – “We’re just making the risks more transparent” 04:20 – T-REX has an enterprise SaaS model 04:59 – Customers are paying $2k-20K per month depending on the functionalities they need 05:09 – Benjamin launched T-REX in 2012 05:55 – The Ecosystem Integrity Fund is T-REX’s series A lead investor 06:12 – T-REX has raised $15M in total 06:26 - T-REX had 2 priced equity rounds 06:32 – Team size is 21 and based in New York 06:39 – Half of the team is based in Tel Aviv, Israel and are mostly software engineers 06:57 – The cost of living in Israel is a bit lower 07:35 – T-REX has over 225 users 07:51 – The 225 are all paying customers 08:28 – The model of T-REX is that investors are coming in and looking for different deals than what originators have out, which includes different loan portfolios—specifically in the renewable energy sector 09:34 – Loan’s interest 09:44 – The secure ties 10:30 – Average MRR 11:13 – “I invested 2 years of my time before getting a dollar” 11:19 – It took Benjamin 2 years to raise capital 11:36 – Benjamin’s fund was from his previous role in Macquarie Bank 12:12 – Renewable energy presented a great slate of a market 12:33 – Benjamin funded T-REX with a 6-figure capital 12:52 – A junior engineer’s average salary from Tel Aviv 13:53 – Everybody in the company has equity 14:03 – Benjamin is the sole-founder of T-REX 14:32 – Customer churn is currently zero 14:54 – Benjamin is expecting T-REX to be incredibly sticky 15:20 – T-REX is selling additional seats and their customers can sell more modules 15:29 – T-REX can expand horizontally to different markets and vertically where they can sell different models 15:50 – Years ago, T-REX has set up their own broker/dealers 16:05 – CAC is dependent on the customers 17:11 – T-REX will do a $10K conference sponsorship and they need to be there 17:35 – T-REX series B closed in November 15th 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be in the space that you know best and don’t fear being a solo founder. It is actually GREAT to make mistakes and GREAT to fail, as long as you learn from it. Don’t fear that every decision you make or action you take has a lifelong consequence in your life—it simply isn’t true. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/5/2017 • 25 minutes, 49 seconds
649: HolaGus $1.4M Raised Helping Clients Automate Support with AI with CEO Pablo Estevez
Pablo Estevez. He’s a Mexican entrepreneur who co-founded HolaGus, an artificial intelligence company that focuses on automating customer service and sales via chat for Spanish speaking countries. Since founding his company, he has been distinguished for receiving awards like The Diamond Winner by MassChallenge. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – A lot Favorite online tool? — N/A How many hours of sleep do you get?— Usually 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That this is going to be really, really hard, I was going to work a lot of hours” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan introduces Pablo to the show 02:00 – HolaGus develops AI to automate customer service and sales via any chat channel 02:11 – HolaGus charges businesses for every assisted conversation 02:39 – HolaGus’s standard fee is 1-2 Mexican pesos 02:47 – HolaGus has a pay-as-you-go model 03:20 – HolaGus is a B2C business and is similar to GoButler 03:37 – “If we really want to scale the business, we have to focus on the AI” 04:04 – HolaGus was launched in 2015 04:10 – There are 3 co-founders 04:22 – HolaGus has raised capital and is about to close their third round 05:04 – HolaGus has raised a total of $1.4M 05:23 – HolaGus focuses on the customer’s closing and how much automation they’re able to create 05:39 – “We try to keep the bots, like, between 80-90%” 05:53 – HolaGus focuses on closing the biggest amount of clients that they can 05:58 – HolaGus has a lot of interesting commercial deals in the pipeline 06:09 – HolaGus has already sold 3 contracts 06:16 – HolaGus only started selling 4-5 months ago 06:21 – HolaGus is hoping to close 85 clients 06:55 – HolaGus is still on pre-revenue 07:10 – HolaGus has different projected revenues and models for their 3 customers 07:12 – HolaGus has an upfront development fee of $25K 08:02 – HolaGus pricing will depend on the technology 08:13 – HolaGus develops AI, specifically for a business 08:39 – HolaGus is now creating an ocean of knowledge 09:08 – “If we have a thousand clients, our AI gets smarter and smarter really quick” 11:08 – Pablo believes that they automate a lot 11:25 – Total projected conversations for the first 3 customers will be 20K-40K conversations 11:56 – HolaGus tries to charge a minimum of monthly consumption 12:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: AI technology can be complicated and needs continuous development. Play around with different payment models to see what works best and is most profitable. Starting and running a business is tough work—you just have to be dedicated. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/4/2017 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
648:Biluu Lets Mexicans Safely Drink Tap Water for $150 with CEO Peter Aronso
Peter Aronson. He’s an award-winning journalist who’s has been featured on NPR and Marketplace. He’s also been a vice president in the corporate world. Now, his startup helps Mexico transform that notorious Mexican tap water into perfectly drinkable clean-tasting purified water. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Founder’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — HubSpot CRM Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Peter wished he took business courses and knew about the GTD (Getting Things Done) methodology Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Peter to the show 01:33 – People aren’t supposed to drink the water in Mexico 01:41 – Mexico became the No. 1 consumer per capita in the world 02:08 – 70% of the consumed bottled water in Mexico is 5-gallon jug 02:21 – An average Mexican family is spending more for their water than on their broadband or landline 02:48 – Peter’s company is Biluu 03:07 – Peter had been curious about the startup and business world 03:13 – Peter was the corporate vice president for US-Indian Joint Venture 03:30 – While in the Himalayas, Peter would boil his drinking water every day 03:35 – Eventually, Peter taught the people how to use a water purifier 04:00 – Peter searched how to properly filter water and what should be taken out 04:25 – Peter’s wife is Mexican and he returned to Mexico 04:36 – Biluu is a for profit business, not a non-profit 04:44 – Biluu is currently doing direct sales and YouTube promotions 05:00 – The main challenge in Mexico is changing people’s habits 05:12 – “We’ve had to establish trust” 06:12 – Biluu filtration system cost is $170 06:50 – For $170, they can get virtually unlimited purified drinking water for a year 06:58 – A cartridge will last for a year 07:11 – 1500 people are drinking Biluu’s water 07:35 – Some of Biluu’s filtration systems are in restaurants 07:53 – Biluu has sold around 100 units 08:10 – The previous water filters in Mexico weren’t effective or scientifically proven 08:43 – 42% of Biluu’s growth came from referrals 08:55 – Biluu isn’t manufacturing by themselves 09:28 – Biluu has an exclusive license to the technology 09:39 – The deal is by volume commitment 09:57 – Biluu needs to maintain a 6-figure sales 10:14 – Biluu is totally self-funded 10:20 – Team size is 5 and all are based in Mexico City, Mexico 10:47 – Biluu is trying to look for brand ambassadors to reach out to people 11:06 – Biluu is also doing Facebook paid ads and Google AdWords 12:17 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s not easy to change people’s habits, but you HAVE to try—especially if it’s for the better. Learning from a community can be a life changing experience. Find a brand ambassador who has a good online reputation and large following. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/3/2017 • 15 minutes, 21 seconds
647: Tai Lopez Owns 50% of $89/mo MentorBox.com, 800 Units, $80k In Initial Test for Self Help Box with CEO Alex Mehr
Alex Mehr. He’s the founder of Zoosk, which filed to go public in 2014. His current venture is MentorBox, a unique and new self-help concept. Before that, he was an aerospace scientist at NASA. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I try at least 8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To take more risks” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 01:43 – Zoosk announced to go public for $200M 02:24 – Zoosk decided to stay independent, so they didn’t pursue going public 02:44 – When you go public, you make projections about the growth rate and what you want to do financially 03:05 – The expectations from the public market for tech companies who go public are different than those who do not 03:14 – Alex and the team didn’t want the company to push hard for a quarter by quarter growth 03::50 – Zoosk was launched in 2007 04:00 – Alex and his co-founder split everything 50/50 04:21 – Alex and his co-founder have worked for 8 years and they never had a problem 04:40 – Alex and Shayan have different domain expertise and they respect each other’s’ domain expertise 05:30 – Zoosk has grown rapidly until 2014 05:36 – “But the company was not profitable” 06:40 – Alex still has his equity and is part of the board 07:36 – Zoosk is growing again 07:53 – MentorBox is a self-education self-improvement education box 08:07 – Alex has always been a book reader his whole life 08:33 – Alex would gift his friends books all the time 08:43 – 10% of the population’s primary method of learning is reading 08:50 – There are 4 methods of learning: auditory, visual, reading, and kinesthetic 09:20 – The idea of MentorBox is a subscription for business books that Alex thinks everybody should read per month 09:38 – MentorBox makes the information concise so that you can study the main concepts in 10 minutes 09:46 – MentorBox delivers in 4 formats 10:28 – Tai Lopez is Alex’s co-founder 10:41 – 7 years ago, Tai and Alex met at an online gaming conference 11:05 – It turned out that Tai reads 1 book a day 11:40 – Tai and Alex have a 50/50 deal with MentorBox 12:03 – Alex had a landing page to test MentorBox 12:19 – They had a video that explained the product 12:27 – Tai has a large social media following so he tested his ad on his social media 13:05 – In the first test, they were able to sell $80K worth of product 13:22 – MentorBox is priced at $89 a month 13:50 – MentorBox’s retention 14:14 – MentorBox’s space is education subscription 14:40 – Average retention in the space 15:12 – Tai and Alex knew that MentorBox would be a sustainable business 15:38 – LTV and CAC are both high 16:18 – MentorBox also relies on word-of-mouth marketing 16:37 – The cost per box drops depending on the volume 17:26 – MentorBox buys from distributors and publishers directly 17:48 – MentorBox is looking at getting directly from the author 18:18 – The number of books MentorBox has bought from Ryan Holiday 19:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The public market’s expectations for companies that go public are very different and can put on additional pressures that, otherwise, wouldn’t exist. Do what you love AND share what you love doing to other people. Be a risk-taker – you’ll learn more that way. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/2/2017 • 24 minutes, 15 seconds
646: He Coined Term "Growth Hacking" After DropBox, EventBrite, LogMeIn Work, Now Launching Book "Hacking Growth" with Sean Ellis
Sean Ellis. He’s the founder and CEO of GrowthHackers.com, he coined the term “growth hacking” in 2010 after using it to ignite growth for Dropbox, Eventbrite, LogMeIn and Lookout. He also founded and sold customer insights company Qualaroo, growing it to millions of dollars in recurring revenue. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Peep Laja Favorite online tool? — The Calm App Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished my 20-year old self knew things are going to be pretty good” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Sean to the show 02:03 – Sean speaks at The Capital Factory in Austin, Texas 02:07 – Sean’s talk was about viral coefficients and why it’s important to decrease the time of the original share to really drive growth 02:50 – If you don’t have a lot value at the foundation of the growth, it’s hard to make your business sustainable 02:56 – Sean tries to understands the value of the product first, then goes backwards from there 03:16 – Sean used the referral program for Dropbox 03:30 – Sean, together with the group, came up with the idea of giving away free storage for referrals 03:45 – Sean’s friend tested a double-sided referral program prior to Dropbox 03:53 – Sean’s friend is James Siminoff, founder of Ring and the previously the CEO of PhoneTag 04:45 – Sean provides advice on viral coefficients 04:55 – In the case of DropBox—“Referrals were strong before the referral program went in place” 05:12 – Understand what the motivation is for people to do refer 05:18 – Think about every step in the process; for example, what’s the prompt that gets people to share? 05:42 – Optimize all the steps of the referral process 05:47 – The more you have qualitative and quantitative insights about what’s happening, you’re going to be more informed in the tests that you are running 06:41 – Eventbrite didn’t have an incentive, but just a natural viral product in itself 07:18 – Eventbrite helps companies sell tickets 07:30 – Eventbrite doesn’t only offer a convenient experience but also good SEO, social integration, and other factors that will help you sell tickets 08:00 – Sean worked for LogMeIn’s marketing for 5 years 08:05 – LogMeIn is now a $5B company 08:07 – “Natural word-of-mouth was huge with LogMeIn” 08:10 – By the time Sean left LogMeIn, 80% of the users were coming in through word-of-mouth 08:15 – LogMeIn was spending more than $1M monthly with a 3-month payback on acquiring customers 08:21 – “Value drives word-of-mouth” 08:35 – At first, the majority of LogMeIn’s users didn’t really use the product 09:25 – The CEO and whole team worked together to find out the problem with the customer experience 09:55 – LogMeIn has always been cash flow positive 10:13 – Look up how Sean runs questionnaires in his Youtube videos and slideshows 10:31 – Qualaroo is about customer insights 10:45 – Sean acquired Qualaroo in 2012 10:49 – Qualaroo was acquired from KissMetrics 10:53 – Qualaroo was a side business and Sean was an advisor for it 11:08 – Sean built Qualaroo to millions of dollars of recurring revenue and sold it last year 11:45 – Sean bought it for less than a million dollars 12:00 – The revenue of Qualaroo was less than a hundred thousand dollars 12:25 – Qualaroo was acquired by Xenon 13:01 – Jonathan Siegel owns Xenon 13:14 – Sean wanted to sell Qualaroo and wasn’t trying to get top dollar for it 13:57 – Sean had a 7-figure advance on the book, so he’s not losing money 14:09 – Sean has signed with Crown Business 14:29 – Sean has self-published a book before 14:49 – Sean’s background and Growth Hackers allowed him to get a great deal with Crown Business 15:00 – Sean is the guy who came up with the term “growth hacking” 15:09 – There are already a lot of publishers who approached Sean to write a book about growth hacking 15:22 – Morgan Brown is Sean’s co-author 15:47 – Morgan and Sean hired an editor to write the proposal 16:10 – Sean’s agent is Lisa DiMona 16:30 – The process is getting an agent to invest in your book, they help you with the proposal and they pitch your book 17:21 – Sean’s plan to make the book a successful one 17:26 – First is to gain momentum to get on the New York Times’ Bestseller List 17:43 – The weekly sales is what will determine whether you make the list 18:05 – “If you get on the list, then it’s a lot easier to stay on the list” 18:32 – People’s perception on growth is often a bit flawed 18:45 – Growth hacking is more about testing stuff and doubling down when something works 19:04 – Sean has some copies of his book for his Microsoft presentation 19:20 – Sean also has some copies for different companies 19:31 – Sean offers ticket bundles for Growth Hackers Conference in May, in LA 19:37 – Growth University’s growth master training course has bundled with book sales 19:43 – Sean is running bundled ads, too 19:51 – Sean is getting sub $50 sales on their course with the book bundled 20:51 – Sean is currently at a ConversionXL conference 21:05 – Peep Laja was on Episode 620, and he is the founder of ConversionXL 21:37 – Sean didn’t commit to buying any books 22:35 – Why should people buy this book rather than the other growth hacking books? 22:39 – “Ryan Holiday’s book was awesome to bring attention to growth hacking” 22:47 – There hasn’t really been a guide book to what do you do as a team, especially for bigger companies who want to replicate what Facebook or Uber has done 23:12 – Marketing isn’t that hard, but you need cultural change, cross-functional coordination, and collaboration 23:31 – Hacking Growth has the methods for what you need to drive growth at its foundation 23:44 – It is powerful and people need help 24:06 – Crossing the Chasm provides observations regarding the growth process 24:20 – The main difference between this book and Sean’s is that it doesn’t tell you how to organize your team to exploit that growth situation 24:32 – “We’re not just telling you the fundamentals of how growth works, we’re telling you how to run a growth process across a team...” 25:02 – “You need to have a very integrated coordinated team and the best time to build it in your business is early, when the culture is malleable to do it” 27:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Regarding viral coefficients, the more you have qualitative and quantitative insights about what’s happening in the referral and sharing process, the more informed your tests will be. Growth hacking is more about testing stuff and doubling down when something works. You NEED a very integrated, coordinated team—the best time to build this into your business is early on, when the culture is still malleable. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/1/2017 • 44 minutes, 3 seconds
645: WeFarm Helps 140k Off-Grid Farmers Learn Faster, $1.7M Raised, 90% Still Active After 3 Months with CEO Kenny Ewan
Kenny Ewan. He is in charge of the overall strategic direction for WeFarm where he oversees the day-to-day activities of the business. After graduating, he spent 7 years in Peru running an international NGO, specializing in work with indigenous communities. Kenny played the lead role in developing WeFarm, before launching it as a startup in 2015. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Chaos Monkeys What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I’m happy to let him make mistakes” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Kenny to the show 01:49 – WeFarm is a growth focus model 02:29 – WeFarm offers their services to farmers 02:37 – WeFarm leads farmers to the sellers and WeFarm will take a small transaction commission 03:00 – WeFarm offers information in the space 03:08 – A farmer in Kenya who has no internet access can ask WeFarm a question, through SMS, for free 03:30 – 10-15 people in WeFarm’s network will try to answer the question 03:45 – The people who answer want to share their knowledge about farming 04:12 – WeFarm has generated revenue, but they’re still on pre-profit 04:20 – WeFarm just closed a seed round for $1.7M 04:27 – WeFarm started as an Impact project for Google and they won 04:36 – They used the prize as capital 04:42 – The prize was £500K 05:04 – Team size is 20 and is still growing; they’re around the globe 05:41 – WeFarm uses radio to connect with more farmers 05:51 – WeFarm partnered with radio stations and invited farmers on 06:00 – 4-5K people were joining WeFarm in just an hour 06:12 – WeFarm also partners with businesses where farmers buy 06:45 – WeFarm currently has 140K farmers on their platform 06:55 – WeFarm measures activity by the number of users who actively contribute every month 07:55 – WeFarm is also available online 08:15 – WeFarm has a super active marketplace 08:32 – WeFarm doesn’t incentivize people who answer inquiries, just like Quora 08:50 – WeFarm’s roadmap this year 09:00 – WeFarm has 20 people 09:30 – WeFarm already has a couple of commercial contacts with a major retailer in UK 09:48 – “We have validated our revenue sources” 10:00 – 2017 target revenue is around $50K 11:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A business does NOT always have to be revenue focused; helping people can be a goal in and of itself. We have a responsibility to help guide those who need it and access those who still do not have the internet. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, but be sure to learn from them. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/30/2017 • 15 minutes, 34 seconds
644: Tech CEO Takes on Coffee, $325k Raised, $17k in GMV in Jan 2017 Helping 750 Buyers Find Their Coffee with Crema.co CEO Tyler Tate
Tyler Tate. He’s the CEO of Crema.co, the coffee market place. Previously, he co-founded TwigKit, which is an enterprise search software and was the first design lead at Nutshell, which is a SaaS CRM platform. In each case, he used product strategy and design thinking to play its part in envisioning, designing and building products from the ground up. He’s also co-authored the book called Designing the Search Experience which Morgan Kaufmann published in 2013. He’s spoken at numerous conferences. While at TwigKit, he consulted for organizations such as The Financial Times, Thomson-Reuters, Qualcomm, Vodafone, ITV, Rolls-Royce, BASF and Gemalto, helping them design search-driven applications. He’s originally from Alabama, went to University of Kentucky, and spent 7 years in UK. He’s also lived in Seattle and currently resides in the San Francisco Bay area. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Tyler prefers reading blogs at the moment What CEO do you follow? – Michael Dubin Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Tyler wished he realized earlier how important a network is Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Tyler to the show 02:41 – In TwigKit, Tyler was selling an expensive software product to large companies 03:00 – Tyler learned that he’d rather do something that is more marketing-driven than sales-driven—something that is more consumer-driven than enterprise 03:14 – Tyler’s realization in switching to a coffee company from a SaaS business 03:28 – At Nutshell, Tyler was the first design hire 03:33 – Nutshell has 3 founders and a CTO 03:53 – Tyler, together with the whole team, was able to build something from the ground up 04:01 – Tyler had some equity in the business 04:38 – Tyler had put in $15K to Crema 05:05 – Tyler sold his equities back to TwigKit and Nutshell 06:03 – Tyler started working with Crema early 2015 06:08 – Tyler did a Kickstarter campaign and made $25K 06:19 – Tyler closed and had an Angel round 06:25 – A total of $325K was raised and $150K came from 500 startups 06:48 – 500 startups had a deal of $150K for 6% which is a standard deal 07:21 – Crema is a marketplace for coffee drinkers to subscribe to roast-to-order beans 07:35 – Crema has a platform fee on every order 07:43 – When you buy $18 worth of coffee, Crema takes a $9 platform fee and the other $9 goes to the roaster 07:58 – The price that you pay is almost similar to retail price and the roaster price is above their typical wholesale price 08:15 – The total price includes shipping and other fees 09:00 – $9 is a flat fee no matter the order size 09:46 – Crema’s concept is a single-origin emphasis 10:12 – Crema does the co-production for the roasters 10:24 – Crema has a storytelling team that write journalistic write-ups for their website 10:43 – Team size 11:06 – Crema currently has 15 roasters 11:11 – With a total of 60 types of coffee beans 11:27 – Crema had 750 customers in January 2017 11:30 – Generated $17K on the platform 11:44 – Crema’s growth is 28% month over month 11:48 – “We’re targeting something like 10x growth” 12:07 – Crema’s growth metric is based on GMV and revenue 13:55 – Average cart value is $17 for a typical purchase 14:08 – Each box of coffee is shipped individually 14:43 – A customer spends an average of $23 a month on the website 15:05 – Crema started in Kickstarter in October 15:13 – Crema has been generating organic traffic since then 15:48 – Crema has spent $5K for Facebook paid ads 16:06 – CAC is around $20-25 to convert website visitors to subscribers 17:02 – Crema ran surveys about people’s coffee drinking preferences 17:29 – Crema had sample packs for new customers allowing them to try 4 different types of coffee 20:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Shifting from B2B to B2C is a breeze when you really know who you want to target. Great storytelling can engage consumers and connect them to the product. Do not hesitate to meet people, move around, and build a network for yourself. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/29/2017 • 26 minutes, 10 seconds
643: Nimble Passes $1.5M In ARR Last Year, $200k MRR now as CRM space heats up with CEO Jon Ferrara
Jon Ferrara. He’s in CRM—a relationship management entrepreneur and noted speaker about social media’s effects on sales marketing. He’s reimagined the CRM by building a simply smarter social sales and marketing platform. His most recent venture is called Nimble.com. It’s the first CRM that works for you by building the updated contact data for you and then works with you everywhere you work. He’s best known as the co-founder of GoldMine Software, one of the early pioneers in the Salesforce automation and customer relationship management in software categories for SMBs. He’s recently been recognized by Forbes as one of the Top 10 Social CEOs and Top 10 Social Sales people in the world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Not to sweat shit so much” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:17 – Nathan introduces Jon to the show 02:13 – There was no Outlook, CRM or Salesforce when Jon had the idea of GoldMine 02:31 – Jon started on $5K with no bank loans and VC 02:35 – Jon ran GoldMine for 10 years, had 5M customers around the globe, sold it and retired at 40 02:44 – GoldMine was a software platform 02:55 – GoldMine started as a floppy disk until it became a CD 03:28 – Jon started GoldMine in 1989 and sold it in 1999 03:38 – GoldMine passed $70M in annual revenue, with 250 team members worldwide 04:00 – ARR wasn’t necessary before when it comes to valuation 04:22 – Jon sold GoldMine for $125M in cash with no strings attached 04:55 – A year after GoldMine was sold, Jon was diagnosed with a head tumor 05:07 – “The most important thing you have around you is your health, next is your family, then your passion and business” 05:19 – Jon was 41 when they found the tumor 05:27 – “We are on this planet to grow our souls” 05:51 – After the tumor, Jon spent next 10 years of his life with his family and friends, adding value to people 06:15 – Jon got into photography and worked as the photographer for USC football for 10 years 06:42 – “You need to be your own advocate” 06:56 – Jon found a doctor who developed the technology to have a radiation beam reach the center of your head without touching any vital nerves 07:17 – The tumor disappeared after 7 weeks of radiation treatment 07:42 – The radiation is like burning the seed inside the watermelon without burning the watermelon’s skin 08:18 – Jon started in social media in 2006-2008 08:33 – Jon saw that relationship managers are contact managers 08:58 – Jon looked at CRM and saw the gap 09:07 – You have to use salespeople to use CRM 09:08 – “That’s why they’re called salesforce because you force salespeople to use it” 09:27 – Nimble’s team was formed in 2010, Alpha in 2011, and they turned the paywall in 2013 09:36 – “Just like with GoldMIne, I was early to the idea of an intelligent social relationship manager that works for you” 09:57 – Business is social and life is social 10:11 – First year revenue 10:21 – Jon got their first customer for Nimble the same way he got their first customer for GoldMine: 10:36 – Jon had a trusted advisor for his prospect 10:51 – Jon got his first $50K revenue in GoldMine from resellers 10:56 – Jon grew the $50K by mobilizing writers who write about technology and business 11:10 – In 2009-2011, there was no reseller because everything was cloud 11:27 – Jon looked for influencers 11:36 – Jon put in his own $3M to the company 11:48 – Jon also got some cash from Mark Cuban, Jason Calacanis and others 12:05 – Jon’s money went to the company’s capitalization 12:20 – Nimble currently has 100K customers and 10K paying companies 12:31 – An average of 3 seats per company 12:36 – Nimble is a SaaS business and is generating 80K website visitors with zero marketing 12:43 – Trial to paid conversion is 20% 13:05 – Nimble started at $15 per user per month 13:08 – It recently rolled out to $25 and will have $45 and $65 buckets with a $99 mark automation add on 13:16 – “Sales and marketing should never have been split apart” 14:07 – $200K average MRR 14:15 – Gross churn is about 3% 14:22 – “We provide a lot of value and satisfaction to our customers” 14:32 – Nimble just rolled with Microsoft Outlook mobile by providing 40M handsets for free 15:04 – CAC is really small because they don’t have a large team 15:25 – You don’t need to spend or overspend in order to build a company 15:35 – It is great to find people who want to grow with your help 15:42 – Rather than hiring a sales guy, Jon would rather hire someone who truly cares about the customer experience 16:16 – Jon’s team is based in Santa Monica with remote workers in USA and Ukraine 16:53 – 2017 target revenue 18:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Engage with your customers and add value – don’t always think about the sales. Share your passion with people on a daily basis, don’t be afraid to bare your soul and make those connections. You don’t need to spend more to build a business – find people who are willing to grow the business with you. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/28/2017 • 26 minutes
642: ParkEvergreen $100/mo Per Airport Parking Space to Help You Park Faster with CEO Ben Cantey
Ben Cantey. He’s a San Francisco entrepreneur and has a passion about solving problems and changing lives through technology. He teaches entrepreneurship and lean methodology at universities and high schools on his free time. He’s launching some bad-ass technology with a handful of math geniuses in a parking space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Rough Riders What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Yesware Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 8 1/2 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Execute faster” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Ben to the show 01:51 – Park Evergreen revolutionizes the way parking is sold and managed at airports 01:55 – Airports currently use a whole stack of services, suppliers and contractors that are outdated 02:15 – Park Evergreen uses geolocation technology to bring physical parking online 02:25 – Travelers can find a reserve pay per parking through Park Evergreen’s app 02:35 – Park Evergreen is somehow a marketplace 02:49 – Park Evergreen is more focused on the traveler’s experience 02:54 – Ben and his co-founders came from the consulting space 03:10 - Park Evergreen started out with customers who wanted to find paid street parking 03:23 – Park Evergreen currently has a couple of deals 03:30 – Park Evergreen started growing their revenue in June 03:54 – Ben is just happy that they got a great product market fit 04:03 – Most USA airports are now going into modernization projects 04:44 – There’s an interesting balance between travelers who prefer to leave their cars and those who prefer to just take an Uber car 04:53 – Park Evergreen’s average customers are business travelers who are gone for only a couple of days 05:18 – The airport modernization includes parking expansion 05:54 – Travels tend to get cheaper each year and more and more people are travelling 06:02 – The millennials demographic has the most frequent business and pleasure trips 06:28 – The parking growth is growing 4-5% per airport, per year 06:34 – Park Evergreen was founded in 2016 06:43 – Park Evergreen didn’t want to compete with parking meters and pay machines 07:08 – Park Evergreen was making a couple of thousand a month 07:22 – Park Evergreen made $15K topline 07:33 – Park Evergreen’s biggest cost was for CAC 08:02 – “It’s a tough market, people are used to their options” 08:10 – Park Evergreen pivoted because they’re tired of their mobile apps parking solutions 08:18 – SpotHero and ParkWhiz are the biggest in the space 08:28 – Park Evergreen has raised $150K from 500 startups 08:43 – Team size is 5 09:01 – The equity is divided by 5 co-founders 09:19 – Park Evergreen is bootstrapped and the 2 co-founders have been building everything for free 09:25 – Ben is in charge of closing deals and doing the strategy 09:40 – It’s a balanced team 10:03 – The team had some contractual work on the side and some have full-time jobs 11:11 – Park Evergreen charges a flat fee per space that they manage per month 11:39 – The average is $100 per space 11:55 – The average top 10 US airports manage 18K parking spaces 12:00 – Some double or triple 18K 12:10 – Park Evergreen’s market size in terms of market space is over 4M 12:50 – When a traveler books his flight, he books his parking space, too 13:06 – Park Evergreen shows the traveler 2 hours before his flight, the fastest route to the airport and to the parking space 13:22 – Park Evergreen can tell you exactly how long it will take a traveler to go from one place to another around the airport 13:46 – “I want our travelers to know when they look at their phones in the morning, before they leave their house, what time will they arrive at the gate, ready to get on the plane” 14:20 – Park Evergreen started their user acquisition in March for the contracts 14:30 – Park Evergreen is using SMS initially 15:08 – “The only way to park is to use Park Evergreen” 15:18 – Park Evergreen is doing 500 spaces for their initial pilot 15:35 – Park Evergreen’s contracts are on an expansion plan 16:16 – As soon as you get to the airport, you can get a Park Evergreen ticket with a code that you will use to text 16:45 – You can pay Park Evergreen ahead of time via text 18:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Airport parking is a great space to be in at the moment because of the modernization projects that are on the way. To stay competitive in this space, provide the best traveler experience that you can. It’s can be quite difficult to broaden people’s understanding of their options, but that does NOT mean you shouldn’t try. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/27/2017 • 23 minutes, 6 seconds
641: He Has $25B In Medical Tech Exits, $2B Raised, He's Sitting On PhotoTherapy $1b+ Bet Now with CEO Jim Sweeney
Jim Sweeney. He’s the CEO and one of the founders of Clarify Medical. He began his entrepreneurial journey at Sharp Hospital where he worked full-time delivering hospital supplies while still in high school. He then spent 3 years in the US Army Medical Corps where he ran a remote, medical service dispensary serving 2500 families in Germany. He received a degree in business from San Diego State University. James has founded 12 medical companies including Caremark, Caps, Corum, Bridge Medical, CardioNet and co-founded Owned Outcomes. He’s also led a successful leveraged buyout or LBO with McGaw Labs which he took public and is now owned by BBraun. His financing history includes raising venture capital and expansion capital for his ideas leading to over $25B in exit values of companies he founded. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – David Hale Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Between 4-6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Jim wished he knew “that the government would have the amount of influence on health care that they have, today” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:49 – Nathan introduces Jim to the show 02:53 – Clarify Medical has a first-mover advantage in the dermatology space 03:00 – They have well-established treatments for various skin diseases 03:17 – They’ve developed a device that will enable people to self-treat at home, using their smartphones 03:33 – The device will be launched directly to the patients 03:40 – The device is called Clarify Mobile UVB treatment system 03:59 – There are over 33M Americans who suffer from skin disease 04:21 – The device can be connected through the smartphone 04:51 – Jim has raised a little over $2B in venture capital 04:55 – Jim had an exit value of $25B for his companies 05:06 – There are exits via IPO and sales 05:40 – Jim shares why he decided to have an LBO with McGaw Labs 05:56 – Jim had been an employee of the company so he acquired the company with prior knowledge of what their issues were 06:26 – The deal was in mid-October 1990 06:33 – The company’s valuation 07:27 – Jim bought the company with his friends 07:47 – The Clarify Mobile UVB treatment system device will sell for $600 or can be leased for $39 per month 08:15 – Jim expects to have long relationships with their patients because some of their skin diseases are life-long conditions 08:30 – If the device didn’t exist, patients would spend $100 annually for therapeutic drugs which have various side-effects 09:30 – Obamacare has allowed Clarify to go directly to the consumers 09:43 – Jim thinks the total costs of Obamacare haven’t been exposed 10:35 – Jim expects more medical companies will go directly to consumers 10:42 – The bad news is that people will spend more directly from their pockets than in the past 10:50 – The good news is doctors are now seen as customers 11:11 – The solution for healthcare is for patients to be more engaged with their healthcare providers 11:33 – Clarify will start generating revenue from the device later this year 11:36 – Jim has already raised $6M and is still looking to raise another $12-15M in the next few months 12:00 – Jim doesn’t have a scientific explanation on how he came up with the pre-money valuation 12:22 – All of Clarify’s financing at this point is from their pre series A round 12:43 – Team size is 12 but will double in the next few months 12:50 – The company is based in San Diego 13:00 – Jim can’t disclose the cost of making the device 13:43 – The cost will carry a respectable margin 13:47 – The app will be sold for $9.99 per month, on a subscription basis 14:25 – Jim believes that Clarify’s valuation will be into the billions for IPO exits 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: More healthcare providers are now going directly to consumers and are skipping the third-party service. Knowing a company by heart will make it easier for you to make a fair valuation. Making your employees a share holder of your company will definitely change their attitude towards the job, leading to a more successful company. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/26/2017 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
640: ProntoSign Passes 300 Enterprise Customers with $50-$500k ACV To Help Manage Secure Signatures at Scale with CEO Bill Brice
Bill Brice. He’s currently the CEO of AlphaTrust Corporation which he launched in 1998, to capitalize on the sustained long-term shift from paper-based document businesses to fully electronic document processes. Bill is considered as one of the industry’s pioneers and he’s a leading authority of electronic signatures, especially around generating real economic impact and brand enhancement. He served as chairman of the board for the Electronic Signature and Records Association and is currently a member of the board of directors. Before his electronic signatures company, he started his entrepreneurial career, when in college, by co-founding Brice Foods and is chairman and CEO. He grew the company into a global enterprise best known for its chain of frozen yogurt stores. The company grew into 1500 franchise locations and 43 countries with manufacturing operations on 4 different continents. For his work, he was awarded as The Entrepreneur of the Year Award from the International Franchise Association, which is the world’s oldest and largest organizations representing franchising worldwide. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “At that time, I wished I would know what happened with the internet before it happened” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan introduces Bill to the show 02:36 – Bill was based in Dallas and that’s where he started his yogurt company 02:57 – Bill’s was the first company to bring frozen yogurt in Texas 03:15 – Frozen yogurt was first popularized in California 03:32 – Bill wanted to pioneer the first operational chain selling frozen yogurt in Texas 03:39 – Bill has turned to franchises and now has 1500 franchise locations 04:00 – The first franchise was $150K, $20K franchise fee and 5-6% royalties 04:34 – The frozen yogurt company had $150M in revenue 04:50 – In 1996, the franchise sold because someone wanted to buy it 05:09 – Franchise valuation is similar with other businesses 05:31 – The franchise was cash flow multiple 05:42 – 6-10x was the best multiple 06:15 – Bill was making a lot of software on the side of the yogurt business 06:53 – Bill was annoyed by the amount of paperwork a business had to go through 07:16 – A computer was about automating business 07:35 – Bill had a completely different team for his yogurt company than his e-signature company 07:41 – AlphaTrust is completely privately owned and funded 08:00 – Being privately funded allows them to focus on what they are doing 08:20 – AlphaTrust is in a specialized segment of a market 09:10 – AlphaTrust started on the enterprise businesses in the late 90s 09:24 – Some of AlphaTrust’s clients are General Motors, ADP and AT&T 09:36 – Some of the big companies have millions of documents processed yearly 09:42 – AlphaTrust specializes in the high performance processing of documents 09:52 – AlphaTrust’s customers still deploy and embed their software on premise 10:12 – AlphaTrust also operates cloud systems for their customers, but they support the plan and model the customers want 10:38 – The pro-side of AlphaTrust is quite small 10:53 – It accounts for only 10-15% of the revenue 10:56 – The rest of the revenue comes from licenses 11:50 – Average initial contract value is $50K-$500K 12:00 – Some of the customers pay for perpetual licenses 12:40 – AlphaTrust currently has 300 large enterprises 13:10 – Team size is 20 13:22 – AlphaTrust does direct sales, but they also have partner channels 13:46 – AlphaTrust has 20-30 specialists around the world who are part-timers 14:36 – AlphaTrust is happy with how they’re doing at the moment 14:59 – Bill MIGHT sell the company to Salesforce if an offer comes 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The franchise business is the same as any other business – even when it comes down to the valuation. Working with big enterprises can set you apart in a saturated space. Saying “yes” to an acquisition isn’t a terrible idea; instead, it’s just a good way to exit. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/25/2017 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
639: Fastest Growing Canadian Software Company: $200k to $20M in Revenue from 2010 to 2015 with CEO Tobyn Sowden
Tobyn Sowden. He’s the CEO of Redbrick, the second fastest growing software company in Canada and the birthplace of a product called Shift. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — InVision Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would tell myself technical, all the way” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:39 – Nathan introduces Tobyn to the show 02:00 – Profit Guide named Redbrick as the second fastest software company in Canada, by measuring revenue growth 02:25 – Profit Guide measured a whole 5 year period 02:30 – Redbrick had $200K revenue in 2010 and $10-20M in 2015 03:00 – Redbrick was launched in 2010 03:15 – Redbrick started from an app distribution perspective 03:38 – Redbrick has developed their own tools to track 04:20 – Redbrick’s main software is Deskmetrics, which is integrated into Shift 04:31 – Deskmetrics currently has 500K active users 05:00 – Not all who downloads are active users 05:08 – The number of downloads are tracked 05:34 – SDK is a software development kit 05:59 – Deskmetrics provides consulting services 06:06 – Facebook is one of Deskmetrics’ sources for customer acquisition 06:40 – Redbrick is currently spending around $30K for Facebook paid acquisition 06:54 – Redbrick is working with a team on Facebook and is committed to growing their spending into millions of dollars for growth 07:33 – Tobyn shares the idea of Shift 08:07 – Shift had a preview in September and people liked it 08:12 – Shift allows you to switch around your Gmail and google accounts 08:51 – Tobyn increased their team size and hired more developers 09:08 – Shift is a SaaS business with $20/year subscription fee 09:31 – Shift primarily uses Facebook for advertising 09:49 – Shift has around 30K installs and 10K active users 10:00 – Shift’s free-to-paid conversion rate is around 4-5% 10:23 – Shift is 3-months old 10:48 – Tobyn needed to decide if they will launch Shift on December 20th or wait until 2nd week of January 11:16 – Shift is doing great at the moment and there’s definitely a market for it 11:40 – Tobyn shares why they decided that Shift be a desktop download 12:53 – Tobyn wants to avoid integrations that will make Shift look like a browser 13:15 – Redbrick has 3 parts: the app distribution side, Deskmetrics and Shift 13:35 – The app distribution side is the major revenue stream 13:45 – Tobyn believes that their path is the app distribution side 14:16 – Team size is 37 and they’re based in Victoria BC in Vancouver, Canada 14:31 – There are small teams in Poland and Brazil 15:12 – Deskmetrics is primarily a desktop software analytics platform 16:15 – An average customer pays $500 monthly 16:36 – Tobyn was charging per number of users, but they changed it 17:14 – Deskmetrics was launched in 2016 17:45 – Redbrick has a lot of predictive models that they used in terms of CAC 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Facebook is one of the best places, at the moment, for paid advertising. You can always go and develop more products, but recognize when it’s wise to stick to the path you’re already on. Charging per head can at times restrict your customers from using your product to its fullest potential. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/24/2017 • 24 minutes, 10 seconds
638: Alternative Investment Ideas, His Book Deal Included 10% Royalty, $100k Advance from Entrepreneur Patrick McGinnis
Patrick McGinnis. He’s the author of The 10% Entrepreneur which focuses on living your startup dream without leaving your day job, which was just published by Penguin Portfolio. He’s also credited for coining up with the term “fear of missing out”. He’s a graduate of Harvard business school and is living in New York City. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Sheryl Sandberg Favorite online tool? — Quip Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6-12 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Patrick wished he had more confidence in his abilities and more open to trying new things Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Patrick to the show 02:10 – Patrick is a Wall Street refugee 02:21 – Patrick has his own advisory firm 02:29 – Patrick built up his portfolio of over 20 investments 03:04 – Patrick worked with his friend in Real Influence for free 03:14 – They sold $300K-$400K 03:19 – The business didn’t push through and Patrick sold his shares 03:35 – Patrick was 33 03:46 – After a year, Patrick’s friend asked him if he was interested in investing in a startup 03:51 – Ipsy has raised $100M 04:08 – Patrick is one of the first investors of Ipsy 04:32 – Ipsy’s co-founder is Michelle Phan 04:49 – Patrick’s friend who is the CEO of Ipsy met Michelle through Funny or Die 05:46 – Michelle’s huge fan base made Ipsy spend zero on CAC 06:00 – How Patrick decided to invest in Ipsy 06:03 – Patrick’s friend was already raising a round 06:33 – Patrick’s friend already had a lead 06:38 – Patrick started his venture capitalist path in 2000 06:48 – Most of the deals Patrick looks at are simple deals 06:53 – Patrick invested in Ipsy in 2012 07:50 – Ipsy is one of Patrick’s most successful investments 08:00 – Another one of his investments was Bluesmart 08:24 – He also invested in Affinity which is a big data company 09:04 – How many deals do you have to make to ensure there’s a big exit in the portfolio? 09:12 – When Patrick started investing, he thought of the possible mistakes he could make as an investor 10:03 – As an investor, you have to invest in your area of expertise 10:08 – Second, think of the deal as a commercial deal, even with friends 10:21 – Third, don’t follow other people 10:39 – Stay away from “will-to-be” syndrome 11:09 – Patrick was working with AIG’s private equity fund 11:41 – Patrick shares why he wrote a book 11:48 – Patrick always talks to people about what he does as an investor 12:12 – As Patrick met with more and more people, he realized that he could actually help people believe in what he does 12:25 – “It’s been a blast actually and I love writing, anyway” 12:56 – Patrick shares why he decided to have a publisher rather than self-publish his book 13:02 – Patrick wasn’t a well-known media figure and a publisher would help his credibility 13:12 – Patrick got a great editor 13:24 – Patrick wanted to go global 13:34 – Patrick has sold an average of 50K copies 13:40 – A book update is given every 6 months 14:00 – Patrick gets around 10% royalties on sales 14:26 – Patrick’s book is a bestseller in South Korea 14:48 – Patrick had an advance of around $100K prior to his book launch 14:58 – Patrick has an agent who is with UTA 15:38 – Patrick met his agent through his friend 16:02 – If you are generous to the world, it comes back to you in so many different ways 16:25 – “If you want to publish a book, you should know how hard it is” 16:40 – Publishing a book is like running a startup 16:54 – Patrick shared on a couple of podcasts which boosted his sales 17:03 – Patrick’s book is in physical bookstores, too 17:20 – Patrick was also live in CNN Espanol in South America 17:37 – Amazon’s ranking is always updated 17:44 – Patrick also has a group who does social media for him 18:22 – Launching a book is a process 18:56 – Patrick has a day job that covers the bills 19:12 – “Freelancing is great in terms of flexibility, but you build zero wealth” 19:48 – Patrick also invests in commercial real estate 20:04 – Patrick shares how he and his friend get dividends from real estate 23:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Investing in your friend’s business is a commercial deal, so invest wisely. Be prepared—publishing a book is not a walk in the park and involves several processes. Freelancing is great in terms of flexibility, but you build zero wealth. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/23/2017 • 28 minutes, 15 seconds
637: Reason Infusionsoft Didn't IPO, Passes $100M ARR, $125M Raised, Helping 45,000 SMB's With Marketing and Sales Automation with CEO Clate Mask
Clate Mask and he has been educating and inspiring entrepreneurs for over a decade. He’s recognized by the small business community as a truly visionary leader. His passion for small business success stems from his personal experience, taking Infusionsoft from a struggling startup to an 8-time Inc. 500 and Inc. 5000 winner. As CEO, he’s leading Infusionsoft on its mission to create and dominate the market of sales and marketing software for small businesses. Under Clate’s leadership, the company has landed 4 rounds of venture capital including a $55M series D led by Bain, with contributions from prior investors including Signal Peak Ventures and Goldman Sachs. He’s also named Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist, a Top 100 Small Business Influencer by Small Business Trends, and one of the 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs of 2013 by Goldman Sachs. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm and The Advantage What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Thumbtack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Never If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Clate wished he knew that business, not law, was the path for him AND that building a team and culture is far more fun than making money. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Clate to the show 02:28 – When you serve small businesses, make sure you have the right target customers 02:35 – There are 27M small businesses 03:02 – “You got to get it right. You got to get the market fit” 03:20 – Infusionsoft focuses on businesses with 2-25 employees but the sweet spot is 2-10 employees 03:28 – Average customer pay per month is $250-300 03:54 – “It’s CRM, marketing automation, sales automation, e-commerce on one suite” 04:03 – Majority of Infusionsoft’s revenue is SaaS 04:10 – Infusionsoft’s $3.4B payments processed 04:36 – Infusionsoft created their own payment solution 2 years ago 05:04 – It triggers all kinds of Infusionsoft’s automation 05:50 – Infusionsoft started in 2002, as a software company 05:56 – Infusionsoft pivoted in 2007 and decided to really go for it 06:16 – “We started, like every small business, with no intention to build something big” 06:34 – Clate saw how Salesforce moved upfront quickly and that opened up the opportunity for Infusionsoft 06:43 – “Why not be the Quickbooks to sales and marketing software” 06:53 – Infusionsoft’s dark days 06:56 – In the first 3 years, every day was a fight for survival 07:43 – The second dark day for Infusionsoft was when their product market fit went off and the churn rate went up to a 8% gross monthly customer churn 08:08 – Infusionsoft had raised $17M when their churn skyrocketed 08:38 – Infusionsoft’s churn rate is usually 2-2.5% 09:15 – Infusionsoft has raised a total of $125M and about half was capital for the business 10:00 – “When you create something that’s growing, there’s always a new investor who wants to replace an old investor” 10:27 – When the round becomes “over-subscribed”, you have to take a percentage of what you’ve raised and make it available for your existing shareholders to sell some shares 11:09 – Infusionsoft currently has around 600 employees and still continues to grow 11:20 – Infusionsoft has around 135K users 11:30 – Infusionsoft just completed their 10 year adverse completion 11:56 – There are more things coming up for Infusionsoft 12:27 – Average MRR 13:19 – Clate shares why they haven’t gone public 13:58 – What happens is private money is easier to raise 14:06 – Historically, public valuation was better than private valuation, but that shifted over the years 15:00 – When the market changed in 2014, Clate had decided that it’s better to stay private as long as they could 15:30 – Infusionsoft is currently between $100M – 150M ARR 15:51 – The leverage that Clate pulled to turn their monthly churn 16:10 – Infusionsoft is serious about helping small businesses succeed 16:22 – The breakage model that results in you having a lot of churn 16:45 – Infusionsoft says “no” to thousands of businesses every month 17:06 – The challenge when you serve small businesses is you that have to tweak and adjust to get the LTV-CAC ratio right 17:17 – Infusionsoft is currently at $4 LTV for a dollar CAC 17:44 – The LTV-CAC ratio is the number that every SaaS business has to manage well 18:15 – It’s better to look at your revenue in unit churn 18:42 – The upfront fee was the number one factor for Infusionsoft’s churn moving from 8% to 2% 21:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you serve small businesses, make sure you have the RIGHT target customers and be committed to helping your customers. Going public requires a deep understanding of how adaptable you can be in an ever changing market. The LTV-CAC ratio is the number that every SaaS business has to manage well—that’s the trick. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/22/2017 • 26 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 636: Bangalore Startup Hits $40k MRR Helping 18 Customers Get Consumer Data Using Social Intelligence with Frrole CEO Amarpreet Kalkat
Amarpreet Kalkat. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Frrole, an AI (artificial intelligence) startup that is redefining consumer intelligence. He loves building things, be it product, revenue streams, teams or organizations. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kalanick Favorite online tool? — Klout Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Amarpreet would tell himself to focus and prioritize Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Amarpreet to the show 01:50 – Frrole provides consumer intelligence 01:53 – Frrole relies on public data to build insights about the consumers 02:07 – Frrole works with companies’ marketing teams 02:35 – eBay and Flipcut are some of Frrole’s customers 02:44 – It is crucial for marketing teams to understand their customers 02:57 – Frrole works with eBay’s shipping insides team 03:02 – eBay wants to understand their customer’s shipping experience 03:34 – Frrole has data partnerships with Twitter and Facebook 03:40 – Frrole has official access to data 04:11 – Frrole looks at the attributes and annotations as a guide for the data they need 04:30 – Frrole is SaaS business and customers pay them for the insights 05:00 – Average customer pay per month is around $32K per year 05:28 – “Personally, I don’t believe in locking customers in” 05:37 – Frrole has a 30-day walk out clause 05:46 – Most of Frrole’s customers pay quarterly 06:08 – Frrole started as a B2C in the news discovery product, in 2012 06:14 – In 2014, Frrole pivoted to a B2B model 06:46 – Frrole currently has 13 team members 06:52 – The team is in Bangalore and Amarpreet goes back and forth between Bangalore and San Francisco 07:11 – Amarpreet is currently in San Francisco looking for a sales guy 07:25 – Amarpreet ideally looks for a co-founder kind of role 07:39 – Amarpreet is willing to give 5-10% equity 07:49 – Frrole has raised a couple of small angel rounds 08:00 – Frrole has raised a total of $250K 08:05 – Frrole currently has 18 paying customers 08:23 – Average MRR 08:45 – Average customer churn 09:36 – Frrole has 1 sales guy in Bangalore 09:50 – CAC 10:15 – Frrole spends $500-1K a month for paid marketing 10:39 – Frrole is recently experimenting with LinkedIn for marketing 11:18 – Frrole sponsors an email list and a banner ad 11:28 – It worked out okay 12:00 – Frrole is currently breaking even 12:10 – Salaries in Bangalore are way less than in the USA 12:26 – The best web developer in India would cost around $30K 13:58 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Customers will use your product if they see the value – locking in is not always necessary. Marketing people need to dig deeper to understand and serve their customers well. Know what your priorities are and focus in. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/21/2017 • 18 minutes, 35 seconds
635: RocketReach Kills Low Margin Product, Doubles Down on $70 ARPU Customers, $10M 2017 ARR goal with CEO Amit Shanbhag
Amit Shanbhag. He bootstrapped RocketReach from 0 to over 300K registered users in its first year. RocketReach and RocketReach API are trusted by some of the largest companies on the planet like Apple, Google, Chase and Morgan Stanley—just to name a few. He has more than a dozen patents and has started his professional life writing code for geostationary satellites. He’s also a judge for the MIT $100K competition and hopes to invest more time and money back into the startup ecosystem. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Sundar Pichai Favorite online tool? — Google Search Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 4-5 If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Amit would tell the young ones to take risks, give everything you’re doing a good shot, and that worrying isn’t productive Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Amit to the show 02:08 – Amit was in Episode 465 and just passed 100K paying customers 03:03 – RocketReach has 300K signup users 03:31 – RocketReach has doubled its growth 04:00 – “We tried to go more into the lead generation space” 04:21 – The end customers hold RocketReach responsible for higher quality data, which is out of their control 05:04 – RocketReach is similar to LeadGenius 05:10 – LeadGenius charges higher for their data 05:48 – LeadGenius uses a combination of people and software to gather data 05:56 – Amit wants RocketReach to rely purely on software, without human intervention 06:25 – The other problem with the lead generation space is when the users don’t follow up with the leads generated for them, then put the blame on RocketReach for not having quality leads 06:51 – Amit isn’t sure if Lead Genius is doing something about this problem 07:36 – CAC is quite high 07:52 – The lead generation part of RocketReach hasn’t really piloted 08:17 – RocketReach was getting $3K – 7K per delivery set, but the retention rate is low 09:00 – RocketReach is using a lot of open APIs like AngelList and Crunchbase 10:17 – Most of the APIs that RocketReach uses are paid APIs 10:55 – Amit has decided that RocketReach will not continue down the lead generation path 11:06 – Amit wants customers to think of RocketReach as a productivity tool that is accessible on their browsers 11:26 – “We wanted to become more of a de facto productivity tool for sales” 11:33 – RocketReach focuses on features that can make a team more productive 12:17 – RocketReach doesn’t have the self-serve team feature on their website, at the moment 12:57 – RocketReach currently has 7 team members and is still bootstrapped 13:02 – RocketReach has one of the highest revenues per employee in the lead generation space 13:12 – If RocketReach had continued with the lead generation model, it would have made sense to raise 13:25 – RocketReach is trying to scale without hiring a sales team 14:20 – RocketReach has an average of $70 monthly RPU 14:30 – But the number of paying users is complicated 15:25 – RocketReach’s 120K users mentioned in Episode 465 is the number of registered users 16:13 – Amit doesn’t see the need to reveal the number of paying customers 17:18 – Customers are paying anywhere from 1K-50K 17:42 – Gross customer monthly churn is 7% 17:53 – The churn has gone down a bit 18:56 – RocketReach has 2 different revenue streams 20:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The lead generation space isn’t as easy as it seems. It IS possible to stay bootstrapped while, at the same time, scaling your business. Take risks, give your best shot, and worry less! Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/20/2017 • 24 minutes, 53 seconds
634: Lice Killing Brush Raises $2.2M Pre-Sale, Retail For $20 Bucks to Kill Lice with No Chemicals with CEO David Tavor
David Tavor. He has more than 20 years of experience as a general manager and founder of Biotech Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Company. He served as a fighter pilot and a commander in the Israeli Air Force and retired with the rank of a colonel. Mr. Tavor holds an MA degree in political science and national defense studies and MBA studies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Born to Life What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — David’s common sense Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— About 3 or 4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Lean on yourself” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces David to the show 02:04 – ParaSonic develops an ultra-sonic bomb that destroys lice and lice eggs 03:39 – ParaSonic developed a comb that treats lice in just one stroke of the comb 03:50 – The clinical trial was just completed and it was a success 04:52 – ParaSonic started in 2014 05:08 – The company was established within a technological incubator 05:16 – The incubator has 23% equity 05:45 – The incubator had put in $600K 05:51 – ParaSonic has raised an additional $1.6M 05:56 – ParaSonic is also in the process of raising $2M 06:28 – The rounds are equity rounds 07:28 – David’s wife, Dana, is also part of the company 08:11 – ParaSonic has 5 team members who are mostly engineers 08:46 – The comb is going to be an over-the-counter product 09:05 – There will be 3 types of combs 09:25 – The comb’s bristles are disposable 10:17 – David is also a chairman of 2 other companies 10:46 – One company developed a toothbrush where you can see your plaque through an app while you’re brushing 12:17 – David is a freelancer for Colgate 13:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Developing a product in an industry that you are already familiar with is best for you. Consumers will believe in your product when you use the product yourself. Trust and lean on yourself. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/19/2017 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
633: Pipefy $2.6M Raised, $50k MRR, Helping 400 Customers Organize Processes with CEO Alessio Alionco
Alessio Alionco. He’s the founder and CEO of Pipefy, which is part of 500 Startups. He’s a passionate product manager. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Yesware and Salesforce Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Alessio would tell himself to be aggressive with his goals Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:56 – Nathan introduces Alessio to the show 02:12 – Pipefy is a workflow cooperation software 02:21 – Alessio got Pipefy’s idea from his previous company 02:36 – Alessio uses a CRM to manage Pipefy 02:45 – Pipefy has a dozen of processes 03:12 – “We coordinate people’s work” 03:36 – Pipefy provides guidelines for a smooth, business process 03:48 – Pipefy is more of a people coordination solution and Zapier is similar to IFTTT 04:00 – Pipefy charges per user, per month 04:10 – Average customer fee is $200/month 04:20 – Pipefy started at the end of 2014 04:26 – Pipefy had its beta 04:36 – Pipefy released pre-signups in April 2015 04:51 – Pipefy became one of the most voted products of the day 05:23 – There was no revenue in 2015 05:32 – Pipefy started charging in August 2016 05:47 – Pipefy now has more than 400 paying customers 06:00 – Average MRR 06:54 – Pipefy offered a special price for customers who renew their subscriptions 07:00 – Pipefy has more than 60K customers who use them for free 07:24 – Only a small portion of the customers converted 07:40 – SMBs don’t have business processes in place and aren’t willing to pay for one 08:06 – Pipefy wants to focus on companies that are close to being considered enterprise companies 08:42 – Pipefy has raised a seed round of $2.2M 08:50 – Some of the investors are Zendesk’s founders, Valour Capital, Redpoint Ventures, FundersClub and AngelList 09:06 – Pipefy has raised a total of $2.6M 09:13 – Team size is 33 09:32 – 27 are in Brazil and 6 are in San Francisco 09:55 – Pipefy is still hiring more people 10:00 – CAC 10:30 – Overall CAC is around $900 per company 10:50 – LTV is still hard to predict 11:34 – Pipefy’s per seat pricing 12:10 – Pipefy negotiates deals with companies with over 10K employees 12:33 – 2017 revenue goal 12:50 – “It’s really a huge funnel to raise the seed round” 13:00 – The series A dynamic is completely different 13:26 – 2016 total revenue 14:00 – Pipefy is aiming for a $200K MRR which is 10x the growth 16:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The best time to switch to a paid version of your product requires careful consideration to ensure the conversion takes place. Some SMBs rely on free business software and services for their processes—therefore, you may need to adjust your target audience. Be aggressive with your goals and just go for it. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/18/2017 • 21 minutes, 32 seconds
632: Recursion enzyme company raises $23M, launched in 2013 now 40 people with drugs ready for market with CEO Christopher Gibson
Christopher Gibson. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Recursion Pharmaceuticals, a biotech company leveraging the latest automation, computation and biological tools to perform drug discovery at scale. Chris holds a BS in bioengineering, a BA in managerial studies, and a bioengineering PhD from the University of Utah. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Perry Fell Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 5.3 to 5.4 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Chris wished he knew where he was going to go so he could get to where he is now, faster Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:12 – Recursion shortcuts the long, arduous path of drug discovery into the market 02:24 – Recursion combines the best elements of biology, automation, and computation 02:34 – Recursion partners with large pharmaceutical companies 02:45 – Recursion partnered with Sanofi Genzyme 02:51 – Sanofi had drugs that didn’t end up in the market 03:10 – The challenges involved in being target-based 04:00 – Recursion earns from partnerships and royalties 04:20 – Recursion also has an internal pipeline for the drugs that they’ve developed themselves 04:43 – Recursion doesn’t earn from the internal pipeline 05:51 – Recursion and what they receive from their partners 06:28 – There are partnerships with very, little upfront 06:34 – There are partnerships that have 8 figures, upfront 06:46 – The number of scientists that will work on the drug is also considered 07:22 – If Recursion is successful with their deals, they get royalties 08:38 – The royalties’ lifeline 08:56 – Recursion has 40 people 09:25 – Recursion was launched in 2013 09:34 – They sat in their office until January 2014 10:01 – Chris was part of a program where he was paid a stipend, so he broke even 10:20 – Chris’ parents were excited about his PhD 10:37 – Recursion has raised $19M in equity and $5M non-diluted from grants and private foundations 11:28 – Recursion’s valuation as a platform company 12:14 – If Recursion will be successful, they will impact the society in a big way 12:41 – It is vision-based 12:54 – First year revenue was 6 figures 13:12 – “Our deals have been strategic in terms of the way we put them together” 13:45 – 2017 target 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Different sources of revenue benefit a company. The valuation of your company depends on how your company is currently performing and how well they will perform in the industry. First year revenue isn’t always nil. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/17/2017 • 20 minutes, 37 seconds
631: Saleswise Raises $3m, Launches Product, Helping 12 Customers Deveop Better Relationships with Their Data with CEO Gregg Freishtat
Gregg Freishtat. He’s a technology executive with over 20 years of experience leading innovative and transformative companies. He founded 4 venture-backed startups, all of which had successful exits and is now building a company called SalesWise. He’s deeply rooted in venture capital and the management of internet technology companies having led several through acquisitions. He’s also handled developing and disruptive technologies, convergence of telecom plus internet, personal finance and online banking, web-based analytics and digital media, such as online marketing and currently relationship intelligence. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Mark Benioff Favorite online tool? – FullStory Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t sell your first company for $20M, when you can sell it for $50M” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Gregg to the show 01:59 – SalesWise is a business relationship intelligence platform 02:03 – SalesWise helps sales leaders gain visibility of the most important relationships they have 02:17 – SalesWise is a SaaS company, but doesn’t charge per seat 02:21 – SalesWise believes in democratizing data 02:31 – SalesWise prices based on the company size 02:52 – Average customer pay per month 02:53 – $500/month for entry level companies with less than 100 employees 03:00 – A company with 2K employees pays $2500 a month 03:11 – SalesWise was founded in 2015 and their current product was launched 4 months ago 03:33 – Gregg sold his last company to Outbrain 04:23 – SalesWise was bootstrapped for 6-8 months 04:50 – Gregg has raised a total of just over $3M 04:58 – All priced rounds 05:02 – Gregg’s initial capital was a convertible note 05:12 – SalesWise has 12 team members and is currently hiring sales and marketing people 05:46 – SalesWise’s current number of customers 06:00 – Average MRR 06:10 – The whole team is based in the Atlanta Tech Village 06:30 – Anticipated customer churn 07:16 – Some of SalesWise’s competitors are Salesforce and Xero 08:17 – The guys in the BI space, like Domo and Tableau 08:43 – SalesWise isn’t into web scraping 08:38 – SalesWise uses Clearbit 08:55 – SalesWise is breaking the linear relationship you have with email 09:29 – SalesWise walked directly into the APIs of Salesforce and Gmail 10:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Use your frustration as motivation to make things better. Keep building companies – you’re constantly learning and contributing to the industry while doing so. Don’t settle for less or devalue yourself and your company – reach beyond your expectations. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/16/2017 • 15 minutes, 48 seconds
630: Mention Helping 4000 Customers With Google Alerts on Steroids, All Paying Minimum $60/mo for $240k in MRR with CEO Matthieu Vaxelaire
Matthieu Vaxelaire. He’s the CEO of Mention where he moves all Trello cards to the right and closes deals. He splits his time between Paris and New York City. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Rand Fishkin Favorite online tool? — Hull Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6-7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do more things and read less as you learn much more by doing than reading” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:17 – Nathan introduces Matt to the show 01:37 – Mention is Google Alert on steroids 01:51 – Mention is a SaaS business 02:05 – Mention has different segments of customers 02:08 – The SME customers pay an average of $65 monthly 02:13 – The mid-market customers pay an average of $400 monthly 02:25 – Average customer pay per month 03:20 – Most of Mention’s customers don’t like sharing their information 03:40 – Ogilvy uses Mention to track the campaigns they’re building for their clients 04:17 – Mention is also an inferential tool 04:49 – Mention raised capital at an early stage 05:03 – Mention raised a total of $500K 05:11 – There are 45 people on the team and 10 are in NY, the rest are in Paris 05:50 – Prior to Mention, Matt worked at eFounders which is a startup studio 05:57 – Mention was one of the startups built by eFounders 06:20 – Mention has over 600K users and over 4K paying customers per month 06:42 – Mention’s free version 07:20 – Mention uses a number of features 07:53 – There’s no touch sales in the SME market 08:01 – The mid-market is inside-sales driven 08:15 – There are 2 groups of inside-sales teams: the inbound and outbound with 6 people in each group 08:50 – Average MRR 09:28 – Mention is more focused on gross MRR churn 09:35 – SME gross churn is 2% 10:43 – Mention is almost in a negative net churn 11:20 – Mention has an average of 10K signups per month 11:47 – Mention is currently spending $5-10K on paid advertising 12:04 – Mention is exploring other advertising options like G2 Crowd 12:20 – Mention’s first trial result with G2 Crowd isn’t that encouraging 12:44 – Mention uses a strong open-content strategy to drive people to their website 13:17 – CAC 14:00 – Matt is willing to spend up to $1K to generate new mid-market customers 14:17 – 2017 goal 14:58 – Mention is currently in the process of raising 15:07 – An $800K MRR by the end of December 2017 is a good number 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Sometimes, you got to spend to acquire those new customers. Paid advertising isn’t the only solution to drive traffic to your site. Get out there and start moving—you learn more by doing than by reading. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/15/2017 • 22 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 629: Mexico's Gaszen Raises $700k, Uses Roof Meter to Tell Mexican Households When Gas Is Almost Empty with CEO Jennifer Reyna
In Episode #629, Nathan interviews Jennifer Reyna. She’s got a lot of energy and more importantly, she studied business creation and development in Mexico. She’s created 3 startups so far, Agri DeliCo which is a socio-company, Brain Fusion which is embedded in software development, and Gaszen or gas management. They’ve raised over $650K in Mexico and have developed their own working product. She’s a mother, lover, sister, and daughter that enjoys her life and lives with zero regrets. She said, after all, there’s only one life and she’s in a constant pursuit of the best version of herself. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 6 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That hard work can make everything happen for sure” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Jennifer Reyna to the show 02:22 – Jenny realized that people complain about their gas 02:38 – Jenny created a device that works with stationary tanks 02:48 – Gaszen has an application where the consumer can see his gas consumption, statistics, and choose the best gas supplier 02:59 – Gaszen monetizes through selling information to gas suppliers 03:08 – Gaszen also monetizes from a consumer who wants automation 03:34 – Gaszen isn’t in the market yet and is still finishing its development 03:41 – Gaszen will start selling in April 03:43 – Gaszen already approached gas suppliers and has pre-ordered from them 03:57 – There are already 2 gas suppliers who have bought from Gaszen 04:05 – Gaszen also has real estate clients 04:31 – Gaszen has partnered with 3 real estate firms 04:35 – Gaszen is currently in discussion with 15 more real estate firms in Mexico 04:48 – The firm buys the device for $77 04:59 –The device will go directly to the buyer of the house 05:21 – Gas suppliers get a discounted price for buying the device in bulk 05:48 – Mexico has problems with gas suppliers giving updates 06:08 – Each gas supplier bought 5k units of the device 06:19 – The amount per piece will be $50 06:38 – Having clients before the actual launch of the product is good for Gaszen 06:49 – Gaszen’s first Kickstarter 07:07 – Gaszen raised 80K Mexican peso 07:19 – Gaszen had 111 backers 07:41 – Gaszen is B2B focused 07:48 – Gaszen has raised their first seed round with a total of $350K 08:05 – It was an equity round 08:14 – Gaszen started 2 years ago 08:26 – Gaszen had Angel investors and won the biggest Hackathon in the world 08:47 – Gaszen raised $300k with Angel investors 09:13 – From the gas suppliers, Gaszen charges after the 6-month trial, a monthly fee is charged per device or per device and user 09:32 – Gaszen charges 9 Mexican pesos per automated service 09:59 – Gaszen has no MRR currently 10:23 – The team has 5 people in management and 3 junior engineers 10:43 – The team is based in León Guanajuato, México 11:03 – It costs Gaszen $36 to make the device 11:30 – The whole device is made in Mexico 11:43 – The volume needed per year is 50K units in order to get a better price 12:13 – Gaszen wants to keep manufacturing in Mexico, if possible 13:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look at the most common problem and create a solution. If you can keep sourcing and manufacturing locally and with a good price, the better. Keep at it—hard work definitely pays off. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/14/2017 • 17 minutes, 54 seconds
EP 628: RapidAPI w/ 19 YO Founder Raises $3.5M, Helping You Connect to API's Faster with CEO Iddo Gino
In Episode #628, Nathan interviews Iddo Gino. He’s the CEO and co-founder of RapidAPI which he founded when he was 16 years old. He’s listed on the Forbes 30 under 30 list and previously, he was the co-organizer at Hacking Gen Y. Originally from Israel, Iddo, currently resides in San Francisco, California where he runs RapidAPI and runs JavaScript projects on the side. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Stewart Butterfield Favorite online tool? — GitHub Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — 6-7 hours If you could let your 10-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew what I didn’t know back then” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Iddo to the show 01:57 – RapidAPI let developers find APIs online 02:09 – RapidAPI has a marketplace model where developers can pay for the APIs 02:16 – RapidAPI’s processing fee is from 10% - 25% 02:30 – The fee depends on the API vendor 02:46 – RapidAPI is like a point connection for developers to find APIs 02:55 – Iddo was part of Hacking Gen Y 03:09 – Iddo realized how powerful APIs were while he was at Hacking Gen Y 03:18 – Iddo created the first version of RapidAPI 03:41 – Together with Iddo is his co-founder, Mickey Haslavsky 03:49 – Team size is 20 03:58 – The engineering team is in Israel and marketing and sales teams are in San Francisco 04:10 – Developers’ salaries in Israel 04:34 – RapidAPI just announced their seed round in November 04:44 – Total amount raised was $3.5M and an equity round 05:00 – RapidAPI started as an open-source project 05:40 – There are 148K apps or projects that have used Slack in RapidAPI 05:54 – Slack is a free API and the service is free, but there are paid APIs 06:43 – Average MRR 07:06 – The fee is charged from the API and not the consumer 07:16 – Any consumer transaction in RapidAPI is free 07:31 – One of the most popular paid APIs is Twilio 08:01 – If someone connects to Twilio API through RapidAPI, that’s when RapidAPI takes the processing fee 08:31 – “RapidAPI is all about neighboring developers to connect with APIs” 08:40 – RapidAPI will soon open a facility for developers 09:12 – Iddo volunteered for Hacking Gen Y and helped Hackathons 09:21 – Iddo was working on creating apps and websites prior to RapidAPI 09:36 – Iddo is currently 19 and his parents are just excited for him and what he does 09:54 – Iddo still thinks of going back to college, but is currently enjoying RapidAPI’s success at the moment 11:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: APIs are powerful and having a one point connection is beneficial for the developers. In the process of helping people, you also learn from them. Being an entrepreneur at an early age opens you up to the opportunity to learn more. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/13/2017 • 15 minutes, 52 seconds
EP 627: SmartSheet $70M Raised, $80M ARR, Helping 65,000 Customers with Project Management with CEO Mark Mader
In Episode #627, Nathan interviews Mark Mader. He’s the CEO of Smartsheet. He’s passionate about delivering superior, customer experiences. Mark strives to find innovative ways for customers to collaborate more intelligently using the Smartsheet platform and its partner ecosystem. Prior to Smartsheet, Mark served as SVP of Global Services for Onyx Software, leading the consulting and consumer operation team in America, Europe and Asia. In 2015, he was recognized as Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of Technology for the Pacific NorthWest. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Play Bigger What CEO do you follow? – Stat Mandella Favorite online tool? — Tripit Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “You tell me what the major trends are in the next 3 decades, in tech, and I would make you a lot of money” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Mark to the show 02:21 – Smartsheet is a software SaaS company 02:27 – The people who subscribe to Smartsheet are teams and enterprise teams 02:47 – Smartsheet is similar to Trello’s space but in the enterprise class 02:57 – Smartsheet has everything from time tracking to other things that are more diverse in nature 03:23 – Smartsheet serves 65K distinct brands on a paid basis 03:30 – Each brand pays an average of $1K annually 03:36 – The range is $200 to $1.6M annually 04:08 – Average MRR is $5.4M 04:20 – Smartsheet has been growing really well for the past 4 years 04:43 – “As you grow bigger, the gross rate is more challenging” 04:47 – Smartsheet isn’t only focused on getting new customers, but on helping their customers grow as well 05:23 – 2016 revenue 05:37 – 2017 target ARR 06:10 – First year revenue was zero 06:37 – Smartsheet’s promise didn’t change, but how they brought the product to the market changed dramatically 06:55 – 60% of Smartsheet’s revenue came from customers who learned about Smartsheet organically 07:18 – Smartsheet’s first million ARR was in 2010 08:02 – Smartsheet has raised a total of $70M 08:16 – Mark feels that they have a really good platform 08:21 – Team size 08:55 – Have the balance sheet in your model if you want to invest more this year 09:06 – Smartsheet is still trying to focus on efficiency in their growth model 09:34 – Smartsheet’s current status is that they have the decision to slow their growth or drive profit overnight 09:57 – “Control your own destiny” 10:06 – Smartsheet is currently not cash flow positive, but still a healthy business 10:20 – Smartsheet is based in Seattle, Washington and will have an office in Boston 10:48 – Smartsheet has a diverse funnel 11:02 – Smartsheet spends millions of dollars in paid advertising a year 11:34 – One of Smartsheet’s keys to growth is to go where the action is 11:39 – “Dominate in the world of collaborative, work management and partner effectively with the tools people use and love” 11:50 – “Partner with the places where heat exists” 12:08 – It’s about having an ecosystem mindset 12:30 – Gross customer churn 13:17 – Smartsheet has a broad population service 13:31 – “The key to sustain long-term growth is not just keeping up, but expanding” 13:59 – Smartsheet can still grow by 30% in 2017, without new customers 14:17 – Smartsheet charges the people who create new work in their application 15:00 – Smartsheet’s safe LTV 15:25 – Smartsheet looks at their specific sources and campaigns 16:06 – Smartsheet’s cohort analysis 17:22 – Smartsheet’s last round of raising was in 2014 19:16 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus not only on acquiring new customers, but helping your current customers to grow their company. The key to sustaining long-term growth is not just keeping up, but expanding. Dominate in the world of collaborative, work management and partner effectively with the tools people use and love. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/12/2017 • 24 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 626: Senior Editor at The Atlantic Releases Book To Predict Popularity In New Distraction Age with writer Derek Thompson
In Episode #626, Nathan interviews Derek Thompson. He’s a Senior Editor at The Atlantic, one of the biggest media companies out there. His first book, Hit Makers, is about the science of hits, pop culture, and technology and why people like what they like. He currently resides in New York. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Homo Deus What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take more risks because people are fundamentally resilient and can handle the downside of those risks” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Derek to the show 02:15 – The reason people go into journalism is because they seek answers to questions 02:21 – For Derek, the best reason to write a book was to answer questions 02:29 – Derek loved writing about what people like 02:33 – People say a book has to have an “elevator pitch” 02:39 – Books are more of a broken elevator 03:36 – “Creativity is the ability to come up with surprising answers to familiar problems” 04:36 – Derek wrote his book to allow himself the opportunity to be curious about anything he found interesting 05:00 – Derek worked with Penguin Publishing 05:10 – Derek had an agent, Dell Ross, who was Derek’s proposal doctor 05:35 – Derek and his agent sent the proposal to every publisher they could reach 05:43 – Derek also talked directly to publishers 06:06 – There are a lot of different audiences for a single book 06:10 – Derek’s agent was his first audience member 06:18 – Derek picked his agent because she’s unsentimentally intelligent and has a motherly approach 07:27 – Hit Makers came out in February 2017 08:08 – The rating in Amazon was quite high for a first-time book writer 08:40 – “Self-publishing is riskier” 09:15 – The average amount an author gets for the book sales 10:30 – Derek hasn’t talked about his advance with his agent 10:58 – The delta was probably about 2X 11:11 – There are publishers who believed that Derek’s book wouldn’t work at all 11:20 – Almost all book proposals from first-time authors are rejected and the best example of this is J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter 12:46 – “The future of popularity is a very tricky business” 13:13 – The easiest metaphor for the science of popularity is the weather 14:09 – One of the theses in the book was to ask the question: is virality a myth? 16:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Creativity is the ability to come up with surprising answers to familiar problems. Most book proposals from first-time authors are rejected, but there will be that ONE who will believe in you. People are fundamentally resilient, so TAKE that risk – the regrets of not taking that risk will be more difficult to handle. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/11/2017 • 22 minutes
EP 625: Booker $80M Raised, $3.5B in 2016 Volume, $1.5M+ MRR Helping 10,000 Spas and Salons Manage Business and Transactions with CEO Josh McCarter
In Episode #625, Nathan interviews Josh McCarter. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Booker Software, a leading business management and marketing solution serving over 10,000 health and beauty businesses. Josh has served in a variety of senior executive board roles at various technology companies including Arbitech, Spafinder and Autobytel. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Make Big Happen What CEO do you follow? – Steve Case, author of The Third Wave Favorite online tool? — OpenTable Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Startups are a blast, but they are not easy” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan introduces Josh to the show 01:59 – Booker is a business management and marketing solution for health and wellness businesses 02:08 – Booker is like OpenTable 02:16 – Booker does everything for a business to run 02:31 – Booker gains revenue from their subscriptions averaging $150-250 monthly 02:48 – Booker also has merchant processing 02:53 – Booker also sells its add-on product, Frederick 03:50 – Josh started to focus on the spa industry because of the technology from his previous company 04:25 – “It’s important to understand what type of customers you serve best” 05:31 – Josh shares how he spun out of business in his previous company 06:00 – Make sure you have the right type of structure when you spin out a business 06:10 – Give preferences to the shareholders 06:18 – It took Josh 6-9 months to get all the right structures and licensing in place 06:30 – Josh had a series A for $150K in 2011 06:42 – Spafinder had put in the initial capital for Booker 07:17 – Booker’s current team size is around 200 07:26 – Booker has raised a total of a million 07:47 – You have to do a proper valuation for a spin out 08:30 – First year revenue 09:00 – Booker is currently at 10K locations 09:20 – There is a fee per location 09:34 – A company who has more locations pays more 10:05 – Average MRR 10:25 – Booker does a lot of upselling and retention 10:41 – Booker makes sure that they keep their existing customers happy 10:50 – “You’ve got to focus on upsell opportunities” 11:20 – Booker’s merchant processing 11:37 – Online booking for spas is more common 11:58 – First Data is Booker’s newest investor 12:54 – Average total transactions 13:15 – Josh is currently not in any acquisition talks and isn’t raising a round 13:23 –“We’ve got some good runway” 14:05 – Gross customer churn 14:30 – “50% of our churn is the people who ran out of business” 14:39 – Failure rate of the SMB market is quite high 15:00 – CAC 15:05 – Most SMBs in SaaS and marketing business spend $1500-3500 to acquire new customers 15:40 – Frederick came to Booker for partnership 16:10 – Frederick was able to look at how SMBs are retaining their customers 17:22 – Frederick was able to get high conversion and retention metrics 18:14 – Frederick is integrated heavily into Booker 18:38 – Team location 20:16 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s important to understand what type of customers you serve best. Make sure you have the right type of structure in place when you spin out a business. Startups are a blast, but they’re definitely not easy—be willing to put in the work. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/10/2017 • 25 minutes, 14 seconds
EP 624: Winmo Passes $1.1M in MRR, Helping 2000 Customers Close More Sales with CEO Dave Currie
Dave Currie. He’s an entrepreneur-leader in the sales intelligence space, specifically for advertising, media, and the tech industry. Since 2014, he’s directed the company on a rapid innovation and growth trajectory. They are recognized by their customers and the industry as one of the largest, agile, fast-growing, private companies and the best place to work in America—the company, TheListInc.com. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Kyle Porter Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Balance is as important right now as you thought about it then. Being healthy is #1. Work and everything fall into place when you got your priorities stacked up the right way” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:40 – Nathan introduces Dave to the show 03:20 – The List is also known from their other products 03:34 – Winmo was launched last year 03:41 – Winmo is the lead brand 03:52 – Winmo is a subscription-based, sales intelligence platform 04:01 – Winmo provides sales intelligence to national advertisers 04:28 – Winmo has an annual subscription 04:45 – Annual subscription increases the valuation 04:55 – Winmo has been completely bootstrapped since day 1 05:09 – The List started in 1995 and went online in the early 2000s 05:25 – Dave came into The List in 2005 05:45 – The List is a joint venture with a company in the UK 06:08 – The team currently has 85 members 06:27 – Average annual customer pay 06:38 – Winmo initially charges $400-500 per user annually 07:07 – CAC 07:14 – “We’re very deliberate with our marketing efforts” 07:24 – 2014 paid marketing expenditure was around $100K, but was toned down currently to $50K 08:03 – The $50K would go to Google AdWords and some retargeting 08:17 – Dave’s target CAC 08:50 – Dave’s looking into 25% conversion rate 09:17 – Winmo has 4 targets in the UK and USA 09:44 – Winmo also sells to marketing services agencies 10:19 – Winmo has a good customer retention 10:46 – Winmo is just a bit stronger in the media space over the agency 11:30 – Winmo’s customer retention is a bit lower than revenue retention 12:05 – Lifetime Value 12:24 – Dave calculates retention on a 90-day cycle 13:06 – The question of when you consider a customer a “new customer” 14:10 – Average number of customers 15:35 – Average MRR 15:52 – Dave shares what is considered healthy in his business’ space 16:28 – Dave is part of the succession team of The List 16:46 – Dave and the team is not looking into going out and will just stick to being bootstrapped 17:05 – Dave won’t sell the company for $90M or higher 19:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be deliberate with your marketing – it pays off in the end. A healthy business can stay bootstrapped for a very long time, and still be OK. Regardless of whether you're young or old, new to business or not, balance is KEY. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/9/2017 • 24 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 623: rfactr Raises $9m, $900k MRR Helping 220 Customers With Social Selling With CEO Richard Brasser
In Episode #623, Nathan interviews Richard Brasser. He’s the foremost expert in helping companies increase the effectiveness and influence of their Salesforce’s strategic use of social communication. He does this through his company, rFactr. Richard pursues his focus in enabling salespeople to leverage social communication and build more meaningful relationship. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Tony Robbins Favorite online tool? — Outlook Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Very rarely If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Richard wished he knew the concept of compounding interest and the concept of deferred asset allocation Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Richard to the show 02:15 – Companies need to engage their buyers in a more meaningful way 02:32 – rFactr is focused on enhancing sales people’s ability to connect with people 02:51 – rFactr’s platform is called a social port 03:15 – rFactr has a per month/per user model 03:26 – rFactr is not a marketplace 03:33 – rFactr is directly plugged into companies’ CRMs 03:55 – Average customer pay per month 04:15 – rFactr has channel activations 04:40 – rFactr’s starting price is $5K a month 04:49 – rFactr was launched in 2009 04:57 – rFactr was bootstrapped for the first 8 years 05:04 – rFactr had a seed round and will probably have a series A 05:17 – rFactr has raised a total of $9M 05:32 – Richard played golf on tour for 7 years 05:45 – Richard made a good amount from playing golf 06:01 – Richard was already 7 years in business when he needed someone for the operations and finance side of the company 06:08 – Richard’s partner was just exiting his software company when he joined rFactr 06:25 – Nathan tells Richard about Episode 615 where he had Shin as a guest whose company makes carbon fiber golf shafts 06:47 – Richard hasn’t seen Shin’s product 07:05 – The seed round is an equity round 07:17 – The last round was in 2010 07:40 – The company has been around for 16 years, but the main product was developed 9 years ago 07:51 – Richard’s company started as a strategy and consulting firm 08:33 – Richard shares how the first company was valuated 09:31 – Team size is 18 09:39 – rFactr has 220 paying customers 09:44 – Average MRR 10:29 – Richard shares why they’re having the small companies together with the biggest ones 11:25 – Gross customer churn 11:37 – CAC 12:08 – rFactr has no paid marketing 12:23 – Team’s location 13:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Small companies may not be able to pay as much as the big companies, but the level of help they need is similar. Use your money from your exit for your new company. Paid marketing isn’t always necessary—know your options to better decide if it’s right for you. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/8/2017 • 18 minutes, 49 seconds
EP 622: This FinTech Accelerator Has Helped 60 Companies, Linking Industry with Startups with $17k Investment with Nektarios Liolios
In Episode #622, Nathan interviews Nektarios Liolios. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Startup Bootcamp, Financial Technology, and Insurance Technology—the leading innovation program in the financial and insurance industry. They provide funding, mentorship, office space in the heart of London, Singapore, New York and Mumbai and access into their global network including investors and VCs, up to 10 folks, each time they do it. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Nektarios wished that at 20, he would have known that he didn’t know everything and to be less scared Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Nektarios to the show 02:08 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech is a network of accelerators 02:17 – It is cohort-based 02:24 – The programs are industry focused programs 02:58 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech has 400 companies that have graduated 03:12 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech was launched in January 2014 03:29 – Nektarios shares how Startup Bootcamp FinTech started 03:56 – “To add real value, you need to be super sharp in your focus” 04:20 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech doesn’t take investments, but they take equity 04:30 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech takes 6% equity 05:52 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech has a variety of programs 06:35 – One of their teams is in Singapore 07:30 – Walnut Algorithms of France is part of their program 07:47 – It was built thinking it would revolutionize the algorithm industry 07:57 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech usually works with pre-seed startups 08:05 – Their products are not ready to launch yet 08:38 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech had 60 companies that are FinTech focused 08:52 – Buzzmove is one of the companies that have raised the most 09:05 – It provides accurate data for home insurance 09:25 – It is a data provider solution 09:35 – It sells to insurance providers 09:54 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech programs are funded by the industry players 10:26 – Nektarios shares what drives their company 11:07 – Who will win, Betterment or Wealthfront? 11:49 – It is difficult for Nektarios to discern which company will succeed 12:25 – Nathan shares his interview with Andy of Wealthfront 12:58 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech is the only program with the global reach 13:08 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech offers every entrepreneur in the globe access to their network 13:24 – The Global Insurance Accelerator is their only competition 13:34 – Nektarios shares what he thinks of the insurance space 13:58 – Insurance people are relevant to the industry 14:24 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech creates fund structure for every program 14:42 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech needs a minimum amount to run a program 15:05 – Every location of Startup Bootcamp FinTech has 5 people 15:53 – Startup Bootcamp FinTech isn’t driven by a commercial perspective 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: To add real value, you need to be razor sharp in your focus. Insurance space has so much potential to be a lucrative space—it’s less crowded and there are so many problems to solve. Just go for it—take the consequences as it’s going to be a ride. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/7/2017 • 22 minutes, 34 seconds
EP 621:BluePrintRegistry Raises $1.7M, Passes 2500 Postings and $10M in Transaction Volume with CEO Nevin Shetty
In Episode #621, Nathan interviews Nevin Shetty. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Blueprint Registry, an innovative wedding registry platform where you can shop for products from a variety of retailers based on the layout of your home. The company has generated over $10M in their first 2 years of operation. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Smarter Faster Better What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — SimilarWeb Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I should’ve learned computer programming” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Nevin to the show 02:00 – Blueprint Registry is a wedding registry platform for newly-engaged couples 02:23 – Blueprint Registry gets commission from the retailers on their platform 02:38 – An example of Blueprint Registry’s partners is Target 02:43 – Nevin explains how their platform works and how it is different from the traditional wedding registry 03:08 – Instead of couples going to different retailers physically, they can just go to Blueprint Registry 03:23 – Blueprint Registry has a unique visual representation of your home 03:45 – Blueprint Registry was conceptualized in January 2015 03:49 – Nevin shares how he came up with the idea 04:04 – Blueprint Registry’s co-founder is a designer 04:13 – Nevin found his co-founder through networking 04:55 – The equity conversation with the co-founder 05:21 – Blueprint Registry was launched in 2014 05:29 – Blueprint Registry did $225K of gross sales 05:44 – Average cart value 05:53 – Blueprint Registry raised $700K with friends and families 05:58 – Blueprint Registry did $4M in sales in 2015 06:04 – Blueprint Registry did $6M in sales in 2016 06:12 – Blueprint Registry has had 2000 users 06:19 – Blueprint Registry is originally focused on weddings but now they have people who use them for baby registries, house warming parties, and fundraising 06:40 – Blueprint Registry spends the most on development and marketing 07:25 – Team size 07:46 – Blueprint Registry just closed a million dollar seed round 08:00 – It was an equity round 08:09 – The friend and family round was a convertible note 08:12 – Nevin shares why he decided to have an equity round 08:45 – Blueprint Registry’s value depends on gross and growth 08:55 – 2017 target revenue 09:09 – Blueprint Registry deals with seasonality 09:30 – There’s no monthly subscription 10:20 – Nevin wants to keep Blueprint Registry as accessible as possible 10:35 – Blueprint Registry was founded in New York and they stayed for a year and a half 10:38 – Blueprint Registry is currently based in Seattle 11:15 – Blueprint Registry’s biggest competitors 11:26 – The wedding registry market is a huge market 11:38 – Zola, Myregistry, Honeyfund are some of the newest in the market 11:53 – Blueprint Registry has the lowest fees 12:00 – 2.5% of credit card processing fee 12:25 – Nevin will accept Zola’s $20M imaginary acquisition depending on their vision 13:43 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Finding co-founders is easy, choosing the right one is hard. In a saturated space, having the best features that set you apart can make all the difference. An acquisition will not always depend on the price. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/6/2017 • 18 minutes, 23 seconds
EP 620: ConversionXL Doing $200k+/Mo With 3 Products, Live Masterclass, Agency, and Self-Serve with CEO Peep Leja
Peep Laja. He’s the founder of CXL. He was voted as the most influential, conversion rate optimization expert in the world. He helps fast-growing companies grow faster through his services, coaching and CXL Institute’s certification programs along with his world-favorite optimization blog. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Used to be Ready, Fire, Aim What CEO do you follow? – No Favorite online tool? — Google Analytics and Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Peep wished that he had thought bigger when he was younger Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:33 – Nathan introduces Peep to the show 02:18 – CXL is an optimization company 02:30 – CXL does conversion optimization 02:40 – CXL also teaches about conversion optimization and everything a company needs to grow fast 03:13 – CXL has been an agency model for the longest time 03:31 – Conversion XL Institute was launched in 2016 03:41 – It also has a monthly subscription 03:52 – MRR as an agency 04:11 – In running an agency, it doesn’t make sense to work with small businesses 04:59 – CXL has a minimum engagement of 3 months 05:06 – The size of the client determines their length of stay with CXL 05:17 – CXL agency currently has an average of 15 clients 05:26 – Team size is 10 05:32 – Agency people are mostly based in Estonia 05:38 – Peep is based in Austin and is mostly working on the institute side 05:54 – Peep only steps into the agency, if needed 06:08 – CXL has a blog where most lead generation happens 06:19 – CXL has 2 full-time writers for the blog 06:35 – Average MRR 07:10 – Peep is working on the scaling aspect of the institute 07:32 – “Self-paced is not a good model for learning” 07:40 – Coursera, Udacity and other e-learning platforms struggle with churn 08:16 – CXL Institute added live courses which are happening in real time 08:30 – The participation rate is way higher than the self-pace courses 08:38 – The reasons why the participation rate is higher 09:01 – Self-pace is priced at $99 a month 09:04 – Live courses have a one-time fee per course and there are 2 courses per month which are priced from $299 to $499 10:08 – Average number of students per course 10:41 – CXL Institute has their predominant list 10:47 – CXL Institute also uses retargeting 10:56 – CXL Institute is now starting to explore affiliate marketing 11:09 – List size 11:24 – The blog was launched at the end of 2011 11:43 – The pop-up is the most effective CTA that drives more opt-ins 12:18 – Peep shares how to make a pop-up for a blog 12:33 – CXL Institute is using Bounce Exchange 12:50 – “We try not to annoy the users” 13:04 – Bounce Exchange CEO was in Episode 253 of the Top 13:27 – CXL Institute does a revenue-share model with the instructors 13:34 – The instructors are marketing their classes on their own, as well 14:18 – The live course inclusions 15:02 – It is like a one day workshop 15:30 – The big companies are the ones who buy the self-paced courses 15:52 – CXL Institute currently has 1 certification program 16:04 – CXL Institute is adding 2-3 certifications quarterly 16:30 – Peep initially thought the self-paced would be for small businesses 17:30 – Annual signup is 20-25% 18:10 – CXL Institute is having a conference called CXL Live 18:16 – A whole resort is booked for the conference 18:30 – The conference will be at Hyatt Regency Hill Country ,in San Antonio 18:38 – A ticket includes a 2-night stay and meals 18:50 – The conference will be on April 5-7 18:55 – Visit live.conversionxl.com for more details 21:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As an agency, the amount of time spent working with small and big companies is the same, so it’s better to stick with the big ones. Self-paced learning faces more churn than live courses. Think big and don’t just settle on what you think you can do—aim higher. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/5/2017 • 26 minutes, 11 seconds
EP 619: Smartbeat Raises $250K Onboards First Customers To Help Brick and Mortar Track Customers with CEO Paul Trappitt
Paul Trappitt. He’s currently the CEO and co-founder of Smartbeat. Before Smartbeat, he was the senior business analyst at National Australia Bank and a senior project lead at SignIQ. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Start with Why and The Startup Owner’s Manual What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew smartphones were coming” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Paul to the show 01:45 – Smartbeat helps small businesses to navigate the complex omni channel 02:30 – Paul shares how one of their paying customers uses Smartbeat 03:02 – Smartbeat is about the people that are already using your business 03:10 – Smartbeat turns customers into raging fans 03:20 – Smartbeat is currently focusing on brick-and-mortar businesses 03:51 – Paul explains how they can help Jim, the café owner 05:14 – Smartbeat provides Wi-Fi to business owners and other technologies 05:50 – Smartbeat targets your audience in social media 06:32 – Smartbeat is a SaaS business 06:39 – Pricing starts at $250 a month 07:06 – Smartbeat currently has 5 customers 07:12 – Paul had a Wi-Fi company for 3 years 07:38 – Paul’s Wi-Fi business did $20K in 2016 07:44 – Paul pivoted because there was too much competition in the Wi-Fi space 08:23 – Smartbeat raised $150K in Australia 08:39 – It was an equity round 08:55 – Paul shares how he came up with the valuation 10:10 – Smartbeat started in 2015 10:18 – Team size is 6 and they are all based in Australia 10:30 – Paul shares how they find their customers 10:55 – Smartbeat built their list organically through networking 12:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to pivot—you’ll know when it’s time. One way to build your network is by spreading news about your product in social gatherings. Technology is unpredictable so you have no choice but to adapt. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/4/2017 • 16 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 618: Astronomer.io 2 Yrs Old, Hits $60K MRR, $2m Raised Helping Companies Makes Sense of Data with CEO Ry Walker
Ry Walker. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Astronomer.io, a big data infrastructure company headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. Astronomer is an AngelPad batch #9 company and has raised $2M from the likes of 500 Startups, CincyTech, Router Ventures and SocialStarts. Astronomer measures, connects and centralizes data—making it super simple for anyone from business users to data scientists to quickly create and monitor their data and pipelines. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – 7 Habits of Highly Effective People What CEO do you follow? – Dennis Mortensen Favorite online tool? — Fabricator Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Ry would tell himself to be bold and to be confident Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:35 – Nathan introduces Ry to the show 03:17 – Astronomer helps companies figure out how to use their data to benefit their business 03:22 – Astronomer works with early stage startups and big companies 03:41 – Some companies in the web analytics space are Mixpanel, Amplitude, Google Analytics 03:57 – Astronomer helps companies get the right data from their inside companies 04:32 – Astronomer is called data engineering, as a service 04:39 – Astronomer does the work for their customer while building the platform 04:51 – Astronomer has a flat price of 6K and 10K monthly 05:14 – Astronomer has their private cloud edition for their customers 05:33 – Astronomer was launched in May 2015 05:36 – Astronomer was at Collision Conference when they pivoted after the first day 06:13 – They realized that their biggest problem was to get companies to send them the data to run the analysis 06:35 – The number one issue in the space is the onboarding 07:03 – Ry explains the type of company they are 08:02 – The Angelpad is one of the most important pivots Astronomer did 08:13 – Angelpad’s model 08:46 – What Ry was thinking when they got into Angelpad 09:30 – First year revenue 09:38 – 2016 revenue 09:57 – Team size and location 10:08 – Astronomer has raised $2M in 2 years 10:31 – Last round was at $1.1M and a convertible note 10:40 – Average MRR 12:04 – Astronomer currently has 20 customers 12:14 – Customer churn 12:17 – Astronomer currently has a net negative churn of 48% 12:46 – Ry explains the net negative churn of 48% 13:33 – CAC 13:38 – Astronomer just started with paid CAC this year 14:00 – Astronomer started with $600 14:21 – LTV 15:40 – Last round of funding was in August 16:21 – Ry explains the amount they are burning 16:42 – Ry is thinking now of the post-seed round 16:52 – It’s a $3-5 M upround 17:14 – The valuation Ry is aiming for 17:40 – “We don’t really want to bump our valuation too much” 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The number one issue in data analytics is the onboarding. Know your valuation and understand the data that had led you to that valuation. Believe in yourself—be bold and confident. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/3/2017 • 25 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 617: DataSigns Raises $5.4M, Gives Loans To Indian Credit Borrowers At 1/2 The Rate Money Sharks Do With CEO Monish Anand
Monish Anand. He’s a banker, a technologist, and a Fintech evangelist. Above everything else, he’s a father. He spent 20+ plus years in corporate working for large banks and technology companies only to realize that they were not solving big problems and quite frankly, were often part of the problem. His company, Datasigns Technologies, aims to provide underserved and unserved access to optimal credit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Calvin and Hobbes What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar and Google Task Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew what Internet was” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Monish to the show 02:20 – Datasigns Technologies started last year 02:32 – Datasigns Technologies gives credit ratings 02:38 – 400M people in India apply for loans yearly 02:42 – Less than 107 get loans from banks and other financial institutions 03:00 – Datasigns Technologies tries to bridge the gap between the credit givers and credit takers 03:15 – Datasigns Technologies has grade scoring algorithms 03:35 – Monish believes that the calculus used to determine credit worthiness is not good enough 04:03 – Datasigns Technologies calculates data from sources and turns them into algorithms 04:10 – Monish shares his driver’s experience applying for a loan 05:18 – Datasigns Technologies relies on mobile data 05:48 – Datasigns Technologies has a mobile app 06:06 – Datasigns Technologies’ marketing explained 06:35 – Datasigns Technologies has a tie-up with micro-small to medium enterprises 07:00 – Datasigns Technologies does financial literacy for the enterprises 07:21 – There are 75K people who now understands Datasigns Technologies 07:54 – Datasigns Technologies has around 10K app downloads 08:07 – Datasigns Technologies has closed 600 loans 08:20 – Loan terms 09:24 – Datasigns Technologies was Angel funded, last year 09:31 – They have raised around $400K on an equity round 09:39 – Datasigns Technologies is raising another round of $5M 09:50 – Nathan breaks down the math 10:27 – Datasigns Technologies’ interest rate varies from 22-26% 10:46 – Interest rates, in India, are much higher than in the USA 11:27 – Datasigns Technologies is the only company in India that is mandated by financial institutions to acquire customers 12:00 – Loan sharks charge 3% a month 12:40 – Datasigns Technologies has a processing fee and a basic interest rate 13:03 – How Datasigns Technologies makes money 13:43 – Datasigns Technologies helps banks build their books 14:00 – Why Datasigns Technologies is raising $5M 14:22 – Team size is 17 14:36 – All based in Bangalore, India 14:45 – Monish shares why he started Datasigns Technologies 15:05 – “There are people who deserve loans, but are not getting loans from the banks” 16:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be the solution—not just part of the problem. There are people who deserve a loan, but are not given a chance—Monish wants to change that. The fintech space is one of the hottest spaces, at the moment. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/2/2017 • 21 minutes, 48 seconds
EP 616: His Coffee Shops Do $1.8M But His Crowdfunding Platform is More Impressive With $550k 2016 Revenue on 486 Projects With $2.5M Funded with CEO McCabe Callahan
McCabe Callahan who has been an entrepreneur his entire life. He began with a coffee shop named Mugs Coffee Lounge, which has been operating successfully in Fort Collins, Colorado, since 2002. He began a company called Community Funded, in 2011, out of his passion for providing technology that connects, supports and empowers people. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – E-Myth and Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Pay attention to numbers” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan introduces McCabe to the show 02:33 – Mugs Coffee Lounge is McCabe’s first real business 02:43 – McCabe went to Colorado State University 02:50 – McCabe was coming back from Europe when he had the idea of the Mugs Coffee Lounge 02:56 – Mugs Coffee Lounge was the first wireless internet café in Fort Collins 03:11 – Building relationships is the key to a successful coffee lounge 03:36 – First year revenue 04:04 – McCabe is 36; but when he was 24, he was already opening 5 coffee shops 04:22 – Total topline of all the coffee shops and restaurants 04:58 – McCabe didn’t raise any capital 05:31 – McCabe’s credit card debt when he started Mugs Coffee Lounge 05:48 – McCabe also had debt from other sources 06:43 – “Coffee is a good business to be in—there’s no recession” 06:58 – McCabe shares where he sells his business to 07:07 – McCabe’s income is now generating well 07:16 – McCabe did $1.6M in sales in 2016 07:30 – McCabe shares how he started with Community Funded 08:17 – McCabe had to find a way to secure a loan to open up a location 08:31 – The amount McCabe wanted to loan 08:45 – 2009-2010 was the hardest time for McCabe 09:41 – McCabe was about to give up when one of his regulars offered help 10:05 – 5 months after the McCabe’s next shop opened, he heard about NPR’s Kickstarter 10:20 – McCabe thought, “What if he could something like Kickstarter, but for communities?” 10:44 – Community Funded started out bootstrapped and just recently raised a round 11:03 – Community Funded first round raised $40K-75K 11:29 – Total funding was $2.3M 11:38 – Rounds are equity round 11:50 – McCabe shares Community Funded’s valuation 12:18 – People believed in Community Funded’s vision 12:38 – Community Funded’s is a SaaS model 13:46 – Sample of fundraising raised in Community Funded 14:26 – Community Funded’s focus 14:53 – Current Community Funded’s revenue and revenue goal for 2017 15:54 – Total transaction volume in 2016 16:03 – 2016 total revenue 17:21 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Lack of funds is not a hindrance in building a company. There’s nothing wrong sharing your problems with your regulars – you don’t know who can offer you help. Stick and pay close attention to your numbers. Resources Mentioned: The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
4/1/2017 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
EP 615: $75M Raised, This $15K Machine Folds Your Laundry, $35M 2016 Revenue with Seven Dreamers CEO Shin Sakane
Shin Sakane. He’s the founder and CEO of Seven Dreamers. Seven Dreamers is daring to create technology that has never been seen in the world. Shin has a PhD in Chemistry and Biochemistry from the University of Delaware. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Path What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Facebook Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Get global experiences, visit so many different countries, cultures...” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Shin to the show 02:20 – Seven Dreamers creates technology that the world has not seen yet 02:30 – First product is the fully automated carbon golf shaft 02:35 – Second product is the nascent nasal airway stent 02:58 – There’s no connection between the products 03:16 – Seven Dreamers wanted to develop something that is not yet available anywhere 04:00 – Seven Dreamers was launched in 2011 04:20 – Seven Dreamers has raised over $75M 04:29 – The money was mainly spent on product development 05:05 – The nasal stent currently has more sales than the golf shaft 05:27 – The golf shaft price is $1200 - $120K 05:53 – The most popular model sells for $1800 06:10 – The golf shaft was launched in 2014 06:30 – 400 shafts/month are being sold 07:35 – The way to make a golf shaft 09:06 – Team size 09:45 – 2016 total revenue 10:30 – It took Seven Dreamers 11 years to develop laundroid 11:15 – Seven Dreamers has spent $15M for product development 11:33 – Shin shares how they came up with the idea of laundroid 12:13 – Laundroid was initially limited 12:50 – Laundroid’s price is $15K 13:38 – The 3 products are completely different—from the suppliers to the technologies 14:08 – Most of the product ideas come from Shin 14:43 – The last round they raised 15:03 – Shin shares the valuation of each of their products 15:30 – “Everything counts” 16:12 – The nasal airway stent is currently their biggest money maker 16:25 – Average MRR $1M 16:53 – 2017 goal is $80M 17:07 – Seven Dreamers are working on their sales and marketing 17:14 – “We do our own marketing” 17:34 – Advertising cost 18:40 – Seven Dreamers spent money on sponsoring athletes 19:09 – The number of golf shaft complete sets that have sold 21:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Think outside the box—have a solution to a problem, then create a product. Study and know your market well so that your product speaks directly to a need. Be creative and innovative. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/31/2017 • 24 minutes, 48 seconds
EP 614: Pendo Raises $31M Helping 200 Customers With In App Messaging To Drive Usage with CEO Todd Olson
Todd Olson. He’s the CEO and founder of Pendo, a product experience platform that helps product managers deliver successful products. Before Pendo, Todd served as VP of products at Rally Software Development which he led through its public offering. Todd joins Rally in its acquisition of 6th Sense, the company he founded and served as president and CTO. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Aaron Levie Favorite online tool? — 15Five Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew more at 21, than I thought I knew” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Todd to the show 02:17 – Pendo provides a solution that helps companies build an application to improve its experience 03:00 – Optimizely uses Pendo to understand the people who are in their trial and onboarding flow 03:32 – Pendo is different to Intercom’s space 04:01 – Pendo is a SaaS company 04:21 – Pendo was launched in 2013 05:11 – Todd experimented with different technologies 05:26 – “Every product has key set features” 05:45 – Todd founded 6th Sense and sold it to Rally 06:24 – First year revenue is zero 06:55 – Todd invested $1.2M to start Pendo 07:11 – Pendo has raised a seed round 07:44 – It was a million dollar convertible note 08:15 – Pendo has raised a total of $31M 08:26 – Team size 08:55 – “All of our customers are top-tier” 09:43 – Average customer pay per month 09:52 – Pendo serves mid-market to enterprise companies 10:20 – Todd shares what drives their expansion revenue 10:50 – Pendo increases prices by adding products to existing plans 10:55 – Pendo has tier-prices based on features 11:17 – Todd shares why adding products is their main expansion driver 12:30 – Average number of customers 12:45 – Future target market 13:00 – Average customer churn 13:35 – Pendo has a net negative churn 13:49 – Todd explains net negative churn 14:54 – CAC and LTV ratio is healthy 15:26 – Pendo’s expansion plan 15:44 – Average MRR 17:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Treat all your customers as if they are top-tier customers. Expansion drivers will depend on what suits the company. Be more confident. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/30/2017 • 21 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 613: 16 Year Old Doing $70k MRR Helping You Put Your Ads Inside of Taxis' in India with CEO Sahil Arora
Sahil Arora. He’s an entrepreneur, author, and a guitarist and defies what you think someone his age could do. Tune in to learn his entrepreneurial story, from creating the Vuzelaa Group to jumpstarting Tabverts—a company that broadcasts ads in taxis all over India. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — No Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You could get a Lamborghini at the age of 10” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Sahil to the show 01:35 – Vuzelaa Group is the parent company which Sahil started when he was 16 01:51 – Under Vuzelaa Group, they created Tabverts; a company that broadcasts ads in taxis all over India 02:11 – Tabverts’ pricing 02:45 – Tabverts was launched in 2016 03:06 – Sahil is the sole founder of Vuzelaa Group 03:20 – Sahil shares how he found people on Twitter and got them on board 03:59 – Sahil shares how he convinced them to join 04:55 – Sahil shows Nathan his sample pitch 06:28 – Sahil is 18 now 06:45 – There are around 10K cabs in India with Tabverts’ hardware 06:50 – Sahil shares how he funded Tabverts 07:05 – Sahil spent $100K in the early stage of the business 07:12 – Sahil raised $500K in an equity round 07:32 – The $500K was from a VC based in India 07:50 – The brands that pay Sahil 08:18 – Sahil shares how the brand, Snapdeal, pays him 08:40 – Average pay per second 09:45 – Tabverts’ customers can track their ads’ performance through an app 10:14 – The clicks on the tablet can also be tracked 10:37 – Sahil shares how the ads’ loophole functions 11:00 – Team size 11:08 – MRR is $70K 11:35 – Sahil shares how his team operates 11:56 – Sahil dropped out of high school and won’t go to college 12:26 – Tabverts has a predictive revenue stream 12:35 – Sahil’s future plans for Tabverts 13:18 – How Tabverts deals with the cabs 14:05 – The key metrics Tabverts tracks 14:38 – 2017 goal 14:50 – Sahil shares what he does with the revenue he gets 15:23 – Cost per hardware 15:48 – Sahil shares how their tabs work 16:16 – Tabverts only shows the ads that may be interesting for the people riding in cabs 16:47 – Tabverts is tied up with Uber 16:57 – The amount Tabverts pays Uber 17:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Entrepreneurship knows no age. Continue to grow your company by investing consistently. You can find your clientele through social media – you just have to have the right pitch. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/29/2017 • 22 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 612: Sauce Labs Raises $130M (At Great Valuation!) Helping 3500 Customers Execute Concurrent and Parallel High Fidelity Testing with CEO Charles Ramsey
Charles Ramsey. He’s the CEO of Sauce Labs and has been in that position since April 2015, and has served as Chief Revenue Officer from February to April 2015. Prior to that, he’s had 25 years of industry experience—he was a venture partner at JMI Equity and held a number of roles at Quest Software, including VP of marketing and sales. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Finding Your North Star What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — No Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I’d become a CEO sooner in my career” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:27 – Nathan introduces Charles to the show 03:03 – Sauce Labs has just raised a significant amount, $70M 03:45 – Sauce Labs has raised a total of $130M 04:04 – Charles shares how they decide to raise capital 04:14 – Sauce Labs checked their ability for an acquisition 04:42 – Sauce Labs had great timing 04:54 – Sauce Labs does automated testing in the cloud for web app and mobile devices 06:38 – Sauce Labs’ market is about continuous integration and delivery 07:17 – Sauce Labs is SaaS based with an annual subscription and self-service 07:58 – Sauce Labs has invested in pre-sell and technical support 08:30 – Average transaction fee is $50K annually 08:56 – The fee varies from the number of parallel testings the customer wants 09:20 – The concurrency of 50 09:45 – Sauce Labs is growing organically 10:11 – Sauce Labs is an 8 year old company 10:33 – “The founders started the company with the notion of automated testing from day 1” 10:54 – 3 years ago, a number of ISVs realized that they wanted to leverage selenium 12:03 – One of the founders is still in Sauce Labs and all of them are still on the cap table 12:41 – Team size 13:20 – Sauce Labs currently has 3500 customers 13:58 – Sauce Labs’ 90-day post-transaction clause window 14:17 – Depending on the complexity of the environment, it can require professional services 14:26 – Charles shares what their technical team does 14:58 – Average ARR 16:00 – Average pay of self-serve customers 16:59 – Valuation 17:46 – Sauce Labs wants to focus on the enterprise companies 19:15 – Gross annual customer churn 19:46 – Sauce Labs is currently at net negative revenue churn 19:54 – CAC 20:00 – Sauce Labs is doing paid marketing 21:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Do your research—know what your customer wants and needs. Focus your energy on the strengths of your company. Take courage, take the leap. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/28/2017 • 24 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 611: VSee Helping 1000 Customers Use Video To Transact Information with CEO Milton Chen
Dr. Milton Chen. He’s the co-founder and CEO of VSee, and has a PhD from Stanford on the design of video collaboration. Additionally, he was the co-founder of XMPP Video Standard which is now used by Google Talk and Facebook Chat. He has deployed VSee for Hillary Clinton, Angelina Jolie, Linkin Park and UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Rapportive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Milton would tell himself not to be as naïve and clueless Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Milton to the show 02:20 – Vsee is a SaaS company 02:31 – Vsee offers mobile app and call center workflow 03:04 – Price range is $49-499 per medical provider per month 03:30 – Milton explains how VSee provides a service to client, Trinity Health 04:30 – Milton assures their client security and confidentiality 05:05 – Vsee was launched in 2008 05:33 – Milton went to graduate school because he wanted to become a professor 05:46 – Milton now loves everything about startups 06:03 – Vsee’s initial investment 06:24 – It was an equity investment 06:42 – Milton was clueless about valuations and didn’t know what he was doing 06:59 – Milton started VSee after graduate school with zero knowledge about business 07:15 – Milton was just grateful that people wanted to invest in VSee 07:35 – Vsee currently had a thousand paying customers 09:00 – Average number of nurses in VSee 09:23 – First year revenue 10:11 – Average amount raised 10:40 – Team size is 52 and they are based in Sunnyvale, CA 12:12 – VSee is currently cash flow mutual 12:51 – Vsee invests in making sure their customers feel secure 13:18 – Milton shares how their technology is built into Facebook Messenger 14:00 – Milton doesn’t get royalties 14:40 – Vsee started as a general video conference market 14:50 – Milton shares how they pivoted to the health industry 15:34 – Vsee has an inside sales team 15:41 – Vsee has 3 sources for sales 16:22 – Vsee is currently not into paid marketing 17:40 – Vsee has close to 100% customer retention 18:17 – Vsee is on a net negative churn 19:20 – 2017 revenue target 20:56 – Vsee’s last closed round was in 2011 21:10 – Milton is just focused on acquiring more customers and is not interested in any acquisition talks 22:47 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Everyone has to start somewhere – even if it means being naïve and clueless. Getting into a market with less competition could mean more customers and sales. Paid marketing won’t always work so test everything, first, before investing in a certain marketing strategy. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/27/2017 • 26 minutes, 44 seconds
EP 610: Toofr Hits 100 Active Customers Paying $180 Monthly to Get Better, More Accurate Emails With CEO Ryan Buckley
Ryan Buckley. He’s a serial entrepreneur, a founder and CEO of Scripted and Toofr. He focuses on solving the problems that marketers and business owners deal with on a daily basis such as connecting businesses with writers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rework What CEO do you follow? – Josh Pigford Favorite online tool? — HubSpot CRM Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Ryan would tell himself not to be so stressed and just say “yes” as much as possible Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Ryan to the show 01:40 – Scripted is marketplace that matches businesses with writers 01:45 – Scripted has a subscription fee 02:19 – Scripted has raised a total of $15M 02:23 – Scripted was launched in 2011 02:26 – Ryan started in screenwriting 02:40 – Ryan shares how he started Scripted 03:04 – “We just followed the market” 03:12 – Toofr came before Scripted 03:50 – Ryan shares how Toofr came to life 04:17 – Ryan was using Genius software and had a drip campaign 04:35 – Ryan learned about Phyton 05:14 – Toofr is different from the original script 05:29 – Toofr is a SaaS model 05:32 – RPU 05:45 – Ryan put up the paywall in 2013 06:32 – Ryan used Toofr to learn web development 06:37 – Toofr is completely bootstrapped 06:45 – Team size 07:40 – Toofr has a hundred customers 08:00 – Gross customer churn 08:40 – Toofr relies solely on organic traffic 08:55 – Ryan shares why he thinks people leave Toofr 09:20 – Ryan shares the improvements that he can make to reduce churn numbers 10:10 – Toofr has 16K registered users 10:27 – Toofr’s competition 10:59 – “Hunter kicks my ass in SEO” 11:30 – Toofr has better data 11:59 – Toofr has multiple sources 13:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Learn as you go — as you build your business, be mindful of all the opportunities to learn. There are great advantages in working with a small team. Use your competition as motivation to make yourself better. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/26/2017 • 16 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 609: Pagecloud Raises $8.5M Helping 8500 SMB's Drag and Drop Websites Together with CEO Craig Fitzpatrick
Craig Fitzpatrick. He’s a serial entrepreneur, self-professed child nerd, and CEO of PageCloud. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Biography of Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Jump in while there’s still nothing to lose” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Craig to the show 01:48 – PageCloud is a SaaS business 02:10 – PageCloud is different from Weebly and Wix, but they are in the same space 03:28 – PageCloud has reinvented the experience for desktop publishing and puts it into your browser 03:56 – Average customer pay per month 04:08 – RPU 04:22 – PageCloud was launched in September 2014 04:48 – Craig started PageCloud as a hobby 04:48 – Craig has been frustrated with desktop publishing in the past 05:20 – Craig shares how he started the planning and creating of PageCloud 06:15 – Craig’s previous company 06:45 – Team size 06:52 – The team is based in Canada 07:05 – PageCloud is well-funded 07:17 – PageCloud has raised a few rounds 07:40 – First three rounds are convertible note and the fourth one is a priced round 07:55 – Average number of customers 08:15 – MRR 08:24 – PageCloud was in Kickstarter 09:00 – Below $200K MRR 09:23 – Craig shares how they pre-sell: 10:00 – They built a landing page from TechCrunch’s promo video 10:30 – Craig did a lot of marketing before the launch 11:19 – Starting price point 11:30 – Average number of units sold 12:21 – Craig learned how to do effective marketing in 6 months 12:40 – Craig put in $1M in paid advertising 12:56 – The payback was just after a month 13:10 – Gross customer churn 14:30 – CAC 14:50 – LTV 15:32 – 2017 goal 17:01 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to invest in marketing – it shows that you believe in your product. Be innovative—make a change in an industry that is quite stationary. There is no time better than the present to get started. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/25/2017 • 20 minutes, 24 seconds
EP 608: Tinitell Raises $4M, Ships 15,000 Units of Watch That Calls (No Phone Needed) With CEO Mats Horn
Mats Horn. He’s the CEO and founder of the Swedish tech company, Tinitell. Together with a team of Scandinavian industrial designers, telecom experts and engineers, he developed one of the first wearable devices with cellular connectivity for voice and data. Tinitell wrist phone is an ingeniously simple wearable phone for kids with call and smart location features as well as an intuitive, one button, voice guidance interaction. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Sapiens What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Mats would tell himself to not be in a rush and take life as “unseriously” as possible Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:31 – Nathan introduces Mats to the show 02:12 – Tinitell is a simple mobile phone that kids wear 02:20 – It’s a smart locator for parents 02:35 – Kids can make and receive calls 02:57 – Tinitell is independent from its smartphone administrators 03:03 – It is like a robot in a simple product 03:13 – The smartphone app is how the parents control what’s in it 03:36 – Tinitell needs to have a SIM card and it is already provided 03:50 – Tinitell is partnered with a telco 04:48 – Tinitell was launched in Kickstarter in 2014 04:54 – Shipping started after a year and a half 05:16 – Tinitell has shipped 15K units 05:30 – Tinitell sold 1,102 units in Kickstarter 05:41 – Tinitell has raised $150K in Kickstarter 05:51 – “It’s tough making the world’s smallest mobile phone” 06:03 – Tinitell has put it in additional $4M for funds 06:18 – “Most money came from VC companies” 06:25 – Tinitell has raised thrice 06:36 – All are equity rounds 06:53 – Mats shares why he raised in smaller rounds 07:35 – In doing smaller rounds, Mats and his team wouldn’t dilute themselves 08:03 – Mats was working as a consultant before Tinitell 08:25 – Mats realized that he wanted his own company 08:29 – Mat’s idea of Tinitell 09:15 – Team size is 30 09:25 – Average number of customers 09:43 – The critical numbers of Mats 10:12 – Mats looks at the conversion rate and general market activity 10:50 – Tinitell’s competition 11:20 – What people should look at in conversion rate 11:40 – Tinitell has 4 colors 12:03 – The bestsellers are the darker colors 12:36 – Markup vs. cost 13:49 – Mats shares about making a physical product 15:15 – Mats shares how he finds his suppliers 15:32 – “I knew I had to go to China” 15:48 – Mats has to have a network of suppliers 16:29 – Mats reached out to everyone he knows who could possibly help him 18:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Know your numbers and track them consistently. Your network can be your advantage in sourcing and creating your product. Enjoy life—take things slow and don’t be in a rush. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/24/2017 • 20 minutes, 48 seconds
EP 607: The SaaS Co Passes $90k MRR Helping 20 Companies Get Leads And Qualified Meetings with CEO Peter Schlecht
Peter Schlecht. He’s the founder and CEO of The SaaS Co whose aim is to change sales through artificial intelligence as they have launched their new product, Lisa. He’s a 30-year old from Germany—a poker and e-sports playing, politician who became an entrepreneur. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Der Weg zum erfolgreichen Unternehmer What CEO do you follow? – Felix Staeritz Favorite online tool? — OneTap Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Stop earlier with politicians, don’t do your masters and study entrepreneurship earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Peter to the show 01:37 – Peter makes more money in entrepreneurship than being a politician 01:58 – The SaaS Co is an agency for B2B lead generation 01:55 – The SaaS Co is subscription based 02:06 – The SaaS Co’s focus is Lisa 02:14 – Lisa is a bot for salespeople 02:18 – Lisa reads and replies to your email 02:52 – Lisa doesn’t delete emails and won’t reply if she can’t find an answer to an email 03:08 – The SaaS Co was founded in July, 2014 03:17 – First year revenue 03:22 – The SaaS Co was selling the service of full-sales for tech companies 03:34 – The SaaS Co specializes in appointment setting for B2B tech companies 03:51 – The SaaS Co was providing 4 services 04:23 – The payment depends on a company size 04:44 – The fee for every qualified lead 05:05 – Current number of customers 05:19 – MRR 06:12 – No charge for Lisa, at the moment 06:20 – Anyone can sign up for Lisa 06:41 – The SaaS Co was bootstrapped until last year 06:53 – The SaaS Co raised €500K from angels and €300K from The European Union funding 07:55 – Peter shares how they get new customers 09:03 – The SaaS Co doesn’t buy leads from other sources for verification 09:08 – The SaaS Co uses datavalidations.com to validate their leads 09:38 – Peter uses Full Contact 09:50 – The SaaS Co finding leads process 11:15 – The SaaS Co scrapes data from open sources 11:40 – The SaaS Co tried other sources, but the price point has to be considered 12:10 – Team size 12:16 – There are 17 developers and the rest are on sales 12:30 – No paid marketing, at the moment 12:44 – Customer churn 13:06 – The SaaS Co needs to keep on adding new customers to sustain growth 13:55 – The SaaS Co’s big focus is on Lisa and Peter believes she will add more value to the company 14:55 – The SaaS Co is based in Berlin 15:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are many things to consider when it comes to subscribing to other sources for leads; price is a major factor. One way to get people to sign up for a new product is to offer it for free. Get into business early as early as possible. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/23/2017 • 19 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 606: Hornet Raises $8M to Become Gay Content Hub, 17M Users, 3M MAU with CEO Christof Wittig
Christof Wittig. He’s a serial, software entrepreneur and investor. Currently, he’s the founder and CEO of Hornet Networks, the world’s second largest gay social network and is a managing partner of Strive, based in San Francisco. He’s an investor and board member of various companies including Enish, Metago, KeepSafe, VirtaHealth, Black Medicine, Movie Pilot, Box Fish and App Annie. He has been active in the US, Germany, and throughout Asia. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Sami Inkinen Favorite online tool? — Capshare.com Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Christof wished he told himself to be bold, that he didn’t need a degree, and to follow his dreams Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:19 – Nathan introduces Christof to the show 03:09 – Strive and Hornet came at the same time to Christof 03:32 – Hornet started as a side project 03:50 – Christof exited Servo Software before Hornet 04:00 – Hornet is Christof’s first consumer business 04:10 – Servo Software was launched in 2004 05:02 – Christof sold Servo software in 2010 05:20 – Hornet’s capital came from that exit 05:48 – Christof is now 48 05:58 – Nathan had Sean Howell, Hornet’s co-founder in Episode 440 06:20 – Sean focused on marketing 06:50 – Sean and Christof are running it together 07:10 – Hornet had a subscription model and premium option 07:50 – Hornet’s revenue is 2/3 from subscription and 1/3 from ads 08:00 – Hornet’s future revenue model 08:28 – GHI 09:02 – Hornet raised their $8M in their Series A 10:05 – Hornet’s focus is the advertising revenue 10:46 – “Our focus is to get more engagement” 10:57 – Engagement is measured through sessions 11:12 – Peak days 11:30 – User base 11:41 – 3M monthly active and 1.5M daily active 12:09 – The key metrics to track the number of sessions 12:30 – Christof shares about Tinder 13:16 – Hornet sells CPM and provides premium exposure 14:00 – Hornet has a feed model to drive more organic traffic 14:34 – Hornet has the following features 15:20 – Hornet’s published price for CPM 15:56 – The number of advertisers currently working with Hornet 16:28 – Hornet uses TFP for their ads 17:10 – Hornet has the largest gay media newsroom in the USA 17:30 – The story feed makes the interaction in the gay community easier 18:05 – Christof shares where they spend the $8M 18:25 – Hornet also spends in marketing 18:39 – Christof wants users to understand that Hornet isn’t just about dating 19:00 – User growth 19:30 – Hornet takes the new concept of the gay app to the next level 20:14 – Hornet is about creating a new digital space for the gay community 21:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: They gay community needs a place where it’s not just about dating, but having interactions with the whole community. The focus isn’t always on the number of users, specially if you’re driving traffic well. A degree isn’t as important as just following your dreams. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/22/2017 • 25 minutes, 48 seconds
EP 605: Demandbase Will Break $100M ARR 2017 Helping 400 Customers With Account Based Marketing with CEO Chris Golec
Chris Golec. He’s the CEO and founder of Demandbase. Chris is an entrepreneur and prior to starting Demandbase, founded one of the most successful B2B software and data solutions in the late 90s called Supplybase. With previous positions at GE and DuPont, Chris uses his wealth of experience to position Demandbase as one of the most rapidly expanding B2B marketing companies in the space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Keith Krach Favorite online tool? — Amazon and Skype Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Go for it sooner” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:10 – Demandbase is a marketing technology company focused on B2B marketers 02:46 – Demandbase sells subscriptions to large enterprises 03:10 – Chris used his experience in GE to find what salespeople need 03:40 – Average customer pay per month 04:09 – Demandbase has raised $90M 04:51 – Demandbase was launched in 2007 05:20 – Demandbase started pushing the account-based marketing technology 05:32 – Chris explains what an account-based marketing technology is 06:03 – Supplybase was in a supply-chain space 06:37 – Chris started as a consultant 07:04 – Chris saw the huge opportunity from his clients’ experiences 07:33 – Chris shares how he determines the red flags in revenue plans 09:05 – First year revenue 10:17 – Demandbase had their first round in 2007 for $2.5M 10:33 – It was an equity round 11:00 – Chris shares what he deems important to know before raising a round 11:07 – Have a goal 11:22 – Know that “it’s not easy raising money” 12:00 – Demandbase currently has 400 customers 12:23 – Average MRR 12:40 – Team size is under 250 13:44 – Gross customer churn 13:59 – “Even if we don’t add any customers this year, we’ll still grow by 10% next year” 14:14 – Chris shares how the teams are designated by customers 15:00 – CAC 15:13 – Average contract value 15:40 – Demandbase is in San Francisco 16:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you see an opportunity, go for it! Raising money is not a walk in the park – know your goal beforehand. Don’t wait around, go for your dreams as soon as you can. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/21/2017 • 21 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 604: Lumo Accelerator Invests $150k in VRee To Give You Full Body Virtual Reality Experiences with CEO Andy Lurling
Andy Lürling and his business partner, Menno Bischops. Andy has over 15 years of experience in the startup world and is truly a serial entrepreneur. He has tons of experience in corporate and the corporate environment including strategy, business development and product development in entertaining and series gaming, VR, AR and online applications. He and Menno are working on a company called VRee. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Exponential Organization - Andy What CEO do you follow? – Andy Lürling Favorite online tool? — Google Maps and Google Docs Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Go for it—just do it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:21 – Nathan introduces Andy and Menno to the show 02:05 – LUMO Labs is a 2-year accelerator 03:30 – LUMO labs is all capital at this point 04:27 – The size of the funds that LUMO Labs has contributed 05:08 – The number of investment rounds LUMO Labs has made 05:20 – Official launch of LUMO Labs 06:30 – Menno shares what VRee does 07:00 – The full-body VR experience 07:26 – The VR suits, headset and goggles are wireless 08:05 – It is like augmented laser tag 08:42 – VRee also offers e-sports 09:18 – The capital VRee has raised 09:50 – The grant is non-dilutive 10:05 – Menno shares how they earn from VRee 10:29 – VRee is currently showcasing what their platform can offer 10:43 – VRee has revenue, but it’s not substantial yet 11:11 – VRee is usually used in pop-up events 11:30 – VRee is in current talks with VR arcades for permanent installation 12:42 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Accelerators is a great avenue for startups to get going. You may have to start small and that may mean intermittent revenue. Just go for it, take courage and just do it! Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/20/2017 • 17 minutes, 52 seconds
EP 603: Velasca Has Sold 20,000 Italian Shoes to 15,000 Men, $1.6m 2016 Revenue, $750k Raised with CEO Enrico Casati
Enrico Casati. He is the co-founder and CEO Velasca, a company that specializes in handcrafted shoes. Enrico is based in Milan, Italy. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 4-Hour Workweek What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Adabra Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Know your audience before doing anything business related” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:43 – Nathan introduces Enrico to the show 02:03 – Velasca is an online brand focused on hand-crafted shoes 02:26 – Velasca was self-funded and had a VC round 02:39 – Velasca had raised €750K 03:01 – It was an equity round 03:18 – Enrico’s dad was an entrepreneur but not a shoe maker 03:31 – Enrico shares how the idea of Velasca started 03:51 – It was 4 years ago when Enrico started Velasca 04:34 – Enrico shares about one of their products 04:52 – The source of the raw materials 05:30 – The cost to make the Artista shoes 05:52 – 2.4 markup 06:47 – Net margin 06:52 – Depends on the marketing budget you want to spend 06:59 – High growth pace 07:32 – “We invest so much on marketing” 08:10 – Velasca has spent €20K on marketing in January 2017 08:38 – Enrico had the first idea of Velasca in the summer of 2012 08:52 – The first collection on their website was launched in May 2013 09:25 – The first year was about the testing 09:34 – Since September 2014, Velasca has grown in people 09:43 – Current team size is 10 09:54 – Around 15K customers have bought from Velasca 10:17 – Average check out value 10:50 – Customer repurchase rate 11:52 – CAC 12:00 – LTV 12:10 – “The lifetime is really worth the cost we’re spending” 12:45 – Velasca has sold around 20K pairs of shoes 12:56 – Velasca’s best-seller is the Black Oxford 13:16 – “Versatility is what makes the shoes’ 14:00 – First year revenue is €60K 14:04 - €200K the second year 14:08 - €1.6M the third year 14:43 – Topline revenue 15:25 – Enrico’s goal is to reach €4M 16:06 – Enrico spends more on paid advertising 18:08 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Study your product, first, before putting it in public. Invest paid marketing that performs well. Your relationship with your customers will reflect on your customer retention. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/19/2017 • 21 minutes, 33 seconds
EP 602: Findo Raises $7M, Passes 80k Users, 700 Pay $10 to Use AI to Find Their Files Quickly with CEO Gary Fowler
Gary Fowler. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Findo, a smart search across multiple platforms for email, files, and folders. Gary has over 23 years of startup experience and is an award-winning CEO, a senior executive, a speaker with over 7 technologies startup and a successful IPO for the company CKSW. Gary is known as the go-to startup CEO that gets stuff done. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Never If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Gary wished he could look back and spend more time getting deeply involved with his first startup Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Gary to the show 02:08 – Gary shares what Findo is 02:15 – The challenge that we have nowadays is the large, vast amount of information that we have 02:25 – An average person has around 3000 items 02:58 – “We’re an AI tool, so it’s learning all the time” 03:15 – Findo has a monthly subscription model 03:23 – Advance is $499/month and ultimate is $999/month 03:48 – Average customer pay per month 04:01 – Findo was founded by David Yang who built 9 startups including ABBYY 04:21 – Gary was the co-founder and CEO for the US corporation 04:36 – Gary shares why they had to spin out ABBYY 05:05 – Gary bought the IP from ABBYY 05:33 – Gary shares how they found the person who did their independent evaluation 06:08 – Average cost of buying the IP 06:19 – Gary shares where they got their capital 06:36 – Gary has raised $7M 06:45 – Gary is currently on seed 2 06:51 – Gary’s major seed contributors 07:40 – Gary shares why they call their current round, seed 2 08:38 – Gary had an equity priced round 08:56 – Findo was launched in April 2016 09:06 – Gary started the most successful accelerator, GVA LaunchGurus, in Russia, prior to Findo 09:31 – 60% of the companies have raised money 10:04 – Gary raised capital to fund the accelerator 10:58 – None of the companies have exited yet 11:25 – Gary shares why he left GVA LaunchGurus for Findo 12:00 – Team size is 26 12:22 – Why Gary chose the people from Europe 13:10 – Findo just came out of beta 13:15 – Findo has over 80K customers 13:19 – Percentage of paying customers 14:15 – Average MRR 14:25 – Findo is currently moving into the model of reason strategy 14:50 – Gross customer churn 15:10 – Between 5-10%, but most come back 16:15 – The problem that 12% of the population have 17:13 – CAC 18:58 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a solution to the most common problem. Follow your intuition when it it’s time to make a move. Your contributors play a big role to your company’s growth—make sure they are suited to you and your company. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/18/2017 • 22 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 601: TapChief Passes 75,000 Minutes Of Experts Teaching Students, $150k Raised, Team of 10 with 23 yo CEO Shashank Murali
Shashank Murali. He’s a BITS Pilani alumni. He’s a co-founder and CEO at TapChief – a platform to seek advice from industry professionals. Previously, he built and sold Edvice, an on-demand tutoring app, to HashLearn. He had a product for Hashlearn before he decided to set on a path to democratize knowledge sharing with TapChief. Apart from startups and tech, Shashank enjoys cricket, psychedelic music, and swears by Pink Floyd. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Everything Store What CEO do you follow? – Vijay Shekhar Sharma Favorite online tool? – Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To persist more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Shashank to the show 02:11 – Shashank shares what TapChief is 02:25 – TapChief charges from the expert’s pay 02:36 – TapChief is similar to Clarity.fm 02:44 – Shashank shares how TapChief is different from Clarity 03:14 – TapChief has a various of offerings 03:25 – TapChief is a marketplace 03:39 – The 2 sides of TapChief: 03:45 – Experts ask for a consultation charge and TapChief gets a fee from that 04:30 – Experts monetize their knowledge using TapChief 05:33 – Average order size 06:14 – Shashank believes that their market would still grow 06:40 – TapChief was launched in a B2C play 07:07 – TapChief takes 20% from the experts’ charges 07:21 – Average number of experts in the platform 07:31 – TapChief was launched in February 2016 07:48 – Average number of students who have purchased from TapChief 08:28 – TapChief is giving the experts options to present themselves better 09:05 – 1000 out of 5000 experts in TapChief had conversations already 09:31 – Shashank shares how they measure their growth 09:58 – What Shashank primarily measures 10:16 – TapChief has raised $150K with a team of 10 10:40 – The number of hours TapChief has crossed 10:50 – Average monthly minutes of interactions 11:25 – Shashank shares how they leverage the number of students 12:25 – Revenue goal for 2017 12:42 – Shashank’s focus is on the number of minutes of interactions 13:02 – Shashank’s plan is to grow the number of minutes 14:10 – Shashank is open to B2B collaborations 14:45 – Shashank explains why a business would pay for collaboration 15:18 – Where the majority of the revenue is coming from 15:46 – 2016 total revenue 16:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: We are experts in our own field and there are platforms where you can monetize your knowledge. You don’t always have to focus on the revenue—there are metrics that should be considered. Be more persistent—especially in the things that are most important to you. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/17/2017 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 600: Konversai Raises $1.3M Helping 800 Teachers Make Money With Marketplace CEO Sushma Sharma
Sushma Sharma, the CEO of Konversai. She’s a lawyer turned entrepreneur. She has law degrees from The University of Oxford and Columbia University and has worked in two prominent Wall Street law firms and set up a department of practical law at City University of Hong Kong. Sushma has taught thousands of students and seen some the most privileged humans as well as some of the least privileged in her life journey spanning 3 continents to where she has lived and worked over the last 15 years. Konversai was born as her solution to the problems facing mankind today. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t doubt yourself and just keep doing what you’re doing. There’s a time and place for everything” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:30 – Nathan introduces Sushma to the show 03:19 – Konversai is a social conversation platform 03:28 – Sushma shares the types of conversations in Konversai 04:43 – Konversai’s focus is the knowledge from personal experience 04:21 – Sushma’s philosophy is “nothing valuable is free” 04:25 – Konversai has a credit system 04:33 – The charge is .50 cents for one month for creating a box in Konversai 04:54 – “I want to make people feel accountable for what they’re putting up” 05:25 – Sushma shares how they make revenue from a paid conversation 06:09 – Konversai gets 10% from the amount paid 06:36 – The seeker is the one who pays the service 07:02 – There are 2 sides of the business: the seeker and the provider 07:22 – Konversai has under a thousand current providers 08:00 – The number of buyers 08:19 – Sushma’s target was to get the providers as well as the buyers, too 08:40 – The traction has been quite slow 09:21 – Sushma explains why they have to use Stripe 09:25 – Konversai is a global company and the currency has to be considered 10:02 – Some users are quite hesitant to fill out the Stripe sign-up form 11:10 – Konversai is only 3 months old 11:40 – Konversai has raised $1.3M in a seed round, in November 12:20 – It is a convertible note/safe 12:42 – Average order value 13:30 – Current revenue 13:46 – “It is growing every month” 15:21 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Nothing valuable is free. The way you win is by doing things consistently. Don’t doubt yourself and keep doing what you’re doing—there’s a time and place for everything. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/16/2017 • 18 minutes, 54 seconds
EP 599: Taivaco Helps Brands FInd Old Offline Content to Digitize and Annotate With $50K Raised, CEO Michael Kaplan
Michael Kaplan. He’s the CEO and founder of Taivaco which is a media technology company. He’s also the former director of marketing at Sanyo and was appointed at San Francisco Water Bay Front Committee. Michael speaks Chinese, French and Japanese. He attended The University of Redlands, Waseda University in Tokyo, George Mason University and Chinese Culture University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – It’s Not My Department What CEO do you follow? – John Cleese and Ken Okuyama Favorite online tool? — Any.do Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The more you listen to other people, the more success finds you” and “Be a nice person” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Michael to the show 02:07 – Michael shares why January 20th is a special day 03:15 – Taivaco was set out to solve an invisible problem and ended up solving more problems 03:47 – An archive isn’t an accurate description 03:50 – Organizations are struggling to manage their media 04:17 – One of Taivaco’s original ideas was to digitize media 05:08 – Taivaco helps companies find their content within their media or discover what DAM (Digital Asset Management) software does 05:50 – Taivaco incorporates both software and manual work 06:01 – “This is not a software that we sell, this is a service that we do” 06:15 – Taivaco is a service-only company 06:26 – Taivaco was launched in 2016 06:33 – Taivaco is currently on pre-revenue 06:49 – Taivaco has done under 10K in pre-revenue 07:00 – Taivaco version 1.0 will be available in April 07:12 – Taivaco was originally self-funded 07:20 – Michael put in 20K in Taivaco 07:27 – Taivaco just closed their “seedling” round for less than 50K 07:43 – Long term plan is to have another round 07:56 – Michael shares how they actually make a sale 08:32 – Sabra Design is one of Taivaco’s paying customers 08:39 – Sabra Design came to Taivaco to ask for their service 09:04 – Taivaco got less than a thousand for the job 09:10 – Taivaco has already reached out to potential clients to scale up 10:17 – Michael explains why it is taking them more time to close a deal 10:50 – Taivaco doesn’t specialize in digitizing and they do it for a minimal cost 11:23 – Taivaco annotates content which nobody has done before 12:12 – Michael shares their annotation process 12:46 – The charge for annotation will depend on the volume 13:20 – Taivaco will have a subscription model for the annotation 14:10 – Taivaco’s goal is to make their service as easy and possible for their clients 15:34 – Taivaco is making money through annotation 16:27 – The metrics that Taivaco is measuring in pricing 17:09 – “We have to provide the whole thing” 18:21 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Try to solve one problem and you might end up solving more problems. Do something that is new in the market to stand apart. Take things at your own pace and don’t rush. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/15/2017 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 598: Fidzup Riases $3.7M, Helping 2500 Retail Locations Track In Store Visits From Advertising, 25 Team with CEO Olivier Magnan-Saurin
Olivier Magnan-Saurin. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Fidzup which provides innovation retargeting solutions for brick-and-mortar businesses such as retail chains and shopping centers. Olivier founded Fidzup right after school, in between school, and a little bit of freelancing works. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – On M'Avait Dit Que C'Etait Impossible: Le Manifeste Du Fondateur de Criteo What CEO do you follow? – Jean-Baptiste Rudelle Favorite online tool? — Pipedrive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Create your own company” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Olivier to the show 01:42 – Fidzup provides marketing platforms for physical retailers 02:04 – For physical retailers, clicks don’t have any value 02:25 – Fidzup sells advertising campaigns to retailers 02:38 – Fidzup is a CPC model and gets paid for every in-store visit 03:20 – Fidzup is currently working with 2500 retailers in Europe 03:43 – Fidzup was created in 2011 03:58 – In 2014, Olivier decided to start an advertising platform 04:11 – Fidzup tracks the retailer using Wi-Fi or sensor 04:57 – Fidzup is able to track 80% of the customers entering the store 05:16 – Olivier shares how they get the customer’s phone information 05:56 – When a customer opens an online ad, they can track that customer 06:43 – Average online campaign cost per brand 07:20 – Fidzup buys CPM and sells CPE 08:00 – Fidzup has recently raised $3.7M 08:39 – Team size 08:50 – Olivier hopes to double their team size 09:00 – First year revenue 09:50 – 2016 total revenue 10:04 – Average annual pay per customer 11:00 – Ad volume per year 11:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Online advertisement is not always valuable to brick-and-mortar businesses, these businesses still rely on physical advertisement. Be patient with yourself and your company—growth takes time. If you’re in stuck between joining a company or creating your own, choose the latter. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/14/2017 • 17 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 597: Nova.ai Passes 100 Customers, $2.2M Raised To Help SDR's Sell More Using AI with CEO Will Dinkel
Will Dinkel. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Nova. Prior to founding Nova, Will developed his passion for enterprise sales while working in various technology and sales roles at CloudFlare and HP. Will studied engineering in Harvard Business School. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Presenting to Win What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kimmel Favorite online tool? – Apple Notes Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “I try” If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish my 20-year old self was more ambitious” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Will to the show 02:08 – Nova AI is a sales product that uses AI to help set appointments more effectively 02:25 – Nova helps sales reps, they don’t necessarily get leads 02:52 – Nova creates personalized emails and merged templates 03:08 – Nova charges per seat 03:30 – “What we do is very unique” 03:39 – Nova is a smart, workflow product 04:08 – Average pay per seat is $150 04:28 – Nova started in 2015 05:01 – Nova’s co-founder is from MIT 05:15 – Team size 05:40 – Will shares how it’s like in San Francisco 06:00 – Nova has raised $2.2M 06:20 – Salesforce Ventures is one of Nova’s investors 06:54 – The space is getting bigger and bigger 07:15 – Will shares why he raised and went to YC 07:50 – Nova just crossed 100 customers 08:10 – Average seat number per customer 08:40 – Nova is now looking into a bigger number of seats per customer 08:55 – Nova has around a thousand sales reps using them 09:15 – Will’s focus is to make sure the team is functioning well 10:20 – Average MRR 10:45 – Growth rate target in 2017 10:51 – Will is looking into adding additional people to the team, 3 per class 11:51 – Nova uses their own wrinkle for SDR 12:10 – Gross customer churn 12:35 – People are mostly happy with Nova 12:55 – Nova’s paid marketing 13:47 – How do you beat a company like Yesware? 14:05 – Focus on what you do best and don’t get dragged into trying to do everything that everyone else does 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on what YOU do best—you will lose when you focus on what others are doing. Offer something unique and it will make you stand out amongst the crowd. Be ambitious, act sooner than later. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/13/2017 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
EP 596: ClaimCompass Has Helped 1000 Airline Passengers Get $420 Each Back From Airlines for Cancelled Tickets and Lost Items with CEO Tatyana Mitkova
Tatyana Mitkova. She’s the CEO and founder of ClaimCompass, a company that helps airline passengers submit a claim online for cancelled, delayed or overbooked flights. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Kathryn Minshew Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Her life is to become more and more interesting with every decision she makes that takes her out of her comfort zone” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Tatyana to the show 01:42 – ClaimCompass get airlines to pay up to $680 for cancelled flights 01:51 – Flights could be delayed, cancelled or overbooked 02:05 – ClaimCompass can help you get paid for your lost baggage 02:13 – ClaimCompass is based on the regulations in Europe 02:29 – More than 90% of airline passengers are unaware of their rights 02:46 – ClaimCompass tries to speed up the claiming process for passengers 02:49 – ClaimCompass has a web app and passengers can submit a claim online 03:03 – ClaimCompass makes money by keeping a 25% success-based commission 03:25 – ClaimCompass is growing 75% month over month, in the last 3 months 03:39 – In January, ClaimCompass will reach a thousand claims 03:43 – Average claim refund is $420 03:58 – Average MRR 04:11 – ClaimCompass has their own internal software for their claims management system 04:36 – ClaimCompass has established relationships with more than 50 airlines 04:55 – Team size 05:24 – ClaimCompass was launched, in 2016, as a side project 05:48 – Tatyana and the co-founders have their own stories about getting frustrated with an airline 06:04 – Tatyana has a legal background 06:24 – ClaimCompass was bootstrapped and got into the 500 Startups program, in Europe, 2 months ago 06:40 – ClaimCompass has raised $150K 07:02 – Plans for 2017 07:10 – “Our goal is to reach as many passengers as possible” 07:50 – CAC 08:20 – ClaimCompass’ paid ads expenses are increasing 08:53 – ClaimCompass had their demo day on the 15th of February at the 500 Startups program 09:00 – Tatyana believes they will have their seed round in 6 months 09:51 – Tatyana is looking to raise a million in their next round 10:12 – One of ClaimCompass’ biggest competitors is AirHelp 11:00 – Tatyana believes that if they partnered with online travel agencies, they can reach more people 11:18 – Flight Right and Refund.me are some of ClaimCompass’ competitors, too 11:31 – Some of ClaimCompass competitors’ business models can make you lose money 13:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: More than 90% of airline passengers are unaware of their rights – we should know our rights to make an appropriate claim. Not all business models are the same – study the company first, to be aware of the charges. Every step out of your comfort zone, leads to something far more interesting for you. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/12/2017 • 16 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 595: nDreams is #1 VR Application Creator, 250,000 Sold, $6M in Funding with CEO Patrick O'Luanaigh
Nathan interviews Patrick O'Luanaigh. He started as a programmer and designer at Codemasters 20 years ago, working on micro machines V3. Prior to founding nDreams, in 2006, he was a creative director at Eidos where he was responsible for the design and gameplay of all the titles there including the well-known Tomb Raider Legend and Hitman Blood Money. nDreams is now 50 people strong and pivoted to solely focusing on virtual reality 3 years ago. nDreams has launched 6 VR titles to date. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Chimp Paradox What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Brendan Iribe Favorite online tool? — Box Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Life is too short to play it safe, you gotta take your risk. It’s so much more exciting even though it is scary, you just gotta do it. Be brave!” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Patrick to the show 02:07 – The greatest challenge of VR (virtual reality) at the moment is the limited number of hardware available 02:16 – “We are still figuring out how to make the very best games in the experience of VR” 02:36 – nDreams’ game that has generated the most income is Perfect Beach 03:02 – nDreams’ key metric is the number of units sold 03:18 – nDreams has sold 250K units 03:49 – nDreams has 50 people in the team 03:56 – Ideas come from anyone in the studio 04:05 – They work with the best idea and do an estimate 04:25 – There’s a lot of things to learn in VR 04:30 – nDreams focuses on gameplay 04:49 – Perfect can be purchased on Google Play Store or your VR digital store 05:16 – Mobile version currently costs $2.99 05:20 – The high-end version costs around $7.99 05:40 – nDreams has earned 75K from Perfect 05:50 – The challenge of PlayStation VR is the price 06:06 – Patrick has not heard of other competitors who have sold as much VR as they have 06:44 – It’s hard to tell the total potential basis for the VR space 07:00 – Patrick started the company 10 years ago 07:36 – nDreams was bootstrapped but they raised capital for VR 08:06 – nDreams has raised around $6M 08:14 – Patrick started the business even before the start of the VR market 08:41 – 2016 top line revenue 09:30 – Patrick can predict which games will do well even when they’re still early in the market 09:43 – nDreams is trying out different games and genres 09:53 – “We’re in the stage of learning what works well” 10:08 – In nDreams’ released games, SkyDIEving is the only one that’s for free 10:48 – Perfect Beach was from an experiment 11:08 – Gunner’s expenses 11:45 – nDreams is launching more games this year 12:30 – Patrick shares where most people are buying their games 13:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Being in a space that is new can be challenging because of the limited data and resources. You learn in every process you take . Life is too short to play it safe—be brave and take those risks! Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/11/2017 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 594: Klipfolio Raises $12M on $45M+ PreMoney Valuation with 7000 Customers, $500k+ in MRR Helping With Business Dashboards with CEO ALlan Wille
Allan Wille. He was on The Top on December 12, 2016, Episode 506. His company, Klipfolio, raised $7.9M in the past and has grown to 7000 paying customers. They create dashboard software for companies who want to monitor their business processes. Klipfolio is into something incredible, tune in as Allan shares about it on today’s episode. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – What CEO do you follow? – Favorite online tool? — Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:22 – Nathan introduces Allan to the show 02:52 – Klipfolio is an online and cloud based, and they create real-time dashboard software for SMBs 03:03 – There are over 7000 companies globally who uses Klipfolio 03:15 – Klipfolio just had a $12M Series B raise 03:33 – Klipfolio has a total of $19.9M total raised 03:41 – Klipfolio already has good investors in their cap table 03:56 – Allan shares how he came up with the Series B 04:19 – The initial intent was to bring in new investors 04:30 – Things turned out differently from the initial intent 04:47 – RPU 04:55 – MRR 05:02 – 2017 MRR goal 05:52 – Klipfolio licenses per number of dashboards 06:25 – Allan wants customers to see Klipfolio’s value first 06:35 – CAC 07:20 – LTV 07:33 – Team size 08:00 – Klipfolio believes in product first policy 08:21 – Most of the investment will go into Klipfolio’s product 08:35 – Allan shares where they spend most of their CAC 09:00 – Klipfolio will add more people in sales and support 09:13 – “We’re actually gonna put a lot of effort in content strategy” 09:37 – Allan is friends with Craig Fitzpatrick from Pagecloud, who talks about content marketing, too 10:26 – Allan wants the system to be more efficient to maximize user experience 10:44 – Allan was able to get a great valuation 11:06 – Allan shares how things happened during the valuation 12:23 – Allan shares the offer he received 12:55 – The questions Allan had before accepting the offer 13:30 – The first offer was a low-ball 15:03 – “In many cases, terms are probably more important than valuation—multiple or the actual preimposed” 15:54 – “We got to basically where we wanted to be” 16:35 – Allan was happy with the terms 16:45 – One of the terms is 1x multiple 17:14 – The other term includes an anti-dilution clause 18:20 – Nathan closing the episode 3 Key Points: There are cases where terms are more important than valuation. Content strategy plays a big role in marketing – invest in it. Go in the direction you want to be. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/10/2017 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
EP 593: XOR Data Announcing $2m Funding Round Live, Invested $800k Before Any Revenue with CEO Mike Cook
Mike Cook. He founded XOR Data Exchange to bring privacy and accountability back to data management. Today, his organization works with the nation’s largest financial institutions to fight fraud and manage risk. You might have never seen Mike presenting the newest consumer tech, but rest assured every digital entity in America is safer under his watchful eye. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Sam Yagan Favorite online tool? — Periscope Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That you should go to anger management” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Mike to the show 02:10 – Mike mentions how XOR Data Exchange works 02:54 – Mike wanted to create a company where financial institutions can share their data with one another 03:16 – XOR Data Exchange is a B2B model 03:21 – XOR Data Exchange will eventually help consumers 04:04 – Mike shares how XOR Data Exchange will work in between companies 04:31 – Companies like AIG and JP Chase Morgan store data 05:32 – XOR Data Exchange changes the mentality of the pipe 06:25 – XOR Data Exchange generates revenue by building pre-exchanges 07:17 – XOR Data Exchange charges transaction fees based on return data 07:38 – XOR Data Exchange is a pay-as-you-go model 07:43 – XOR Data Exchange is building a new exchange focusing on financial services companies where companies can exchange fraud information 08:10 – XOR Data Exchange was launched in January 2014 08:20 – First year revenue is nothing 08:27 – Mike put in his own money in XOR Data Exchange 08:34 – Mike sold his company ID Analytics to fund XOR Data Exchange 08:40 – Mike sold ID Analytics in 2012, which he started in 2000 08:56 – Mike was 17 when he started ID Analytics 09:15 – Mike had 2 other co-founders 09:26 – Mike tried to work in a big company after his exit 09:56 – Mike has raised $6M and will close $2M, today 10:53 – The last round was in August 2015 11:22 – Most of the money from the current round is from the previous investors 11:36 – Mike shares about his Angel investors 12:40 – “Raising a Series B in this environment is not the easiest thing to do” 12:51 – Mike explains what he means by this 13:20 – XOR Data Exchange is working with big customers 13:45 – “If you work with the top 6, 7, 8 financial services companies, you’re really covering 90% of America” 14:05 – XOR Data Exchange has dozens of companies 14:23 – Team size 14:26 – XOR Data Exchange is not yet cashflow positive 15:05 – 2017 goal 15:25 – Most of the XOR Data Exchange employees are tech and based in Austin 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Reinvest your money in something that you believe in. The financial service space isn’t the easiest environment to raise a Series B. If you work with the top 6, 7, or 8 financial services companies, you’re really covering 90% of America. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/9/2017 • 20 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 592: Bugsee Raises $1.2M Launches Pricing to Help You Know Why Your Mobile App Crashes with CEO Alex Fishman
Alex Fishman, the founder and CEO of Bugsee, a bug reporting tool for iOs and Android. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Henry Worth Favorite online tool? – Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—I wish If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "You want start playing in the startup ecosystem as early as possible when you have less commitments and less things to worry about" Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 01:31 – Bugsee is bug reporting tool for iOs and Android 01:51 – Bugsee provides video network and blog, leading out to the event 02:15 – You will not only know that the app crashed, but what led it to crash 02:50 – Bugsee is a SaaS model and they price based on the app size 03:19 – For an app that has 500K users, it will cost $500 03:40 – Bugsee provides different levels of value 04:33 – Average customer pay per month 04:45 – Bugsee started in January 2016 05:01 – Bugsee started charging in December 2016 05:20 – Bugsee has 1100 sign ups and 30% have used Bugsee 06:22 – Alex mentions why he calls users as customers, too 06:40 – Most customers are given free tier to continue using Bugsee 07:11 – New customers use the plan available 07:30 – The limitations of Bugsy's free plan 08:52 – Number of paying customers 09:20 – Bugsee is funded by K9 Ventures 09:33 – Bugsee has raised $1.2M 09:40 – Bugsee had a previous failed attempt 09:53 – The cap table had been reset by Bugsee 10:43 – The previous attempt was in July 2015 10:57 – Team size 11:05 – The team is remote 11:24 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Users are also customers, regardless of whether you sell them on something or not. Having a failed attempt does NOT mean you should give up. Start playing in startup field as early as possible and while you're still free of obligations. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/8/2017 • 14 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 591: Now Interact Closes $5M Round On $18M Pre Money Helping Enterprises With OmniChannel Data with CEO Magnus Astrom
Magnus Åström. He's the CEO and founder of Now Interact, a machine-learning, SaaS platform for omni channel optimization. He's also the founder of InLead, a business consultant and operations company which was sold in 2010 and prior to that, he was founder of Primelog, a transportation management SaaS platform which was sold in 2006. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Blue Ocean Strategy What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "It's all about focus" Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces to the show 02:17 – Primelog started in 2000 02:29 - Primelog connects transportation providers with transportation buyers 02:57 - Annual revenue 03:10 – Primelog was sold to Swedish group 04:44 – They raised 4.5M 04:57 – Inlead's idea is to help customers sell in C-level 05:39 – Inlead turned out to be too heavy on the consultancy side, so Magnus sold it 05:48 – It didn't turn out as a software play 06:10 – Inlead's annual revenue was $1.5 M 06:27 – Now Interact offers machine-based algorithm software to large businesses 06:40 – The software personalizes how each customer is offered a customer service channel 07:00 – Businesses get less calls from customer service 07:30 – Now Interact tracks the data of how customers behave on a website and how they interact with a customer service 08:06 – Magnus goal is to get telco giants like AT&T and Verizon as customers 09:04 – Now Interact has a group that chooses their customization 09:22 – Now Interact is a SaaS model 09:31 – Average customer pay per month is $10K 09:39 – Now Interact was founded in 2010 09:45 – Now Interact raised $100K in 2012 10:46 – Now Interact has raised a total of $7M 11:20 – Customer churn 11:31 – Team size 11:47 – Headquartered in Stockholm 12:04 – CAC is $30K 12:22 – Now Interact has salespeople and are doing paid content marketing 12:58 – "Sales play a lot" 13:30 – Magnus discusses what they’ll do with the capital they've raised 13:45 – Some would go to the expansion in the USA 14:05 – 2015 total revenue 14:30 – 2016 total revenue 15:00 – Magnus shared how he negotiated for the valuation 15:45 – The top 3 most important terms when negotiating 15:48 – The preference structure, the lock-in and the investors you want to have 18:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can choose to close your company if it is not going in the direction you intended it to go. Valuation is not always everything—there are more things to consider when negotiating. Stay focused, don't take on more than you can handle. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/7/2017 • 21 minutes, 24 seconds
EP 590 :Particle.io Raises $14M, Passes $5M In Revenue, Helping Usher in IoT Connecting Keurigs to Internet with CEO Zach Supalla
Zach Supalla. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Particle, a venture backed startup that’s making it easier to build internet connected hardware and other things. Particle is the most, widely used IoT platform with a developed community of a hundred thousand users and is listed as one of Fast Company's Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in 2015, of the Internet of Things. Zach has been featured on CNN, The Wall street Journal, TechCrunch, Fast Company, Forbes, Fortune, Mashable and more. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Lawson Favorite online tool? — Slack and Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You don’t have to be an engineer to be an engineer” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Zach to the show 02:16 – Zach used to be a management consultant 02:45 – While Zach was doing his MBA, he interned in Groupon’s sales operation 03:07 – Zach did engineering 03:21 – Particle is an IoT platform 03:44 – Particle helps manufacturers connect their physical product to the internet 04:11 – Particle does the whole communication stack between the physical device and web 04:40 – Particle has raised $10M 04:50 – Particle generates revenue in 4 ways 04:55 – Particle works with large companies and sells them subscriptions, data plans, hardware, and professional services 05:24 – Main revenue stream is from the hardware 05:54 – Hardware pricing ranges from $5-50 06:09 – For Keurig, they added hardware to plug into the back of the coffee maker 06:45 – The hardware volume for Keurig is in the thousands 07:00 – Particle has customers who will be deploying millions of hardware products by 2018 07:28 – Security is part of Particle’s story 07:37 – Zach shares about the webcam botnet incident 08:09 – The Mirai botnet in Liberia explained 08:32 – Zach shares how Particle works to secure everything from the device to the in between communication 08:50 – Typical, cheap webcams that are in the market and manufactured in China are not secure 09:23 – There are products that people aren’t unplugging and are considered unsecure 09:45 – Particle started in 2012 09:59 – Zach first launched a product in Kickstarter named Spark Socket 10:07 – The product was unsuccessful 10:21 – It was frustrating, but it turned to be a huge benefit 10:51 – Zach relaunched a new product in Kickstarter, in 2013, called Spark Core 11:20 – Zach was inspired by his dad who is deaf to create the first product 12:20 – Zach shares what is important in launching a Kickstarter campaign 12:28 – Zach looks at any Kickstarter campaign as an experiment 12:33 – Zach made sure that they nailed the marketing on their first launch 13:43 – “We’re definitely advocates of the lean startup mentality” 14:13 – 2013 revenue 14:41 – 2014 revenue 15:43 – Zach shares where the scale is coming from 15:58 – When Zach launched the product, they weren’t targeting enterprise stores 16:28 – Zach was originally creating development tools then shifted to management tools 16:43 – The growth started in selling deaf kits 17:00 – They started making modules, then the software platform 17:26 – One of the challenges a hardware startup faces is going from being a product to a company 17:56 – 2017 revenue goal 18:08 – Team size is 35 18:21 – Half of the team is from San Francisco and the other half are all over 18:50 – Particle is not facing a problem yet with their people who work in China 19:03 – Zach created a program while he was in China, where he lived for 4 months 19:22 – Zach has a deep trusting relationship with their people in China 21:14 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Solve your own problems and make the people around you, your inspiration. See the beauty in a failure – it can be a way for you to create something better. One of the most difficult challenges a hardware startup faces is going from being a product to a company. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/6/2017 • 24 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 589: HeptIo Growing Kubernetes Adoption With $8.5M Raised From Accel with Founder Craig McLuckie
Craig McLuckie. He’s the founder and CEO of Heptio, a startup focused on making Kubernetes accessible enterprises. Prior to starting Heptio, Craig was a product manager at Google where he founded the Kubernetes project, launched Google compute engine and created The Cloud Native Computing Foundation that he also shared. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Andrew Grove Favorite online tool? — Lever Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wished my 20-year old self understood the importance of kindness” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Craig to the show 01:55 – Kubernetes is a technology that is used to run applications in a production setting 02:16 – The idea is to take the collective learning that Google instilled over the last decade of building and running applications 02:35 – Kubernetes is an open-source technology 02:53 – Kubernetes is being widely adopted by enterprises but there are still some gaps 03:16 – Heptio‘s job is to make Kubernetes more accessible to a broad array of developers 03:47 – Heptio generates revenue through support, training and professional service and consultancy 04:25 – Heptio is currently on pre-product revenue 04:50 – By providing Heptio’s professional service, they connect with customers and understand where the key gaps are 05:12 – Heptio has raised $8.5M 05:20 – The people backing Heptio 06:17 – Nathan simplifies Kubernetes’ description 07:50 – Craig explains how Kubernetes actually works in applications 09:07 – Heptio wants to present the perfect idea of how machines should be operating 09:23 – Kubernetes provided the steps from thinking about virtual infrastructure to logical infrastructure 09:49 – At Heptio, they bring the idea of logical infrastructure to companies everywhere so they can experience a better way to decode without worrying about the difficult task of configuring 10:22 – Heptio also helps companies organize themselves around the technology 10:53 – It is like helping people stack the bricks of technology 11:58 – John and Craig started Kubernetes in Google and they had successes in the past 12:20 – Craig demonstrated clearly the product market fit for Kubernetes so they were able to raise $8.5M 12:40 – Craig has spent time with the community 13:10 – Craig quantifies the adoption of Kubernetes 13:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Kubernetes is an open source technology that is used to run applications in a production setting. Demonstrating your product’s market CLEARLY can lead to investors believing and trusting your product. Remember the importance of being kind. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/5/2017 • 17 minutes, 58 seconds
EP 588: Zirra Raises $3M, Hits $50k MRR Helping You Get Company Data with CEO Aner Ravon
Aner Ravon. He’s the co-founder and chief product officer of his new company called Zirra. Zirra’s mission is to solve the education and entry pain of the retail investors when it comes to equity investments. Before this company, Aner spent his time at Celltick as a VP of media and head of business unit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Tipping Point What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Ask Wonder Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Not to worry so much” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:42 – Nathan introduces Aner to the show 02:58 – Zirra steps into the void between data and excel analysis of the companies 03:10 – There’s a big void in the data collection and actual decision making of a company for the people who want to invest 03:48 – Zirra is a service 03:52 – Zirra has an a la carte system which is pay-as-you-go 03:55 – Zirra has 2 main products 03:58 – Spotlight reports which costs $49 04:11 – Value packages for corporate investors which is a monthly subscription 04:29 – Average customer pay is $99 monthly 05:05 – Zirra started in August 2014 05:30 – Zirra first offered their services for free 05:45 – Aner shares how they decided to stop the free service 06:01 – Zirra had 150 free users 06:13 – Some of the free users are large equity firms 06:23 – Zirra started in Israel 06:35 – Microsoft was using ZIrra heavily, for free 07:00 – 80% of the free users converted to paid users 07:20 – Zirra managed the free service with free coupons 07:41 – Zirra didn’t take away the credits, but started renewing them 07:48 – When users use up their credits, they’ll be greeted with a pay wall 08:05 – Zirra’s paywall: pay $49 to get the report or buy 10 reports for $299 08:40 – Zirra’s revenue comes from pay-as-you-go and monthly subscriptions 09:10 – 15 customers are on monthly subscriptions 09:20 – 40-50 of the customers are habitual users 10:35 – Another product Zirra offers is deep report which sells from $1K-3K 11:45 – Team size is 15 12:39 – Zirra is based in Telavi, Israel 12:49 – Zirra has raised capital and closed almost $3M 13:19 – Zirra is founding new investors without going through another round because of their current Angel investors 13:51 – 2016 revenue 13:55 – 2017 goal revenue 14:28 – There are currently a hundred thousand companies in Zirra 14:55 – Zirra can deliver the report in just a few hours 15:30 – Zirra has 85 different data sources 16:09 – The resources are running through ZIrra’s search engine 17:12 – Zirra’s vision 18:19 – Aner thinks PitchBook and CB Insights are great services 18:28 – Zirra’s ability to storify the data makes them different from their competitors 20:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Having access to and understand the data of the company will help inform that decision to invest. Shifting from a free service to paid is risky move, but needs to be done. Don’t worry too much—it won’t do very much for you in the end. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/4/2017 • 23 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 587: Revue Raises $350k, Helping 1000 Customers Send Personal Newsletters with CEO Martijn De Kuijper
Martijn de Kuijper, founder of Revue. He’s a product guy and his company’s focus is to get your thoughts to people’s inboxes via newsletters. He previously founded Fosbury and Yunoo. Martijn is also a Techstars alum. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just keep doing what you’re doing and don’t get distracted by what other people are saying” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Martijn to the show 02:10 – Revue focuses on personal newsletters like editorial newsletters 02:45 – Revue helps people share their content through newsletters 02:50 – Revue currently has a free and premium model 03:20 – Average customer pay per month is $7 03:45 – Martijn is a listener of The Top 04:10 – Revue was launched in January 2015 04:27 – Martijn started Revue on his own as a side project 04:30 – Martijn was working on the acquisition of Fosbury 04:59 – Martijn shares what Fosbury is about 05:24 – Martijn was in Techstars Texas 05:44 – Team size is 5 06:18 – Fosbury wasn’t earning 07:08 – The money that Martijn received from the assets 07:42 – Martijn used the money from selling Fosbury to start Revue 08:12 – Martijn also sold Yunoo when he was 26 08:30 – The buyer is the software company AFAS from the Netherlands 09:20 – Martijn has raised $350K for Revue in convertible note 09:50 – Terms on the convertible note 10:05 – Revue currently has a thousand paying customers 10:23 – Martijn is currently focusing on growth rather than revenue 10:48 – Revue has 20K registered users at the moment with 10% active users 10:57 – Active users are the ones who send at least 1 email a month 11:27 – Monthly churn 11:35 – No paid CAC 11:49 – Revue has a content marketer 12:24 – Revue is currently sending 2M emails, monthly 12:40 – First year revenue 13:00 – Total 2016 revenue 13:26 – Martijn’s current side project 14:30 – Where Martijn got his marketing ploy idea 16:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to sell your company if it comes down to it. Study and strategize a marketing plan that works and at no cost. Just keep doing what you’re doing and don’t let what others say distract you. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/3/2017 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 586: Zapnito ACV is $210K, Helping 12 Customers With Knowledge Networks and $650k Raised with CEO Charles Thiede
Charles Thiede. He’s the co-founder and CEO of the knowledge network platform called Zapnito. Zapnito helps organizations create privately, branded, expert communications and networks. He calls this “experts as a service”. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Product Hunt Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I try to If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do everything with courage” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan introduces Charles to the show 01:41 – Zapnito is a SaaS platform 02:16 – The idea of Zapnito is to helps brands bring their audience back to the trusted sources of knowledge 02:40 – Zapnito’s Slack channel 02:51 – The platform behind the scene that pulls the audience and brands together 03:40 – Each brand has their own slack domain 04:40 – Average customer pay per year is £60K 05:38 – Zapnito started in trading in March 2013 05:48 – Started as a marketplace for experts in 2014 06:38 – First year revenue 07:12 – Zapnito currently has 12 customers 07:57 – Average MRR 08:50 – Team size is 12 09:36 – Charles doesn’t batch their sales calls 10:00 – Charles usually takes the calls 10:32 – Zapnito is based in London 10:50 – No customer churn and negative net churn 11:12 – The leverage Zapnito pulls to drive the RPU up 11:30 – “We focus on niche networks’ 11:50 – Zapnito has scaled their number of networks 12:10 – CAC 13:21 – Zapnito was bootstrapped and raised angel money 13:40 – Zapnito has raised £650K in priced equity round 14:02 – Zapnito had 3 rounds 14:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Continually pivoting is not a disadvantage to your company, as long as you just keep learning from the experience. Do not hesitate to hire the people that you need. Do everything with courage. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/2/2017 • 18 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 585: CaliberMinds Raises $1.1M Helping 12 Customers Close B2B Leads Using More Intelligence with CEO Raviv Turner
Raviv Turner. He’s the co-founder and CEO of CaliberMind – the first marketing, technology platform to apply machine learning in human language analysis to build detailed psychographic profiles. He has more than 10 years of experience leading products and development for high growth B2B SaaS companies. His previous roles include Director of UX at FullContact and VP of product at TapInfluence. Raviv is a mentor at Techstars Accelerator and holds a Masters in Interactive Media at NYU. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hacking Marketing What CEO do you follow? – Bart Lorang Favorite online tool? — Asana, 7Geese and Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Doing my best If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Your network is your net worth” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Raviv to the show 02:25 – CaliberMind analyzes and boosts structured and unstructured data 03:18 – CaliberMind is a SaaS model 03:36 – Monthly billing starts at $2K 03:46 – Average customer pay per month 04:15 – CaliberMind was launched in 2015 04:48 – Raviv adapted the idea from the military 05:05 – Raviv was in product design for the past 15 years 05:23 – The analytics structure data 06:30 – CaliberMind currently has their first 12 customers 06:54 – CaliberMind has bundled packages of services 07:40 – CaliberMind was bootstrapped on their first year 07:55 – CaliberMind had raised their $1.1M seed round after seeing traction from the customers 08:20 – No customer churn yet 08:42 – CAC and LTV 08:56 – The account-based marketing 09:20 – Team size of 8 and based in Colorado 09:39 – Most of the team are developers and data scientists 09:46 – They have Nic Zangre who was a Director of Marketing at AdRoll 10:00 – Raviv shares how he convinced Nic to work with CaliberMind 10:26 – Nic has equity in CaliberMind 10:45 – Some companies that are in the space are Usermind and Pegasystems 12:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work with people who share the same passion and vision as you do. Taking that leap out of your comfort zone is often risky and also, often, worth it. Find ways to help the people in your network without expecting something in return. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
3/1/2017 • 17 minutes, 3 seconds
EP 584: FlightFox YC Founder: We Talk About When To Quit All The Time, $700k Revenue, Making Travel Way Easier with CEO Lauren Sullivan
Lauren Sullivan. She’s the co-founder of Flightfox, a site which Nathan recently used to book multi-country travel. Flightfox helped him understand the best way to leverage his points from his Chase Credit Card for travel purposes. Flightfox helps you search flights, manage your trip, and leverage your loyalty points, to help ease your trip planning experience and it is growing fast. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – John Mackey Favorite online tool? — PocketSmith Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes, currently If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Lauren wished she had stopped working for someone else and started building her own company earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Lauren to the show 02:02 – Flightfox is an online and real-time platform that manages travel for individuals, companies and organizations 02:15 – Flightfox’s revenue model is to charge per trip and they make money from commission 02:32 – Flightfox’s expert will help match and plan a trip and they will authorize the credit card you use 03:33 – Flightfox books for companies, too 03:50 – The more complex the trip, the more expensive it is 05:10 – If Flightfox can’t find you a trip, they won’t charge you 05:34 – Flightfox was launched in 2012 05:45 – Flightfox was originally launched as a contest based, cloud source system 06:10 – There were a small number of the majority winning the contest 06:21 – The model was switched to a one-on-one 07:04 – The experts are contactors 07:15 – The experts get a fee per trip 07:40 – Most of them are full-time 07:50 – Flights metrics 08:03 – Flightfox is focused on companies and organizations 08:14 – CAC is a bit high 09:20 – There are at least 50 companies who have booked with Flightfox 09:35 – 5-10 companies are booking at least 30 trips per month 09:50 – Companies usually have 80 people 10:20 – In 2012, Flightfox has raised $850K 10:50 – Four Team members 11:50 – Flightfox has pivoted a couple of times already 13:19 – Lauren has been through alot with her company thus far, and has chosen to carry on 14:14 – 2016 total revenue 14:40 – Flightfox is close to breaking even 14:53 – Average MRR 15:11 – Raising another round will depend on the things that will happen in the future 17:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Changing your business model isn’t easy – but, it’s very normal to have to do so. Going through the most difficult times will test not just your patience, but your ability to make the best decisions. If it’s what you really want, just keep going. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/28/2017 • 20 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 583: Socedo Does $1.5M+ In 2016, $200K MRR Now Helping 200 Customers Close More Leads with CEO Aseem Badshah
Aseem Badshah. He’s the founder and CEO of the company called Socedo. Before that, he built his own full-service marketing agency called Uptown Treehouse that leveraged social media and digital channels to reach current and potential customers. He’s upgraded and improved that initial business model with his current company, Socedo. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crushing the Cashman What CEO do you follow? – Favorite online tool? — Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Aseem wished that he would have prioritized building relationships Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Aseem to the show 01:50 – Aseem noticed that there was so much data on prospects for B2B marketers in an agency 02:07 – Socedo’s goal 02:13 – Lead generation is what Socedo uses to get more customers 02:45 – Socedo provides behavioral data 02:56 – Socedo makes money from their software license 03:03 – Clients sign-up from 6 months to 1 year of license usage 03:11 – Average pay the company gives to Socedo monthly 03:25 – Socedo started in 2013 03:37 – In social media marketing, everything was setup for B2C marketers 04:25 – Social media is like a big CRM so Aseem leveraged it in a way to help B2B marketers 04:45 – There are 200 paying customers 04:50 – Socedo has raised $1.5M 05:00 – Socedo’s revenue has tripled in 2016 05:10 – Average contract price 05:25 – Socedo started with SMB 05:50 – 2016 total revenue 06:05 – Socedo has 25 people 06:20 – 2017 goal 06:30 – Aseem is targeting 2x for 2017 06:41 – Aseem wants to focus on their current customers 07:17 – “It’s not necessarily about growth at all costs; we want to focus on the fundamentals, focus on the relationship with customers” 07:35 – All 25 members are in Seattle 07:53 – The round was an equity round 08:32 – Socedo is currently cash flow positive 08:50 – Socedo is willing to take in new capital if they are ready 09:11 – Socedo has almost broken even 09:23 – How Socedo drives new customers 09:37 – Socedo doesn’t spend much money on marketing 10:30 – The data source which Aseem thinks is the most accurate 10:39 – “Everyone is accurate in their own way” 10:52 – How Socedo matches data 11:10 – Socedo’s goal is to get metrics as high as possible 11:31 – “We don’t guarantee an accuracy rate, but our accuracy rate is pretty high” 12:00 – The data sources that are connected to Socedo’s API are Full Contact, ClearBit and SellHack 12:34 – Socedo’s unique data advantage 13:30 – As a B2B marketer, there’s a bigger chance of a higher conversion rate 13:50 – Data sources that have the most accurate revenue numbers are Marketo and Salesforce 14:22 – Socedo doesn’t have the marketing budget for each lead 14:45 – Socedo has the company size which can be used as a revenue basis for each lead 15:15 – Gross customer churn 15:36 – CAC 15:45 – LTV 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Social media is a big CRM that can be leveraged to build a better marketing space for B2B businesses. Focusing on fundamentals and customer relationships can be more advantageous than focusing on just growth. Each data source out there is accurate in their own way. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/27/2017 • 20 minutes
EP 582: Simplero SaaS Team of 2 Makes $1M Per Year, Bootstrapped, Totally Happy Helping Users Sell Courses with CEO Calvin Correli
Calvin Correli. He’s the CEO of a holistically focused, multi-million dollar, online, all-in-one solution driven software company called Simplero. This company exists to reduce the stress associated with figuring out software systems and how to join them together. He’s passionate about helping online business owners do exactly what brings them the most life. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – There Is Nothing Wrong With You What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — FastMail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not every night If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Invest in getting to know yourself, and who you are, and how you’re different” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:20 – Nathan introduces Calvin to the show 02:49 – Simplero is a tool that helps people sell online 03:20 – Simplero is a SaaS business model 03:30 – Simplero was launched in 2009 03:39 – Calvin started to charge people in 2010 03:50 – Number of current paying customers is 700 04:02 – One of Simplero’s customers is Robin Green, who is an acupuncturist in California 04:25 – Robin decided to teach acupuncture online 04:42 – Robin made around $60K on her first program 05:10 – Simplero automates everything that can be automated 05:27 – Average customer pay per month 05:31 – Simplero charges monthly and takes a percentage of the revenue 05:51 – Simplero’s main revenue stream 06:25 – 10% is from the revenue fee and 90% from the SaaS model 07:15 – Average MRR 07:21 – Average ARR per customer 07:50 – Average customer retention 08:25 – Calvin shares how he got their customer LTV 08:58 – Calvin is based in New York, but he has team members in Denmark and on the West Coast 09:56 – Most of the people in the business started 6 months ago 10:20 – Simplero is self-funded 11:25 – Calvin is happy with how his company is doing at the moment 11:40 – Calvin wants to show the world a different way to live 12:01 – Calvin’s big dream is to be a presidential adviser for USA 13:00 – How do we measure happiness? 13:07 – Calvin is not a metrics guy 13:19 – There’s a sweet spot for every person where they are happy and work doesn’t feel like work 14:00 – How do we know if people are really happy? 15:10 – Productivity gains do not directly correlate to happiness gains 15:55 - The source of happiness vs. the thing you do for others or with others 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s a feeling of contentment you can find in helping others. Invest in yourself, first. There’s a sweet spot for every person where they are happy and work doesn’t feel like work. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/26/2017 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 581: DocSend $11M Raised, 2800+ Company Customers, 10,000+ Seats Because Links > Attachments For Docs with CEO Russ Heddleston
Russ Heddleston. He’s the CEO and co-founder of DocSend. Previously, he was a product manager for Facebook. He arrived at the B2B acquisition of the product Pursuit.com. Russ also had roles in Dropbox, Greystripe and Trulia. He received a BS in Computer Engineering and MS Computer Science at Stanford along with an MBA from Harvard. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Keith Krach Favorite online tool? — Gmail and Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Do things well and be patient with them—and then, they will turn out well later” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:33 – Nathan introduces Russ to the show 02:03 – Pursuit was a human resources to management referral program for employees 02:22 – Russ shopped their company to Facebook 02:38 – Russ explains why they made this decision 03:38 – Russ was the product manager for Facebook’s pages team 03:55 – Russ worked both for the brands and personalities 04:15 – DocSend was launched in 2013 04:24 – DocSend’s first version was made in 2010 05:18 – First year revenue was zero 05:27 – “We were focused on growth” 05:50 – DocSend was doing something of very high value; not necessarily for a broad user base 06:40 – DocSend has been approached by a hedge fund 06:59 – Most salespeople are using DocSend long term 07:37 – Average customer pay per month 08:42 – Most deals of DocSend are outbound deals 09:00 – Average enterprise prices: 09:24 – The price varies from $50-90 per month 09:40 – Outbound target for a team of 30 and above 10:10 – Average contract value depends on the size of the company 10:30 – Team size is 25 with 6 sales people 10:42 – Team location is San Francisco with 1 in New York 11:08 – Pricing plan was introduced a year after DocSend launched 11:35 – The current number of DocSend’s paying companies 11:48 – There’s a mix of logo and seat count 12:04 – Average seats per company 12:45 – Total number of users under paid plan 13:03 – DocSend has raised capital for $10M in VC and $1M in venture debt 14:03 – Venture debt was done post-series seed 15:00 – Average MRR 16:16 – Possible minimum average MRR 17:00 – Russ shares the difference of inbound self-serve and outbound 17:25 – Russ gets excited with outbound 18:25 – Gross monthly customer churn 19:01 – The churn for self-serve is quite high, but not for outbound 19:45 – Net negative churn 20:12 – The expansion would benefit the team 20:38 – As the company gets bigger, the more they need DocSend 20:48 – DocSend closed their last financing last year 21:00 – DocSend doesn’t need to raise capital at the moment 21:25 – “We don’t need to get acquired” 23:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focusing on growth rather than revenue is never bad thing. Improve your product until you are no longer expendable to your customers. Do things well and be patient with them—in time, they will turn out for the better. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/25/2017 • 26 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 580: Self Funded Vainu SaaS Hits $400K MRR, 1000 Customers To Serve Up Business Data with CEO Pietari Suvanto
Pietari Suvanto, cofounder of the company, Vainu. Vainu was founded recently and is a tool that defines piles of data from the web and turns into fact check and actionable company information. His vision is to understand more organizations around the world more than anybody else and his company currently has about a thousand customers in Europe, including FedEx and Santander Innoventures. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Mike Bloomberg Favorite online tool? — Zoom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be a bit more braver” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Pietari to the show 01:50 – Vainu is a SaaS business model 02:40 – Pietari shares a company that is searchable in Vainu 03:06 – Salesforce has a lot of organizations around the globe 03:50 – The uses of companies’ data in Vainu 04:12 – Vainu gives the company’s in-depth data 04:30 – Salespeople are the ones who uses Vainu 04:49 – Vainu’s revenue stream is from the subscription per seat 05:05 – Average customer pay per month is €400 05:21 – Vainu was launched in 2014 05:33 – Vainu hasn’t raised capital 05:37 – Vainu is based in Hilsinki, Finland, Amsterdam, and New York 06:00 – Number of paying customers is 1000 06:30 – ARR in 2016 €4.5M 06:55 – MRR goal in 2017 07:20 – Vainu is finding their customers through their software 08:07 – Pietari shares how they find the companies 08:50 – Vainu can check the company's’ data in preview 09:30 – The number of salespeople in Vainu’s team 09:55 – Gross customer churn is 1% 10:05 – CAC 10:24 – Assumed LTV per customer 10:40 – €20K-30K 11:04 – Pietari is hoping to raise capital 11:36 – Pietari would likely to raise €5-10M 12:30 – Pietari shares how they are different from their competitors 13:20 – Vainu hasn’t bought any API access to any data providers 13:30 – Everything in their system is owned by them 13:50 – The best asset of Vainu 14:50 – Pietari shares how they access the revenue data 15:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be the BEST in your market, having an asset that will set you apart from your competitors. Raising capital is always an option, but not always a necessity. Be brave—step out and believe you can do it. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/24/2017 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 579: Organifi Hits $25M 2016 Sales, 150k Customers, Indian Sourced Ashwagandha is Million Dollar Ingredient with CEO Drew Canole
Drew Canole. He’s a nutrition specialist, transformation specialist, and national spokesperson for the benefits of juicing vegetables for health and vitality. He is the founder of Fitlife.TV where he shares educational, inspirational, and entertaining videos and articles about health, fitness, healing, and longevity. More recently, his company, Organifi, is getting directly into the green juicing space with a physical product. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To stay fricking focused on one thing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Drew to the show 02:25 – Organifi is sourced from the best farms for their organic ingredients 02:34 – The ingredients are high quality, organic, non-GMO, soy free, and vegan 02:43 – Drew did clinical studies on their product and has sold over a quarter million bottles 03:20 – Drew started getting his audience from Youtube and Facebook, 6 years ago 03:33 – “Influence marketing has been our focus for the past 3 years” 03:48 – Drew has one of the largest, green juice followings online 03:56 – Drew started working on a their own concoction by looking at the gap in the green juice market 04:35 – The green juice that is available in the market is not good for the brain and body 04:56 – Drew recreated the world’s most great tasting juice that helps mental cognition, weight loss, and boosts moods 05:14 – Organifi was launched in early 2015 05:44 – Organifi sold around 350K bottles 05:55 – Around 150K people bought the product 06:00 – Average reorder rate is 2.8 06:17 – Organifi’s main product is a 30-day canister 06:55 – Organifi costs $79.95 on Amazon 07:08 – 20% of the sales is from Amazon and 80% is from other traffic 07:15 – 65% is from Organifi’s website 08:00 – The cost of making Organifi 09:07 – “We’re all about congruency” 09:25 – The most important ingredient of Organifi is the Ashwagandha 09:40 – Drew is importing Ashwagandha from an organic farm in India 10:18 – KSM Ashwagandha is the farm Drew chose 10:35 – Organifi’s formulator is the one who visits India to check the farm and the farmers 11:25 – Gross margin is around 75% 11:45 – Marketing cost 12:25 – Software that Organifi is using 12:37 – Unbounce, Infusionsoft, Exit Intel, and Shopify 13:02 – Organifi has a subscription model 13:20 – The subscription has a 15-75% discount 13:40 – The subscription cost 14:43 – Organifi’s 2015 revenue 15:15 – Net margin is around 15-20% 15:40 – Drew’s influence benefits their net margin 17:04 – What Drew is doing with his wealth 17:07 – Organifi has no investors 17:34 – Total list size is around 1.4M 17:45 – Actively opening is 500K 18:15 – Team size is 70 18:45 – 2017 revenue goal 20:04 – Cost of affiliates 22:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Influence marketing is one way not just to increase your online presence, but also sales. A thorough study and being well researched is crucial in order to fill a gap in a field that is quite saturated. Stay congruent with your plans and actions. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/23/2017 • 25 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 578: Ripple Recruiting Passes 8,000 Ivy League Resumes With 15 Employers Paying $300/mo For Access with Ripple CEO Andrew Myers
Andrew Myers. He grew up in Denver, Colorado and recently left Yale before the start of his senior year to pursue Ripple Recruiting, full-time. He now serves as a CEO in a fast growing, 12-person startup. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Anna Karenina What CEO do you follow? – Kevin Ryan and Reid Hoffman Favorite online tool? —PersistIQ and Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Go for it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 01:56 – Ripple Recruiting allows employers to create their dream applicant 02:32 – The whole revenue model is based on the employers and Ripple Recruiting is subscription based 02:43 – Ripple Recruiting is both a marketplace and a SaaS business model 03:04 – Ripple Recruiting has three subscription packages 03:15 – Average contract size is about $300 a month 03:25 – Andrew shares the differences between the packages 04:25 – Andrew won’t sell Ripple Recruiting at this time 04:50 – Andrew and his partner are first time founders 05:05 – Andrew and his partner both have strong opinions regarding their business 05:40 – Ripple Recruiting was launched in 2015 05:54 – First year revenue 06:03 – Andrew’s focus is on user engagement, rather than revenue 06:36 – Total debt Andrew has for Ripple Recruiting 07:00 – Ripple Recruiting has raised in a seed round 07:12 – Ripple Recruiting will be in a series A, soon 07:24 – Ripple Recruiting has a syndicate 08:11 – No revenue in 2015 08:20 – Ripple Recruiting has 15 paying clients at the moment 08:30 – Average MRR 09:00 – Andrew shares the pitch to investors 09:10 – Ripple Recruiting currently has over 10K Ivy League students signed up, on the platform 10:36 – Ripple Recruiting’s valuation 11:18 – Andrew wants to raise $2-3M is series A 11:30 – Andrew wants the highest valuation possible 12:11 – Andrew already has the strategies to build the syndicate 13:05 – Andrew wouldn’t take a $13M deal 13:58 – Andrew has just started focusing on revenue in terms of sales stream 14:42 – The customers are paying for their access in Ripple Recruiting’s database 15:52 – Andrew believes that they’re doing it better than other competitors in the space 17:07 – Ripple Recruiting doesn’t have an official hire number yet 17:23 – Andrew is seeing 20K students being hired on Ripple Recruiting 17:30 – No churn yet 18:58 – The whole Ripple Recruiting team ages between 22-25 20:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Being new to business allows you to be more optimistic, but listening to those who have done it can definitely help. A good pitch can drive good investors. Start early – if you truly feel that you should do it, then NOW is the right time. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/22/2017 • 25 minutes, 52 seconds
EP 577: Vinod Khosla, Others Invest $600k+ In Ex-Intuit Founder Providing Financing Against Invoices with Numberz CEO Aditya Tulsian
Aditya Tulsian. He launched and led multiple small business focused software service and mobile offerings at Intuit India. He’s also a management consultant at Diamond Consultant which is now PWC. He’s a product manager. He’s got an MBA and he’s doing very big things especially in the SMB SaaS space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Brad Smith Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Adi just wished that he could have taken the chance earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Adi to the show 01:45 – Adi’s company is Numberz 02:14 – Half of Numberz’ revenue comes from their SaaS model and half is from commission 02:35 – One of Numberz’ customers is NH1 Design 03:05 – How NH1 Design uses Numberz 03:50 – Numberz has receivable financing 04:15 – Numberz has 2 pricing plans 05:00 – Average customer pay annually is $185-195 05:26 – Transaction fee is 2% of every transaction that is done in Numberz’ platform 07:00 – Adi was a business head in Intuit India 07:18 – Adi shares why he made the jump 07:35 – Adi has a design agency and they’re stable financially 08:13 – First year revenue 09:20 – 2016 total revenue 09:33 – Numberz has more than 5,500 customers 10:02 – Average MRR 10:45 – Numberz’ paying customers is 1,200 12:15 – Adi shares Numberz’ growth 12:50 – MRR starting 2017 13:27 – Numberz has 3 channels of acquisition to get customers 14:20 – Numberz is spending $150 CAC 16:32 – Team size 16:38 – Numberz’ location is in India 16:51 – Numberz has raised capital 17:23 – Total is $750K 17:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Taking the leap from corporate is more possible with financial stability. Having 2 streams of revenue for your business can increase your growth faster. Take the chance earlier – opportunities pass you by way too easily. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/21/2017 • 20 minutes, 16 seconds
EP 576: Will This Mobile Payments Startup Survive with CEO Rode Luhaaar?
Rode Luhaäär. He’s an enthusiast and entrepreneur who has years of experience as an e-marketer and digital strategist. During his career in the digital field, he’s been overseeing execution and delivery of activities such as digital concept, e-business concepts, creative solutions design, software development, SEO, social media marketing, and global solutions. Over the last few years, he’s been an active member of a startup community and currently manages a large software company called, Paytailor. Famous Five: Favorite Book? — Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? — n/a Favorite online tool? — n/a Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Think faster” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:30 – Nathan introduces Rode to the show 03:10 – Paytailor is a smart payment solution allowing merchants to get paid the way they want 03:26 – Paytailor gives merchants an app and the users a card wallet 03:45 – Paytailor is a SaaS company 03:50 – Paytailor charges €10 monthly 04:05 – Paytailor’s revenue comes from the monthly fee 04:10 – Average number of customers is 40 04:20 – MRR 04:28 – Paytailor has raised €70K in a convertible note 04:45 – Paytailor was launched in 2015 04:55 – Paytailor started as a side project 05:15 – Team size 05:24 – Paytailor’s development is based in Estonia 05:38 – Why did you give up good pay in the digital field to start Paytailor? 05:52 – “We see a problem” 06:31 – Paytailor also has a 1.8% per transaction fee 06:58 – Paytailor’s payment gateway 07:14 – Rode is 32 07:32 – What Rode is being paid as a founder 08:09 – Rode’s plan for 2017 is to expand in Europe 08:30 – “We don’t want to be a financial institution” 08:50 – Rode sees that they have to expand as they make adjustments 09:31 – Last month sales is €450 10:50 – Paytailor has 20 taxis as merchants 11:22 – Some of the merchants’ usage is once a month 13:14 – Paytailor’s focus is to test out different kinds of users 13:24 – Paytailor currently has 4 bars as merchants 14:44 – Paytailor’s merchants are not using their service exclusively 16:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you can see a problem then try to create a solution. Expanding helps your company to improve and grow. You have to start somewhere – regardless of how small it is. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/20/2017 • 19 minutes, 14 seconds
EP 575: Fruitstreet Raises $6m From 180 Customers for HealthTech, New Kind of VC with CEO Laurence Girard
Laurence Girard. He’s the CEO and founder of Fruit Street. He was a pre-med student at Harvard University Extension School for three years before he decided to pursue Fruit Street full-time and move to San Francisco. In high school, he played soccer for the New York Red Bulls Academy as a goalkeeper, which sparked his initial interest in health. Later, he decided to pursue a career focused on social impact and spent a year volunteering in an emergency room unit in Huntington Hospital, Long Island. He’s now exclusively focused in Fruit Street. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Science of Growth What CEO do you follow? – Milton Chen Favorite online tool? — eShares Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 5 out of 7 days If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Laurence would tell himself to put significant emphasis on the team when you are starting a company Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Laurence to the show 02:10 – Fruit Street is a telemedicine software product that is licensed to healthcare professionals 02:19 – Fruit Street allows professionals to do HIPAA compliant video consultations with their client 02:32 – Each patient has their personal info integrated with gadgets like Fitbit 02:48 – Fruit Street uses a SaaS model and the professionals will pay a monthly licensing fee 03:09 – MRR is $15K 03:15 – Fruit Street was launched in May 2014 03:33 – Average customer pay per month is $200 for the software 03:43 – Fruit Street is starting to expand to get enterprise customers 03:57 – Current customer number is around a hundred 04:10 – 2016 total revenue 04:37 – Gross customer churn 05:30 – Current LTV 06:00 – Team size is 9 full time and Fruit Street has a joint venture agreement with Vsee 06:33 – Fruit Street is located in New York, and San Francisco 06:51 – Laurence wanted Fruit Street to be funded by physicians and not VC firms 07:00 – Getting the feedback from the physicians would help Fruit Street to improve 07:17 – Physicians can get Fruit Street more customers 07:29 – “Fruit Street is actually a public-benefit corporation” 08:08 – There is no tax benefit in being a public-benefit corporation 08:26 – Laurence wanted to attract investors that are primarily motivated by social impact and not by the financial outcome 08:54 – Fruit Street reached out to physicians through LinkedIn advertising 09:00 – Fruit Street gave the physicians a one-on-one call using Fruit Street’s telemedicine software 09:18 – Fruit Street’s lawyer is using eShares to manage their cap table 09:47 – Fruit Street has a structure that allows them to make quick decisions 10:00 – Fruit Street has 180 shareholders that are not in a syndicate 11:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With new technology comes the advancement in telehealth, making it easier for patients to reach out to their physicians. Choose an investor that shares the same vision as you. Put a significant emphasis on the team you build when you are starting your business. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/19/2017 • 15 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 574: Buying $2m 600 Acre Pecan Farm, $450/acre/mo, Literally Shaking Money From Trees with Investor Luke Stronach
Luke Stronach. He’s spent the last few years raising money for his farmland fund. He’s got one single family office as an investor. He’s currently 44, he’s taught finance, and most of his background is in low-income housing. He’s really looking forward to coming to the show and he’s a listener. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Fish That Ate the Whale What CEO do you follow? – Stewart and Lynda Resnick Favorite online tool? — Duolingo Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – If you want to have a meaningful life, you should be doing meaningful things Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Luke to the show 01:46 – Luke shares what he likes about The Top 02:04 – Luke has raised less than $10M for his farmland fund 02:15 – Luke is currently in the process of moving to Atlanta 02:20 – Luke is about to close his first farm 02:28 – Luke’s second orchard is under contract 02:34 – Luke wants to develop a 100 acre orchard in Georgia 03:06 – Luke mentions what farmland investors are looking for in a farmland 03:24 – Luke’s first orchard had good irrigation 03:43 – It has 600 acres and was almost $2M 04:41 – 40% of North America’s farmland is leased to farmers 04:50 – Investors buy the farmland, lease to farmers who rent per acre or have a revenue share agreement 05:35 – Many farmers are cash flow farmers 06:00 – There are differences across different crops 06:45 – Luke shares the farmer’s perspective on crops 07:01 – Average rent per acre 07:40 – The farmers growing rice and corn are renting at $250 per acre 08:00 – Luke’s return on his $2M investment 08:50 – The return will always depend on the yield which varies 09:06 – People look at farmland investing as a way to lock value into the land 09:12 – There are people who are after the yield and there are those who are not 10:05 – Luke shares what happened in 2007-2009 10:10 – S&P 500 lost 50% of its value 10:46 – Historically, farmland has done well with inflation 11:00 – Luke’s opinion regarding inflation 11:14 – The returns in farmland can be attractive 11:57 – Farmland is not as big as commercial property 12:03 – Farmland investment is a hard space 13:10 – It is a persistence game 13:40 – Luke is currently in Alabama 14:00 – Nathan wants to study Luke’s field and work with Luke 17:17 – There are so many things to do in Georgia and Luke will keep Nathan busy 18:08 – Luke makes software for farmers 18:59 – In Episode 450 of The Top, Nathan had Robert Leclerc, the founder of AgFunder 19:23 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The farmland investment industry is a hard space and requires persistency. People look at farmland investing as a way to lock value into the land. If you want to have a meaningful life, you should be doing meaningful things. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/18/2017 • 23 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 573: I Sell My Financial Data On This Podcast with BitMark CEO Sean Moss-Pultz
Sean Moss-Pultz. He’s the CEO and founder of BitMark, the property system for the digital environment. It enables an individual to claim ownership of personal data and digital assets akin to how land registrars track land titles or patent offices track patents. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – Andy Grove and Yvon Chouinard Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Luck plays a big role and you just can’t quit” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Sean to the show 01:53 – Anybody that has data coming out of Fitbit can establish ownership over that data and can list it for sale or protect it 02:11 – BitMark’s business model is that they earn a small commission 02:31 – Fitbit’s data is in your phone 03:08 – We don’t have property rights on our data 03:40 – Download BitMark’s software to sell your data or protect it 03:58 – BitMark is currently on beta mode and only desktop software 04:09 – BitMark works with IFTTT 04:56 – BitMark’s software can generate a link for your data that you can share 05:40 – You can make around $50 a year for selling your data 05:59 – This is for location data alone 06:15 – “Data is the next big asset class” 06:30 – Can I use BitMark’s data to sue someone for using my data? 06:50 – Sean has talked to lawyers and his father is a lawyer 07:42 – Sean thinks the court system will understand digital property titles 08:51 – BitMark was launched in 2014 09:00 – Sean’s co-founders are from his previous company 09:42 – BitMark just closed a seed round for $1.7M 10:18 – BitMark is based in Taiwan, with 12 people 10:41 – BitMark has raised from WI Harper Group, which is Taiwan-based 11:08 – BitMark is currently on pre-revenue 11:17 – Sean is hoping for revenue this year 11:53 – Sean mentions how part of their expenses go towards his travelling expenses—going to and from New York and Taiwan 12:33 – BitMark will launch both in Asia and USA 13:10 – BitMark is actively recruiting buyers who are interested in health data 14:30 – Sean looks into location data, health data, fitness data, and financial data 14:50 – Nathan proposes a deal with Sean 16:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Our data is as unique as our thumbmark—protecting it isn’t a bad idea. Data is the NEXT, big asset class. Luck plays a big role in your success and you just can’t quit. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/17/2017 • 19 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 572: 400,000 Books Sold Teach How to Take $1000 to $1.5m with Author Phil Town
Phil Town. He’s a two-time New York Times’ best-selling author, hedge fund manager, and founder of Rule One Investing. He’s teaching individuals how to take control of their financial futures so they don’t have to find a fund manager or financial advisors. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Intelligent Investor What CEO do you follow? – Warren Buffett Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – That USA will put us in a war and it will suck Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Phil to the show 02:00 – What makes you qualified to talk about this? 02:08 – “By New York Wall Street standards, I’m completely unqualified” 02:23 – Most people invest using the concept of modern portfolio theory 02:50 – There are people who Phil follows for 30 years now 02:58 – Ben Graham developed the ideas and values of investing in the 30s and 40s 03:12 – Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger 03:41 – Phil has a principle of picking good companies while they’re on sale 03:55 – Phil learned to use other people’s money to build up their funds 04:22 – How much outside capital have you raised in your hedge fund to date? 04:32 – Under a hundred million 04:40 – Phil started to manage money through separate, managed accounts 04:58 – Phil can manage other people’s money that don’t have the investing capital for hedge fund 05:53 – The people who needed their accounts to be managed the most are getting the least attention 06:10 – How do you beat a company like Wealth Front 06:24 – Wealth Front is run by modern portfolio theory math 06:58 – “It’s such nonsense and yet, it’s the only math there is” 06:57 – A robo-advisor pretends that they can use volatility as a reference point for risk 08:10 – People need to know how to invest on their own 08:23 – Phil mentions the three things that he believes someone should do if they don’t want to be an active investor 09:19 – Find a financial advisor who knows what they’re doing 09:30 – The gap Phil wants to fill 09:56 – “An active fund cannot be the index” 11:05 – If you’re not going to learn how to invest, you’ll have fewer choices 11:43 – It is simple to invest correctly 12:00 – It’s not true that there are losers and winners in investing 12:46 – “Investing is simply buying something that you understand for less than its worth” 13:20 – Phil started with real estate 14:02 – Warren Buffet is one of the best real estate investors 15:02 – Phil shares the essence of a good investment 16:05 – The essence of speculation or trading 16:40 – Nathan asks Phil for his opinion regarding Bill Ackman’s Chipotle Mexican Grill 17:21 – Chipotle Mexican Grill has no leverage 18:40 – The one rule Phil applies to all different investment strategies is don’t lose money 18:55 – Rule 2 is to remember rule 1 19:15 – Phil’s 4-rule process 19:18 – First, am I capable of understanding this business? 19:22 – Second, does this business have protective characteristics that keeps competition a leg? 19:33 – Third, is this owned by people with integrity? 19:36 – Fourth, am I buying this at a big discount to its value? 20:35 – How do you handle imperfect planning? 21:13 – You have to have a big discount on the value that you’re purchasing 22:48 – Phil’s first book came out in 2005, second in 2010, and another one in 2018 24:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: People need to know how to invest on their own—if you’re not going to learn how to invest, you’ll have fewer choices. There is a difference between a good investment and speculation. Investing is simply buying something that you understand for less than its worth. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/16/2017 • 28 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 571: SenaHill Transacted $200M In FinTech 2016, 7 Predictions for 2017 with Founding Partner Neil DeSena
Neil DeSena. He’s one of the founders of SenaHill Partners. He was previously at Goldman Sachs, where he really led the creation of a pioneering and institutional training technologies system which has been used worldwide for over 20 years. He was the Managing Director, Global Head of REDI Products at Goldman Sachs from 2000 - 2006. Neil’s leadership helped build a leading, global, multi-asset training system that has expanded data centers and global networking through Europe and Asia. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – n/a What CEO do you follow? – Duncan Niederauer Favorite online tool? — Salesforce Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Pay a little more attention to the details” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Neil to the show 02:20 – Neil shares how their company is finding businesses to invest in 02:40 – Neil and his partners are all entrepreneurs and have experience running businesses 02:54 – Neil shares why they focus on FinTech 04:25 – Average total transaction volume that they’ve had in 2016 04:54 – Fintech in 2017 05:40 – Distributive ledger of concept is ready for primetime 06:00 – Symbiont is well positioned in the distributive ledger of concept space 06:24 – Symbiont will be at the point of formation for all other companies 06:34 – Companies can now be registered digitally 06:46 – Symbiont’s founder, Mark Smith, was Neil’s first advisor 06:50 – Mark also founded Lava Effects 07:00 – Mark teamed up with the most successful open source company 07:45 – Neil’s prediction of how people will respond to Wall Street and their new administration 08:08 – “I’m not quite sure how things are going to work out” 08:14 – Banks have to adjust to it 08:55 – Neil discusses the economy of the distributive ledger 09:45 – The company that Neil thinks is well positioned to take advantage of the no churn economy in the FinTech sector 10:10 – Neil is also interested in the retirement sector 10:30 – There is still no new technology to work around retirement money 10:50 – Neil has seen possible companies, but not one from their portfolio 11:00 – Fundamentals being displaced by quantimentals 12:10 – Neil’s opinion regarding Wealth Front winning over on the money the people currently have on Vanguard 13:20 – There are companies who are trying to bridge the gap between the Baby Boomers and Generation Y 13:50 – SenaHill hasn’t made an investment yet, on an insurance company 14:40 – SenaHill’s focus in 2017 14:50 – “We try to find companies that we can invest in and help and be with them for the life” 15:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Pay attention to the details. Wall Street can be unpredictable because of the new administration – regardless, banks will have to adjust. There are companies who are trying to bridge the gap between the Baby Boomers and Generation Y. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/15/2017 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 570: GrowSumo Helping 70 B2B SaaS Companies Grow Affiliate Programs, $100k New MRR So Far with CEO Bryn Jones
Slater Victoroff. He’s the CEO and founder of Indico Data Solutions. He’s a poet, a coder, MMA fighter, vegan Buddhist, and Red Letter Christian. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – n/a What CEO do you follow? – n/a Favorite online tool? — Stack Overflow Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Slater hoped he had realized how much he loved programming Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:26 – Nathan introduces Slater to the show 02:45 – Indico is a text and image analytics provider 03:25 – Indico’s business model 03:52 – The enterprise client is their main revenue channel 05:09 – Indico was founded in 2013 05:25 – Indico has raised $4.5M 05:30 – Indico started with a seed round 06:10 – How Slater managed having a bridge round 07:05 – First year revenue 07:31 – 2016 revenue 07:38 – Slater is hoping to hit a million dollar revenue for 2017 08:03 – Average MRR 08:22 – Indico is a SaaS company 08:42 – Indico currently has 20 customers 09:11 – Manulife is working with Indico 11:30 – Each client of Indico wants to have their own set of algorithms 12:00 – Nathan summarizes how Indico works 12:30 – Indico gives their customers an engine 13:20 – Slater worries about Facebook’s echo chamber 13:33 – “Facebook’s algorithm is not designed to create echo chambers” 15:17 – Customer churn 15:53 – Zero spent on marketing 16:00 – Most funding goes to the engineering team 16:12 – Team size is 10 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Having a bridge round does not mean you’re losing money—prove that you are growing and need more funding. Learn how to work around echo chambers. Find out what you love to do and go for it. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/14/2017 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 569: GrowSumo Helping 70 B2B SaaS Companies Grow Affiliate Programs, $100k New MRR So Far with CEO Bryn Jones
Bryn Jones. He’s the co-founder and CEO of GrowSumo. GrowSumo graduated from Y Combinator in the summer of 2015, and they’re building a marketplace for influencer programs. Prior to building companies, Bryn was also a member of a swim team. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To just go for it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Bryn to the show 01:41 – Nathan found Bryn through Product Hunt 02:42 – There are large enterprise clients who came from GrowSumo 02:53 – GrowSumo builds a marketplace for influencer programs 03:10 – GrowSumo charges a one-time annual fee 03:14 – GrowSumo takes a percentage of every dollar the influencer earns from the brand 03:22 – GrowSumo is an affiliate program on top of an affiliate program 03:33 – An influencer can be anyone 04:19 – GrowSumo has a month over month fee which is $300 a month 04:48 – It is for a new startup with no affiliate program 04:56 – It lets you go in and manage the program yourself 05:16 – For an enterprise account, GrowSumo automates the entire program 05:23 – GrowSumo helps you identify the influencers 05:32 – The enterprise account: $10K annually 05:36 – GrowSumo takes 10% from all payouts to influencers 06:20 – “You have a lot of customers today that are influencers and you just don’t know where to find them” 07:03 – Bryn shares how they identify the influencers 07:43 – GrowSumo doesn’t have the ability to qualify an influencer based on the list size they have 08:33 – GrowSumo was launched in August 2015 09:06 – GrowSumo has a lot of traction 09:20 – Percentage of customers that GrowSumo is currently working with 10:30 – GrowSumo’s biggest competition are Commission Junction and Influitive 11:07 – GrowSumo hasn’t raised capital yet, but they’re going to soon 11:35 – Current Y Combinator terms 12:45 – Team size is 8 13:03 – Bryn is Canadian 13:50 – Number of unique new customers driven by GrowSumo 14:00 – GrowSumo has driven over $100K recurring monthly revenue 14:20 – GrowSumo still qualifies and chooses the customers 15:20 – GrowSumo is software and there is no need for an internal tool 16:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find new ways to grow your following by leveraging websites that are popular in your niche. Having a feature that your biggest competitors do not offer will give you an edge. There is no clear path to success—the only way to succeed is to START trying. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/13/2017 • 19 minutes, 40 seconds
EP 568: 3,000 Brands Have Discounts on BonusWay, $63M in 2016 Volume, $5m Revenues, 40 employees, $9m raised with CEO Tatu Koistinen
Tatu Koistinen, the CEO of Bonusway. His background is in loyalty and digital marketing and he has many growth stories to share. He’s now building the most social e-commerce loyalty platform on earth. He’s currently focused on building the leadership and culture of the business and he’s also an Ironman triathlete. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Halo Effect What CEO do you follow? – n/a Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Trust yourself, act quicker, and be brave Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:16 – Nathan introduces Tatu to the show 02:00 – Bonusway creates more sales for ecommerce businesses 02:09 – Bonusway gets compensated when they create sales for a particular business 02:21 – Bonusway inspires consumers by informing them of the newest sales and shopping opportunities 02:48 – Bonusway is similar to a marketplace 03:15 – The companies that are partnered with Bonusway 03:40 – The biggest partner has the most amount of sales generated by Bonusway 03:53 – The sales that Bonusway has generated for Hotels.com 04:20 – The ways Bonusway connects with Hotels.com’s customers 05:15 – Total volume of sales from all the partners combined is €60M 05:39 – Bonusway gets commission 06:20 – Sample computation of Bonusway’s commission 07:17 – Bonusway’s commission percentage varies per company 08:00 – Average 2016 revenue 09:10 – Tatu’s idea for Bonusway’s business model 10:05 – Bonusway was founded in 2011 10:24 – The number of people who bought in Bonusway’s platform 10:50 – Bonusway is currently partnered with 3000 companies 11:10 – 2017 goal 12:00 – Total funding of Bonusway is €6.9M 12:20 – Bonusway had a previous capital raise 12:39 – Team size is 40 12:50 – Based all in Europe 13:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be in the space where you feel most confident and know how things work. Having a unique business model equates to less competition in the space. Trust yourself, act quicker, and be brave. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/12/2017 • 17 minutes, 51 seconds
EP 567: EnvoyAmerica Does $160k in 2016 Helping Senior Citizens Get Around with CEO KC Kanaan
K.C. Kanaan. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Envoy America – a Scottsdale, Arizona based national company that operates a wide-sharing platform and mobile application that matches seniors and patients that can’t drive or don’t want to drive themselves with driver companions. K.C. is a senior executive with more than 30 years of general management, operational sales and marketing experience. He’s known both for his command of the big picture and ability to execute on short-term strategies. He has inspired teams to strive for and achieve the impossible. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People What CEO do you follow? – Rafe Furst Favorite online tool? — Trello and Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – K.C wished that he had known how to work more effectively with people Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces K.C to the show 02:33 – Envoy America provides service to seniors and patients that cannot, should not, and would choose not to drive 02:45 – Envoy America makes money on the time spent delivering the service based on hourly rate 03:05 – Envoy America is currently in Phoenix and will expand in Tucson, Arizona 03:19 – The plan is to expand to 3-5 other states 03:30 – Envoy America currently has 30 drivers in Phoenix 03:35 – On an average week, Envoy America delivers 75-85 trips, usually 2 hours per trip 04:01 – Envoy America’s based rate is $39 per hour 04:20 – Average weekly revenue 04:25 – In 2016, Envoy America made $180K in revenue 04:55 – Envoy America was launched in 2015 05:15 – K.C. tried to help his parents find a reliable driving service—it was a challenge 06:00 – There are approximately 10M seniors in the US who need a reliable driving service 06:18 – K.C. and his partner invested about $100K in Envoy America and have raised $110K which is convertible note 06:36 – K.C has started a crowd funding campaign with crowdfunder.com and they’re trying to raise an additional $500K 06:53 – What K.C will spend the funding on 07:35 – The drivers are all independent contractors 08:10 – Clients can reserve 08:26 – Most seniors rely on phone to make reservations 08:55 – The drivers can stay with the seniors wherever they want to go 09:35 – The drivers are paid $18/hour 09:48 – The drivers are responsible for their cars 10:00 – Envoy America has B2B sales and B2C sales 10:16 – In B2B, they have clinics as key clients 10:44 – Envoy America now leverages social media 11:03 – The keywords people use to find Envoy America 11:21 – Most of Envoy America’s clients come from the businesses that they serve 13:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Transportation services for seniors are not very good, causing them to be isolated at home. The most taken for granted problem could be the problem that only YOU can solve. Take the time to grow in working with people more effectively. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/11/2017 • 17 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 566: Scollar Founder Sold Company to AutoDesk in 08 Now Making $99 Smart Pet Collar with CEO Lisa Tamayo
Lisa Tamayo. She’s the CEO of Scollar, an open platform, multi-functional, smart collar for pets. She has over 25 years of experience in entrepreneurship and financial and strategic planning. She’s the co-founder of Green Building Studio which was acquired by Autodesk in 2008. She’s also the chairman of SoCo Nexus, an incubator accelerator in Northern California. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Pitch Anything What CEO do you follow? – Ben Horowitz Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Trust Yourself” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Lisa to the show 02:13 – Scollar is a smart collar 03:10 – The first product, Scollar Mini, was designed exclusively for the under-searched cats and small dogs market 03:29 – Scollar is currently on pre-order and has launched a Kickstarter campaign 03:52 – Scollar is like Fitbit for animals 04:10 – The Fitbit engineering team has partnered with Scollar Mini 04:26 – Scollar Mini is currently at $99 for pre-order and will retail at $149 04:35 – The pre-order started in mid-October 04:50 – Scollar is starting to build their following 05:15 – Scollar has negotiated with a bank to get credit 05:23 – Lisa and her partner have self-funded a part of it 06:00 – Lisa and her husband are the first founders of Green Building Studio 06:18 – Autodesk has bought all the assets of Green Building Studio 06:35 – Green Building Studio was Autodesk’s market partner for a long time 07:28 – Lisa has almost $600k in Scollar 07:44 – Lisa discusses the spending 08:07 – Finding someone in hardware to help build the product are typically employed elsewhere 08:30 – It took Lisa a while to find the right team to work together 09:08 – Most funding went to the trial and error of the product 09:25 – Team size is almost 40 10:00 – Lisa shares the factors involved in asking for a loan 11:10 – It took the bank months to agree with Lisa and grant her the loan 11:40 – Working Solutions gave them the loan 12:10 – Working Solutions is a great option for quick capital 13:00 – The cost of making Scollar 13:19 – Cost per unit 13:43 – Possible wholesale price 14:50 – They might use the wholesale price in 2018 16:02 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Hardware is a far different process to create than software—it may take time to find and build the right team. There are many options for gaining capital – choose the one that suits your company best. Trust yourself and everything will fall into place. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/10/2017 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 565: Giraffe360 Hits $84k MRR Helping Real Estate Industry Record 360 Virtual Tours Quickly with CEO Mikus Opelts
Mikus Opelts. He’s the CEO at Giraffe360. He started this company 7 years ago, in February of 2010, when he got involved with Giraffe Visual which provides interactive visualization services. It has now developed into something so much more. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How Google Works What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Everything I’m thinking about and planning for will take three times of the time than what I was hoping for” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan introduces Mikus to the show 01:40 – Giraffe360 has the best visual tool technology 02:00 - Giraffe360 has a virtual tool that works with virtual reality headsets 02:15 – 6 years ago, Mikus started the company 02:37 – It took 14 months to develop 03:16 – Mikus spent $200K on software development 03:34 – Mikus just raised $500K for their product development 03:39 – It is a convertible note 03:49 – Mikus describes how it’s like to raise capital in London 04:15 – Mikus went through a hundred meetings before getting that $500K 04:25 – 90% of the investment is from one company 05:15 – Giraffe360’s camera is free for companies who have a large volume of properties 05:31 – Giraffe360 charges per property 05:47 – Giraffe360 has developed their technology and it is on par with professional companies 06:13 – 1 apartment tour costs €67 or $70 06:28 – Minimum is 20 apartments per company 06:45 – Payment is done monthly depending on the properties 07:12 – Giraffe360 has sold their first 10 cameras in the market 07:19 – There are 50 new cameras coming in at the end of February 2017 07:39 – Giraffe360 already had 50 pre-sells who wanted to try the cameras 08:00 – The incoming 50 cameras are almost sold out 08:30 – Average MRR 09:00 – Cost per hardware 09:10 – The hardware is made solely by Giraffe360’s engineering team 09:55 – People find out about Giraffe360 through word-of-mouth 11:20 - Giraffe360’s only team is the engineering team with 8 people 11:28 – 3 people in the back office 11:50 – No customer churn yet 12:20 – Giraffe360 is similar to a SaaS model 13:13 – 2017 goal is to have 100 subscriptions and cameras in the market 14:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create something of the BEST quality that will stand out from the rest. Raising capital takes perseverance; it may take 100 meetings before landing what you need. Great things take time—relax, be patient, and get things done. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/9/2017 • 17 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 564: Proleads Passes 100 Customers, $75 ARPU Helping You Find Better Leads with CEO Anders Fredriksson
Anders Fredriksson. He’s a Swedish, serial entrepreneur who recently moved to San Francisco to build his sales technology startup, ProLeads. He’s an engineer with a business mind and currently holds both CEO and CTO titles. Previously, he built and scaled ArrivalGuides.com as the founding CTO. Prior to that, he was the founder and CEO of Tablefinder.com, which he sold. He studied computer engineering and management at Chalmers University of Technology, but dropped out before getting his degree when he got funding for his first startup, Table Finder. Additionally, in 2007, Internet World named him the most prominent entrepreneur in Sweden. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Google Inbox Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I really wished I knew how easy it is to start a business, but also I wish I didn’t know how hard it was” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:20 – Nathan introduces Anders to the show 03:25 – Anders got $75K when he started Table Finder 03:50 – ProLeads is a platform that aggregates service data to optimize workflow 04:07 – ProLeads is a SaaS model with annual subscriptions 04:40 – Average customer pay per month is around $75 05:20 – ProLeads was launched in the USA, in 2014 05:40 – Anders was in 500 Startups, Batch 12 05:43 – Anders was turned down 4 times 05:58 – What Anders said to convince 500 startups to accept them 06:10 – ProLeads was doing $5K per month when they were just starting 06:53 – There were 2 co-founders and now they have 3 07:20 – Average MRR 07:50 – The amount ProLeads receives from 500 startups 08:08 – ProLeads also raised funds during the program 08:20 – ProLeads totaled $500K from their fundraising 09:15 – Zesty is a longtime customer of ProLeads 09:38 – Zesty has 50-70 seats in ProLeads 10:45 – ProLeads’ lowest pricing is $300 per month 10:55 – ProLeads’ focus is mid-sized companies 11:14 – 2017 MRR goal 12:10 – Gross customer churn per month 12:49 – ProLeads was growing their MRR 12:56 – ProLeads had a problem during close demo day churn 13:35 – ProLeads had monthly contracts 13:51 – Average monthly churn is quite low 14:22 – Team size 14:36 – CAC 14:48 – No paid marketing 15:20 – The tools ProLeads uses: 15:30 – Clearbit, Full Contact, and DiscoverOrg 15:41 – DiscoverOrg was on The Top: Episode 512 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: BELIEVE in your own product—this will make it easier to convince other people to believe in it as well. Problems arise at the start of any business, learn from it and move on. Starting a business has both its hard and easy moments; either way, it’s worth the jump. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/8/2017 • 21 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 563: InsightPool Near $300k MRR Helping 100 Big Brands Find Influencers with CEO Devon Wijesinghe
Devon Wijesinghe. He’s the founder and CEO of InsightPool. He co-founded the business in 2012; and, within a short time led the company from 2 to 60 employees. He is currently revolutionizing marketeering and sales across many social platforms. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Travis Kalanick Favorite online tool? — Pardot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Try and learn to concentrate on financial metrics and understand finance deeply Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan introduces Devin to the show 01:53 - InsightPool focuses on the sector of influencer marketing 02:03 – “A brand needs to have an army of people syndicating their content with their own voices” 02:15 - Insight Cool finds influencers for brands that they can work with 02:35 – InsightPool’s pricing model 03:10 – Average customer pay per month is $3K 03:33 – What is included in $3K 03:53 – Devin was the solo founder 04:00 – Devin sold a previous company for 9-figures in early 2012 04:50 – “Social became prevalent as the newest data set” 05:11 – Devin seeded a business idea for $250K 05:33 – Devin has a formalized angel group 05:41 – Devin is an advisor and investor 05:58 – David Cummings is Devin’s friend 06:17 – David and Devin’s companies are the first ones in ATV lean and tech village 06:48 – He currently has 60 people on the team 07:21 – InsightPool is currently serving over a hundred enterprises 07:50 – MRR 08:23 – InsightPool has a sales team 08:49 – CAC LTV 10:00 – Average spending on CAC 10:25 – Gross churn 11:00 – Net revenue churn 11:53 – InsightPool did a series A round and got an investment of $8M 12:35 – InsightPool did a debt round last year 12:50 – The amount InsightPool is burning per month 14:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A brand needs to have an army of people syndicating their content with their own voices. Go with what you think you are made to do. Learn how to make the metrics and finance dance – understand it deeply before taking that leap. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/7/2017 • 21 minutes, 29 seconds
EP 562: Illumineto Raised $700k raised, Passes 100 Customers with DC Team with CEO Nick Caruso
Nick Caruso. He’s the CEO and founder of Illumineto. He’s the VP of Sales in Eastern US & Canada with Notable Solutions and he was there for 6 years. Before that, he was at Kofax as a federal sales manager and he also served the country in the Marine Corps as a Captain. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Built to Last What CEO do you follow? – Drew Houston Favorite online tool? — API.ai Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Nick wished he knew that starting a company was not as hard as he thought it would be and wished he’d started earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:06 – Nathan introduces Nick to the show 01:45 – Illumineto is a SaaS company and they charge monthly 02:00 – Nick has been in the technology field for 20 years and in sales for 15 years 02:15 – Nick wasn’t able to find a tool to help him close more deals 02:34 – Illumineto focuses on the individual sales rep and not the whole company 02:58 – Illumineto has a lot of sales reps from Fortune 500 companies 03:14 – Illumineto has been running for 6 months now 03:48 – Illumineto currently has a thousand of sign ups or users that represent several hundreds of logos 04:25 – Illumineto was founded in mid 2015 04:30 – Beta in 2016 04:50 – Nick has sunk in $700K before starting 05:00 – Illumineto had an Angel round 05:23 – Illumineto has 3 co-founders 05:32 – All of them had successful exits in different companies 05:55 – There are 5 Angel investors 06:15 – Current team size is 4 06:50 – Average pay per user per month is $30 07:00 – Average MRR 08:00 – Nick won’t disclose the amount, but Illumineto is profitable 09:00 – Nathan explains why he asks for numbers 10:15 – Illumineto has more than 100 paying customers 10:30 – Gross customer churn 10:52 – 0% churn rate on paying customers 11:31 – Illumineto had paid advertising 12:07 – They had thousands of people coming in for the premium model 12:50 – Illumineto leverages their connections in LinkedIn to get their customers from IBM 13:11 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It is possible for a startup to be profitable in as early as 6 months. Leveraging your connections can help you engage with customers and increase sales. Start your business as soon as you can, you’ll learn as you go. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/6/2017 • 17 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 561: He Did $1b in 2016 Transactions (Takes on avg 3%) at his M&A Firm Marlin and Associates with CEO Ken Marlin
Ken Marlin. He’s the founder and managing partner of Marlin and Associates – an award winning mergers and acquisition business focused on investment banking. They are headquartered in New York city with offices in San Francisco, Washington DC and Toronto. Ken is also the author of The Marine Corps Way to Win on Wall Street: 11 Key Plans From Battlefield to Boardroom which was published in September. From 1971-1981, Ken rose in rank becoming a Marine Captain and Infantry Commander. He’s applied his Marine Corps principles to leading successful businesses. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best-run Companies What CEO do you follow? – Fred Wilson Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn, Salesforce and Morning Star Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Pursue your passion and you’ll do well—play to your strengths and not your weaknesses Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Ken Marlin to the show 03:00 – Ken is not doing it for the money 03:13 – Marlin and Associates tries hard to be the trusted advisor to people who want to buy or sell middle-market, technology companies 03:26 – Buyers and sellers pay Marlin and Associates retainers 03:55 – “The bigger the deal, the smaller the percentage” 04:20 – Ken shares their success in 2016 04:42 – Marlin and Associates gets 8-10 clients a year 04:58 – Marlin and Associates is service-oriented 05:45 – Marlin and Associates negotiate with all phases of the transaction 05:54 – Marlin and Associates help buyers understand the strengths and weaknesses of the companies they’re planning to buy 06:21 – “We always try to play the role of the honest broker” 07:09 – There are no risk-free transactions, so the question that should be asked is how much risk is there? 07:38 – The average amount of transactions 08:27 – The types of seller and buyers 09:05 – The #1 reason a deal blows up 09:31 – From a seller’s perspective, transactions are made from trust 10:00 – It’s important that they have a set of financial projections they’re going to meet 11:25 – “Perfection is to give people a set of forecasts that you’re going to meet and to meet it” 11:52 – Key principle from Ken’s book is “take the long view” 13:12 – There are people who buy companies without a clear understanding of how that acquisition helps advance them towards a strategic goal 14:30 – Ken talks about the acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft 16:41 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are no such things as risk-free transactions—the question that should be asked is how much risk is there? Give your client a set of financial projections that you’re going to meet—and, meet it! Work around your strengths, not your weaknesses. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/5/2017 • 21 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 560: Badger Maps Does $1.2M in 2016, $120k MRR, Looking to 3x with CEO Steven Benson
Steven Benson. The founder and CEO of Badger Maps – the number one sales app in the Apple app store which helps salespeople become more successful. Badger shows salespeople their customers and leads on the map and connects them with their calendar to build a daily route. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Tools of Titans What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Baremetrics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Steven wished he had known that he’d learn more working for small companies than big companies Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan introduces Steven to the show 02:00 – Badger Maps helps salespeople with their jobs 02:37 - Badger Maps is a SaaS model 02:50 – Average customer pay per month is $35 02:58 – Badger Maps was founded in 2012 03:24 – Badger Maps has 3 co-founders 03:50 – Steven and the other co-founders didn’t really split the equity 04:00 – When splitting the equity, everyone gets a fair deal 04:44 – Steven shares what to consider in splitting equity 05:58 – Badger Maps has an accelerator clause 06:44 – First year revenue is $70K 07:10 – Number of current customers is 4K 07:40 – Apple ranked Badger Maps as #1 08:50 – There are Fortune 500 companies who use Badger Maps 09:01 – The number of customers is both team and individual sales reps 09:16 – Gross monthly customer churn is 3.3% 09:37 – The customers are finding Badger Maps through word of mouth, SEO, and SMM 10:08 – The amount Badger Maps is willing to spend to acquire new customers 10:46 – Badger Maps spent $12K on paid marketing 11:00 – Average CAC 11:24 – Google is around $300 12:06 – In San Francisco, people are spending 100% of LTV on acquisition 12:53 – Badger Maps is bootstrapped 13:03 – Badger Maps had a loan from Lighter Capital 13:45 – Steven shares how Lighter Capital makes loans for SaaS companies 14:10 – Steven is paying 22-28% for the amount they have loaned and there’s no personal guarantee 15:06 – Total revenue in 2016 is around $1.2M 15:20 – Revenue goal in 2017 is $4.5M 17:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be fair and make sure it is a great deal for everyone when splitting equity. Getting a loan can also be a good option for SaaS companies. In San Francisco, people are spending 100% of LTV on acquisition. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/4/2017 • 21 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 559: JSX Exchange Launches To Sell Computational Power to Financial Firms with CEO Andrew Gryaznov
Andrew Gryaznov. He’s an artificial intelligence and a cloud computing evangelist based in Dublin, Moscow. He’s the founder of JSX Exchange – the cloud computing commodity exchange and has built several other services and tools ranging from SshTo.net, Plottico, and many others. Andrew is also a telecom and Linux expert and finalist at the GSOC 2005 Summit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Startup Owner’s Manual What CEO do you follow? – Brad Katsuyama Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— That depends If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Andrew wished he was more mindful of the global market Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 01:48 – Andrew shares his vision for why he built JSX Exchange 01:51 – Computation will be the most influential resource 03:05 – JSX Exchange has invented a way to commoditize cloud computation 03:53 – Andrew shares what people without JSX Exchange are doing 05:02 – Andrew mentions how the financial exchange space can use JSX Exchange 05:48 – Banks may own supercomputers 07:03 – JSX Exchange works with financial institutions who want accurate trade 07:46 – JSX Exchange wants to expand out of the financial space 08:18 – JSX Exchange is currently in pre-seed stage 09:15 – Irish investors have put out less than $1M 09:24 – It is an equity round 09:34 – Andrew was a solo founder for a period of time, but expanded 10:15 – Andrew has a team of 5 people who are all co-founders 10:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There is a possibility that computation will be the most influential resource. Credibility is needed if you want to be successful in your space. Believe in your product. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/3/2017 • 14 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 558: 2 yr Old HotJar Passes $500k MRR Helping 10,000 Customers See What Website Visitors Are Doing with CEO David Darmanin
David Darmanin. He’s the CEO and founder of HotJar. Over the 12 years before founding HotJar, he generated hundreds of millions of dollars in growth consulting small to Fortune 500 businesses. He’s got multiple teams, developed brands, and ran hundreds of tests for his clients spanning across 19 languages, 12 currencies, and 13 different industries. HotJar is now used in over 150 sites around the world and the company is growing to €3 million euros in just under one year. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing What CEO do you follow? – Jay Simons Favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – I wished I truly understood what marketing was Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:18 – Nathan introduces David to the show 03:03 – HotJar is a tool that allows site owners to see how their users are using their websites 03:30 – Once you know the customer experience, it is easier to see what to improve next 03:45 – Nathan experienced HotJar himself, in his website 04:10 – HotJar is careful about what data to show in regards to privacy 05:05 – HotJar’s technology was expensive 05:30 – HotJar has a premium model 05:51 – Average customer pay per month is €50 06:10 – It was only €30 when HotJar started 06:33 – HotJar is currently serving 10K customers 06:50 – The number of sites each customer has 07:30 – ARR 07:40 – MRR 07:55 – Revenue goal for 2017 08:15 – HotJar currently has a team of 22 people and 8 on the leadership team 08:35 – There are 5 people in the founding team 09:14 – There are 4 big pillars: marketing, customer success, product, and operation 09:57 – Gross customer churn is higher than net negative churn 11:05 – “We are the dropping the smaller customers, but we are retaining and expanding the bigger customers” 11:20 – Both have less than 10% monthly churn 11:41 – HotJar was founded in 2014 12:20 – “If you truly want to create a premium company and not just like a trial model which is disguised as a premium, you really need to think about how does that free package stand on its own 2 feet” 12:43 – HotJar minimized the number of interface and allowed users to delete them and create new ones 13:21 – David does not track the time the customer has converted from free to premium, but they track the cohorts 14:00 – CAC is extremely conservative 15:04 – The premium aspect Hotjar offers is brand building 15:50 – There is brand value in doing different types of campaigns 16:17 – HotJar is bootstrapped 16:25 – HotJar sees other players who have raised capital 17:14 – HotJar does not see raising capital as an advantage 17:34 – HotJar gets a lot of referrals 18:10 – HotJar just recently started with paid advertising 18:40 – HotJar has an investment target model 19:10 – HotJar has used this model to offer flexibility and freedom 20:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Churn is one of the biggest challenges of a SaaS business. If you truly want to create a premium company and product—think about how that free package stands on its own two feet. Check your options because NOT raising capital can be very possible and advantageous for you. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/2/2017 • 24 minutes, 26 seconds
EP 557: Appointlet Hits $35k MRR, Co-Founders Because of Reddit Helping 1100 Customers Schedule with Rami El Chamaa
Rami El Chamaa. He’s the CEO and founder of Appointlet. He started earlier as a digital marketing manager at Eastline Marketing where he led lead generation, SEO, email marketing, and content marketing. Before that, he was with Ernst & Young. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – N/A Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Rami to the show 02:03 – Appointlet is an appointment scheduling software 02:34 – Appointlet is a SaaS based business and makes money through subscriptions 02:40 – Appointlet has monthly and annually pricing depending on the team price 02:51 – Average monthly revenue per customer is $50 03:17 – Appointlet’s pricing has been set since 2012 04:18 – Rami’s co-founder was working for his previous company and saw the tedious process of appointment scheduling through different websites 05:17 – Rami saw his co-founder’s thread in Reddit regarding his webapp and Rami replied to him 05:31 – Rami is from Lebanon and met his co-founder through Reddit 05:45 – Rami is in charge of marketing growth and his co-founder is in charge of the coding 06:20 – The Reddit thread 07:05 – Rami and Jared don’t talk much about equity 07:30 – Rami didn’t have any idea about equity and just focused on marketing 08:05 – Rami now has 25% of the company 08:27 – Appointlet has 1100 paying customers 08:55 – Rami had been working with Appointlet for a year when he realized he needed to be compensated 09:16 – First year revenue 10:19 – Average RPU 10:35 – Rami focuses on listening to customers and creating a flow that lets the customer feel that they are being taken cared of 11:08 – Startups grow through support 12:08 – Rami has integrated branding techniques 13:00 – “The lifetime value of a customer usually drives the lifetime value of a new customer as well” 14:00 – Gross customer churn 14:10 – Appointlet is doing paid, targeted, marketing campaigns 14:40 – Appointlet spent $2-3K on a marketing campaign 15:07 – LTV 15:30 – Appointlet just hired their first customer support manager 15:58 – Appointlet is currently looking for software developers located in USA 16:05 – Salary range 16:49 – Appointlet is bootstrapped 16:59 – Appointlet is not interested in raising funds until they need it 17:36 – Appointlet is currently cash flow positive 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Opportunities can now be found on the internet – just look for someone with whom you share the same passion. Working for free isn’t that bad as long as you make yourself indispensable. The lifetime value of a customer usually drives the lifetime value of a new customer as well. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
2/1/2017 • 22 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 556: They 3D Printed Baby Sophia's New Foot Faster and Cheaper than Alternatives with Mecuris CEO Manuel Opitz
Manuel Opitz: He is currently the founder of Mecuris. Before founding the company as the CEO, he worked as a medical IP broker in innovation management and as a technology scout in China. He graduated in Industrial Engineering and he has taken a keen interest in optimizing healthcare process chains by digitalization and 3D printing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Thinking Fast and Slow What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Podio and Acuity Scheduling Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t try to do everything yourself” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Manuel to the show 02:14 – Mecuris is in B2B and medical technology 02:30 – Mecuris provides patient specific prosthetics using 3D printing 02:58 – Manuel discusses the picture on their website 03:19 – Mecuris can be reimbursed by the insurance companies 03:38 – Mecuris gets paid as the service provider for medical supply stores 03:51 – Mecuris uses SLS—which is more costly but lasts 04:25 – The smaller the prosthetics, the cheaper it is 04:50 – Manuel shares the pricing 05:25 – The price for Sophie’s prosthetics 06:15 – Insurance companies have their own prices 06:55 – Average number of prosthetics that have been 3D printed in 2016 07:28 – Mecuris only had prototypes in 2016 07:45 – Mecuris had 2 seed investors in November 08:39 – Mecuris raised under a million 08:55 – Mecuris had a pre-seed round 09:37 – The 6 founders put in 5-digit numbers per person and received a pre-seed government round 10:12 – Manuel shares how the 6 founders talked about the equity 11:26 – The founders who are operational are the software lead and product designer 11:52 – There are a total of 11 people in the office 12:07 – Mecuris was launched in May, 2016 12:52 – Manuel wants to enter the international market after Series A 13:09 – Talks with big companies are in the works 13:40 – Mecuris can do prosthetics in just 10 minutes 14:04 – Manuel discusses Sophie’s prosthetics and what would be her option would be if there was no Mecuris 15:15 – Mecuris can do simulation work with their prosthetics 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Aim high—if you believe that you can enter the international market then do it. Sharing equity requires a good system, defining how you can benefit from one another. Collaborate with the experts in your field. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/31/2017 • 20 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 555: Sudo.ai Raises $2.3M at $10.3M Post Money Valuation to Fix CRM Space with CEo Francisco Larrain
Francisco Larrain who has been an entrepreneur for most of his life. He was born and raised in Chile and is the co-founder and CEO of Sudo. He founded a company called Zappedy – a payment technology company that was backed by Eric Schmidt and acquired by Groupon. More recently, he led a project engineering team of a hundred plus people for Groupon’s local business. Now, he’s working on enabling high quality work for corporations and their teams. The co-founder and head of product, Amit, is also joining Francisco in this podcast. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management (Francisco) What CEO do you follow? – N/A (Amit) Favorite online tool? — Splunk and Github (Francisco) Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No (Francisco) If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Francisco would tell himself that all these people that you look up to are much more human than you think and he’d would love to have more confidence. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:29 – Nathan introduces Francisco to the show 02:11 – Amit codes late at night 02:27 – Team of 9 people and they all code 03:00 – Francisco explains the hedge fund with trigger power 04:00 – Francisco likes the entrepreneurial side of the Valley 04:37 – Francisco has raised $3M 04:45 – Sudo wants to fix the broken CRM of enterprise 05:15 – There are system problems and software problems 05:25 – A time consuming software will lead to people not using it 06:17 – Francisco has experienced problems with CRM in Groupon 07:20 – Francisco shares their plan with Sudo, starting with expense management 07:45 – There’s a free-form format in the CRM where people can update 08:10 – Francisco wants to flip everything around 09:17 – Sudo is on pre-revenue and private beta 09:56 – There are 5 pilot companies 10:10 – Sudo will possibly start with monthly subscription system and will move to an account based system 11:00 – The key features of Sudo allows people to add contacts and notes from their meetings 12:30 – Sudo is very sticky with the representatives 13:43 – The $3M seed round was an equity round 13:59 – Francisco shares who their investors are 15:00 – Why the valuation was easy for Francisco 16:00 – Francisco shared the acquisition of Groupon on Zappidy 17:37 – The valuation that was negotiated for Sudo in the seed round 19:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A time consuming software will lead to people not using it. The valuation is much easier if you’ve had a good exit before. We are all humans – even the ones in the highest positions that we look up to and respect. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/30/2017 • 23 minutes
EP 554: Brandetize is Jack Canfields Internet Engine, Hits $4M 2015 Revenue with CEO Eric Berman
Eric Berman: Since graduating from UCST, he’s been a serial entrepreneur and business operator. He grew his first company to 400K and just missed out on going public. He has been a consultant for many other businesses and is now the CEO and founder of Brandetize, a full service, performance-based, marketing agency that partners with thought leaders such as Brian Tracy, Jack Canfield and many others. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence Others What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — Spark Hire Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 and a half If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Continue to have an open mind, network as many people as you can and…follow your passions and be humble” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:00 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:33 – TheCollegeClub.com was Eric’s first company 02:51 – It grew significantly 03:40 – The stock market crashed just before they become public in 2000 04:25 – They were burning $2M monthly with over 400 employees 05:46 – After the crash, Eric did some consulting 07:00 – They don’t teach life skills in the educational system 07:18 – Eric approached Brian Tracy when Brian was struggling 08:00 – It was 2001, when Eric started working with Brian at no cost 08:16 – Eric shares the difference of Gary Vaynerchuk and Brian Tracy 09:08 – After working with Brian for more than 10 years, gurus are asking Eric if he can work for them 09:20 – Eric had a talk with Brian about him working with other gurus 10:00 – The brands that are going after Brandetize 10:40 – 2015 total revenue is close to $4M and 2016 is close to $5M 10:55 – 28 employees 11:16 – Brandetize doesn’t have a MRR 12:30 – Eric predicts that Brendon Burchard will be the next Tony Robbins 12:56 – Brian Tracy brings the most revenue to Brandetize 13:50 – Eric shares their offer to the brands 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Have an open mind, be humble, and follow your passions. Even if you have a significant fall—this does not stop you from coming back. Offering your services for free can help you gain more in the end. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/29/2017 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 553: Prospectify Raises $1M at $4M Post Money Valuation, $25k MRR, for Better Prospecting with CEO Matt Ekstrom
Matt Ekstrom. He’s one of the founders of Prospectify and formerly co-founded HiringSolved. He’s in-charge of all things revenue for Prospectify, which is a promising sales and intelligence platform. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Sales Acceleration What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — Google Search and HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would have studied more about startups and being an entrepreneur” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Matt to the show 01:55 – Prospectify is a SaaS model 02:14 – Prospectify’s long term goal is to be able to scale personalization from the sales standpoint 02:25 – Prospectify has monthly subscriptions 02:45 – Prospectify’s pricing: 03:25 – The prices from the website are $40, $190, $490, and $975 03:33 – Average customer pay per month is $352 03:50 – Prospectify was launched in February 2016, and was in beta in January 2016 04:16 – Current number of customers is around 100 04:46 – MRR is over $20K 05:09 – Prospectify is based in Phoenix 05:20 – Prospectify just closed their first month 05:25 – It was in Angels and a million dollar round 05:45 – Matt shares why he decided on an equity round and not a convertible note 06:31 – Matt uses the trajectory to argue for higher valuation 07:29 – Prospectify is about to launch their company search which includes 12 million companies starting in the USA 08:10 – The people Prospectify has targeted 08:18 – Prospectify’s customer base is diverse 08:45 – Annual customer churn 09:45 – Matt shares what he will do to keep customers paying and NOT cancel after receiving all the data 11:10 – Prospectify’s top data sources 11:22 – Matt shares what they used to validate the concept of Prospectify 12:18 – Fixed cost per month for crawling 13:11 – Matt shares where to get credits 14:00 – Customer LTV 14:34 – Current team size 14:45 – Headcount expenses 16:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Keep people up to date—that way, they will keep on paying. Decide whether an equity round or convertible note will be most advantageous for you. Discern what is the right track and try to stay on it. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/28/2017 • 19 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 552: $300k last 12 months To Help Sales People Find Perfect Gifts with CEO Greg Segall
Wayne Silbermann. He has founded a number of startups from South Africa including one of the first world’s music discovery services which was originally founded by Mark Shuttleworth. His most recent venture, Sortd, is a new email platform that’s on a path to fundamentally changing the way people communicate and manage work. Sortd has ranked as the number 1 app for Gmail on Product Hunt. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Tipping Point What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — WorkFlowy Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Wayne would tell himself that there’s plenty of opportunities out there and you can pick and choose what you’re passionate about Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Wayne to the show 02:20 – Sortd transforms the Gmail interface into a more organized system to manage lists—similar to Trello for Gmail 02:50 – Wayne discovered that many people use the Gmail Inbox as a to-do list 03:29 – Sortd allows you to drag-and-drop your emails to your to-do lists 03:50 – Sortd is currently free 04:00 – Wayne shares how they are going to monetize Sortd according to agencies that use it 05:00 – Wayne has a number of ventures which are his sources of income 05:30 – The number of free users 05:45 – The behavior of active users 06:40 – Total capital which is self-funded 06:50 – The money goes to development 07:29 – Sortd works under Gmail and there’s no need to add another app 08:05 – Why would people use Sortd? 09:00 – Sortd allows you to “communicate using email as a medium in the context of your priorities” 09:33 – It is like you’re running two applications under 1 tab 10:11 – Sortd was in the chrome store since 2014 10:45 – Sortd has 3 full-time developers 11:16 – The revenue of the other business 11:40 – The funding environment in South Africa 12:48 – Wayne is looking to raise around a million dollars for Sortd 14:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Having a number of ventures can help you create a product that is dedicated to helping people. Email is one of the most used applications—that’s why startups are finding ways to make life easier for email users. There are tons of opportunities out there—pick and choose what you’re passionate about. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/27/2017 • 18 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 551: Sortd, 200,000 users, $500k invested so far, launched2014, othe rbusness funding this that does $1m/yr. Raising $1m sortd
1/26/2017 • 16 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 550: Attentive Raises $150K in Portugal to Solve Sales Problem with CEO Daniel Araujo
Daniel Araujo. He’s the CEO at Attentive.US – a competitive intelligence platform that gives real-time information to teams that use SalesForce, Hubspot, Pipedrive or Full Contact. He’s the next Googler, loves data visualization and all things technology. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Peak What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Roughly If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Daniel would tell himself to learn as fast as he can Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Daniel to the show 02:10 – Attentive is a SaaS platform that integrates with CRMs 02:20 – Attentive alway looks for information and updates in real-time 02:42 – Attentive offers monthly subscriptions and an additional setup fee for clients who want to use other CRMs 03:03 – Average customer pay per month 03:16 – The integration is a one-time fee and will depend on the client’s preferences 03:55 – Attentive does track every person that is in your pipeline 04:40 – Every behavior of a lead notifies the user 05:00 – Daniel shares what their setup looks like 05:09 – The information that needs to be filled out for the setup are on the website 05:44 – There are clients who will give a list of companies they want to track 06:21 – Number of paying customers monthly 06:37 – Attentive just launched a new interface 07:00 – MRR 07:08 – Team size is 5 which includes a newly hired Head of Growth 08:00 – Attentive has raised $150K 08:12 – The first $100K was from a big VC in Portugal and the rest is from an advisor round 08:50 – There are key people who are helping build Attentive 09:00 – Initially, it was convertible note but everything is converted to equity now 09:19 – The valuation conversation with an Angel investor 10:05 – Daniel shares how he started raising Attentive’s capital 10:28 – There are still people who are using Attentive’s Slack bot for free 10:38 – The investors believe that Attentive could grow 10:58 – 10% of the company is for the investors, the rest belongs to the 3 founders of Attentive 11:17 – Daniel shares how the 3 founders split the rest of the company 11:40 – Daniel wants to move Attentive to the US because they want to compete in that market 12:10 – Daniel will focus on having an MRR of $5-10K before raising another round 12:40 – Valuation for Series A will depend on the metrics 13:50 – Attentive is trying to get on the Boulder acceleration program 15:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Believe in your product so that other people, too, will believe in it. Deciding the valuation for another raising depends on the MRR or the metrics. Learn as FAST as you can. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/25/2017 • 18 minutes
EP 549: Propeller CEO on Why He'll Win CRM Space After Exit to Samsung with Eric Bouck
Eric Bouck. He’s the CEO and founder of Propeller, a CRM that lets you sell from gmail. Prior to Propeller, Eric was the co-founder and CEO of Zigzag Software which was eventually sold to Samsung. He also spent some time working as a director for Samsung. He also worked as a Group Product Manager at Dell EMC and spent 4 years with this company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Inspired What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Webflow Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Marry the right person” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:05 – Propeller is the CRM that creates daily tools that salespeople can use to set their meetings, do their email and phone calls, share presentations and documents, and research etc. 02:31 – Propeller is a SaaS business and they have monthly and annual subscriptions 02:50 – Average revenue per customer monthly 02:54 –$50 per month 03:15 – How does Propeller win on a very crowded market? 03:24 – There’s a lot of companies who try to make their own niche 03:42 – Propeller has a unique mix of deep integration with Gmail combined with the ability to do multiple step campaign 04:45 – Propeller is an all-in-one CRM – you won’t be needing another product 05:10 – Propeller was launched September 1st 05:15 – Growth is 21% month over month 05:22 – A little over 50 customers at the moment 05:26 – Propeller is bootstrapped 05:39 – Eric got decent money from the exit 06:23 – No revenue churn at the moment 07:00 – Team size, they are also remote 07:36 – Eric is not open to acquisition talks at the moment 08:00 – The leading companies in the CRM space are Salesforce and Dynamics 08:35 – Pipeline and Hubspot are getting positive feedback as well 09:00 – Eric shares his opinion of Outreach 09:25 – Eric mentions Propeller having an AI 09:55 – The core differentiator of the products 10:04 – An example of how Propeller makes getting your emails done easier 11:00 – Nathan’s acuity to batch schedule 11:20 – CRM pricing 11:42 – Deliver the VALUE 12:00 – Eric shares their vision as a company to make salespeople more effective 12:12 – Eric shares how he got their first 5 customers 12:46 – Eric has also spent for paid marketing 12:58 – LTV is $1500 13:30 – CAC LTV ratio 15:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If your market is crowded, you have to work HARDER to differentiate yourself. The value is not in losing sales or making more sales—the value is found in whether or not you provide an effective product. Don’t live with regrets—it’s gotten you to where you are now. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/24/2017 • 18 minutes, 26 seconds
EP 548: $200M FinTech Fund Bullish on Kabbage with Santander Innoventures Partner Manuel Silva
Manuel Silva. He’s a partner at Santander InnoVenture. Prior to that, he was the founding member of BBVA Ventures which focused on lending, new platforms, financial inclusion, and private banking. He’s worked across Latin America and Europe and holds a BA in Business Administration from CUNEF, a MSc in Political Science, and a MPhil in Development Economics. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Rob Frohwein Favorite online tool? — Crunchbase Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “There’s so much to do in this world” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Manuel to the show 02:25 – Manuel is involved in all investments at Santander 03:10 – Manuel is separate from the Santander group 03:31 – Manuel facilitates the relationship across the banks 03:48 – The banks refer to the Santander’s franchises all over the world 04:24 – Manuel shares how they worked with Kabbage 05:01 – “It’s a successful investment, it’s a successful partnership” 05:20 – Kabbage is the perfect example of how Santander wants to work 05:30 – The fund size for innoventure at Santander 06:45 – Manuel shares how Santander plays in the venture capital world 06:48 – Santander does equity investment only 08:05 – Santander works out the opportunities for the CEO and the company 08:55 – The companies in Santander’s portfolio is not complete because there are still companies unannounced 10:00 – Manuel shares how they work in the round and in the FinTech space 10:03 – FinTech space has a level of maturity and density in entrepreneurship 11:00 – Companies that Santander have invested in are data driven 12:13 – Santander wants banks to partner with startups so that these companies can access the reach these banks have 14:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: FinTech has the maturity to deal with the problems that come up in the industry—this sets them apart. Santander exists to bring together a partnership between banks and startups. Be focused in your task and goals as there’s so much to do. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible and giving FREE money now from Nathan. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/23/2017 • 17 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 547: Handshake.com Raises $24M, Helping 1000+ Customers Manage Store Product Purchasing with CEO Glen Coates
Glen Coates. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Handshake. It focuses on putting the right product on every shelf in every store. He goes between Sydney, San Diego and New York City. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Five Dysfunctions of a Team What CEO do you follow? – Dave Yarnold Favorite online tool? — Boomerang for Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Glen wished he knew how intense running this company was going to be and to spend a lot more time making music and going surfing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Glen to the show 02:15 – Handshake is about getting the right product on every shelf, in the world 03:30 – Handshake brings the Amazon-like buying and selling platform to businesses 03:55 – Handshake Rep is the mobile app used by sales reps who work for the brand 04:21 – Handshake Direct is the mobile and web-based ecommerce for B2B 05:00 – Handshake is a SaaS business and they sell to manufacturers and distributors 05:10 – Handshake’s customers are the manufacturers, distributors, and their customers who log into Handshake 05:22 – Handshake has a similar model to Salesforce 05:40 – Glen started working with Handshake in 2010 and got their first customer in 2011 05:51 – First year revenue 06:16 – Average number of customers at the moment 06:51 – The pricing model is per seat per year for Handshake Rep, Handshake Direct is made-to-order 07:37 – Average customer pay per month 08:24 – December 2016: total average revenue range 09:35 – Handshake used to have monthly contracts 09:59 – Most of the contracts now are annual contracts 10:07 – Total capital raised is around $24M inclusive of Series B 10:29 – Series B closed in February 2016 10:40 – Handshake isn’t in any acquisition talk 12:03 – What Glen and his team is building is grand in scale and requires a lot of hard work 12:44 – Team size and location 13:05 – Glen shares the number of people per team 14:10 – LTV 14:15 – “I don’t think much about lifetime value” 16:51 – “I care about delivering 100% growth with a better payback period than I care about delivering 200% growth with like a terrible payback period” 17:05 – Handshake growth is 100% annual 17:30 – Glen shares the flagged payback period in VC communities 18:48 – Glen is currently burning close to $500K a month 18:56 – Glen thinks that it should take at least 6 months before having to raise again 19:50 – Glen usually raises for a couple of years and each time he raises gives them 2 years of runway 20:15 – Gross annual customer churn 20:30 – Churn has come down when they shifted their market 21:25 – Glen shares what they did to combat high monthly churn 22:38 – Handshake always has a negative revenue churn 23:30 – Glen wouldn’t sell Handshake for Nathan’s sample offer 25:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s difficult to create a SaaS that is web-based and mobile-based – it takes hard work. Delivering 100% growth with a better payback period is better than delivering 200% growth with a terrible payback period. Raising usually takes 6 months and it is the CEO’s responsibility to decide how he can leverage each raise. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/22/2017 • 28 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 546: The Pitch Made $80k in Year 1 Sponsor Revenue, 700,000 Downloads with Producer Josh Muccio
Josh Muccio: He’s the host of The Pitch Podcast and he recently launched Season 2 on January 11th. Before The Pitch Podcast, he was the founder of iHeart Repair, which he sold in 2014. He is a father of 2, soon to be 3. Josh is 29 and he loves the tech world. He’s in Florida and loves skiing and takes 2 ski trips every winter. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Slight Edge What CEO do you follow? – Nicholas Quah Favorite online tool? — Slack and Google Drive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To create more stuff and just put it out there” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Josh to the show 02:35 – The Pitch Podcast is similar to the TV show SharkTank 02:53 – Season 2 is where investments happen on air 03:05 – Josh shares why Season 1 of The Pitch Podcast was challenging 03:40 – Sheel is Josh’s co-host 04:09 – Josh discusses iHeart Repair 05:20 – iHeart Repair was sold in 2014 05:25 – Revenue was around $750K annually 05:59 – Josh just didn’t see his future with iHeart Repair 06:25 – Josh had a broker who helped him with the exit 06:43 – MTechRepair bought iHeart Repair 07:12 – Josh did the Wordpress site for iHeart Repair 07:35 – Josh installed Woocommerce in iHeart Repair’s site 08:30 – Josh shares what happened after the exit 08:50 – Josh shares how he met Sheel 09:10 – Josh had a dream that he was going to have a podcast 09:30 – Josh shares how he met Spencer Handly of Blab 09:52 – The start of the daily hunt 10:45 – Josh shares how Sheel approached him 11:25 – The advertisers in the podcast are the main revenue stream 12:00 – Nathan asks Josh for his feedback regarding promoting his product 12:49 – Josh plans to stay in their business model 12:54 – Average revenue for Season 1 of The Pitch Podcast 13:11 – Season 2 pre-sold revenue 13:30 – There are 2 advertisers per show 14:15 – 250K total downloads for Season 1 14:42 – The idea of Season 2 15:13 – The amount Josh spent on his Facebook ad trial 15:31 – Press is the most successful growth channel for The Pitch Podcast 16:07 – If Season 2 flops, Josh would stop the podcast 16:25 – Nathan makes an offer to Josh 18:51 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The services market is tedious and requires a thorough study. If you don’t see your future in it – put an END to it. Do NOT hesitate to create more and put it out there. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket The Pitch Podcast – Josh’s Podcast iHeart Repair – Josh’s previous company MTechRepair – The company that purchased iHeartRepair Woocommerce – Josh installed this program into iHeartRepair Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/21/2017 • 23 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 545: Unomy Raises $3.4M, $160k MRR Helping Businesses Get Leads with CEO Gal Harzvi
Gal Har-Zvi: He’s a passionate entrepreneur who lives and breathes B2B sales, marketing, and everything in between. He’s one of the founders of Valueshine Ventures, the technology holdings company and a successful online marketer for various software categories and verticals. He’s currently the CEO and founder of the company called Unomy. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Pitch Anything What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Calendly, ZoomUS, Yesware, SalesLoft, Boomerang Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just do whatever you love and are passionate about and everything will be good” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Gal to the show 02:14 – Unomy provides sales intelligence solutions 02:27 – Unomy makes money by selling annual subscriptions 02:40 – Unomy was launched in 2014 02:53 – Raised capital after 6 months 03:00 – Launched the current version focused on enterprise sales a year ago 03:25 – First year revenue 04:05 – Unomy currently changed their business model because the first one was not successful 04:21 – 2015 revenue 04:36 – 2016 revenue goal 05:03 – Unomy currently has mid-market businesses, but gradually switching to larger accounts 05:36 – Average customer pay annually 05:49 – Average number of current customers 05:58 – Unomy has currently raised capital 06:08 – Unomy did a seed round and a few convertible notes 06:18 – Unomy is going to raise a Series A 06:39 – Gal shares why they are raising capital 06:56 – Unomy’s competitors are raising capital as well 07:21 – Unomy will probably raise $5-6M 07:40 – Unomy’s valuation 08:33 – In any round, a founder should expect to lose anywhere between 25-35% of their company 09:17 – Gal and Nathan discuss what an average deal is 09:45 – There are a lot of VCs in Israel 10:20 – Unomy has 3 branches 10:48 – Team size is 24 10:56 – Gross annual churn 11:35 – Customer’s LTV 12:02 – CAC 13:20 – Number of companies in Unomy’s database 13:58 – Gal shares what makes them better than their competitors 15:00 – Unomy has a variety of categories 15:30 – Unomy was founded to help sales companies, not investors 16:06 – Unomy uses more sources than others 17:19 – Unomy has a guarantee and if you get a bounce email, you can get your money back 17:38 – Unomy does real-time verification 19:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: In any round, a founder should expect to lose anywhere between 25-35% of their company. A company should focus on why it was founded in the first place. Do what you love and are passionate about and the rest will take care of itself. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/20/2017 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 544: RevBoss $700k 2015 Revenue, Now $90k MRR to Help Customers Drive Revenue with CEO Eric Boggs
Eric Boggs: He’s the CEO at RevBoss – a sales prospecting SaaS company. RevBoss helps B2B sales teams grow pipelines and win more customers. Prior to RevBoss, he was the founder and CEO at Argyle Social and was a one-man sales team at Bronto Software. Eric is in North Carolina with his wife and 3 small children. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Things About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Matt Williamson Favorite online tool? – Stripe Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “To not worry so much about the long term—that things just have a way of working themselves out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:10 – Eric shares what happened to Argyle 02:42 – Argyle raised $1.5M 03:52 – Argyle’s buyers 05:32 – Eric was only 22 when joined he Bronto 05:39 – Eric was a one-man sales team for 2 and half years 06:32 – Eric went to business school after Bronto 07:05 – Bronto is now an Oracle company 07:12 – RevBoss is a SaaS company that helps B2B seller relations find more prospects and win more customers 07:45 – In between the Argyle wind down and RevBoss, Eric was a consultant for a year 08:20 – RevBoss’ competitors 09:20 – RevBoss started as a services company and launched in September 2016 09:47 – Building a services business is easy, growing it is hard and turning it into a SaaS business is much harder 10:26 – Eric shares the weird things he encounters in the business 11:07 – “We’re cannibalizing ourselves a little bit” in the short term, in regards to services revenue vs. recurring Saas revenue 12:12 – Average customer pay per month 12:28 – Weighted MRR 12:39 – RevBoss raised a seed round for $1.1M 13:45 – Eric sold 20% of the business for $1.1M 14:50 – Total 2015 revenue 15:01 – Team size and location 15:41 – Projected LTV 16:27 – CAC 16:34 – All inbound sales 17:20 – Gross churn 17:59 – Eric plans for the worst after his experience with Argyle 19:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Recurring SaaS revenue will beat out services revenue in the long run. Your worst experiences are your greatest teachers. Don’t worry too much about the long term—things just have a way of working themselves out. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/19/2017 • 24 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 543: Bant CEO Hits $32K MRR, Helping Companies Get Higher Quality Leads with CEO Andrei Breaz
Episode 543 Summary: In Episode #543, Nathan interviews Andrei Breaz. He’s the founder and CEO of Bant.io which is a B2B leads company. Before that, he was the founder of Keptify, which was acquired by Well Investments. He also worked as the CTO of Harty Hanks and is highly experienced in the B2B sales space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Anthony Robbins and Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Andrei wished he would have caught the entrepreneurial bug sooner Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Andrei to the show 02:25 – Bant initiates conversations for companies with their ideal prospects 03:10 – Bant is a service model and not a SaaS model 03:47 – Bant is on the prospecting and lead generation stage 04:05 – Bant doesn’t sell data 04:10 – Bant uses the data they generate using their own software 04:35 – The distinct data points that Bant uses 05:10 – Average customer pay per month is $1200 05:39 – The price reflects a medium plan which is a customized plan 05:44 – There’s 100% money-back guarantee 06:00 – Andrei shares their definition of a hot lead 07:13 – Bant was launched in early 2015 07:30 – Bant is self-funded 08:00 – Number of current customers 09:08 – MRR 09:30 – Andrei is aiming for $1.5M next year 09:34 – 2015 total revenue 10:10 – Bant’s actual clients 10:25 – Most are SMBs 10:50 – Team size and location 11:10 – Bant gets their customers from referrals and word of mouth 11:30 – Bant ran a $ 200 adword campaign when they started 11:41 – Andrei shares Bant’s process 12:28 – LTV 12:55 – Bant’s CAC is marginal 13:10 – No sales team, but there are account managers 14:18 – Monthly gross customer churn 15:10 – Bant has their own database and has researchers who validate their leads 15:55 – 8 contractors on research 16:03 – 3rd party data apps that Bant is using including Builtwith 16:50 – Andrei shares LinkedIn as one of their main data sources 17:15 – Andrei shares his thoughts regarding LinkedIn being acquired by Microsoft 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Do NOT rely on just one large source of data, have a variety of sources. Businesses can spend less time hiring the right people if they go through right channels providing the right prospects. Once the entrepreneurial bug bites you—just go for it. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/18/2017 • 21 minutes, 4 seconds
EP 542: HipLead Hits $120k MRR Helping 30 Customers Get More Leads with CEO COnor Lee
Conor Lee, founder and CEO of HipLead. The company helps leading B2B companies scale their outbound sales with high quality lead generation outbound campaigns. Before founding HipLead, Conor founded several other companies including TellFi which was in the Y Combinator, Winter 2011 batch. Prior to that, he worked as a lobbyist in statewide political campaigns. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? – Zapier Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Conor wished he had spent more time in tech than in politics Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Conor to the show 02:07 – Conor shares what happened to TellFi 02:58 – Conor had a co-founder who wanted to keep it going 03:19 – Conor shares how the exit happened 04:10 – HipLead helps companies scale their outbound sales 04:35 – HipLead’s pricing 04:55 – Current number of customers is 30 05:18 – HipLead was launched in 2013 05:30 – Conor is the solo founder, but he had a co-founder for awhile 06:25 – Conor has the majority of the shares of the company 07:35 – Conor and Nathan discuss cap tables 08:00 – Conor hired a lawyer for his legal documents 08:17 – Use the startup attorneys 08:31 – HipLead is bootstrapped 08:50 – HipLead’s loan 09:20 – Conor shares why he got the loan 10:00 – Conor shares how the loan works 11:30 – The type of loan is only for specific companies 12:00 – The company name that provides the loan is Lighter Capital and it is based in Seattle 12:21 – Annual customer churn: less than 15% 12:58 – CAC 13:09 – Customer’s LTV 14:15 – First year revenue 15:40 – 2015 revenue: $900,000 15:50 – Current ARR 15:59 – Conor is also looking into raising capital 16:10 – Team size of 16 16:29 – Team location is in San Francisco and other remote locations 18:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: We need to be more open about exits—there are times where you just have to pull the plug. If you need funds and do not want to share equity, try a bank loan. Make sure your legal documents are in order, especially in the case of a split from your co-founder. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/17/2017 • 21 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 541: VerticalIQ Hits $175k MRR, Helping 140 Banks Prep for Company Meetings with President Bobby Martin
Bobby Martin, the author of The Hockey Stick Principles: The Four Key Stages to Entrepreneurial Success. He believes too many startup founders pivot way too early, quit too early, and expect rapid take off. Through his experience of starting and selling First Research, he's learned firsthand the challenges and solutions at each stage of entrepreneurial growth. Bobby’s currently the chairman and co-founder of Vertical IQ—a leading provider of sales research insight for banks. He's an angel investor and an active board member with several innovative startups including Local Eyesight, Boardroom Insiders, My Life Site, SageWorks and etailinsights. While he's a national speaker, he's still a hometown guy who focuses most of his investments in North Carolina where he's lived and worked. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rework What CEO do you follow? – Brian Hamilton Favorite online tool? — Salesforce Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Be patient for a long journey Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Bobby to the show 02:53 – First Research was launched in 1999 03:19 – Bobby had the exit before the bubble 03:31 – First Research provided profiles to sales and marketing professionals 03:51 – First Research is a SaaS business 04:11 – It took 7-8 years for Bobby to build First Research 04:42 – Bobby made the book because he loved the process 05:09 – Bobby loved the journey 05:26 – Bobby had a publisher and agent for the book 06:00 – Bobby’s agent negotiated the deal with the publisher 06:28 – Bobby’s book was just recently published 06:41 – The average number of copies sold 07:30 – Bobby shares what he thinks made the book sell 08:57 – Bobby is an angel investor 09:40 – Vertical IQ provides profile revenue to bankers 10:19 – The revenue model of Vertical IQ is similar to SaaS 10:30 – Vertical IQ gets paid upfront annually 10:43 – Average number of customers 10:55 – “We don’t charge per seat, we charge according to the number of bankers” 11:20 – Vertical IQ pre-sells to banks 12:05 – ACV is between $15-20K annually 12:28 – Average ARR 12:40 – Gross customer churn 13:25 – Average CAC 13:34 – Vertical IQ is a sales driven company 14:04 – Vertical IQ has a solid profit margin 14:55 – LTV 15:53 – Team size 16:40 – First year revenue 16:58 – 2015 total revenue 17:15 – Vertical IQ is self-funded 19:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Write a book—not because it’s convenient—write because you have something to share to the world. Requesting an upfront annual payment can have clear advantages over monthly payments. Be patient and do not get discouraged—the entrepreneurial journey takes time. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/16/2017 • 0
EP 541: VerticalIQ Hits $175k MRR, Helping 140 Banks Prep for Company Meetings with President Bobby Martin
1/16/2017 • 22 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 540: Cliently Hits $8k MRR, Aims for $5m Valuation Next Round with CEO Spencer Farber
Spencer Farber. He is the CEO and founder of Cliently and he’s been in the industry for 10+ years working across many spaces. He discovered one thing—the constant pain for companies is to define creative ways to generate leads and THAT is what he’s trying to solve with Cliently. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Marc Benioff’s books What CEO do you follow? – Mikita Mikado Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – People are going to throw curveballs and you just need to understand how to deal with them Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Spencer to the show 02:12 – Cliently helps a client engage with prospects 02:23 – A lead is only valuable if you’re able to do something with it 02:33 – Cliently is a SaaS model 02:40 – Cliently’s subscription plans starts at $99 to $599 a month 02:50 – Average RPU 03:18 – There are clients who pay annually 03:45 – They currently have 70-80 customers 04:02 – Cliently is bootstrapped with $30K and friends and family with $75K 04:22 – Cliently was launched in February 2016 05:00 – Spencer shares about a client in Australia and how they are using Cliently 05:20 – The client is BigReviewTV 05:28 – Cliently creates custom campaigns for them 06:10 – “We are not trying to be a CRM but we are trying to put the pieces together that are essentially going to help engagement” 06:45 – Cliently is using different APIs 07:00 – Spencer is looking to partner with Bond.co in the future 07:21 – Spencer shares how Cliently is going to beat the “other guys” in their space 08:12 - Spencer wanted to raise capital 08:54 – Cliently is using multiple sources for their leads 09:49 – Cliently’s target MRR 09:58 – Spencer would raise $500K on an equity round 10:30 – Spencer would give up 10-15% to get the target MRR 11:06 – Spencer shares how Cliently’s system is unique 11:34 – Team size 12:05 – Gross customer churn 13:05 – Team location 15:00 – The Famous Five 17:18 – Connect with Spencer through email 3 Key Points: A lead is only valuable if you’re able to do something with it. Stand out in your space—give your client more reasons to stick with you. If you have a dream, pursue it. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Spencer@Cliently.com – Spencer’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/15/2017 • 18 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 539: eTailInsights Bootstrapped, $1.4m ARR Ecommerce Data with CEO Darren Pierce
Darren Pierce. He’s the founder and CEO of eTailInsights. Prior to launching the business, he has spent many years working with B2B companies specializing in leadership, strategic development, client relationships, and maximizing revenue growth. Darren was the Director of Sales for First Research which was acquired by Hoover. Darren helped Bronto Software accelerate their revenue market share to become the leading email service provider in the ecommerce industry. He’s a graduate of The Walker College of Business at Appalachian State University with 2 BSBAs in Management and Marketing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hockey Stick Principles What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Darren wished that his 20-year old self could have been more patient Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Darren to the show 02:35 – Darren didn’t want to leave Bronto Software, but he came up with the eTailInsights’ idea and couldn’t let it pass 02:53 – Darren joined Bronto, in 2008, to help sell their email marketing and make offers to online retailers 03:25 – One of the early problems in Bronto was how to find the companies/retailers 03:47 – eTailInsights is a database that indexed the e commerce companies 04:03 – eTailInsights is a SaaS business 04:10 – Average MRR/ARR 04:43 – The pay is manual upfront 04:48 – eTailInsights was launched in 2011 04:51 – Total 2015 revenue 05:15 – 2016 goal 05:50 – Average MRR 06:18 – Average churn is adjusted 06:50 – CAC 07:29 - eTailInsights’ average pay per click 07:48 – LTV 08:25 – eTailInsights has been tracking hundreds of thousands of retailer globally 08:36 – eTailInsights will start indexing next year 08:58 – Number of current companies is 3000 09:09 – The three biggest competitors of eTailInsights 10:08 – Exit is not Darren’s priority at the moment 10:16 – Darren’s dream number is $100M 11:18 – Darren wants to know how far his business can go 11:30 – eTailInsights is completely bootstrapped and they have $100K in it 12:06 – Current head count 12:20 – Average compensation 12:36 – eTailInsights’ location 12:52 – eTailInsights sourced their own data and they built their own tech 14:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you become predictable, you lose SO much leverage. If the idea of a business strikes you, go with that passion and just do it. Be patient—it takes patience to be a successful entrepreneur. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/14/2017 • 17 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 538: Nexd.io Raises $1m Pre-Rev, Aims $6M Series A For Smart Sales Automation with Founder James and CEO Larry
James and Larry of Nexd.io. James is the founder and the Chief Stratgey Officer of Next.io and has previously worked with IBM, Socialware, SailPoint Techologies. He has studied at Berkeley and now builds softwares that help people everyday. Larry is the President and CEO of Nexd and is highly experienced in leadership and operations. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Peopleware (James) What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Miller (Larry) Favorite online tool? — Clearbit (James) Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes (Larry) If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – James wished he built a network. Larry would tell himself that the most important thing is execution. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces James and Larry to the show 02:10 – Larry just joined Nexd and he’s the new CEO 02:26 – Larry helps James build a business around the idea 02:34 – Larry’s background is multiple CEO 03:35 – James shares why he brought Larry in 03:59 – Nexd was founded 14 months ago 05:23 – Nexd’s space is analytics 05:45 – Nexd analyzes which emails are effective 05:55 – Nexd is currently on pre-revenue 06:00 – Nexd raised a million dollars on a seed round 06:10 – It is a convertible note 06:12 – Nexd did 2 convertible notes 07:10 – Larry discusses what he thinks about CEOs and founders not being on good terms in a company 07:20 – Larry has been an advisor to VCs 07:30 – Larry shares his advice to entrepreneurs 07:56 – Founders and CEOs should agree on who is going to drive the steering wheel 08:43 – Larry shares how he and James would represent the company in a sample article with TechCrunch 09:15 – Larry shares how they would resolve a possible disagreement in a seed round 10:17 – It was James’ own decision to get a CEO 10:48 – On the technical side, there is another co-founder 11:10 – “What Nexd is doing is going to be a game changer” 11:32 – Nexd targets sales manager and sales reps 12:58 – James and his co founder’s background is enterprise integration problems 13:20 – “We’re trying to be a system of engagement for multiples systems of work” 13:43 – Target for Series A is $6-7M 14:08 – A minimal viable product is needed to step forward—a pilot that has been tested 15:50 – Nexd is not interested on a quick exit and they are going to be the next great company 17:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Choose someone who can do something you’re not good at and who you respect. Founders and CEOs should agree on who’s going to drive the steering wheel – if issues come up, own your mistakes and deal with it. You need a minimal viable product with validation from potential customers to move forward with your business. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/13/2017 • 21 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 537: Raised $150k Then CTO Left, Now He's Cruising $30k MRR with LeadFuze CEO Justin McGill
Justin McGill. He’s an entrepreneur and owned a startup in 2008 when he started a digital agency. After he scaled that out, he launched LeadFuze – a B2B lead generation platform. He’s also the co-host of Zero to Scale Podcast which gives us a behind the scenes look at growing a startup with 200K per month in MRR. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Ultimate Sales Machine What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — ZenPayroll which is now Gusto and bench.co Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Justin would’ve told himself that entrepreneurship was a path in life he could take Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Justin to the show 02:15 – LeadFuze is a software platform 02:21 – LeadFuze allows to you to search for contact information and automate the outreach to ideal and prospective customers—turning them into possible sales opportunities 02:35 – LeadFuze is a subscription-based company 02:55 – Average MRR is $175 03:08 – Early stage companies are using LeadFuze 03:25 – Average number of customers 03:45 – LeadFuze started off completely bootstrapped and had a small raise of $150K 03:56 – Two of three investors are Rob Walling of Drip and David Hauser of Grasshopper 04:26 – Justin shares why he decided to take capital 04:43 – Justin did a small equity round 06:10 – If you’re trying to grow your sales, LeadFuze can help you 06:43 – LeadFuze is web-based 07:00 – LeadFuze wants to focus exclusively on lead generation 07:24 – LeadFuze is a software with a service 08:14 – Gross customer churn and revenue churn 08:35 – “Customers stay for 6 months or so” 09:15 – Why not just charge $175 upfront? 09:31 – LeadFuze is currently a product company without engineering help 09:47 – Justin is trying to look for a CTO 10:58 – Justin shares why his CTO left 11:57 – Current team size on remote 12:18 – About to open an office in Phoenix, AZ 12:30 – LeadFuze has 3 co-founders, one who was Justin’s sales coach 13:55 – CAC 14:05 – Around $300 14:28 – Justin invested in content and that is what driving the signups at the moment 14:50 – LeadFuze offers 20 leads for free 15:02 – 8.5% of the signups convert from free trial to paid 15:10 – Free trial doesn’t require a credit card 15:40 – Total 2015 revenue 15:50 - LeadFuze started totally free 16:11 – Average total cash flow by the end of 2015 is around $250K 16:45 – Some of the sources where LeadFuze pulls data are from ClearBit, Full Contact, and Tower Data 17:23 – Hit Justin up on Twitter 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As a startup, the pay-as-you-go model may be more beneficial than subscription plans. Entrepreneurs need to be more open about their people leaving. Don’t waste time and TAKE the leap as early as you can. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket ClearBit, Full Contact, and Tower Data Where LeadFuze pulls its data @Jus10McGill – Justin’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/12/2017 • 21 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 536: HGData $24M Raised, $10M 2016 Revenue Helping B2B Companies Get Accurate Data with Mark Godley
Mark Godley. He has held leadership positions at technology companies of all different sizes from pre-revenue to publicly traded. He’s best known for driving revenue and outpacing industry growth while rejecting herd mentality. Outside of work, Mark finds time daily to read, work-out, and cook—all the while, being an engaged father, spouse, and citizen. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Devil in the White City What CEO do you follow? – Henry Schuck and Yonatan Stern Favorite online tool? — Flipboard, Stitcher, GaggleAMP and Lead Forensics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Living below your means gives you tons of options. Think about the life you want at age 50 and work backwards. We’re running a marathon not a sprint, and it takes planning, sacrifice and resilience and then, don’t define success and happiness by your paycheck” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Mark to the show 02:25 – HG Data is in a competitive and intelligent space 02:35 – HG Data build data sets, used by sales and marketing teams, to do precision targeting at scale 03:05 – The founder founded HG Data in 2012 after an exit 03:43 – Mark is the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) at HG Data 04:02 – Mark handles all the market phasing for the company 04:31 – When HG Data was founded it served the enterprise space 04:49 – Last year is when they started to go down market 04:58 – Number of enterprise clients is 15-20 with 6-figure ARR 05:15 – HG Data had traditional customers, as well, that totaled 50 05:58 – HG Data transitioned from a data company to a product company 06:12 – Total ASP 06:50 – HG Data wants to increase the customer base, but lower the RPU 07:56 – HG Data created a use-space specific databases 08:19 – HG Data tries to keep the balance of enterprise and down market pricing 08:34 – 50% of the revenue is from direct clients and 50% is from the partners 09:22 – Mark shares what he is worried about in regards to their target 10:09 – Mark shares how their partners use their data 10:55 – Average pay per user annually 12:05 – There are 10-50 OEMs in the customer base 12:37 – Average number of customers 13:00 – Mark only follows ARR and not MRR 13:27 – Mark shares that they are focused on building the new space—they are currently spending and losing money by design, but hoping for a positive cash flow 14:00 – Gross annual customer churn is less than 10% 14:30 – “We’ve had one 6-figure churn in the last 4 years” 14:40 – CAC 15:23 – “We’re looking for a more high-velocity sales model” 16:13 – The company is based in Santa Barbara, where they have 80 employees 16:42 – Connect with Mark through Twitter and LinkedIn 18:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: “We’re running a marathon, not a sprint, and it takes planning, sacrifice, and resilience.” Be mindful of your partners BEFORE making decisions. Live without regrets. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket @Mgodley21 – Mark’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Mark’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/11/2017 • 22 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 535: He's 24 yo Founder, Now VC at Hummingbird
Dominik Vacikar. He is currently an Associate at Hummingbird VC, but was previously the co-founder of Spaceship and some other startups, including Growth at Nestpick. Listen as Dominik gives us an inside look at the workings of Spaceship and why he was chosen by Hummingbird for a very specific task. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Stripe Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Dominik wishes he wasn’t so hard on himself, so long as he was progressing Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Dominik to the show 02:00 – Spaceship started as a side project when Dominik had their lead generation tool in social media 03:02 – Dominik shares how Spaceship works 03:18 – Spaceship searches your entire target audience and provides you with prospect data 03:35 – Spaceship is pay-as-you go 03:51 – 10% of Spaceship’s customers are on a monthly plan 04:10 – Spaceship was launched in October 2015 04:30 – 2015 revenue 04:55 – Current total revenue 05:12 – Dominik shares why he turned to Hummingbird 06:33 – Spaceship was bootstrapped 06:52 – Spaceship’s current team size 07:20 – Dominik has been with Hummingbird for 2 months 07:30 – Hummingbird wants Dominik to build a radar for startups 07:54 – The radar will track interesting companies and identify them 08:29 – Dominik shares how their product is different from Crunchbase 09:31 – Dominik shares the variables they use to identify the startups 10:30 – The current biggest problem is updating the data as frequently as possible 11:45 – Hummingbird is good at identifying the funders’ DNA 12:08 – Hummingbird’s main area of expertise 13:00 – Hummingbird might be interested in a Series A 13:21 – Hummingbird’s ARR target 14:05 – Nathan asks Dominik about Spaceship’s founder 14:37 – Dominik is active on Twitter and LinkedIn 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Growth comes in many forms—sometimes from within your own company or from the help of others. Develop your expertise by drawing knowledge from other fields and markets. Your progress determines your future and YOU set the pace. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket @chichikid – Dominik’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Dominik’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/10/2017 • 18 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 534: 29yo Radius CEO Raises $100M, Helping Expand B2B Sales Pipelines with Darian Shirazi
Darian Shirazi. He’s the CEO and co-founder of Radius. He was an early employee at Facebook and worked on the” Sell Your Item” Team at eBay. He’s founded, invested, and advised many successful technology companies. Prior to starting Radius, Darian studied Computer Science and Philosophy at UC Berkeley. He’s also a prominent keen speaker at Top of Technology Innovation. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Essays of Warren Buffet What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Yesware Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How much harder building the business is than you originally thought and how once you get to scale how amazing it feels.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Darian to the show 02:15 – Darian shares about his time with Facebook 02:30 – Darian’s favorite project on Facebook was Facelift 02:45 – Darian shares what he thinks of Mark Zuckerberg 03:30 – Darian can’t think of a time when Mark was at odds with another team member 03:58 – Radius is about growing pipelines for B2B marketers 04:08 – The customers are typically enterprise and mid-market businesses 04:15 – Radius fixes data 04:30 – Radius’ services 04:48 – The whole foundation of the product starts with the Radius business graph 05:17 – Darian shares how they help the client 05:40 – Darian shares how Radius is different with CB Insights 05:50 – Radius’ data is powered by their customers which allows them to access their CRMs 06:20 – The activity data allows Radius to improve their data 06:50 – Radius doesn’t rely on publicly available data 07:30 – Radius was founded in 2011 and launched in 2013 08:00 – Average number of customers 08:30 – It is not really a seat model 09:10 – Radius has a used cased expansion 09:41 – Team size is currently 150 people 10:00 – Radius has currently raised $100M 10:25 – Radius still has a lot of net capital left 10:42 – Radius’ retention for enterprise customers is around 93% 10:50 – Gross monthly customer churn 11:24 – Darian shares what drives their revenue 11:48 – Radius’s implementation day is only 18 days so customers see the value quickly 12:11 – Radius’ pricing 12:23 – ACV 13:00 – First year revenue 13:25 – Darian has 2 co-founders 14:07 – Radius requires a team 14:28 – Darian hired people from enterprise companies 15:00 – Darian shares Radius’s CAC to LTV ratio 15:36 – Radius’s sales cycle 15:52 – “Customer trust is our number one value” 16:50 – It is difficult to measure CAC to LTV when enterprise companies rely on big events for marketing 17:53 – Radius’s growth rate 19:14 – Radius’ marketing budget 19:29 – The amount Radius spends on Dreamforce 20:27 – Dreamforce is an incredible way to grow a pipe 20:40 – Is Radius going to be the next Benioff’s acquisition? 21:48 – Darian shares how Microsoft has been an incredible partner for Radius 22:36 – The last funding 23:05 – Darian discusses Radius’ future 23:40 – Follow Darian at Twitter and email him 25:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It takes a great team to create a great product. Take what you’ve learned from your last employer, be grateful for it, and leave graciously. Acquisition requires planning, an exchange of ideas, and thorough researching. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Ceo@Radius.com – Darian’s email address @Darian314 – Darian’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/9/2017 • 28 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 533: $1.5M Raised, $100k MRR Helping 800 Customers Manage and Track Documents with CEO Tim Samulet
Tim Saumet. He is the CTO of the company called Tilkee – a SaaS solution software for business proposals, follow ups, and sales process tracking. It is a super hot space. Before that, he was involved with OXFOC Technologies as the CEO. He is also a Manager of General Services in another company and a Project Manager at Travel Due. Famous Five: Favorite Book? –100 Conseils Pratiques Pour Couler sa Boite What CEO do you follow? – Bruno Bonnell and Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Zapier Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Yes” for Kate and “No” for Tim If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Tim would have focused more on personal development Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Tim to the show 02:13 – Kate is developing the European market 02:30 – Tim used to be a salesman and it was difficult for him 03:03 – Tilkee is a simple SaaS software to analyze a prospect’s behavior 03:30 – Tilkee works with any kind of document 03:50 – Tilkee started as a side project 3 and a half years ago 05:00 – First year revenue was $20K 05:15 – Tilkee is currently serving 800 customers 05:41 – Average customer pay per month 06:20 – December 2015 MRR 07:30 – Tim started with small companies, then progressed to enterprise companies 08:05 – Tim pivoted the product and customer base 08:12 – Tim raised, 2 years ago, a million and a half dollars 08:34 – Tim is thinking of raising more next year 09:08 – Tim won’t go to a typical Series A round 09:35 – Employees have a part of the equity 10:15 – Tim wants a raise, but would still want more than 50% of the company 10:37 – Typical valuation in Europe 11:15 – Gross monthly customer churn 12:00 – Kate shares how they find their enterprise deals 13:22 – Tilkee is not doing an e-signature but a u-sign from the European market 14:14 – A customer lifetime value 14:45 – Average CAC 15:45 – Tilkee has an advertisement in one of the biggest French radio stations 16:20 – Current team size is 20 and 15 from them are salespeople 16:42 – Tim shares the stack they have built Tilkee on 17:15 – Kate is currently using Pipedrive to drive Sales 18:35 – Find Tilkee on Twitter and Facebook 20:19 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You CAN solve your own problems—you just need to do the work of finding solutions. Raising capital is always an option to take that next step forward for your business. Meditation is a great avenue for personal development. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan kept his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it at the airplane’s back seat pocket @TilkeeUs – Tilkee’s Twitter handle Facebook – Tilkee’s Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/8/2017 • 24 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 532: $1m Raised, $70k MRR to Record Sales Calls and Coach with ExecVision's Steve Richard
Steve Richard whose mission in life is to help as many sales professionals as possible to become wildly successful. He has been featured in numerous publications including The Harvard Business Review, The Washington Business Journal, and The Washington Post. Outside of work, Steve enjoys scuba diving, skiing, running, and people-watching. He’s from Arlington, VA, with his wife Ellen and their 4 kids all under the age of 7. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – RSVP Selling What CEO do you follow? – Tony Bates Favorite online tool? — Owler Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You got to start with the technology company in the beginning because you’re going to create much more impact on people’s lives” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:58 – Nathan introduces Steve to the show 02:45 – Steve shares the idea of ExecVision 03:17 – ExecVision is a SaaS business 03:20 – There are 50 organizations who are currently using ExecVision 03:34 – ExecVision allows you to access, analyze, and share call records 04:20 – Average pay per user per year and how it ranges per sales person 04:54 – Average MRR 05:24 – Sales professionals love ExecVision 06:04 – ExecVision has coaching requests for their customers 06:37 – Every month there’s a high volume of requests for coaching 07:13 – ExecVision has voice recognition 07:52 – Richard shares how their customers find valuable keywords in ExecVision 09:15 – Richard was running Vorsight before ExecVision 09:50 – People pay per meeting 10:02 – Richard used the profitability of Vorsight to fund ExecVision 10:15 – Richard has raised capital for ExecVision 10:58 – Richard shares what drives them 11:38 – They have raised around $1M 11:50 – Richard acquired ExecVision in April, 2015 12:07 – None of the original people from ExecVision are still working with the company, but they have equity 12:26 – Retention is 90% annually 13:38 – CAC 14:42 – Total head count is 15 14:55 – ExecVision is based in Arlington, Virginia 15:27 – First year revenue 16:08 – Connect with Richard through Call Camp 18:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Use your stress to CREATE an idea to relieve that stress. Sales professionals who analyze and assess feedback well WILL improve in their field. Make something that adds value to people’s lives. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Call Camp – Steve’s Call Camp Movement website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/7/2017 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 531: $5m Note Cap Pre-Revenue? How? With ZeroApp CEO Alex Babin
Alex Babin. He’s a serial entrepreneur who has more than 10 years of expertise in innovation, product development and artificial intelligence. He started his first hybrid vehicle company at the age of 24 funded by DFJ. He also founded an interactive video software company. Now, he’s running an artificial intelligence, communication startup which is building a device-centric, secured, corporate email client called Zero. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? – Mark Daniels Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Trust your intuition” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:45 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 02:23 – Alex loves listening to podcasts 02:53 – Zero is currently on pre-revenue, but they have a list of pre-sales 03:12 – Zero is focused on the corporate market 03:28 – Zero helps people be more productive with the help of AI 03:38 – Zero charges per user per month on the corporate market 03:48 – Zero was launched 2 years ago, was in self-mode for 1 year, and launched the first version a year ago 04:00 – Zero had a seed round, in May, from angel investors 04:41 – Zero has 3 founders and a total of 6 on the team 05:19 – The one who will win the space in the market is the one who will penetrate the market with the most convenient product for the customer 05:33 – Customers don’t want to change anything – they have strict security policies 07:15 – Zero has 30,000 downloads 07:30 – 2,000 active daily customers 07:37 – Alex shares the difference between daily and monthly active customers 08:55 – Zero has recently introduced exchange support 09:28 – Zero currently targets CIOs 09:48 – Zero’s pricing 10:10 – Alex shares that they are open to another seed round 10:19 – Target to raise is $1M 10:22 – Convertible note CAP of $5M 11:00 – Some of the customers are converting into investors 11:38 – Find Alex on Twitter 13:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The one who wins the market is the one who penetrates the market with the best and most convenient product for the consumer. Be patient and respectful with your customers when explaining your product. TRUST your intuition—it’s often the right direction to follow. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan kept his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it at the airplane’s back seat pocket @AlexBabin – Alex’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/6/2017 • 16 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 530: Shut Down $2m Business, Why with CEO Shawn Livermore
Shawn Livermore. He’s an author and technology consultant and more recently, the founder and CEO of tech startup Ziptask which has generated nearly $2M in revenue. He has raised 4 rounds of funding and closed it down to take on new opportunities. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Tipping Point What CEO do you follow? – Mark Fields Favorite online tool? — Acuity Scheduling Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Calculate risk carefully” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:00 – Nathan introduces Shawn to the show 02:30 – Ziptask is a fully-managed outsourcing with a progressive effort to fix the problem of outsourcing technology projects 03:23 – “We succeeded in the goal, but we failed as a company” 03:31 – Shawn raised 4 seed rounds 04:18 – Shawn also had his day-time clients as a technology consultant 04:50 – Ziptask dissolved in September 2016, and was launched in 2010 05:05 – Ziptask’s MRR was $107K 05:30 – Shawn shares why they shut down Ziptask 06:59 – Shawn launched Ziptask prematurely 08:35 – Shawn also did NOT try to sell the business 09:30 – Shawn is now working with Carvana 10:00 – Connect with Shawn through Twitter. Medium and email 10:15 – Shawn is currently working on a book called Obscurity 12:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The time will come when you have to pull the plug – and when it happens, just do it. Reaching your goal is NOT the peak of success. Calculate risk carefully. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan kept his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it at the airplane’s back seat pocket Carvana – Shawn’s current employer @shawnypants – Shawn’s Medium handle @shawnypants – Shawn’s Twitter handle ShawnLivermore@gmail.com – Shawn’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/5/2017 • 16 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 529: $10m Raised, Pre-Revenue, Notion.ai Adds AI to Email Messaging with Co-Founder Guy Suter
Guy Suter and he runs Notion.ai. His mission is to improve communication using artificial intelligence. Previously, he co-founded BitLeap and led the product to the world’s top selling appliance after 2008 acquisition by Barracuda. He started venture data backup, cloud storage, group chat, file sharing with Copy.com and CRM with Nutshell.com Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Brand New World What CEO do you follow? – Jay Simons Favorite online tool? — Picasso Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “How early stage capital works...and influence management has been the biggest learning experience” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Guy to the show 02:10 – Guy and his co-founder started with a data backup company 02:46 – Notion.ai is currently on prerevenue 03:00 – Notion.ai started 3 years ago 03:47 – Notion.ai was launched in November 2016 04:18 – Digital communication was problematic 04:55 – Notion.ai has raised a total of around $10M 05:13 – Guy started with a lot of SaaS businesses 06:13 – Guy shares the revenue opportunities for Notion.ai 08:00 – There’s a huge barrier in entry to Notion.ai’s space 09:00 – Guy discusses the companies that are trying to make another category 09:40 – Notion.ai is beneficial to everyone who uses email to interact 10:40 – “Our goal is not to make the best email app In the world” 11:00 – Notion.ai has features that differentiate them from others and offer value 11:10 – Notion.ai is more “people-centric”; the focus is on relationships and what’s important based on the message 11:43 – Average number of downloads 12:09 – Notion.ai helps clean-up inboxes quickly 13:00 – Less than a million but more than tens of thousands of downloads 13:39 – The number of downloads consistently grows daily 13:55 – Team size and location 14:20 – Guy shares why they chose Michigan 15:50 – Notion.ai has someone that was from LinkedIn 16:00 – Connect with Guy through Twitter 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The digital communication space has been problematic and we need a solution. Raising big capital on pre-revenue IS possible, if you have a great product that helps people become more efficient in communicating. Have patience, take time, focus on building the right culture, and get your team on board. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @GuySuter – Guy’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/4/2017 • 20 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 528: ConvertKit Hits $480k MRR, Helping 10,000 Professional Bloggers Grow Email Lists with CEO Nathan Barry
Nathan Barry, CEO of ConvertKit – an email marketing company for professional bloggers. Listen as Nathan shares how he manages to stay self-funded while, at the same time, increasing the growth and bloggers’ interest in using ConvertKit. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Predictable Success What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Workable Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Pick just one thing you love to do and do it really well Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Barry to the show 02:15 – ConvertKit is a SaaS company and has around 10,000 bloggers 02:47 – ConvertKit’s pricing depends on the blogger’s subscribers count 03:04 – Average revenue per user per month 03:24 – 65% of the users are on $48/month plan 03:48 – ConvertKit’s cash flow is doing well 04:15 – Annual plan has a big impact on churn 04:50 – Barry pushes the annual plan on Cyber Monday 05:00 – Average annual plan total 05:30 – ConvertKit had a free 1 month promotion for new users 05:56 – ConvertKit has a 40K email list – half of it is from content marketing, the other half is from webinars 06:30 – ConvertKit has added 25K new people in their list this year from joint webinars alone 06:55 – Barry is using Google Hangout and Chatroll for the webinars 07:20 – ConvertKit is doing 10-20 webinars a month 07:53 – There are 2 people in Barry’s team who are involved in the webinar process 08:28 – The team is trying to get people who use MailChimp or Aweber to switch to ConvertKit 08:38 – It is a 2-step direct sales process 09:54 – Barry shares how he mitigates the show up rate in their webinars 10:54 – Some of the bloggers reach out to ConvertKit and some find them through other bloggers 11:16 – Average expenses a month in affiliate payouts 11:33 – A quarter of ConvertKit’s revenue comes from affiliate programs 12:10 – 2015 total revenue is around $300K 12:20 – 2016 average revenue 12:34 – ConvertKit is self-funded 12:44 – It was an intentional choice 13:03 – Barry shares what he did when they were almost running out of funds 14:15 – ConvertKit’s gross profit and total money in the bank 14:38 – ConvertKit just had a big expense from the annual plan switch 15:15 – Gross monthly customer churn 16:15 – Expansion is ConvertKit’s next focus 17:08 – Current CAC 18:28 – Team size and location 18:50 – Average headcount expenses 19:14 – ConvertKit was launched in 2013 20:18 – There are two advisers who have a share in the company 20:45 – Connect with Nathan through ConvertKit and his website 23:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can stay self-funded with a fast growing business and by managing your funds properly. Joint webinars and 2-point direct sales are excellent options to increase mailing list. Pick one thing you love to do, focus in, and do it really well. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences ConvertKit.com – Barry’s business website NathanBarry.com – Barry’s personal website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/3/2017 • 26 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 527: Proposify Hits 3200 Customers and $150k in MRR with CEO Kyle Racki
Kyle Racki, co-founder and CEO of Proposify. He’s passionate about design, SaaS, and marketing. He loves jamming out to 90s covers/tunes at open mic nights, and also has the unique ability to work in perfectly, cromulent Simpsons’ references to any conversation. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Analytics What CEO do you follow? – Alex Turnbull Favorite online tool? — Heap Analytics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Sometimes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That it’s all going to be okay and…I’m going to give myself a hug” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Kyle to the show 02:24 – Proposify is a SaaS business and it helps people streamline their sales and close more deals 02:40 – Average customer pay per month is $40-$50 02:53 – Current number of customers 03:10 – Average MRR 03:25 – Proposify was launched in 2013 03:35 – Proposify had less than $1000 MRR for 17 months 04:03 – Kyle and his co-founder had an agency 04:22 – Kyle raised $250K in seed capital from a local investor 04:39 – Kyle and his team’s pay is around $60K a month during that time 05:40 – Team size is 15 and are located in Halifax, Canada 06:20 – Kyle shares how the startup market is in Halifax 06:50 – Known startup companies from Halifax 07:24 – Kyle does weekly phone calls with customers to check in on them 07:50 – Kyle shares how one of their customers beat VaynerMedia in a proposal 09:15 – How Proposify creates proposals in a flash 09:40 – Proposify’s competition 10:04 – Proposify is more focused on the digital agency space 11:25 – Average number of new customers per month 11:50 – Proposify has a free and no-credit card sign-up 12:00 – Proposify does inbound sales, but organic search is the biggest source of traffic 12:43 – Best podcast that drives Proposify’s traffic 13:05 – Proposify has a general marketing budget 13:28 - $10K for paid marketing 13:45 – CAC is quite low 14:18 – LTV 14:40 – Gross monthly customer churn 15:00 – Proposify currently has 2 sales people 15:35 – Other system Kyle uses for business intelligence is Heap Analytics 16:16 – Total 2015 revenue is $551K 17:11 – Proposify is profitable and continually growing 18:30 – “We’ll always entertain acquisition offers if it makes sense” 19:00 – The process Kyle will go through if there’s a possible acquisition 19:47 – Number of Proposify’s developers 20:00 – Connect with Kyle through their website and help Kyle look for Proposify.com’s owner and he’ll pay you 22:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There’s a temptation to spend VC money; be decisive when you want to raise capital and stick to your goals. Organic traffic is good, but getting paid marketing can still drive more traffic and customers. There are a lot of things to consider in an acquisition – it should match your personal goals, be a cultural fit, and the numbers need to make sense. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Proposify.biz – Kyle’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/2/2017 • 24 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 526: Yanado Hits $25k MRR, Helping 17000 Users Better Manage Tasks with CEO Ivan Mojsilovic
Ivan Mojsilovic, CEO and founder of Yanado.com – a teamwork collaboration tool that will truly change the way you work. He’s also the CEO of E-75 IT Services, a project manager, and a media man who did a small stint at STARTeurope. He’s very active in the startup space. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – n/a What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Move out my current city and go travel, travel the world” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Ivan to the show 02:17 – Yanado is a project management tool integrated into Gmail 02:40 – Yanado is SaaS business 02:54 – Average customer pay per year is around $3000 03:30 – Ivan has been in SaaS industry 04:09 – Ivan shares how they started Yanado 04:28 – Yanado started in 2014 04:40 – Total capital raised is $200K and currently fundraising 05:09 – Goal for the current fundraising is $500K in equity round 05:20 – Willing to give up 15% to 20% equity 05:30 – Yanado is based in Eastern Europe 05:40 – Ivan shares about the market in Eastern Europe 06:10 – Ivan shares what happened to their first business 06:30 – The business was doing €200K a year 07:05 – Yanado’s average number of paying customers is a little under 100 07:15 – Average MRR 07:45 – Team size 08:10 – Number of total users 08:23 – Ivan shares how their customers find them 09:00 – Gross monthly churn is 7% 09:21 – Average customer stay is 14 months 10:05 – Ivan does the inside sales for Yanado and they just hired a person are planning to do outbound sales 10:40 – Ivan’s plans for the company 10:59 – Ivan hopes Google will acquire them 11:45 – As of the moment, Ivan will only sell Yanado for $10M and no less than that 12:00 – Ivan shares how he will sell Yanado to Google 13:00 – Ivan shares how Google can’t create something similar to Yanado 13:54 – Follow Ivan on their blog, sales and discussion groups 16:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a way to help people focus their tasks and make life easier. Create a software that is unique and cannot easily be imitated. When you’re young and if you can, leave your city and travel the world. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Blog – Ivan’s blog Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
1/1/2017 • 18 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 525: Orangedox Doubles Down on Enterprise with $7.5k in MRR with CEO Chad Brown
Chad Brown, CEO and head of product along with his co-founder at Orangedox.com. He has a strong background in business intelligence and technology startups and has a passion for business documents and the color orange. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Drew Houston Favorite online tool? – Stack Exchange Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be more confident” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan introduces Chad to the show 02:07 – Orangedox started as document tracking and was originally on Dropbox 02:17 – Orangedox has premium services on top premium products 02:48 – Why would people choose Orangedox over PandaDoc 02:55 – Orangedox is integrated into your account 03:22 – Orangedox is a SaaS business 03:55 – Orangedox has over 20K product signups 04:05 – Orangedox was in beta in 2014 and pre-launch in early 2015 04:25 – Average weekly active customers: 2000 05:05 – Average number of paying customers: about 300 05:30 – Average pay per customer is $25-30 a month 06:00 – MRR 06:17 – Chad was looking at raising capital but still undecided about their focus 06:55 – Chad is looking at their current customer base 07:30 – Chad shares how the customers are using Orangedox and the commonality in paying customers 09:15 – Team size: 2 full-time and few part-time workers 09:30 – Gross customer churn around 5% 09:57 – Chad shares how they acquire their new customers 11:52 – Orangedox is based in Vancouver 12:25 – Chad and his co-founders’ plan on the company 12:45 – Chad hasn’t focused on a lot revenue at the moment, but is working on closing key enterprise clients 13:21 – Connect with Chad through his email and Twitter 14:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: At first, focus on the betterment of your product as opposed to revenue. Analyze your product’s effectivity through your customers’ activities. Have the confidence and motivation to do what you want. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @Orange_dox – Chad’s business’ Twitter handle Chad@Orangedox.com – Chad’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/31/2016 • 17 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 524: Podium Hits $1m MRR in 12 Months, $4m Raised with 6500 SMB Customers sub 1% Churn with CEO Eric Rea
Eric Rea, co-founder and CEO of Podium.com which is based in Utah. He’s a software engineer at the International Atomic Agency and before that, the founder of FineGrain. He worked at Walmart as a software engineer and he has also interned at Orange Soda. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Multipliers What CEO do you follow? – Phil Knight Favorite online tool? – Domo and Apple Notes Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – “I get 7” If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You can always tell them to go to hell tomorrow” – Warren Buffet Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:46 – Nathan introduces Eric to the show 02:20 – Podium helps businesses generate reviews which drives purchase decisions 02:30 – Podium charges $299 a month per location 02:48 – Podium is a SaaS business 02:58 – Average customer pays $499 03:20 – Podium was launched in 2013 03:25 – Eric started Podium because of his dad’s business 04:01 – Team size 04:44 – All employees are working full-time 04:50 – Team is based in Utah 05:35 – Podium raised $4M in total 05:50 – First seed round was in 2014 and $500K was raised 05:57 – Raised $3.5M in December of 2015 06:36 – Eric has given up 20% of the business for the seed round 07:38 – Podium has 25000 customers per location 08:13 – Podium has $1M in MRR 08:45 – Podium’s gross monthly customer churn is around 1% 09:10 – Net churn is negative 2% monthly 09:50 – Average CAC 10:12 – Average LTV is $12K 11:00 – 2015 ARR is $1.8M 11:30 – 2016 ARR is around $11M 11:41 – Goal for 2017 ARR is $25M 12:55 – Connect with Eric through his website and Twitter 15:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s important to have some capital in case you make mistakes – with no capital, just 1 mistake will sink you. Find a solution to the simplest problems to streamline your business processes. The SMB market will continually grow, creating more opportunities for startups. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @EricWilliamRea – Eric’s Twitter handle Podium.com – Eric’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/30/2016 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 523: xIQ Using AI to Power Sales Teams with $1.1m Raised with CEO Usman Sheikh
Usman Sheikh, CEO and founder of xIQ – an award-winning platform for personalized sales, marketing intelligence, and content marketing. He’s the former vice president of SAP AG and he’s pushing digital frontiers by delivering consumer grade experiences in B2B sales and the marketing space. xIQ is the winner of the prestigious 2016 Content Marketing Institute Award for best integration of mobile and content marketing. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Bill McDermott Favorite online tool? — Twitter and LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Take risks as early as you can. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:49 – Nathan introduces Usman to the show 02:30 – xIQ is a next generation sales intelligence tool designed for B2B sales and marketing professionals 03:04 – Usman worked with the top leaders of the world in SAP 03:30 – xIQ extracts the most relevant content from the most reliable sources 04:00 – xIQ is a SaaS product 04:16 – xIQ was founded in 2014, and released in early 2016 04:44 – xIQ raised 2 rounds of seed round 05:08 – Total amount raised 05:37 – Team size is under 15 and is based in Silicon Valley 06:05 – xIQ has 10 corporate customers and thousands of individual customers 06:35 – Average pay of corporate customers 06:57 – Average MRR 07:24 – Usman discusses one of their clients, GenPact, and how they use xIQ 07:42 – First, xIQ is used as a marketing intelligence tool to track competitors 08:47 – All data is real-time 09:20 – xIQ uses Apache Solr technology to index and for natural language processing 09:50 – xIQ gets their corporate customers from organic traffic 10:32 – xIQ’s process is the reason why corporate customers end up buying from them 11:12 – List size 11:24 – xIQ has 1 inside sales person 12:29 – No cancellations/churn yet for xIQ 12:53 – CAC 14:10 – LTV to CAC ratio 15:10 – Connect with Usman through LinkedIn, email and website 16:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Experience is a great teacher—continue to learn and hone your skill set. Building a business takes time and there is always room for improvement. Take risks as early on in life as you can. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences LinkedIn – Usman’s LinkedIn account Usman@xIQ.io – Usman’s email address xIQ.ai – Usman’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/29/2016 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 522: Delivra $15M 2017 Goal, $700k MRR Now, Helping 450+ Customers Sell Things with CEO Neil Berman
Nathan interviews Neil Berman. This guy knows SaaS and launched his company called Delivra, in 1999, in the email marketing space. Listen as Neil shares how Delivra has grown exponentially in 17 years, without the need to raise funds and get into debt. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Great CEOs are Lazy What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Twitter and LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “At least” If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Patience and determination will win the game” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Neil to the show 01:59 – Delivra is an email marketing software tool that helps clients “sell more stuff” 02:10 – They are a high break-even business with a low variable cost, so the more customers the better 02:15 – Delivra is a SaaS business 02:25 – Delivra currently has 500 direct paying clients, and a couple thousand resellers 02:33 – Average customer pays $800-900 per month 03:21 – Total revenue in 2016 about $4.8M 03:33 – Total revenue in 2015 is $4.2M 03:45 – Delivra has 3 marketing buckets 04:00 – Total team size is over 40+ 04:12 – Main team location in Indianapolis 04:23 – Gross customer churn per month is 1.5% 04:45 – A customer stays with Delivra for 42 months 05:00 – LTV 05:10 – CAC is $1.08 06:33 – Delivra hasn’t raised yet and they have no debt, but are looking at options 06:45 – Neil’s target for their first round 07:43 – Delivra has grown organically over the years 08:17 – Neil is meeting with a capital markets team to learn about how to take Delivra to the next level 08:50 – Neil would think seriously about an offer 09:40 – Neil shares how their customers are using Delivra 10:25 – Connect with Neil through his website Delivra 12:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Before you do your first round of raising, get advice from an expert. It’s incredible growing through organic traffic, but always aim to know what is the next level for your company. Patience and determination will win the game. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Delivra.com – Neil’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/28/2016 • 15 minutes, 39 seconds
EP 521: $5.5M Burger Business, Gets Into Monthly Subscriptions with BurgaBox CEO Chuck Sillari
Chuck Sillari: He was born and raised in Boston and is a graduate of Boston College and Law school. He’s a lawyer and a real estate developer who is currently focusing full-time on the expansion of his nationally known Boston Burger Company – a new e-commerce business called BurgaBox.com. Burgabox is in the process of disrupting both the meal kit industry and full service casual dining experience. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Quench Your Own Thirst What CEO do you follow? – Samuel Adams Favorite online tool? — Hotjar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew that I should have travelled more and...spend a lot time meeting interesting people because that’s where you get inspiration from” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Chuck to the show 02:21 – Boston Burger Company’s 2015 revenue is around $5.5M for three locations 02:50 – Chuck has always loved the restaurant industry 03:39 – Chuck jumped into the burger business after 13 years in a law firm 03:45 – BurgaBox opened up in 2009, and Chuck went full-time in 2013 04:07 – “People really loved what we’re doing” 04:17 – BurgaBox was in different TV shows 04:30 – BurgaBox became a must-try destination in Boston 04:50 – Chuck brought on 1 investor 05:13 – The investor approached Chuck for the second location 05:31 – The investor knew about the Boston Burger Company because of its popularity in Boston 05:56 – Chuck shares how much they’ve spent to open up a new location 06:20 – There was no full burger joint in Boston before 06:43 – Chuck shares why the second location costs 10x more than the first location 07:55 – The first location’s growth was $700K in their first year 08:24 – It was 450 sq. ft. 08:30 – It is now doing a $1.85M 09:15 – The amount the investor gets in return 10:00 – Chuck has a good partnership with the investor 10:20 – A restaurant’s gross margin 11:49 – For every dollar you bring in, 20% should go to your pocket 12:09 – The second location will do around $2.5M in 2016 12:27 – Average profit of each restaurant 12:45 – Chuck’s plan for the business 13:03 – Chuck saw how the meal kit delivery industry was booming and wanted a piece of that market 13:20 – The biggest percentage of the diners are tourists and students 13:53 – Chuck started to get into the meal kit delivery in February 14:00 – The meal kit delivery sold around 100 kits in the first month, 2nd month: 150 kits, 3rd month: 400 kits 14:35 – Burger kit’s pricing 15:36 – There’s a subscription: a monthly box or as a gift 16:05 – Shipping process of the burger kits 16:33 – Follow Chuck by checking out Boston Burger and BurgaBox 18:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Do what you love and people will, in turn, love what you have to offer. Trust and believe in your business partners. Get your inspiration from people – learn and improve from their feedback. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Boston Burger & BurgaBox – Chuck’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/27/2016 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
EP 520: Agency Hits $6M 2016 Revenue Helping 60 Clients with SEO with PowerDigitalMarketing CEO Nick Bjorn
Nathan interviews Nick Bjorn. He is an entrepreneur by trade and digital marketer by evolution with over 8 years of professional agency experience. He has gained a national and global perspective on the evolving and digital world with an emphasis in search engine optimization or SEO. Nick is the co-founder of Power Digital Marketing which is based in San Diego, CA. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Eric Schmidt Favorite online tool? — Mixmax Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Commit to a skillset early on in life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:45 – Nathan introduces Nick to the show 02:12 – Power Digital Marketing is a full-service digital agency 02:15 – Power Digital Marketing was created 4 years ago 02:18 – Nick has 2 other business partners who handle finances and team management 02:35 – Power Digital Marketing has 3 employees 02:40 – Power Digital Marketing’s types of services described 03:15 – First year revenue was around $500K 03:33 – Power Digital Marketing has humble beginnings 03:50 – 2015 total revenue is $3.2M 03:57 – Estimate 2016 revenue is around $6M 04:10 – Power Digital Marketing typically has 6-month contracts 04:35 – Minimum amount per contract is $5K 04:43 – Retainers are at $50K a month 05:14 – Power Digital Marketing currently has 60 clients 05:25 – Average MRR 06:10 – 2017 revenue goal 06:35 – Power Digital Marketing and what they do for their clients 06:56 – Soccer Loco is one of Power Digital Marketing’s clients 07:35 – SEO, organic rankings, paid ad initiatives are important for Soccer Loco 08:17 – Power Digital Marketing uses the keywords “cheap soccer cleats” for Soccer Loco intentionally 08:50 – Power Digital Marketing benefits well from link building 10:30 – Power Digital Marketing has PR professionals that build relationships with the clients 10:50 – Google now tracks backlinking and is reaching out to editors 11:43 – Power Digital Marketing relationship with SoccerNation.com 12:42 – “How do you find terms to target?” 12:47 – Do your due diligence 13:37 – Power Digital Marketing is currently in the process of developing their own page analytics software 14:20 – Connect with Nick on Twitter and email 16:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Creating content for SEO requires an understanding of the technicalities associated with backlinking. Track every campaign’s effectivity as you step forward. Do your due diligence when it comes to finding the right terms and keywords that sell. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Nick@PowerDigitalMarketing.com – Nick’s email address @Nick_Bjorn – Nick’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/26/2016 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 519: GetAccept Hits $44k MRR, Helping 1100 Companies Get Deals Signed with CEO Samir Samjic
Samir Smajic, one of the founders of GetAccept. GetAccept recently moved to San Francisco from Sweden because they are part of YC—a solution where you design, send, track, and market your proposals to get more deals digitally signed. Samir has a bunch of experience in project management, consulting, CRM, IT, computer software, business and more. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Never Split the Difference What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? —Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Doing whatever I felt good to do” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:55 – Nathan introduces Samir to the show 02:25 – Samir chooses skiing over snowboarding 02:35 – GetAccept helps sales reps close more deals by focusing on their sales document workflow 02:58 – GetAccept is a subscription-based SaaS business 03:07 – Average pay per user is $40/month or $200 per business/month 03:42 – GetAccept currently has 1,100 paying customers and 4,400 free customers 04:15 – Average MRR is $44K 04:20 – GetAccept was launched in December of 2015 04:47 – GetAccept already had revenue their first month 05:31 – Samir shares why GetAccept has a high conversation rate from free to paying customers 06:00 – GetAccept calls their customers to give them product information and ask them questions 06:50 – GetAccept helps their customers send their first contract 07:17 – Fully weighted CAC 07:35 – Total headcount expenses 08:28 – GetAccept has 200 new customers monthly 08:47 – GetAccept has paid marketing 09:09 – Spending is around $4000 for paid ads 09:20 – GetAccept’s biggest competitors explained 11:00 - Gross customer churn 12:00 – LTV 12:25 – GetAccept is currently based in San Francisco 12:49 – GetAccept had raised capital and is still open 14:20 – Samir’s focus is the growth of the company 14:34 – GetAccept has 4 co-founders 14:42 – If DocuSign offered to buy your business, would you accept? 15:30 – Connect with Samir on LinkedIn 17:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on what YOU can do for your customers – assist them in ANY way possible. Doing the work you love and enjoy is more important than the bottom dollar. Let your competitors motivate you to improve what YOU are doing. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences LinkedIn – Samir’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/25/2016 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 518: See 20 deals, invest in 2 between $75k-150k pre seed, likes b2b saas for investments
Dinesh Kandanchatha. He’s a founder, mentor, speaker, and above all, an entrepreneur. He encourages founders to ask all questions, navigate challenging decisions, and find the right answer that is sometimes difficult to face. He has bought, built, sold, lent, and/or invested in over 13 companies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Essentialism What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t be the smartest guy” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:48 – Nathan introduces Dinesh to the show 02:32 – Dinesh makes money by investing and capital gains against those investments 02:52 – Dinesh does consulting work too 03:45 – A board member’s average retainers 04:33 – Dinesh total revenue as a credit investor in 2015 04:48 – A credit investor is someone who has net assets greater than $5M and earnings in the last 2 years that are greater than $200K 05:35 – Dinesh has built startups; some failed and some are successful 06:04 – Dinesh invests $75K to $150K in a company 06:14 – Dinesh often invests during Pre-Series A or Pre-seed 06:20 – Dinesh takes his capital and amplify it with his network and experience 07:08 – Dinesh’s biggest failure happened right after he sold Precise Software Technologies in the late 90s 07:46 – The person that acquired Precise sued Dinesh 08:09 – Dinesh spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal battles 09:04 – Dinesh’s most spectacular success is yet to come 09:20 – The business Dinesh is currently proud of 10:50 – Dinesh’s equity rate in Protus IP Solution 11:10 – Dinesh has helped Macadamian technology scale up 12:03 – Dinesh has invested in real estate 12:30 – “If you get a few over the fence, you can make up all the difference” 12:45 – Dinesh usually sticks to B2B and SaaS 13:22 – Dinesh is currently working on Patriot One Technologies 14:49 – Dinesh is very passionate about the potential of technology 15:04 – Connect with Dinesh through Twitter and at Clarity.fm 17:27 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: “If you get a few over the fence, you can make up all the difference”—so, don’t get discouraged if you lose some. Do what you know and stick to your strengths. When you get an idea that could meaningfully impact the society as a whole—it will not just be an investment, but your baby. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @DineshAtWork – Dinesh’s Twitter handle Clarity.fm/DineshkAtWork – Dinesh’s Clarity account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/24/2016 • 20 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 517: $3.5M Raised, 6m Users Helping 47k Customers Sign Documents with HelloSign CEO Joseph Walla
Joseph Walla, CEO and co-founder of a San Francisco based startup, HelloSign. The company launched in 2012 and it provides the easiest way for businesses to sign and collect legally binding documents online. The idea behind HelloSign was sparked by Joseph’s first successful product alongside his co-founder, Neil O’Mara, of HelloFax. HelloFax launched in 2010 after attending the prestigious startup accelerator Y Combinator. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – Bill Walsh Favorite online tool? — Google Apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Joseph wished he had moved to the valley earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Joseph to the show 02:30 – Joseph first worked in HelloFax which is an on-the-go fax machine 02:43 – HelloSign has premium products and free products 03:00 – Pricing plans starts at $15 03:12 – API pricing plans differs by bucket 03:40 – HelloSign is cash flow positive in 2014 and 2015 03:50 – Total of $3.5M raised 04:24 – Joseph has been very disciplined with how they spend their money 05:15 – 2016 MRR 05:36 – HelloSign has 47,000 paying customers 05:46 – HelloSign has a 5-6M user base 06:05 – People convert from free to paid because of the volume of their transactions 06:54 – HelloSign team’s operation 07:30 – Average salaries in the valley 08:45 – Total headcount expenses with 16 employees 09:35 – Average MRR from Nathan 10:00 – Average customer churn 10:55 – HelloSign is mainly in the SMB space but they also have some big clients 12:20 – Standard gross churn 12:40 – The amount HelloSign is willing to spend for a new user 12:49 – HelloSign doesn’t spend much for a new user, but spends for a new paid user 12:55 – Joseph read an article on ForEntrepreneurs.com about SaaS metrics and acquiring customers that was beneficial for him 13:35 – HelloSign’s CAC ratio 14:53 – Connect with Joseph through LinkedIn and Twitter 16:23 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t wait for a job or overcomplicate the process of getting started—get out there and figure it out as you go. Make that investment to turn a new user into a paid new user. Don’t just sit and wait for something to happen, take action! Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @JosephWalla – Joseph’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Joseph’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/23/2016 • 19 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 516: SalesHacker $2.5m 2015 Revenue Helping Sales Reps Get Smarter with CEO Max Altshculer
Max Altschuler, CEO of Sales Hacker – a rapidly growing media company focused on the future of B2B sales. Max wrote the book Hacking Sales: The Playbook for Building a High Velocity Sales Machine which was recently published by Wiley. Aside from sales hack and angel investors, Max advises startups all around the globe. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 48 Laws of Power What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Boomerang Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Max wished he could have studied Psychology a bit more Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Max to the show 02:07 – Sales Hacker is a media company ushering the future of sales 02:35 – Sales Hacker does crowdsourcing of content on their blog and holds conferences throughout the year 03:12 – The conferences are Sales Hacker’s main revenue stream 03:20 – Sales Hacker’s last conference was in June 2016 04:09 – The sponsored revenue for the last conference was $1.2 M 04:14 – Ticket sales was $300-400K 04:22 – Average ticket price was $400-500 04:28 – Total attendees 04:41 – The cost per conference is less than $1M 04:53 – Max shares how they manage the cost of the conference 05:51 – You need to find venue sponsorship 05:57 – Max helps clients with bigger conferences like Pulse 07:00 – Sales Hacker finds out which businesses are interested in the conference 07:33 – Have prospective sponsors sign up and pay early 09:15 – Sales Hacker’s average revenue per event depends on the event 10:54 – Sales Hacker takes a percentage from the total profit of SaaSters 11:30 – 2015 total revenue is $2.5M 11:45 – Team size 12:04 – Max shares why he didn’t build a SaaS business 12:59 – Sales Hacker’s list size 13:55 – Max’s goal for a VC round 14:07 – Max is from Udemy 14:35 – Max had 2 companies before Udemy 15:20 – Max’s second business was Last Call 15:45 – Max’s 3 favorite investments at the moment 16:50 – The average amount Max is investing in a business 18:00 – Max sets expectations of what he will and will not do for a company 18:36 – Max is trying to invest in B2B companies 19:21 – Connect with Max through LinkedIn, Twitter and his website 21:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Closing a business does NOT mean it was a failure – you gain experience and learn valuable lessons from that process. Take the time to research and know where to invest. Even if you’re working with SaaS businesses, that doesn’t mean you should or can build one as well. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @MaxAlts – Max’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Max’s LinkedIn account Sales Hacker – Max’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/22/2016 • 26 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 515: 0 to $300k MRR in 16 Months Helping 300 ECommerce Brands Streamline with Skubana CEO Chad Rubin
Chad Rubin. He builds e-commerce businesses. He owns a direct consumer e-commerce business called Crucial Vacuum and grew it from zero to a $20 million valuation in 7 years. He happens to be a Top 250 Amazon Seller. He co-founded Skubana with DJ Kunovac and built one of e-commerce’s hottest operational software. Skubana is the only software that you’ll ever need to manage and accelerate the growth of your ecommerce business. It’s beautiful, intelligent, and highly intuitive and it also incorporates every feature imaginable to drive your future success, especially in ecommerce. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Virtual Freedom What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — Trello or Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Go after passion and change a major in college Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Chad to the show 02:17 – Chad shares how he made the zero to $20M valuation for Crucial Vacuum 03:48 – Chad shares what he thinks is Walmart’s biggest mistake 04:27 – Skubana is making 50,000 orders a month 04:47 – Chad shares a mistake he made and how he lost money 05:08 – Chad had to minimize his headcount from 20 employees to 2 05:40 – Skubana is a SaaS business 06:00 – Number of customers that Skubana is currently serving 06:46 – Skubana’s pricing: 07:07 – Minimum of $999 a month 07:10 – Pricing is customized and is based on users 07:34 – Average RPU 08:00 – MRR 08:05 – Skubana did a seed round 08:41 – Raised 880,000 on the first seed round 08:45 – Chad put in $1M 08:59 – James Thompson is one of Skubana’s investors 09:43 – Chad messaged 10 people that he looked up himself to try and get them involved 10:10 – Chad starting building Skubana for 3 years and it just went live last year 10:29 – Chad raised the $880K when they had the prototype 11:15 – First year revenue 12:30 – Chad wanted Skubana to be available for everybody 12:40 – When Chad raised their pricing, a lot of their customers churned off 12:53 – Skubana is not an entry level software 13:27 – Chad individually called customers to inform them about the increase in pricing and they got emails too 14:12 – Most of Skubana’s RPU growth is coming from new customers 14:27 – Chad shares how people find Skubana 14:48 – Chad wrote a book and hit #7 bestseller 15:22 – Chad has a subscription list from their blog because they’re adding value 15:45 – Number of people on their list 16:22 – Skubana is pairing with other companies for a win-win sale 17:30 – Chad cares more about the quality of the customers as opposed to the quantity 18:05 – Chad shares about the successful webinars he held for certain companies 19:00 – Chad spends a lot of time guest blogging 19:25 – CAC is currently zero 21:20 – Team size 21:40 – Total overhead cost 22:00 – Team location is in NYC and New Jersey 22:10 – Chad is still thinking of raising another round 22:29 – Chad wants to raise $1M 23:30 – Connect with Chad through Youtube, Twitter and his email 25:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Mistakes happen for us to LEARN from it. Make your product KNOWN to the public at low costs by INCREASING your online presence. Need direction? Go hard after your passion! Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Youtube – Chad’s business Youtube channel Chad@Skubana.com – Chad’s email address @Ecommrenegade – Chad’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/21/2016 • 28 minutes, 26 seconds
EP 513: $50M Raised, Helping 50k Customers Get Accurate Contact Data with FullContact CEO Bart Lorang
Bart Lorang, a proven entrepreneur executive and manager in the global technology industry. He’s very active in the startup community as an angel investor, strategic advisor, and speaker at many industry events. In fact, he supports entrepreneurs in his co-founder position and is managing director at V1.vc, a $5 million dollar, seed-stage fund dedicated to help crazy entrepreneurs change the world. More importantly, he’s an entrepreneur himself. He’s currently running FullContact which is responsible for communicating its vision and strategy. He’s a visionary technologist with extensive experience conceiving, designing, building, marketing, and selling enterprise software solutions on a global scale. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Warren Buffett Favorite online tool? – DocuSign Do you get 8 hours of sleep? – No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – It’s about how you make people feel. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Bart to the show 02:35 – FullContact is a universal contact management platform 02:50 – FullContact is a SaaS business and payment is based on the number of contacts 03:08 – Developers can pay for a developer platform 03:17 – The developer access is Bart’s largest revenue stream 04:00 – FullContact is continually building new features 04:14 – FullContact also offers KPI services 04:37 – HubSpot uses FullContact 05:10 – FullContact was founded in 2010 05:30 – There is no application yet that is focused on contacts 06:01 – First year revenue 06:28 – Bart had a couple of businesses before FullContact 06:56 – FullContact was funded through raised capital 07:17 – How can someone look at that market and tell that it is too big to bootstrap? 07:53 – “It’s all about the size of your vision and how fast you want to execute” 08:30 – FullContact has millions of customers 08:55 – FullContact has above 50,000 paying customers 09:03 – Bart shares what’s included in the free plan and paid plan 09:40 – Average monthly RPU 10:05 – Bart discusses the type of individuals using FullContact 11:05 – Average MRR 11:40 – FullContact in ARR 12:54 – Gross customer churn 13:18 – FullContact has an inside sales team helping their customers 13:37 – CAC 14:20 – Team location: they have a global presence 14:30 – Team size: 210-220 14:40 – FullContact had their Series C last August 2016 15:08 – How are investors in this space thinking about the SaaS valuation? 15:47 – They are looking at the SaaS business’ multipliers 16:00 – FullContact’s main competitors 16:35 – The MDM space 16:49 – Connect with Bart through FullContact and his email 18:18 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Analyze your business well and have a goal so you know where you’re going to start. Funding is a very important part of business. It’s NOT about how smart you are but how you make people feel. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Bart@FullContact.com – Bart’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/20/2016 • 26 minutes, 39 seconds
EP 514: $120M Raised, Helping 1m Consumers Get $100m+ In Credit Who Have No Other Choice with KreditTech CEO Alexander Graubner-Muller
Alexander Graubner-Müller. He’s the current CEO of Kreditech and started off as their CTO. He was a senior business development manager at Groupon and he was very active in the financial space such as an internship at Equity Derivatives in UBS. Alex is now in the Fintech space and running Kreditech. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — n/a Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? Spend more time learning how to manage and build companies Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Alexander to the show 02:20 – Kreditech is an end-to-end consumer lending company 02:45 – Kreditech has a powerful rating data 03:05 – Alex shares what kind of credit score they’d assign to a customer as opposed to what a bank would 04:15 – Kreditech is focused on consumers 05:28 – Kreditech is a lending company 05:55 – Current total loans outstanding 06:23 – Most of the loans are short in maturity 07:08 – The kind of person Kreditech loans to 08:25 – Kreditech is growing fast—around 100% every year 08:50 – Kreditech made $40M in revenue in 2015 09:30 – Kreditech explains their interest rates 10:15 – Kreditech offers higher loans with lower rates for specific consumers 12:07 – Some people who apply for a loan won’t usually be able to pay 12:33 – The fraction Kreditech will assume 15:17 – Total amount raised in funding rounds 16:40 – Loan origination 17:12 – Alex had to make sure to run the company on a fully-funded business plan 18:21 – Connect with Alex through LinkedIn, Twitter and his email 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can always work your way up – just give your ALL and embrace your company. Lending companies are different from the banks, but both have their advantages and disadvantages. Learn how to manage your company; NOT just how to manage people, but how to have your people work to make it more profitable. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Alexander@Kreditech.com – Alex’ email address @AGraubnerMuller – Alex’ Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/20/2016 • 25 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 512: $70M ARR B2B SaaS with DiscoverOrg CEO Henry Schuck
Henry Schuck, CEO of DiscoverOrg. He’s a leading entrepreneur in sales intelligence and lead generation. Under his leadership, DiscoverOrg built the industry’s most accurate, highest quality, contact database through a mix of technology and a team of live researchers who continually call into thousands of IT, marketing, HR, and finance departments. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good Boss, Bad Boss What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I do If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Work harder than you could ever imagine working” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Henry to the show 02:13 – DiscoverOrg provides deep intelligence on the company and the contact information of buyers of 60,000 companies worldwide 02:38 – DiscoverOrg is selling the data on a subscription basis 03:09 – Henry worked for a company similar to DiscoverOrg when he was an undergrad 03:28 – Henry’s colleague asked him to build a similar company which is now DiscoverOrg 04:04 – Henry’s acquired iProfile 04:40 – DiscoverOrg is owned by TA Associates 04:58 – DiscoverOrg was self-funded in annual contract value in 2014 05:56 – Henry was approached by different private equity firms in 2012-2014 06:26 – Henry shares the reason why they chose TA Associates 07:45 – Customers pay annual access to the platform which is a SaaS platform and they pay for specific data 08:22 – Average annual RPU 08:46 – Average ARR 09:20 – How Henry manages churn 10:46 – CAC 11:16 – Henry and his team are based in Vancouver, Washington 11:27 – Team size is 315 11:40 – Lifetime value 11:55 – Customers stay with DiscoverOrg for 3-4 years 12:23 – What keeps you motivated in doing this? 12:30 – Henry has a 6 month old daughter and he wants her to see that he works hard, he also wants to make it a success for TA 13:29 – Connect with Henry through LinkedIn and Twitter 15:27 – Annual renewal rate is over 90% 15:46 – DiscoverOrg is continually building new data 16:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Teach users not only how to use a platform, but how to utilize it to INCREASE their revenue. Have a business that is profitable. Work harder than you could ever imagine working, that’s where you add value. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @HenryLSchuck – Henry’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Henry’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/18/2016 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 511: How to Pivot $50K MRR SaaS Company with Ian Cullen CEO of Leadiro
Ian Cullen, a demand generation expert and the co-founder of Leadiro, an account-centric data platform designed to enable account based marketing and sales development efforts at named accounts. Ian was previously the co-founder of Internal Results, which was acquired by Madison Logic in May 2016. He started his first business, Target 250 in 2001, grew it to a team of 130 staff and it was a leading B2B technology based, lead generation company which was sold in 2010. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Magic of Thinking Big What CEO do you follow – N/A Favorite online tool? — SimilarWeb Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Work hard because nothing happens overnight and if you really focus and you can achieve anything” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Ian to the show 02:25 – Ian says he sold Target 250 for simply “not enough” 02:35 – Ian received investments from bench capitalists for Target 250 02:48 – After 6 months, Ian sold with a soft landing 03:19 – One year, non-compete, Ian set up an another company and sold it 03:48 – Chris is a partner and cofounder of Leadiro 03:57 – What Leadiro does and how they make money 04:00 – New startup, four months old, Leadiro is a B2b service platform that offers account-based marketing 05:19 – You can send cold emails to leads that are relevant 05:41 – Customers pay monthly or quarterly basis 05:55 – Average customer pays $ 20,000-40,000 per year but can be much higher, $ 6-10,000 per month depending on customer’s volume 07:00 – Launched July 2016 07:06 – Serving under 20 customers 07:29 – Customers are people we know in the industry 07:57 – Our customers are people that are launching certain products into the market to a specific audience 08:25 – Do they need help in reaching out to a larger audience as opposed to their first party list of possible customers? 08:35 – Why are people buying your data instead of others? 08:41 – Our platform is proprietary, easy to use 08:59 – “You can upload a list of domains within 10 seconds [of using our product] and pull out a specific audience within those accounts” and get their email addresses 09:12 – For example, there are 200 companies you want to target, upload that to our platform, and you have a list of everyone who works in those companies (job title, level, function), and can select what you want 09:52 – Very common product, that people that win are those who market better 10:18 – Like Siftery, but Siftery doesn’t get you the leads 10:53 – Leadiro’s current revenue: $50,000 11:06 – Leadiro is self-funded 11:09 – Ian does not want to raise 11:19 – Team size: 6 people 11:31 – Hired people to develop full-time, remote, in New Zealand 11:56 – 3 in UK, 1 in Ireland, 2 in NZ 12:56 – 50,000 in MR divided by 20 customers = Monthly RPU: $2500 per customer 13:11 – Early cancellations, because they’re in a learning stage 13:25 – One big struggle with this particular product—companies can download everything they need and leave 13:46 – Nathan wonders if these types of companies are SaaS companies or should there be a one-time fee where customers get what they need and leave? 13:55 – Something they are still working out, perhaps a 1-2 month subscription 14:22 – Discussion of competitors and who is doing the same thing well 15:21 – To connect with Ian, go to his LinkedIn 16:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Always think of how your product sets you apart from your competitors and SELL to that strength. A startup and any business for that matter is a work in progress—just keep at it. Work hard, focus in on your task, and you can achieve ANYTHING. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @Qwil – Johnny’s business Twitter handle Blog - Johnny’s business blog site Qwil.co – Johnny’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/17/2016 • 18 minutes, 57 seconds
EP 510: HubDoc Hits $132k MRR, 1200 Customers, $2M Raised to Help You Accountants Manage Their Documents with CEO Yoseph West
Yoseph West. He dreams of a world where accountants and bookkeepers never have to ask their clients for documents—that’s why he joined HubDoc to lead growth. He previously co-founded Vuru, a stock analytics platform for retail investors and led it into its acquisition by Wave Accounting in 2012. Listen as Yoseph shares his experience with Vuru’s acquisition and how he ended up now with HubDoc. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – William Rockefeller Favorite online tool? — Text Expander Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Stay patient Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Yoseph to the show 02:10 – Yoseph co-founded Vuru to make investing easier 02:33 – Vuru was making money off ads, they then supposedly reached out to Wave Accounting 03:15 – The acquisition was a soft landing 03:36 – “All of us want to work with people that we’re excited about” 04:29 – Yoseph and his team got a little excited as they talked more with angel investors 04:50 – Vuru was having a fundraising 05:30 – HubDoc offers SMBs a cloud accounting space 05:42 – There’s a movement to make accounting space invisible 06:13 – There’s a big shift in the accounting industry 06:40 – HubDoc has a feature similar to how bills and other documents are being consolidated in a bank 07:04 – HubDoc has over 700 web scrapers 07:50 – Business owners won’t be bombarded with reminder emails from their accountants and bookkeepers using HubDoc 08:25 – HubDoc was re-launched in early 2014 08:55 – Number of HubDoc’s paying customers 09:28 – HubDoc caters to bookkeepers and accountants who then add all their clients 10:40 – Average monthly RPU 11:20 – MRR 12:00 – CAC is quite low 12:18 – Customers stay for approximately 32 months 12:30 – Gross monthly churn is usually negative 12:40 – Bookkeepers are always continually adding new clients 13:45 – Lifetime value 14:10 – Team size is 22 14:27 – The Australian market is 3-5 times ahead of the American market 14:40 – HubDoc has raised capital 15:00 – The funding market in Toronto described 15:40 – 2017 revenue goal 16:49 – Follow Yoseph on Twitter and HubDoc is looking for content marketers and other marketing people so touch base if you’re interested 19:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The future of accounting and bookkeeping is far better with technology; it’s much faster and paperless. Acquisition is sometimes painful but there are always new opportunities ahead. Stay patient AND optimize for learning—there’s time to learn and grow. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @YcWest – Yoseph’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/16/2016 • 22 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 509: 21 Year Old Invests $500k To Re-Invent Webinars with Demio CEO Wyatt Jozwowski
Wyatt Jozwowzki, co-founder and CEO of Demio, a smart, webinar platform on a simple mission. He’s passionate about creating a great customer and user experience. Listen as Wyatt shares about Demio; from its inception to a Wyatt creating a working, webinar platform that is earning a revenue from only a few days on the market. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Clarity.fm Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— seven to eight hours If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That it was going to be 10 times harder than I thought” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Wyatt to the show 02:08 – Demio is a web-based webinar platform built for marketing 02:18 – “We wanted to create a webinar platform that is actually easy and ready to use” 02:35 – Demio was just launched in November 9th of this year 02:54 – Wyatt has a company called Drip Apps as well 03:12 – Demio is the biggest software project that Wyatt has ever taken on 03:15 – Wyatt has been working with Demio for 2 years now 03:28 – Demio was in free beta for 3-4 months 03:38 – People used Demio for their webinars for free 03:48 – This was done to test Demio’s reliability and performance 04:02 – Wyatt wants simplicity to be Demio’s platform 04:51 – Wyatt has invested about half of million on Demio 04:48 – Demio has a team of 3 developers, 1 designer, and 1 QA manager 05:40 – Some of the team members are from Upwork and other online job postings 06:21 – Wyatt got his funding from Drip Apps’ revenue 06:53 – Wyatt got the idea of Demio from a suggestion 07:30 – First software project of Wyatt’s was a video ranking platform 07:45 – Drip Apps has Drip Core which has a $47/month subscription 08:09 – 470 users have signed-up 08:23 – Drip Apps was launched 3 years ago 08:53 – Drip Apps’ 2015 revenue 09:15 – Drip Apps runs independently of Wyatt, freeing him up to work on Demio 09:52 – Demio was not really planned 10:20 – Nathan refers to Episode 252 and how Wyatt reminds him of Omar of Webinar Ninja 10:38 – Demio already has paying customers 10:46 – Demio is a SaaS business model and they currently have discounted annual pricing 10:59 – On launch day, Demio’s price range was from $237 a year to $497 a year 11:08 – Price range increased on November 16th 12:20 – Wyatt’s strategy for Demio 13:10 – Having a webinar is not that easy and is very challenging 13:40 – Demio is web-based and does not require any desktop software to be installed 13:42 – Wyatt is currently focused on expanding browser and mobile support 14:05 – There are a number of unique customers that have signed-up 14:30 – There are customers who have asked for refunds 15:49 – Connect with Wyatt through Twitter 17:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are huge challenges in the tech industry, but it’s definitely worth it to keep pressing on. Streaming in real-time is one of the most difficult things to achieve in a webinar. Be consistent in working out those hurdles and challenges. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @WyattJawz – Wyatt’s Twitter handle Upwork – Where Wyatt found his team members Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/15/2016 • 20 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 508: Siftery $4M Raised, 25,000 Users to Help You Find Software Tools with CMO Gerry Golyer
Gerry Colyer, head of growth at Siftery. He was previously the VP of growth at HealthSherpa and co-founder of two startups. He’s a graduate of Yale and Stanford. The CEO of Siftery was convinced there was a better way for companies to discover, select, and make better use of their software and so began their journey into filling this particular need in the market. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Hooked What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not quite If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Gerry wish he had studied more in Computer Science Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan introduces Gerry to the show 02:11 – Gerry’s 500 company is Central Mayoreo 02:57 – Siftery helps users discover and choose the right software to reach their needs 03:20 – Siftery is currently tracking 10,000 software programs 03:30 – Siftery gets data from their recommendation engines 03:57 – Siftery has a small team in SF 04:11 – Siftery has 30 team members in Bangalore and Kiev 05:24 – How Siftery collects data 05:59 – There’s a combination of data scraping from the web and getting recommendations from actual software users 06:48 – Siftery is trying to create tools for software buyers 08:10 – Siftery has no pricing model yet and currently free 09:13 – Monthly headcount expenses 10:00 – Advantages of having a development team in Bangalore 10:12 – Cost of living is Bangalore lower than in SF 11:00 – What number are you focused on every day? 11:11 – Data points being contributed in the community 11:31 – Number of vendors engaged in the platform 12:00 – Launched earlier in 2016 12:30 – Siftery is more powerful than Techcrunch 13:00 – How are you able to get updates so quickly? 13:05 – We get feedback from software reviews, friends in the 500, and other software owners 13:43 – 25 data contributors 14:00 – Utility metric 15:15 – Siftery’s target area 15:50 – Connect with Gerry through email, Twitter and Siftery 18:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Meet people and build connections or, better yet, build companies. There are opportunities in the B2B space—find the gap and fill it. Having a team in another country can help startups build their business at a lower cost but still maintain the quality of work. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Gerry@Siftery.com – Gerry’s email address @Ggiaco – Gerry’s Twitter handle Siftery.com – Gerry’s company website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/14/2016 • 20 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 507: $300k Raised, ChatBot Helps Your Audience Talk To You and Get Answer with CEO Abhimanyu Godara
Abhimanyu Godara, founder and CEO of BOTTR.me. He previously managed portfolio investments at TLabs where he worked with over 40 startups around strategies and things similar to that. He’s very well educated and now sitting on a platform that he thinks is going to be very exciting for him coming up. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “The world doesn’t work the way you want it to work” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:31 – Nathan introduces Abhimanyu to the show 02:08 – BOTTR is a personal bot platform that one can converse with to ask questions they’d essentially want to be asking you (ex. How much for your services? When is the next podcast coming out?) 03:01 – BOTTR is like a personal assistant or replica of someone 03:09 – BOTTR is currently focused on influencers and celebrities 04:10 – BOTTR’s current business model 05:05 – Still validating the potential of the business 05:40 – BOTTR currently has 250 paying customers 06:40 – BOTTR’s next version will have all the data pre-filled for every user 06:58 – BOTTR will gather information from social media channels like LinkedIn 07:34 – BOTTR can make you save time because now you do not need to address every question that comes up in email as it can already answer most questions 07:44 – BOTTR had a funding round 08:25 – Current team size is 7-10 09:35 – Abhimanyu shares how users of BOTTR can get paid 10:00 – There are bloggers who have already reached out to BOTTR 11:15 – BOTTR is an ecommerce product to find information and services 12:16 – Connect with Abhimanyu through BOTTR.me/Abhimanyu 13:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create something that is DIFFERENT in your space. Performing a pre-launch can help you gauge what you still need to improve upon. What you plan to do won’t always work – ALWAYS have a plan B. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences BOTTR.me/Abhimanyu – Abhimanyu’s BOTTR account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/13/2016 • 16 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 506: Klipfolio $7.9M Raised, 7000 Customers for Smarter Business Dashboards with CEO Allan Wille
Allan Wille, co-founder and CEO of Klipfolio – a SaaS dashboard company headquartered in Ottawa. He’s focused on making it easier and faster for SMBs (small to medium businesses) to monitor the health and performance of their businesses and they’re taking an interesting approach. It is self-served, in the cloud, right to business users, eliminating them the need to work with IT procurement or make huge upfront investments. He has over 59,000 customers including Jet.com, Zendesk and Lifelock just to name a few. They also have the funding to back them. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Mixpad Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I should have spent more time understanding people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:31 – Nathan introduces to the show 02:15 – Klipfolio is focused on SMBs or businesses that really want to grow 02:36 – There’s a lot of difficult data a SMB just doesn’t monitor 03:09 – Klipfolio helps SMBs monitor their business to make the best decisions 03:28 – Klipfolio is 100% SaaS and a subscription based business 03:35 – Average customer pays per month $70-80 03:57 – Klipfolio does not have outbound sales people 04:34 – Klipfolio is serving 7,000 customers for November 2016 04:57 – Average MRR 05:07 – Customers can start Klipfolio with payments as low as $24 a month 05:40 – Klipfolio was launched in 2001 05:56 – The cloud version was launched in 2012 06:03 – “We’re always into monitoring real-time data” 06:30 – Klipfolio started out bootstrapped 07:06 – By the end of 2012, Klipfolio had 350 customers 07:12 – In the end of 2013, Klipfolio had 1,100 customers 07:54 – Klipfolio had their first seed round at the end of 2014 08:02 – Klipfolio did their Series A at the beginning of 2015 with a $6.2M 08:55 – Klipfolio is continuously raising capital 09:05 – Team size is 70 10:03 – Klipfolio is currently on Series B 10:55 – Allan thinks that they are in a good space 11:16 – SMB is a good field market for Klipfolio 11:50 – Allan shares why he thinks Dasheroo didn’t do well in the dashboard space 13:30 – Allan shares his thoughts on their competitors 14:10 – Gross monthly customer churn 15:45 – CAC 16:00 – Lifetime value 16:46 – Klipfolio does webinars to educate their customers on their data 17:30 – 2016 revenue goal 18:22 – Connect with Allan through Twitter and his blog 20:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on the needs of your customer in running their business AND be a part of their growth. It’s important for businesses to have an editor or someone who can handle things that need to be customized. Spend more time understanding people, especially how they work in a team. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving to listen to audio books The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @Awille – Allan’s Twitter handle Klipfolio.com/Blog – Allan’s blog site Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/12/2016 • 23 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 505: Qwil.co Pre-Pays Contractors/Freelancers $10M in 2016 with CEO Johnny Reinsch
Johnny Reinsch of Qwil which is a company that provides instant pay for the growing freelancer segment of the work force. He’s the co-founder and CEO and also a cryptocurrency nerd. Listen as Johnny shares how he shifted his career path and why Qwil is different from most startups. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Toptal Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I didn’t have to go to law school” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:24 – Nathan introduces Johnny to the show 01:57 – Johnny got tired of making rich people richer so he started his own startup 02:28 – Johnny shares his learnings from the cryptocurrency company 02:50 – Qwil helps freelancers collect their pay on time 03:21 – Qwil has a low price point 03:40 – Qwil is a transactional based model 04:05 – Qwil started summer of 2015 04:20 – First year total transaction volume is in low seven figures 04:51 – Target transaction volume for 2016 05:05 – Qwil’s funding rounds 05:45 – It is an equitable note 06:07 – “We are not disclosing a round at the moment” 07:20 – 2016 total transaction volume 07:40 – Qwil has a similar metric with GMD 08:51 – Some freelancers won’t release their payment right away 09:35 – If freelancers keep their money in Qwil for 30 days, they won’t be charged any fees 09:50 – Qwil can’t touch the cash of the freelancers 11:30 – Qwil offers conveniences to the users 13:28 – Profit margin base 13:44 – Team size 14:10 – Number of contractors who have used Qwil is in the thousands 15:21 – “We are trying to make a freelancer’s lifestyle much easier than it currently is” 17:10 – Connect with Johnny through his website, blog, and Twitter 18:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be sure to USE and APPLY what you learned well. Be in a unique niche where competition is not very tough. School does NOT always lead you to your future, don’t let it narrow your scope. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @Qwil – Johnny’s business Twitter handle Blog - Johnny’s business Twitter handle Qwil.co – Johnny’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/11/2016 • 22 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 504: MailPlaneApp 10,000+ Customers With BetterGmail with CEO Lars Steiger
Lars Steiger, the co-founder of Mailplane. Nathan found Lars when he was searching in the Gmail space. Listen as Lars shares how he ended up managing Mailplane solo and the reason why he would never sell is company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Jason Fried Favorite online tool? — Basecamp Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Stay calm” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Lars to the show 02:05 – Mailplane started as GmailSender in 2006, which was then an iPhoto plugin 02:28 – Mailplane was founded by Ruben, Lars joined in 2007 02:53 – Lars has an equity now with Mailplane 03:15 – Customers are more important for Mailplane 03:33 – Mailplane has an average of 10,000 customers 03:52 – Mailplane offers a 15 day free trial 04:17 – 5,000 users a month try the free trial 04:40 – Mailplane relies mostly on organic traffic 05:00 – Mailplane is a one-time purchase business model 05:30 – 10,000 people from Mailplane’s email list have tried the free trial 05:57 – Lars does the coding for Mailplane 06:15 – Lars uses business development tactics from time-to-time 06:30 – Mailplane is completely bootstrapped 06:53 – Average revenue in 2007 07:40 – Ruben joined Evernote and left Mailplane to Lars in 2012 08:24 – Lars’ goal for Mailplane 09:36 – How much will make Lars sell Mailplane? 10:37 – Lars won’t sell Mailplane because of the customers 11:17 – The most important number for Mailplane is the number of users who are downloading updates 12:25 – Connect with Lars through his email and Mailplane 14:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Value and show appreciation to your customers, working to better address their needs. Sometimes, there’s just no amount that can compensate for the hard work an entrepreneur has put into his business. Stay CALM, nothing to be gained by choosing the alternative. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences MailPlaneApp.com – Lars’ business website Lars@MailPlaneApp.com – Lars’ email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/10/2016 • 18 minutes, 54 seconds
EP 503: $125k for 5%, How To Grow Into $2m+ Valuation with InDemand CEO Alex Saidani
Alex Saidani, founder and CEO of Indemand. Alex is a developer who started coding at the age of 11. He started his first business at the age of 13 and was the youngest founder of a team to participate in the DotForge accelerator program with Hashtrack. Indemand supports businesses with providing online ordering software and an hourly delivery network. On top of this, Alex also finds time to mentor people in their start-ups and provide them with the necessary support. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs Biography What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t waste time pursuing people who are not going to help you or create value” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show 01:52 – Alex went to the 500 startups program 02:12 – Indemand sells software to groceries and other retail stores 02:25 – Indemand charges the stores directly 02:36 – Indemand is a SaaS business 02:52 – Indemand started in 2015 03:14 – First year revenue 03:38 – Indemand’s usual customers 04:15 – Indemand has worked with 150 companies and there are 25 active customers 04:28 – Most of the inactive customers are startups 05:04 – Indemand had to increase their fees to make money 05:10 – ARPU per month is around $250 05:22 – MRR 05:55 – October 2016 revenue was $25,000 06:45 – What do people get when they pay $400 a month? 06:51 – help with start-up, customize branding, end up with a customer facing application 07:14 – Users get to monitor all the orders in real-time 07:40 – Total transaction volume in October 2016, is around 200 orders 08:20 – Indemand had a capital raising 10:30 – Indemand’s other expenses 10:46 – Indemand sources people from Fiverr to find information 12:00 – Alex and his team are based in California 12:18 – Connect with Alex through his LinkedIn and email 13:51 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An entrepreneur can start as early as 13 years old—you’re never too young or old for that matter! Raising fees is often necessary to meet your clients’ demands and update your services. Don’t waste your time on “non-value creating” people. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences LinkedIn – Alex’s LinkedIn account Alex@TryInDemand.com – Alex’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/9/2016 • 16 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 502: 30% Annual Yield AirBNB Investing with Andrew Keene
Andrew Keene, president and CEO of AlphaShark Trading which is originally founded as KeeneOnTheMarket.com in 2011. Prior to that, he grew up working as a proprietary trader at Chicago Board Options Exchange. He began his career on a trade program and would eventually co-found the KATL group. He currently actively trades future equity options, currency options present in commodities, and was a regular guest/market commentator on such networks as Bloomberg, CNBC and Fox Business. His first love will always be trading but he’s arguably even more well-known for building a trading room. He is especially proud of having taught his personal strategies trading for over 50,000 guests for years. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Automatic Customer What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Not to date a girl for 8 years and be engaged” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Andrew to the show 02:32 – Andrew is based in Austin and San Diego 03:17 – Andrew is part of Entrepreneur Organization 03:55 – Andrew purchased a place in San Diego and put it on Airbnb 05:18 – “This year I expect to make $20,000 from that $70,000 investment” 06:24 – Andrew wants to get the “Super Host” status on Airbnb 06:33 – Airbnb advertises Super Host’s properties more 06:53 – Andrew looks at Airbnb hosting as an investment 07:25 – The risk of having your properties in Airbnb 07:31 – Stand-alone is not covered by HOA 07:48 – HOA wants to ban short-term rentals in San Diego 08:10 – Hosts can take advantage of their cash-flow situation 08:50 – Andrew has made $5M from trading 09:30 – Andrew shares how he got into trading 10:32 – Andrew has a place in Chicago, too 10:38 – Andrew is making around $8,000 a year for his place in Chicago 11:16 – Andrew is starting his second deal 11:41 – People ask Andrew how he makes money through the investment 12:04 – Andrew is working on a book with Airbnb 12:11 – AirBNBopen in LA 12:25 – There are around 7,000 people who paid Andrew for trading information 12:35 – Andrew has more than 50,0000 people in his email list 13:09 – Andrew shares how his cash flow works with his property in San Diego 13:45 – Andrew names software that he uses other than Revestor 13:50 – AirDNA is where you can buy reports of any city 14:23 – Mashvisor use to search for rental properties 14:45 – You can use analytics and research by Revestor to get into the market 15:50 – Standard percentage for payment fees 16:30 – Nathan makes an offer to Andrew 17:55 – Email Andrew to connect with him 20:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find the right investment and STUDY it as best as you can. Go to someone who is an expert in a market that you want to be in. Stay independent as long as you can. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Andrew@AlphaShark.com – Andrew’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/8/2016 • 22 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 501: Track Uninstalls with $325k in Funding, 15 Customers, with CEO Pritesh Vora of Uninstall.io
Pritesh Vora. He has over 10 years of experience specializing in building and growing innovative technology products. He was a formerly a partner at 1000Lookz and the business head at NotiPhi. He has also worked at TCS, one of India’s biggest IT service companies across US, Europe and India. He has a Bachelor in Technology from MSIT. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Definitely, knew more about how to see the business” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan introduces Pritesh to the show 02:10 – Uninstall.io is Pritesh’s current company 02:14 – Uninstall.io is a niche analytics company 02:40 – Uninstall.io provides analytics to popular mobile apps 02:50 – Uninstall.io is a SaaS business with monthly subscription and fees depending on the number of users and modules 03:02 – Average pay per customer is $100,000 a month 03:11 – Uninstall.io was launched in 2015 03:22 – Uninstall.io was bootstrapped for the first 6-8 months and raised $365K 03:50 – Uninstall.io is currently serving more than 150 apps 04:36 – ARR is currently $100K 04:48 – MRR is around $10K 05:00 – Uninstall.io currently has 15-17 customers 05:23 – Pritesh shares why companies leave after just a few months 06:37 – Pritesh and his team are still working on how to make customers stay 08:30 – Pritesh and his team are learning more about their customers’ needs and data so that Uninstall.io can become indispensable to them 09:00 – People have a typical analytic scheme in their company 09:25 – Uninstall.io has 10 people on their team 09:44 – Uninstall.io is using shared resources to take the data from each account 10:00 – Average CAC 10:38 – Average monthly salary 11:12 – Pritesh and his team are based in India 12:00 – Lifetime value 12:47 – Pritesh still has around $150K in the bank 13:02 – Pritesh is currently spending $20,000 for the expenses 13:40 – 2015 revenue is around $45,000 14:12 – Connect with Pritesh through his Twitter, website and blog 15:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work to know your niche and target market on a deeper level. Having a business is a continuous experiment—it’s how one learns and adapts. Focus on your team first and look after them well. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences @PriteshVora – Pritesh’s Twitter handle Uninstall.io – Pritesh’s business website Blog.Uninstall.io- Pritesh’s blog site Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/7/2016 • 19 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 500: $5M Funding, $1.3M Revenue For LGBT Lifestyle Traveling like AirBNB with CEO Matthieu Jost
Matthieu Jost, who founded his first company when he was 17 and exited it when he was 21. Most recently, he started Misterb&b in 2015 and has become the world’s largest gay hotel brand in the world. Listen as Matthieu shares how he managed his first business at an early age and how Misterb&b grew exponentially in less than 4 years. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Brian Chesky Favorite online tool? — RJ Metrics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Being less naïve maybe” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:31 – Nathan introduces Matthieu to the show 02:00 – Matthieu’s first company that posted TV series was sold to PlanetSeries (French equivalent of IMDB) for about $1 million 02:33 – The team composed of 4 people 02:53 – The company sold series’ merchandise 03:18 – Matthieu built the company 03:38 – Matthieu studied Computer Science for two years to work in a radio station 04:38 – Matthieu shares how Misterb&b is different from Airbnb 05:00 – Misterb&b is a marketplace 05:25 – The sellers are the homeowners 05:36 – “It’s not only for gay men, we are open to everyone in the LGBT community” 05:45 – There are straight women using Misterb&b because they find it cool and much safer 06:10 – Misterb&b is taking 4% from the host and 12% from the traveler 06:27 – Average booking for 3 nights is $300 06:40 – Misterb&b was founded at the last quarter of 2014 06:50 – Misterb&b was bootstrapped for 6 months and went on raising capital 07:02 – Total funds raised was $5 million 07:10 – Team size is 22 07:44 – Currently, there are 80,000 hosts in Misterb&b in over 135 countries 08:00 – Misterb&b has an average of 80,000 bookings per month 08:22 – Most of the travelers are solo travelers 09:16 – First year total transaction volume is 300K 09:35 – Total transaction volume for 2015 is $3M and 2016 total transaction volume goal is $7M 09:58 – Misterb&b is seasonal 11:00 – Misterb&b’s 2015 average revenue is $480,000 11:12 – Misterb&b’s 2016 revenue aim is $1.3 million 11:24 – Misterb&b is working on different types of ads 12:05 – There are around 300K people on Misterb&b’s email list 12:12 – Average opening click-thru rate is 14% 12:50 – People are paying Misterb&b a flat-rate and they are getting 15,000 clicks 13:00 – Misterb&b also works with non-media companies 13:46 – 40% of Misterb&b’s travelers are repeaters 14:28 – Follow Matthieu’s company on Facebook and visit the website 16:33 – The Famous Five 17:16 – RJ Metrics was at The Top Episode 233 3 Key Points: It is always advantageous to start your business as EARLY as possible. Life is about making a choice; don’t be afraid to step out and make that decision. Misterb&b is about building a worldwide community that promotes safe travel without discrimination. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Facebook – Matthieu’s business Facebook account Misterbandb.com – Matthieu’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/6/2016 • 24 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 499: GetSignEasy Passes $200k MRR and 130k Customers To Help Sign Documents withCEO Sunil Patro
Sunil Patro, founder of SignEasy, a technologist, product thinker and entrepreneur. He has a decade of experience as a member of multiple early stage product team at Microsoft, Juniper Networks and Tokbox. Putting enterprise communication apps to carrier great routing system to consumer focused video conferencing software. After facing many problems to sign an important job offer while traveling in Mexico, he was inspired to build a product that could solve this hindrance. Since bootstrapping SignEasy in 2010, he led SignEasy to a growing and profitable company that putting 3M downloads with a 5-star rating in over 150 countries, ranked 1 of the top 15 apps and in top 100 downloaded apps for business including Apple’s Best New Apps and Editor Choice Picks. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crucial Conversations What CEO do you follow? – Jason Fried Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not everyday If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Just focus on being part of a great team and focus on learning things rapidly and just have an experience. Find the things you enjoy the most at work” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan introduces Sunil to the show 02:33 – SignEasy is a cloud-based easy to use app 02:50 – SignEasy allows users to be completely paperless 03:00 – SignEasy is a SaaS model and has a free trial for 14 days 03:12 – Pay-as-you-go is also available 03:17 – Businesses can subscribe to pro and premium plans 03:34 – Sunil started coding SignEasy in early 2010 and launched around July 2010 03:35 – First year revenue 04:02 – Current number of customers in 2016 04:20 – 40-45% are on subscriptions and the rest are on one-time payment 04:33 – Average monthly RPU is $ 4 – 5 for pro and 80-90% are pro subscriptions 05:09 – Average monthly recurring revenue for SignEasy 05:58 – The difference of their payment plans before and now and how it affects their MRR 06:41 – SignEasy has grown high double digit over the last few years 07:07 – SignEasy is totally bootstrapped 07:25 – Team size 08:00 – Sunil is based in the bay area 08:52 – Gross monthly customer churn 09:02 – SignEasy is focused on SMB 09:45 – Customers can only pay SignEasy annually 10:35 – Lifetime value 10:46 – SignEasy hasn’t done paid user acquisition yet 10:55 – Almost 100% of SignEasy users are inbound based or app store driven 11:57 – Sunil shares how they are reaching high number of downloads in app store 12:10 – SignEasy has been in the app store for 6 years 12:30 – There are many factors that app store considers 12:43 – SignEasy has been using keywords for app store 14:10 – SignEasy gets 60K downloads a month from app store 14:35 – In iOS, the conversion from free to paid users is 5-6% 14:44 – In Android, the conversion from free to paid users is half of the iOS 14:50 – The free trial is either 14 days or limited to 3 documents 15:15 – SignEasy’s paid features 15:39 – SignEasy just launched a new feature wherein a user can send a document to sign to multiple people remotely and they can establish a work flow 16:00 – Sunil’s philosophy 17:10 – Nathan made a mock offer of $ 15M and Sunil is open to it 17:47 – Find Sunil on Twitter and send him an email 19:27 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Build something that people want. Follow your passion and do what you drives your passion. Focus on being part of a great team and focus on learning things rapidly. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/5/2016 • 22 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 498: $130M Raised Wealthfront Crosses 100,000 Investors, $4.4B in AUM with CEO Andy Rachleff
Andy Rachleff, president and CEO of Wealthfront. He served as a member of the board of trustees and vice chairman of the Endowment Investment Committee for the University of Pennsylvania and as a member of the faculty for Stanford Graduate School of Business where he teaches course on Technology Entrepreneurship. Prior to Wealthfront, Andy co-founded and was general partner of Benchmark Capital, where he was responsible for investing number of successful companies. He has also spent 10 years as a general partner for Merrill, Pickard, Anderson & Eyre - MPAE. Andy earned his S from University of Pennsylvania and his MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Associating myself with great people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Andy to the show 03:03 – Andy is retired for his Venture Capital business so he wants to give back 04:07 – David Swensen has been an investor on Andy’s 2 venture capital firms 04:37 – The way Wealthfront generates investment mix is the same method David Swensen uses 05:09 - Wealthfront manages a diversified of portfolio of low-cost index funds in behalf of their client 05:20 – Minimum is $ 500 to open an account 05:55 – “If you like Vanguard, you’re going to love Wealthfront” 06:00 – Wealthfront can minimize taxes using a software that Vanguard can’t do 07:59 – Software works 24/7 so you can monitor your losses daily 08:36 – Wealthfront has been managing around $ 4.4B assets 08:53 – Wealthfront’s asset management worth is much smaller than Vanguard 09:25 – “With every new technology that succeeds, it gets adopted at a faster rate” 09:47 – Automated Investment Services has been adapted at a faster rate than ETF 10:09 – Automated Investment Services are actually managing more assets than ETF 10:21 – Volume of individual metrics 10:54 – Wealthfront manages the first $ 10,000 for free and charges a quarter of a percent on a amount managed excessing $ 10,000 11:10 – Sample model is Dropbox 12:00 – “It is more of the client’s satisfaction of our service” 12:25 – Percentage of sent invites by users 13:01 – The number of people actually invested in Wealthfront 13:51 – Average MRR 14:04 – Overtime, Wealthfront will introduce new services 14:51 – Wealthfront is a hybrid of old model and also new channels in the software 15:28 – “We want to build services that benefit our clients 16:03 – Wealthfront was launched in Dec 2011 16:12 – Team size is about 140 16:15 – Total capital raised is $ 130M 17:15 – “I’m willing to sacrifice some growth for a far more sustainable model” 17:55 – Connect with Andy through his email and Twitter 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: With every new technology that succeeds, it gets adopted at a faster rate. Sacrifice some growth for a far more sustainable model. Associate yourself with great people. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences Andy@Wealthfront.com – Andy’s email address @Arachleff – Andy’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/4/2016 • 23 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 497: Woopra $1M Raised, $1.6M 2015 Revenue, $300k MRR To Help Businesses Get Smarter with CEO Elie Khoury
Elie Khoury, co-founder and CEO of Woopra – a customer intelligence platform that helps businesses essentialize customer engagement across all channels. He studied Computer Science in Lebanese American University where he booked the first generation of Woopra in 2007. In addition to Woopra, he co-founded YallaStartup, a non-government organization establish to proper entrepreneurship in the Middle East and North Africa. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I won’t change a thing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan introduces to Elie the show 02:09 – Woopra is designed for businesses to help them consolidate their customer activities across channels 02:22 – Woopra is a SaaS model and has monthly subscription 02:34 – Woopra is self-funded but they raised an Angel round few years ago 02:43 – Raised about a million dollars in the Angel round 02:48 – It was an equity round 02:58 – There are 12 people in the team 03:08 – All are based in SF 03:18 – Woopra mainly focused on SaaS businesses but they cater to wide-range of businesses 03:39 – Woopra has around 1000 customers at the moment 03:50 – Woopra has 100,000 active projects and 1000 of that are paying customers 04:10 – Average RPU is around $30,000 a year for enterprise and $ 3000 a year for SMB 04:30 – Woopra introduced their enterprise edition a couple of years ago 05:05 – Average MRR 05:27 – Gross customers monthly churn is lower on enterprise than SMB 06:15 – CAC is $ 1-2,000 on enterprise 06:35 – Lifetime value 07:39 – Average monthly lifetime value 07:53 – Woopra has a sales team that engages with enterprise customers 08:08 – Woopra was launched in 2008 08:25 – Woopra has 15,000 active projects that are running for free 09:25 – 2015 total revenue around $ 1.5 million 09:50 – Woopra is in a good place at the moment 10:02 – “Raising funding is always an option. We are just waiting for the right fit and the right time” 10:13 – Woopra has to scale in a faster pace and identify the perfect marketing tool 10:44 – Connect with Elie through their blog and his email 12:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Raising fund is always an option. Just wait for the right fit and the right time. There is time to polish things out. Take things slowly. Embrace your ignorance. Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Elie@Woopra.com – Elie’s email address Woopra.com/Blog – Elie’s business blog Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/3/2016 • 15 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 496: PayByGroup $3.4M Raised, $10m in Transaction Volume to Help Groups Pay with CEO Camilo Acosta
Camilo Acosta, CEO of Pay By Group, which is based out of San Francisco. Their team is working with global brands to make it easier for people to minimize the cost of any purchase at the online checkout. One of their customers expresses their gratitude for the company by saying that their “family reunion [wouldn’t] happen without Pay By Group.” Listen as Camilo shares how Pay By Group’s revenue grew from zero in 2011 to nearly $30 million in 2016. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? —Hubspot Sales Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Now, I do” If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I moved to San Francisco earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:36 – Nathan introduces Camilo to the show 02:05 – Pay By Group is a worldwide payment solution that allows families and friends to split the cost of their online purchases 02:20 – Pay By Group is plugged-in directly to online merchants 02:33 – Pay By Group is a checkout option 02:47 – Pay By Group charges the business and consumers 03:07 – Camilo gives an example on how to use Pay By Group using Walmart’s website 03:44 – Pay By Group makes more money on the consumer charges 03:50 – Pay By Group is active on vacation rental sites like CaboVillas 04:19 – The organizer is free but every invite will be charged 2.9% 05:17 – Pay By Group is a pay-as-you-go model 05:34 – Pay By Group was founded in 2011 05:38 – Team size is 20 05:41 – Pay By Group raised $3.4 million in the second round 05:56 – The first round of raised capital 06:28 – Average order value: 06:46 – There’s no one number because it depends on the merchants 06:56 – Vacation rentals is Pay By Group’s current “bread and butter” 07:08 – Number of merchants currently using Pay By Group is over 300 07:20 – Pay By Group tracks the number of groups/families that have used their system 07:52 – Pay By Group had tens of millions of transactions 08:11 – 2011 total transaction volume number is zero 08:25 – Pay By Group was in 500 startups in 2012 08:58 – Pay By Group’s first merchant was Rent Like A Champion 10:04 – 2012 total transaction volume number is less than a hundred thousand 10:30 – 2013 total transaction volume number is around $3 million 10:45 – Goal transaction volume number in 2016 is $30 million 10:57 – Pay By Group is seasonal 11:33 – The Top: Ep. 489 is the episode where Rent Like A Champion’s CEO was featured 12:38 – Pay By Group’s team is based in San Francisco 12:56 – Camilo’s goal for Pay By Group 13:40 – Connect with Camilo through LinkedIn and his website 16:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Enjoy WHAT you do and WHO you work with—learn from them. The secret is simplicity; less is always more. Dream it and do your best to achieve it. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. LinkedIn – Camilo’s LinkedIn account PayByGroup.com – Camilo’s business website CaboVillas – One of Pay By Group’s vacation rental merchant Rent Like A Champion – Pay By Group’s first merchant Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/2/2016 • 17 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 495: WebEx Killer +$5M In Revenue, 1.7M Users For Better Online Meetings with BusinessHangouts CEO Gary Guseinov
Gary Guseinov, an investor, operator, and advisor in various technology companies including Business Hangouts, InCast, Playsino and Revenue.com. During his career, he has over $100 million in growth capital and structured complex financial transactions. He’s also acquired over 300 million users for global technology product and services. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Power the Mind What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Calendly Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I knew how to start a business with very little capital” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan introduces Gary to the show 02:08 – Business Hangouts is a web-conferencing and webinar platform 02:17 – It is specifically designed for Google apps 02:47 – Gary has raised capital for USTechSupport in 2003 03:07 – Private from 2003 to 2007 03:15 – From September 2007 to 2012, it became public in Nasdaq 03:22 – It was bought out by a big marketing company in LA 03:29 – Gary was the co-founder and left the company because he needed a break 04:24 – “It takes a lot of processes when it comes to legal and accounting when you shift from private to public” 05:05 – SDC reviews the applications and processes 05:20 – Gary was in his mid-thirties when he started USTechSupport and didn’t have any experience running a company 05:29 – Gary is now 46 05:40 – Gary acquired Business Hangouts from the previous owner 05:51 – Business Hangouts had 1.7 million enterprise users when it was acquired 06:02 – Over 700,000 registered users and 70,000 enterprise users 06:40 – Number of paying users 07:10 – Business Hangouts’ competitors usually separate web conferencing and webinar leading to 2 different subscriptions 07:48 – Consumers wouldn’t know what their monthly expenses were going to be 07:54 – Business Hangouts is not as complicated as their competitors 08:10 – “Our pricing model is very simple” 09:07 – Average monthly RPU is $70 10:40 – Business Hangouts is currently getting offers from investors 11:45 – “We try to build a business based on purely economics” 12:06 – “We think that we are a strong contender to multi-million dollar entities” 12:54 – Gary does not wish to disclose their MRR because they are not looking for capital at the moment as they are still a small company 13:57 – Gary’s goal is to stay “at the radar” 14:18 – “You want to be good at what you’re doing and you want the market to recognize that” 14:55 – Churn is less than 10% yearly 15:32 – Gary acquired the company for less than $10 million 17:00 – Gary can afford to put inside sales representatives in the demo 17:36 – Business Hangouts is completely bootstrapped 18:15 – Current CAC is zero 18:55 – Team size is less than 10 19:16 – Connect with Gray through LinkedIn 20:42 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Choose a business that is viable in the marketplace. Staying “at the radar” while doing an excellent job at what you do will help you become recognized by the marketplace. You CAN start a business without raising capital. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. LinkedIn – Gary’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
12/1/2016 • 23 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 494: PDFFiller $10M+ Revenue, 200k Customers To make Document Signing/Management Easier with CEO Borya Shakhnovich
Boris Shakhnovich, president of PDF Filler. He manages the daily operation and marketing campaigns but he is also responsible for the mission and vision of the company. Prior to his work at PDF Filler, Boris earned a PhD in Bioinformatics and he’s a Bioinformatics Professor at Boston University. He later moved to Harvard University to work with Systems Biology. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Guerilla Marketing What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Google Analytics Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That doing is more important than knowing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Boris to the show 02:30 – Boris is the president and co-founder 02:47 – PDF Filler is a document management platform 02:51 – It allows people to do end-to-end document generation 03:40 – PDF Filler is a SaaS business model and they charge per month 03:46 – 3 tiers: professional, non-professional, and business 03:50 – Business is the most expensive at $15 a month 03:58 – Average customer pays per month 04:10 – In 2008, the founder started the business and ran it by himself until the end of 2011 04:25 – Boris joined the company 5 years ago and applied marketing technology to it 04:39 – PDF Filler has now close to 200,000 customers 04:58 – Monthly RPU 05:16 – PDF Filler was needed when it launched so it grew organically 05:30 – Gross customer churn per month is low 06:28 – PDF Filler works with the government institutions 06:58 – PDF Filler’s digital marketing platform 07:08 - PDF Filler runs 60 million keywords on top of SEO and other SEM platforms 07:19 – Brings 4 million website views monthly 07:30 – Internal CRM with A/B Testing 08:22 – “We have a marketing technology that allows us to find sites that would be interested in collaborating with us and we have that as a partnership program” 09:00 – It is part-human and part-code 09:36 – Semantic search technology 10:06 – They write every code in house 10:50 – They have one of the largest SEM platforms and account in Google 11:44 – PDF Filler makes money on the first payment of their customers 12:20 – There are 160 team members divided across Boston 12:52 – PDF Filler is completely bootstrapped 13:14 – First year revenue was about $20,000 13:36 – 2015 total revenue is double digit millions 13:55 – Future plans with the business: 14:17 – Doing a lot of partnerships with private and government companies 14:43 – PDF Filler is a zero salespeople company 15:45 – Do you have an appetite for acquisition? Have you done it before? 15:50 – Absolutely, but we haven’t done it before and are in the process of doing that now 16:05 – “Looking for companies that are complimentary to us and we can add value” 16:40 – “We would buy a competitor of a part of the business, not the whole business” 17:28 – They are currently looking into mail merge space, CRM space, and signature space 17:56 – Connect with Boris through his LinkedIn and website 20:28 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you can, strive to have a partnership with BOTH private and government agencies. A GREAT marketing technology will create TONS of organic website visits. DOING is extremely more important than knowing. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. PDFfiller.com – Boris’ business website LinkedIn – Boris’ LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/30/2016 • 23 minutes, 34 seconds
EP 493: DocHub $90k MRR, 15M Users To Make Document Signing Easy with CEO Chris Devor
Chris Devor, founder of DocHub and other extensions. DocHub allows you to view, edit, and sign PDFs online for free to streamline the exchange of documents. Listen as Chris shares how DocHub is different from their competitors and why he won’t easily jump into offers for a share of his company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — New Relic Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I would have taken Computer Science and it would probably make my life easier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:16 – Chris started DocHub 3 years ago 02:57 – DocHub integrates with different providers 03:17 – DocHub can be opened directly from Gmail 03:30 – The signature looks real 03:48 – Number of users is 15.4 million and 52.2 documents 04:18 – What does 15 million users mean? 04:29 – For every one document opened up equates to one user 05:08 – The monthly recurring expense led Chris to having a paywall 06:57 – Chris runs several of the operations 07:16 – Number of paying users in October is around 5,000 08:00 – MRR in October is about $95,000 09:30 – Chris owns 100% of DocHub 09:43 – Team size 11:00 – In the last 30 days, DocHub had 1600 new subscriptions and 650 new cancellations 11:21 – DocHub has 30-day free trial 11:40 – DocHub’s revenue churn is 75% 12:23 – When can an investor invest or buy DocHub? 12:40 – It is still too early and Chris hasn’t tried new features 13:38 – Chris is finding a good valuation for their company 15:40 – Nathan shows Chris a $200,000 check asking how much equity Chris is willing to give 16:25 – “It’s too complex” 17:10 – Would you consider an offer for $5 million? 17:13 – “I will think about it” 18:50 – Connect with Chris through his website 20:19 – The Famous Five Key Points: A free trial is an EXCELLENT way to attract new customers—including a paywall helps, too. Always continue to BUILD and EXPAND your company. Choose a type of degree or diploma that will give you MORE opportunities in the future. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. DocHub.com – Chris’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/29/2016 • 23 minutes, 16 seconds
EP 492: $2M Raised, $12k MRR with DocuFirst CEO Randall Nachman
Randall Nachman of DocuFirst, who has over 15 years of experience in mortgage lending and software development with a strong focus on business processes, work-flow, operation, sales and marketing. He founded a mortgage brokerage company in 2003 which grew from 2 loan officers to 135 loan officers and ranked 2nd in the region for total loan closings and volume. He then founded ATLOS, a document management in 2008 which is used by lenders and borrowers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Trump: The Art of the Deal What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Pay attention in class” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces to the show 02:31 – DocuFirst focuses on 3 core functions within software 03:12 – DocuFirst also focuses on document storage and management 03:39 – The files are stored securely that they can access anytime 03:44 – ATLOS and DocuFirst was launched in 2015 04:13 – First year for DocuFirst was close to $100,000 04:21 – DocuFirst’s is a SaaS model and is subscription-based 04:58 – Average monthly RPU is $150 05:35 – ATLOS is for mortgage space but DocuFirst handles any type of forms 06:40 – DocuFirst is currently serving 80 unique companies 06:54 – Each company has an average of 6-7 users 07:06 – ATLOS has 4 companies they’re serving 07:18 – ATLOS markets directly to the mortgage lending space 07:38 – DocuFirst’s monthly revenue is $12,000 08:07 – Randall started in the document space because he wanted to automate his own business 08:43 – Why create a new brand if they are both running on the same software? 08:45 – ATLOS stands for Automated Tracking Loan Origination Software which is dedicated in the real estate space 09:18 – Team size for DocuFirst is 16 10:11 – DocuFirst’s churn rate is low 10:33 – Average CAC is less than $100 11:00 – Randall has raised capital for both brands 11:31 – Randall raised capital because he wants to speed up the way they develop 12:08 – Randall and his team are based in Louisiana 12:51 – Randall considered spinning out DocuFirst as a separate entity 13:46 – DocuFirst’s valuation 15:03 – Randall will not sell the business or get an offer 15:28 – Randall has been focus on developing DocuFirst 16:03 – DocuFirst is adding at least 10 customers a month 16:19 – Connect with Randall through DocuFirst and ATLOS 19:02 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can create a business with SIMILAR software, but DIFFERENT target market. Always work to develop and improve your business MORE. Education can lead you somewhere, so pay attention in class! Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. DocuFirst.com – Randall’s second business website ATLOS.com – Randall’s first business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/28/2016 • 21 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 491: $13M in Funding, Grow.com Hits $300k MRR, Helping 600 Customers w/ Better Dashboards with Rob Nelson CEO
Rob Nelson, founder and CEO of Grow – a business intelligence platform. Nathan came across Rob when he was doing research in the intelligence space and Grow provided a lot of good feedback. Rob is a listener of The Top and happily accepted Nathan’s invitation to be a guest on The Top. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The ONE Thing What CEO do you follow? – Aaron Skonnard Favorite online tool? — Calendly Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t ever quit” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Rob to the show 02:00 – Grow is a powerful business intelligence platform and made specifically for SMBs 02:13 – Rob founded Grow in 2014 02:25 – Rob had a software company which was bootstrapped 02:34 – Rob struggled pulling up data from different platforms 03:29 – Rob sold the company and had a great exit 04:10 – Grow is a SaaS model and has subscription based pricing 04:20 – Grow doesn’t charge based on the number of users 05:10 – Grow charges based on the number of metrics used 05:20 – Grow’s RPU is $600 a month 05:30 – Users pay monthly but there’s a 12-month commitment 06:06 – “If we can’t get them hooked with the product in the first 3 days, they can walk away” 06:18 – 75% of the people continue after the 30-day trial period 07:05 – Rob doesn’t know their exact churn 07:29 – Grow’s usage stats 07:44 – Half of their customers log-in everyday 07:50 – 92% of the customers are logging in at least twice a month 08:00 – Grow is currently serving 600 customers 08:08 – Rob started with the concept in January 2014 08:30 – Rob hired a technical co-founder and gave him 20% of the business 09:00 – Rob and his team are based in Utah 09:45 – Team size is 70 09:58 – Grow raised a series A round and seed round 10:12 – Total amount raised was $13 million 10:14 – Total of $9 million was raised in series A 10:25 – Both are priced equity round 10:44 – Rob is a huge fan of bootstrapping during his first venture 11:28 – Rob decided to raise for Grow because bootstrapping just wouldn’t work 11:50 – Total 2014 revenue is about $80 12:20 – 2015 revenue is $150,000 13:00 – Goal for 2016 revenue 13:33 – Rob closed the series A in July 14:03 – Fully-weighted CAC is about $3,500 15:00 – Why do you think Dasher didn’t work out? 15:20 – “It’s hard to build a company on $20 or $30 a month” 16:35 – Connect with Rob through his website 18:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: USE your experience to IMPROVE your business. Explore other options—if bootstrapped worked first, that doesn’t mean it will work again. Don’t EVER quit. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Grow.com – Rob’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/27/2016 • 21 minutes, 18 seconds
EP 490: GoldenKey $3.4M Raised, 1000 Units Sold By Agents Using New Technology with CEO Tommy Sowers
Tommy Sowers, who worked for McKinsey & Company and was the youngest senate confirmed assistant secretary in the Obama administration. On top of this, he is the founder of GoldenKey. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Getting Things Done What CEO do you follow? – Yvon Chouinard Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I try to If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “There is no risk and don’t wait for it to be easy” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Tommy to the show 02:01 – GoldenKey is a no-commission real estate network 02:30 – Tommy didn’t want to commission a real estate agent 2 years ago 02:50 – “People hack real estate agents in a lot of different ways” 03:49 – GoldenKey’s revenue model is a marketplace 03:55 – Consumers pay on the services that they need 04:22 – “When you buy or sell your home, the commission rebate will go to you” 04:44 – In GoldenKey’s platform, the supply are agents 04:50 – Agents offer unbundled services 04:56 – From zero, GoldenKey managed to have 1798 agents in 47 states, much higher than Red Fin 05:25 – The consumers are the home buyers or sellers 05:30 – GoldenKey currently has 1/3 buyers and 2/3 sellers 05:39 – Average of 1900 buyers and sellers 05:44 – GoldenKey has currently executed over 900 service transactions 06:11 – GoldenKey has saved consumers over $100,000 of commission 06:25 – GoldenKey doesn’t share the number of monthly transactions publicly 07:30 – They get different fees for different types of services 07:45 – “This is not a do-it-yourself real estate and you actually have an agent with you” 08:25 – If I buy a property for $500,000, how much would go to GoldenKey? 08:30 – For search services, it is $50 which goes to the agent 08:50 – On average the consumers pay $2000 to have agents represent them through the transactions 09:07 – “The entire agent commission will be rebated back to you, which is usually 3% of the total transaction” 09:30 – Agents choose GoldenKey because they get something rather than nothing at all 09:40 – Agents can still do the traditional real estate commissioning 09:58 – “There are a lot of consumers in the USA who don’t want to pay commission but need an agent’s help” 10:31 – There are millions of real estate agents but they won’t always have a client 11:51 – GoldenKey was founded in April 2015 11:58 – 18 full-time employees 12:00 – GoldenKey raised $3.4 million in venture capital 13:13 – GoldenKey is not a brokerage and CAC is zero 13:59 – GoldenKey is not a big technology company so they need money for the appropriate platform 14:33 – The product design team is based in San Francisco 14:54 – Others are distributed to other states 15:13 – “Rule of thumb is when you don’t need to ask for money when you need money” 15:35 – GoldenKey spends around $100,000 a month 16:14 – GoldenKey joined NFX guild which is for companies building network and network effects 17:01 – Connect with Tommy on Twitter and his website 19:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Rule of thumb is you don’t need to ask for money when you need money. A LOT of consumers in the USA want an agent’s help, but DO NOT want to pay commision. There is NO risk. Don’t wait for it to be easy—just jump right in! Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @Sowers – Tommy’s Twitter handle GoldenKey.com – Tommy’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/26/2016 • 22 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 489: $200k Shark Tank Deal, Cuban/Sacca, 30,000 People Booked $12M Worth of Sports Weekend Housing from RentLikeAChampion CEO Mike Doyle
Mike Doyle, CEO of Rent Like A Champion, a vacation rental platform for sporting events. He has hosted 50 thousand travelers and made over $12 million in sales. Mike is a Shark Tank survivor who received an investment from Mark Cuban and Chris Sacca and both Mark and Chris are still very involved in the business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not now If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Start earlier and take advantages of those resources” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Mike to the show 02:00 – Mike took a total of $200,000 from Mike and Chris for 10% of the company’s equity 02:10 – Shark Tank was their first round of funding 02:27 – Mike wanted to get the deal and the exposure 02:38 – Rent Like A Champion’s valuation during Shark Tank 02:52 – Rent Like A Champion is currently in the market for raising 02:59 – Rent Like A Champion’s episode was filmed in June 2013 03:18 – In Rent Like A Champion’s platform, the sellers are the homeowners who own properties around stadiums 03:29 – Buyers are the sports fans who are travelling to watch the games 03:33 – Rent Like A Champion is focused on non-urban destinations 03:33 – The focus is smaller towns where there are not enough hotels for fans to stay 03:46 – Rent Like A Champion was founded in 2012 04:07 – Since 2012, Rent Like A Champion has hosted under 60,000 fans 04:18 – Total booked destinations: 7500 different places to rent 04:24 – An average of 8 fans per rental 04:28 – Rent Like A Champion’s market is families and groups 04:46 – Rent Like A Champion has over 3000 homes 04:51 – Rent Like A Champion has properties in over 100 towns in the USA 04:56 – About 25 towns are considered their core market 05:16 – 2012 total bookings equated to $630,000 and Rent Like A Champion kept 22% 05:29 – Rent Like A Champion is about to reach $4.5 million this year 05:58 – In 2015, Rent Like A Champion made under $3.3 million and kept $720,000 06:15 – Rent Like A Champion is getting a fee both from the seller and buyer 06:25 – 15% from the seller and 9% from the buyer 06:47 – Rent Like A Champion is seasonal 06:54 – Most of the bookings come from college football 07:05 – Rent Like A Champion is now partnering with 6 PGA tournament events 07:15 – Rent Like A Champion is also partnering with NASCAR races 07:55 – Most bookings come 68 weeks in advance 08:23 – In September, total of 750 groups booked 08:39 – Gross sales for September is about $1.35 million 09:05 – Average order value: 09:08 – $1600-2000 for a 2-night rental 09:36 – Team size is 5 full-timers and 5 part-timers 09:57 – Total transaction volume since 2012 is a little over $12 million 10:13 – How do you beat Airbnb? 10:17 – Rent Like A Champion considers non-hotel destinations 10:52 – “On the demand side, we’re able to be so targeted with our advertising towards sports fans” 11:13 – If Sacca didn’t miss out on the Airbnb deal, do you think you are going to be as aggressive as you are on Shark Tank? 11:28 – The night before Mike is going to film the episode, they still didn’t think that Sacca was going to be one of the sharks 12:00 – Did we accurately see everything that went down on Shark Tank? 12:05 – “It’s super condensed on what you see on TV” 13:03 – Schedule suddenly changes 13:14 – Average reorder rate is 50% 13:53 – Buyers book once a year 15:10 – How do you expand market shares after the sporting events? 15:14 – There’s a ton of green space around college football 15:20 – Graduation is already big for Rent Like A Champion but they’re still pushing it more 15:30 - Rent Like A Champion is starting to working with wedding planners for reunion weekends 16:08 – Rent Like A Champion is doing instant booking where list houses can put the availability of their houses depending on a scheduled game 16:53 – The pricing depends on the homeowners 17:08 – Rent Like A Champion can give homeowners guidelines in pricing 17:20 – Depending on the game, the amount of buyers vary 18:00 – What is it like working with Chris Sacca? 18:30 – “Chris and Mark have been incredibly involved and been receiving weekly updates” 18:45 – Chris and Mark are very responsive and prompt in replies 19:00 – Mike threw a big marketing event and Chris and Mark came to talk about an update segment in Shark Tank 19:39 – Connect with Mike through his business’ website, Twitter and Facebook 21:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your business will being to DEFINE itself as you keep moving forward. EXPAND your niche. Don’t stay seasonal—continue to think bigger. Start as EARLY as you can and take advantage of those resources. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @RentLikeAChamp – Mike’s business Twitter handle RentLikeAChampion.com – Mike’s business website Facebook – Mike’s business Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/25/2016 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 488: Hireology $26M Raised, $1.2M MRR, Helping 4000 Customers Hire More Effectively with Hireology CEO Adam Robinson
Adam Robinson, CEO and co-founder of Hireology where’s he’s on a mission to help business owners make better hiring decisions using data and processes. He’s known in the recruiting industry, an expert speaker, and author with over 20 years of experience in the field of hiring and selection management. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? – Phil Knight Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take more risks” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Adam to the show 02:03 – Hireology is a talent technology platform built specifically for owner/operators 02:14 – Hireology helps the owner with the technology they need in their hiring and employment process 02:30 – Hireology has a monthly subscription plan 02:36 – Hireology is a SaaS business model 02:46 – Hireology is different from Toptal and Upwork 03:03 – Hireology was founded mid 2010 and the product was launched in January 2012 03:13 – Adam had a recruitment and outsource business before Hireology 03:28 – Adam learned from this business that their clients had terrible interviewing skills 03:32 – Adam created an interviewing system and clients started asking to buy it 03:44 – Adam sold the business 04:13 – Hireology first customers were from Adam’s personal and professional network 04:40 – Hireology is currently working with under 4000 individually owned businesses in USA 04:50 – Around 100 brands 06:20 – How Adam sees Hireology’s future 07:15 – Adam had a client who was responsible for 40% of their revenue for 3 years 07:35 – Hireology ended up doing 4000 hires for the company 08:00 – Average RPU per month is $300 per location 08:14 – Kickers Hireology is using to increase RPU 08:18 – Based on employee count per location 08:39 – Hireology doesn’t increase the price of modules but increases its numbers 08:50 – Most of Hireology’s system is proprietary technology 09:15 – Hireology has 7 close partners that they white-label and sell through their platform 09:30 – Average MRR is $1.2 million 09:47 – Gross monthly customer churn 10:35 – Hireology is an all-inside sales operation for up-selling 11:05 – Team size is about 100 11:11 – Based in Chicago 11:27 – CAC 11:40 – Between $7-10 depending on the client’s industry 12:22 – Lifetime value 12:45 – Adam wants a business whose name is on a sign and whose personal balance sheets are invested in the business 13:15 – “There are 7 million employers in the USA that nobody is talking to and that’s the market we want to be in” 13:27 – Find Adam in Twitter, LinkedIn and his website. Shoot him an email at arobinson@hireology.com 16:00 – Hireology was bootstrapped for the first 2 years and did an institutional raise in 2014 16:12 – Raised $26 million in 2 round from 2014-16 16:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find your target market and tap into that market. Don’t rely on a client to stay with you forever—the sooner you accept that it’s part of the business, the better. You need to TAKE more risks! Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @Adrobins – Adam’s Twitter handle Hireology.com – Adam’s business website LinkedIn – Adam’s LinkedIn account ARobinson@Hireology.com – Adam’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/24/2016 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
EP 487: $8M in Agency Revenue, 12% Target Net Margin with BeFoundOnline.com CEO Dan Golden
Dan Golden, a veteran digital marketing executive and speaker who still spends time diving into analytics and making strategic recommendations for his clients. He has spent a lot of time on the client side with large agencies. Dan co-founded the digital agency “Be Found Online (BFO)” and has led the BFO team from his roots as a paid search agency to a full service performance digital marketing agency. Listen as Dan talks about how he turned his side project, BFO, to a now, successful agency, making a 6-figure revenue. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Great Game of Business What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Nudge Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Enjoy the journey” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Dan to the show 02:30 – Be Found Online is a digital marketing agency 02:36 – BFO’s focus is to drive traffic and help their clients make money through that traffic 02:45 – BFO’s processes have evolved over time 03:15 – BFO was a side project for Dan and was called Be Found Local 03:26 – Dan and his co-founder merged their businesses and started in January 2009 03:40 – First year revenue for BFO was $200,000 03:51 – 2015 revenue: $7 million 04:15 – Dan shifted their goal from profitability to finding the right clients that fit BFO 04:50 – Dan aims for 12% net revenue 05:35 – Team size: 05:37 – 50 full-timers in the USA 05:43 – Total of 70 employees 06:02 – The BFO army has grown considerably 06:40 – BFO spends $50,000 a month on their software 07:10 – “A lot of technology we do is client-specific” 07:45 – “Many of the largest SaaS companies came from an agency model because an agency sees all the client-specific tools being used in the agency” – Nathan 08:43 – “I don’t want to build something that is slightly a better version of something out there” – Dan 09:50 – BFO has 60-80 active clients 10:00 – BFO has served over 100 clients since they started 10:14 – BFO has a big project yearly called “Perfect Client” 10:20 – BFO is doing research and client analysis for every client they’ve worked on to figure out where they can do their best work, which client is the best to work with, and where to add value 10:29 – BFO has turned down a lot of clients 10:45 – “I don’t want to double our client base, I want to find the right types of clients.” 11:02 – BFO wants to focus on enterprise clients 11:10 – Average that the customer is paying BFO 11:15 - $10,000 – $15,000 a month in fees 11:50 – How do you calculate lifetime value? 12:13 – Clients stay with BFO for a minimum of 12 months 12:48 – BFO is making a minimum of $600,000 a month 13:11 – Get in touch with Dan through Twitter, LinkedIn and BFO blog 15:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: GREAT things can turn out unexpectedly. Business goals can change from time to time—be OPEN and FLEXIBLE for these changes. Make sure to ENJOY the journey. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @TheGoldenDan – Dan’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Dan’s LinkedIn account BFO blog – Dan’s business blog Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/23/2016 • 19 minutes, 31 seconds
Ep 486: Agency Hits $2M In Revenue, 49 Employees, $36k ACV with RapidBoostMarketing CEO Ali Salman
Ali Salman who heads Rapid Boost Marketing where they exclusively work with professional service providers. Rapid Boost has grown to over $2 million in annual sales over the last 2 years with a goal of $25 million by 2020. They have generated over 120,000 ideal client inquiries for service firms and practices in the last 12 months. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Nonsense: The Power of Not Knowing What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk and Nathan Latka Favorite online tool? — Ninja Outreach Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Sometimes more than that If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Get out of school faster” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces the show 02:09 – Rapid Boost Marketing is an agency 02:17 – Average contract size is anywhere between from $1500 to $6000 and majority of the contracts are from $2000 - $3000 02:28 – Rapid Boost Marketing has a big lead generation 02:53 – The revenue for 2015 is $800,000 and end of 2016 is more than $2 million 03:10 – Average monthly retainer is $2000 - $3000 and the average contract is from 18-24 months 03:30 – Average RPU 03:53 – Currently, Rapid Boost Marketing is working with 72 customers 04:45 – Rapid Boost Marketing can help a lawyer increase his revenue but it will also depend on the area and how salable the lawyer is 06:09 – Rapid Boost Marketing has 4 packages and it includes the paid media 06:15 – 30% of the packages goes to paid media 06:36 – They are focused on content and search engine optimization 06:50 – Team size 07:13 – Monthly headcount expenses equate to about 50% of their revenue 07:36 – Revenue in September 2016 is $857,000 08:22 – January, February, and March are their down months 08:29 – Average revenue for 3 months is $80,000 - $90,000 09:05 – Rapid Boost Marketing’s clients are described 10:17 – How Ali priced his own salary 10:50 – Connect with Ali through his Twitter and LinkedIn 13:16 – Ali founded the company in 2012 13:33 – First year revenue in 2013 is a little over $130,000 13:46 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start AS EARLY as possible in business. Know your niche client and market WELL so you can grow quickly. Your people--both your employees and your clients--contribute to your company’s success, without them, there is no success. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @CanadianLMPro – Ali’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Ali’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/22/2016 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
EP 485: $2.5M Foot Doctor Revenues, Launches InfoProduct, Does $750K with Dr Dan Margolin
Dr. Dan Margolin, a practicing Podiatrist with over 27 years of experience and a practice that ranks from the top 3% in the country. Dan’s second and current practice is widely successful compared to his first. Listen as Dan talks about podiatry and his new business which he co-founded, Effective Management. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 10x Rule What CEO do you follow? – Tony Hsieh Favorite online tool? — Testing Academy Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew to look for mentors a little bit more” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Dan to the show 02:15 – A podiatrist deals with health issues concerning the feet including sprains 02:32 – Dan generates revenue from his patients and sometimes, from insurance companies 02:39 – Dan’s ultimate goal is for the patients to be well 02:51 – In the long-term, Effective Management will be the bigger stream of revenue 03:10 – A podiatrist earns $ 300,000 to $ 500,000 a year 03:26 – The Podiatry Survival Blueprint – a video of Dan’s job description 03:47 – Dan generated $2.4 million in podiatry in 2015 03:55 – Effective Management earned $300,000 in its first year 04:14 – Dan loves helping people so he launched the Effective Management program 04:50 – Expenses hindered Dan to just give away the program 05:25 – Team size 05:43 – Go to BasicStaffTraining.com to find Dan’s info product 06:41 – He provides 4 different products 07:27 – There is an initial fee and monthly recurring fee 08:04 – 2016 revenue is a bit over $400,000 08:12 – There are 300 different companies in their system 08:30 – The Podiatry Survival Blueprint is sold at $6500 09:15 – Dan uses Schoox to run the membership page 09:44 – Current MRR 09:58 – Dan contacted his own patients as prospective clients 10:35 – Connect with Dan through his website and get a free copy of his book Fast Tracking Your Prosperity 12:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are TONS of ways to help people, be it in your field or not. Find people who will help you run the business, ESPECIALLY in the areas where you struggle. Have a mentor and be involved. Be a sponge and absorb everything. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. DrDanSpeaks.com – Dan’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/21/2016 • 14 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 484: $7M Raised with StartEngine CEO and CrowdFunding SnapWire CEO
Ron Miller, CEO of StartEngine,who was in Episode 40 of The Top and Chad Newell, CEO and founder of Snapwire. Listen as Ron and Chad explain how the new rule of SEC in equity crowdfunding helped their companies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Ron: The E-Myth What CEO do you follow? – Chad: Sean Malarkey Favorite online tool? — Ron: Internal Email / Chad: Google Sheet Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Ron: No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s all about confidence.” – Ron Miller Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Ron and Chad to the show 02:30 – StartEngine is the nation’s leading platform that allows entrepreneurs to directly connect with potential investors to raise capital 02:45 – The new law opened up the possibility for everyone to become an investor 03:11 – It allows companies to advertise broadly 03:24 – StartEngine was launched in June 2015 03:30 – Total amount invested is $20 million 03:42 – 60,000 unique users have joined their community 04:00 – StartEngine charged 5% of the total capital from the proceeds raised 04:20 – Entrepreneur can raise up to $50 million a year in the online public offering and StartEngine charges $50 per investor 05:10 – “We are currently focusing on the US market and there’s no SaaS in there” 05:30 – What made Chad decide to use StartEngine 06:40 – Why StartEngine is ground-breaking 07:00 – The congress’ limitation on investing in a company 07:31 – “Real wealth is made by being an early investor” 07:54 – The new law is a radical shift 08:51 – Nathan believes that the best investors are customers 09:10 – Snapwire has 300,000 photographers in the platform 09:22 – Buyer ratio is much smaller than the photographers 09:45 – Snapwire has pay-as-you-go and a SaaS model 10:08 – Snapwire’s revenue is 50% from pay-as-you-go and 50% from SaaS 10:20 – 9,000 images have been bought in Snapwire since their launch 10:30 – Snapwire was founded in 2014 10:34 – Snapwire has raised $2.8 million 11:15 – Snapwire raising in StartEngine opened up a lot of opportunities 11:45 – Can you use StartEngine after a price round? 11:52 – The main advantage is that companies can set their terms 12:03 – Some companies have to essentially create a second priced or non-priced round 12:58 – The good thing about equity crowdfunding is you have to disclose everything 13:08 – Disclosure statement is clear 13:41 – Lawsuits and CAP table 14:10 – There’s a disclosure and subscription agreement that investors sign 14:30 – “I think there’s an immersion of risk” 16:14 – There are limits to investments and to returns 16:28 – During crowdfunding, there’s also a limit on the amount of investment that a company will accept 17:00 – “As far as information rights, you can be very clear in the disclosure” 18:00 – It is not allowed to give out public information even if it is unintentional 18:15 – Upon investing, you will get a shareholder report that is in compliance with security exchange commission requirements 18:40 – “Competition can’t reverse engineer your strategy in execution” 19:06 – StartEngine has 12,000 – 14,000 investors 19:20 – Total of 15-18 companies have raised in StartEngine 19:30 – 14 team size in StartEngine 19:36 – StartEngine raised capital through seed round and Series A 19:47 – Total of $7.7 million raised 19:54 - Ron didn’t use their platform to raise 20:25 – Average value of an investment is $1400 20:40 – StartEngine’s biggest competitors are Seed Invest, Next Seed, WeFunder and Flash Funder 21:11 – What should people look for in the marketplace? 21:23 – If certain companies are establishing themselves in a specific niche area 21:43 – Success rate of the companies 21:57 – Support the companies can provide to entrepreneurs 22:13 – Connect with Ron through his email 22:34 – Contact Chad at Chad@Snapwi.re 24:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Real wealth is made by being an early investor. The good thing about equity crowdfunding is the disclosure. Be confident in yourself. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Ron@StartEngine.com – Ron’s email address Chad@Snapwi.re – Chad’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/20/2016 • 29 minutes, 42 seconds
Ep 483: Pipedrive Passes $10M ARR, Helping 30,000 Customers w/ CRM with CEO Timo Rein
Timo Rein, CEO and co-founder of Pipedrive, a provider of sales CRM software that gives sales teams control over their selling processes. After spending $15,000 on a CRM for his own business that ended up being a total waste of money, Timo brought together a few engineering friends to create a better CRM solution for his own needs. This was the genesis of Pipe Tribe, which now has over 30,000 small business users worldwide and has reached $13.4 million in VC funding. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Turning Pro What CEO do you follow? – Stephen Curry and Gregg Popovich Favorite online tool? — Slack and Viber Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “No, still trying.” If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Take action. It is important to work hard first. Discover who I am and know where my energy flows.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:47 – Nathan introduces Timo to the show 02:31 – It was in 2002 when Timo spent $15,000 on a business 02:41 – It turned out that the business wouldn’t have much return 02:56 – Pipe Tribe helps small businesses around the world control their complex processes 03:23 – Pipe Tribe was founded in June 2010 and the product came out March 2011 03:30 – Current team size 03:48 – They have an office in Estonia and Manhattan 04:28 – Timo is based in California 04:50 – In 2010, revenue is zero 05:30 – 2015: total revenue 06:16 – Current ARR 06:30 – They are doing about a million dollars per month 06:48 – They have 30,000 paying customers 07:00 – Pipe Tribe’s pricing 07:07 – They have 3 plans at the moment 07:25 – Average customers’ pay per month 08:21 – They are doing cohort tracking 08:30 – Monthly customer churn 08:37 – Churn tends to be quite high 09:32 – The churn depends on the tool and business size 10:45 – CAC will depend on the company’s growth 12:00 – 25% of new sign-ups are paying annually 12:28 – How do you drive the company? 12:45 – Timo and his co-founders built the company from the ground up 13:22 – They have an internal goal 13:33 – They raised $9 million from Series A 13:53 – Some of the money they raised was from seed investors 14:13 – Timo won’t sell his business for $90 million or even $150 million 14:49 – Timo sees the company as a work undone 15:11 – “When you build a startup, it seems like you’re building an airplane while you are on air” 16:22 – They have a revenue goal and customer goal 16:45 – Connect with Timo through his LinkedIn 18:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The world around us changes—the economy goes up and down. When you build a startup, it seems like you’re building an airplane while you are on air. Take action. It is important to work hard first. Discover who you are and know where your energy flows. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. LinkedIn – Timo’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/19/2016 • 22 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 482: Snip.ly $50k MRR, 1000 Customers For Lead Gen on Social Media Sharing with CEO Michael Cheng
11/18/2016 • 0
EP 482: Snip.ly $50k MRR, 1000 Customers For Lead Gen on Social Media Sharing with CEO Michael Cheng
Michael Cheng, co-founder of Sniply, an innovative new marketing tool that helps companies caption the value of content sharing in social media. Sniply links has generated over 150 million clicks and is used by notable brands such as IBM, Salesforce and Greenpeace. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs Biography What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Google Translate Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t rush it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:39 – Nathan introduces Michael to the show 02:09 – Sniply is a content marketing platform 02:11 – It allows people to generate ROI from the links they share 02:30 – It is a SaaS subscription model 02:32 – Premium has a customized ability on call to action and other features 02:49 – Sniply was launched in 2014 02:59 – Sniply generates money from the subscription 03:20 – Price range is $39 per month to $3000 per month 03:29 – Monthly RPU is $70-80 03:45 – Most of the users are the social media team of a company 03:51 – Dropbox, Outbrain and Autodesk use Sniply 04:42 – The “Name your Price” option on Sniply’s website 05:03 – The “Name your Price” option allows Sniply to gauge the customers’ needs and price range 05:20 – It also allows Sniply to make an exception for non-profit groups that can’t afford the price 05:33 – It gives them a better idea of how to fill in the gaps when they release a new feature 05:48 – “People are very reasonable when naming their own price” 06:25 – Sniply can still reject customized requests 06:50 – It’s difficult to measure the downside 07:06 – There’s a dedicated page for Enterprise 08:33 – Sniply is currently hitting 12,000 to 30,000 registered users 08:44 – Revenue is $600,000 and about $50,000 a month 09:00 – One thousand paying customers 09:12 – Sniply is bootstrapped 09:50 – Team size 10:48 – A small team helps Michael to prioritize and be more flexible 11:10 – Some startups invest in wrong features and wrong people 11:30 – They are based in Vancouver, Canada 11:37 – Gross customer churn per month is 5% 11:45 – Customer acquisition cost on average 11:53 – Michael doesn’t do ads 12:00 – Cultivate relationships with bloggers 12:26 – Most of the bloggers are also marketers 12:40 – Total customer growth per month is 5% 13:46 – Connect with Michael on Twitter or email 16:08 – Total 2015 revenue is $400,000 and aiming for $600,000 this year 16:23 – Michael is now investing on a new platform that automatically converts blog posts to videos 17:07 – Not currently looking at acquisition 17:20 – Michael owns 33% of the business; there are two other founders 17:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A small team size has a lot of advantages. Business takes time—don’t rush it. Having a “Name your Price” option gives a company a better idea of the needs and desires of customers together with their preferred price. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @Michaelhsc – Michael’s Twitter handle Mike@Snip.ly – Michael’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/18/2016 • 20 minutes, 3 seconds
EP 481: 4400 Flashlights Sold, $79 Price, $23 COGS, 55% Net Margin with TrueGunner CEO Tanner Larsson
Nathan interviews Tanner Larsson, co-founder of 80/20 Media, CEO of e-commerce brand incubator BuildGrowsSale.com. He’s also the founder and facilitator of an exclusive e-commerce syndicate called Black Label – composed of the best and brightest marketers, CEOs, and entrepreneurs in the e-commerce space. He recently published his first book called Ecommerce Evolved which offers readers a box view of how successful e-commerce brands build, grow, and scale. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rocket Fuel What CEO do you follow? – Ed O’Keefe Favorite online tool? —FastStone Capture Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not even close If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “You don’t have to fund everything out of your own pocket, there are other options available” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan introduces Tanner to the show 02:15 – Tanner’s ecommerce world started in 2001 02:20 – Started in eBay and Tanner became a powerseller 02:31 – Tanner was doing $ 50,000 - $ 100,000 a month in eBay 03:00 – “There’s no reason not to sell a physical product” 03:25 – Tanner and his team have a number of e-commerce brands 03:36 – 2 main brands have done $6.5 million in a year 03:48 – They had a problem in production 04:06 – “We’ve had different bottlenecks that prevented us from growing at the rate we could have grown” 04:30 – The flashlight market 04:38 – Tanner doesn’t want to sell what everybody is selling 04:47 – The gap they saw is between the lower price entry level flashlight and high-end flashlight 05:03 – Tanner and his team develop their own flashlight and a kit 05:17 – Truegunner.com 05:25 – The flashlight is in a sales funnel 05:34 – The funnel path 06:02 – The bestseller flashlight is the M600 tactical utility flashlight 06:07 - $22 manufactured price from China 06:32 – They had a much higher per unit cost and much lower profit margin on the first order 06:43 - First order was at a minimum which is a thousand 07:03 – Total is $30,000 tied up which equals to $3 per unit price 07:52 – It took 7 months before the first order started production 07:58 – The back and forth from the manufacturing county took time 08:05 – Shipping takes a week which includes the revises that needed on the product 08:30 – “If you’re building your product from the ground, there’s a whole back and forth with the manufacturer” 09:00 – Started selling on November 2015 09:05 – Sold about 4400 units for 12 months 09:21 – Total money in from this product is around $ 150,000 - $ 160, 000 09:50 – 99% of the funds came from Tanner 10:12 – The downside is some raw materials are specialized 10:27 – They have to buy raw materials in advance to prevent going out of stock 11:28 – Most of their sales are funnel driven 11:43 – They were using ultracart but shifted back to infusionsoft 12:09 – They are also using Hotjar records visitor interaction. Like heat mapping 12:43 – They spend $13 per user acquisition on the front end 13:03 – They breakeven in the funnel 13:30 – They also have subscription plans 14:01 – They have 7000 paying user 14:36 – They also have drop-off rates 16:00 – Connect with Tanner through his website 18:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for alternative funding. Don’t shoulder everything. If you don’t know something, that doesn’t mean you can’t explore. Sourcing from manufacturers abroad takes patience and a lot of research. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. BuildGrowScale.com – Tanner’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/17/2016 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 480: YC Backed Polymail Raises $1M, hits 20k Users with CEO Brandon Foo
Brandon Foo, co-founder and CEO of Polymail (YC S16) – an email platform making businesses and companies more productive. Previously, he co-founded CTRL LA Collective, a co-working space in LA. He graduated from UCLA where he co-founded Bruin Entrepreneurs which is now the biggest entrepreneurship organization at UCLA. Listens as Brandon shares how he built Polymail and why entrepreneurs prefer it over Gmail. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Aaron Levie Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Spend more time with side projects and less on school work” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Brandon to the show 02:08 – Polymail is a super-powerful email platform designed for business users 02:18 – With just 1 app, you can do a lot with your email 02:37 – It is a complete stand-alone email client 03:15 – How are you convincing people to make the switch? 03:20 – Polymail supports multiple accounts 03:52 – People are looking for a complete product experience and Polymail has that 04:31 – A lot of features of Polymail are not in the regular Gmail 04:54 – Polymail started in 2015 05:02 – Launched a Mac prototype in December 2015 05:12 – There’s a tremendous traction 05:38 – Brandon built a small community of people who were invited to try the app 05:48 – They have a Slack group so Brandon can get feedback on a daily basis 06:10 – When they officially launched Polymail, these people downloaded the app and left reviews 07:12 – Polymail is a free app at the moment 07:20 – Polymail pro is in the works but you can sign-up for it now 07:41 – Polymail pro has much more advanced features 08:00 – Over 20,000 daily active users of Polymail 08:12 – 150,000 total downloads and people who signed up 08:27 – Every time Polymail will release a new feature, they will email the whole list of people who signed up to get them engaged in using Polymail 08:52 – Brandon had raised around a million dollars 09:12 – Brandon used a convertible equity 09:24 – Team size of 5 09:48 – The goal for Polymail is to build the platform for external communication on top of email 10:08 – “Email is a critical product for business people so we saw the opportunity there” 11:23 – Polymail is not for a short-term outcome 12:00 – They just wrapped up their seed round 12:30 – They wrapped it up in September 2016 12:48 – Target people 12:56 – A lot of the users are solo entrepreneurs 13:45 – There’s no significant changes with Gmail for the past 10 years 14:09 – Maybe because they make money from ad revenue and let Gmail be a generic email platform 14:40 – Find Brandon on Twiter 16:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: An update on a product can make non-active users use the product again. Consistent feedback from a group of customers can significantly improve the product. Spend more time with side projects and less on school work. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @Foolywk – Brandon’s Twitter handles Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/16/2016 • 19 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 479: $45M Raised, 5000+ Project Management Customers with Mavenlink CEO Ray Grainger
Rey Grainger, founder and CEO of Mavenlink, where he’s leading a mission to re-invent the way businesses do work. Ray brings over 25 years of experience in software and technology consulting to Mavenlink. He also invests in several technology companies through Accenture technology ventures including enterprise knowledge manager vendor InQuira. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I don’t If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “That I would actually end up achieving what I have setup to do” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:24 – Nathan introduces Ray to the show 02:28 – Ray likes corporate world more 03:00 – How Accenture invested in AI Technology 03:20 – Ray left Accenture in 2005 when InQuira started to get into the market 03:48 – Ray already had an idea for Mavenlink 04:45 – Mavenlink is SaaS business management solution 05:09 – Mavenlink is a subscription based business model 05:50 – First year revenue is zero 06:08 – Product development was in February 2009 06:25 – Began monetizing at the beginning of 2010 06:40 – Mavenlink was bootstrapped 07:05 – Before starting Mavenlink, Ray sold some of his stocks of Accenture 07:40 – Before they were able to monetize, Ray and his team already spent almost a million dollar 08:03 – Mavenlink has a broad customer base in over a 100 countries 08:13 – From SMB to large public companies 08:55 – Mavenlink has an inside sales team for each deal 09:30 – Mavenlink partnered with Google 09:38 – Google promoted Mavenlink in their marketplace 10:45 – “The amount of money you have in your bank account influences you” 11:16 – Ray had to look for creative ways to acquire customers 11:41 – Mavenlink sponsored 2 technology conferences 12:35 – It is difficult to say how much one is willing to spend to acquire a business 13:30 – “You have to manage it by channel and see what you’re going to get for the payback” 13:48 – Gross monthly customer churn 13:52 – “We offer a solution that directly impacts the profitability of the company” 14:18 – Clients who stay with Mavenlink continues to grow 15:41 – The upsell part of Mavenlink 16:06 – Mavenlink target seat price 16:29 – Mavenlink has taken a substantial amount of venture capital starting in 2011 16:52 – Team size 17:18 – Follow Ray on Twitter and LinkedIn 18:56 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The amount of money you have in your bank account influences you. Corporate life can hone great entrepreneurs. Achieve what you have set up to do and aim for the big one. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @mavenlink – Ray’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Ray’s business LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/16/2016 • 20 minutes, 47 seconds
Ep 478: Fans Pay $500K To Keep Favorite Shows, Will This Kill Netflix with CEO Ben Dobyns
Ben Dobyns, CEO and founder of Zombie Orpheus Entertainment. He’s started giving the company’s films away for free ever when he started the company—a tradition he’s proud to continue today. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Art of Game Design What CEO do you follow? – Jamie Wilkinson Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Take the time to pursue the dream. Shortcuts will disempower you and empower other people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:33 – Nathan introduces Ben to the show 01:57 – Ben had a terrible experience with Hollywood distribution in 2008 02:10 – Ben didn’t get paid for the film they made 02:18 – The company owed Ben $ 30,000 03:23 – “Independent films will lose your money if you invest in them” 03:34 – Ben launched his new company in 2010 and paid their investors back after a year 03:47 – Zombie Orpheus Entertainment was launched in 2010 03:59 – “We’re going to give people free films and share them” 04:10 – Ben had a realization that each film will be a form of advertising 04:33 – At the end of every episode, there’s a message that will lead viewers to give Zombie Orpheus Entertainment money 05:08 – Journey Quest series on Youtube 05:45 – Ben will let the viewers choose if they want to continue watching or not 06:04 – Based purely on fan contribution, Ben and his team are able to continue the show 06:16 – They made $ 30,000 for season 1 and from Kickstarter is $ 112,000 which funded season 2 06:28 – Zombie Orpheus Entertainment is now out of the investment cycle 07:07 – Zombie Orpheus Entertainment built a fan base on Facebook and Youtube 07:36 – Zombie Orpheus Entertainment had 1,117 unique backers for Journey Quest 07:57 – On Kickstarter, average contribution is $ 97 per backer 08:33 – The fan base is big for Zombie Orpheus Entertainment 09:01 – Ben done 3 Kickstarters this year 09:18 – Attack in the Darkness – raised $ 25,000 09:28 – The Gamers – raised $ 174,000 09:49 – Raised $575,000 for the 3 seasons of Journey Quest 10:04 – Ben setup a pre-funding page with public metrics for journey Quest 10:14 – 4,200 people added their names in the email list 10:29 – They launched with 4,600 names in their list on day 1 10:45 – Kickstarter attracted more people 11:06 – RenewJourneyQuest.com is the pre-funding page 12:00 – Ben has one of the best Kickstarter planning sheet 12:20 – The sheet is not currently for public use 12:36 – With Journey quest, the needed budget was $ 325,000 for the production 12:55 – Ben didn’t aim for profit for this Kickstarter 13:10 – Season 3 of Journey Quest will be moved to BackerKit for pledge management 13:55 – Ben isn’t looking for an exit or an IPO 15:00 – What Ben is doing is similar to a SaaS business model 15:50 – Ben has been offered venture capital but he won’t accept it 16:55 – Ben is going to release their world bible and their intellectual property to allow their commercial derivatives 17:45 – Ben uses Kickstarter to have a merchandise fusion with a reward program 17:55 – Ben is really picky with merchandise quality 18:25 – Keep Zombie Orpheus Entertainment’s shows alive by dropping a dollar or $ 5 at Patreon 21:07 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Use bad experiences as education and motivation. Venture capital is not always an option. Take the time to pursue the dream. Shortcuts will disempower you and empower other people. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Patreon – Ben’s pledge page Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/14/2016 • 23 minutes, 51 seconds
EP 477: 3,000 Employees, 30+ Years in Business for Medical Care And Peace of Mind with CEO Debbie Johnston
Debbie Johnston, recognized as Entrepreneur of Richmond and the founder of Care Advantage – a dynamic and compassionate care company that is devoted in giving back to the community. She’s the author of The School of Heart Knocks. Listen as Debbie shares her inspiration in starting Care Advantage and her experience in Secret Millionaire. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — Facebook Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Never If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Start your business earlier, you know more than you think.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:54 – Nathan introduces Debbie to the show 03:10 – Adoption is close to Debbie’s heart 03:28 – Care Advantage is a full service care company 03:54 – Care Advantage has a special care division 04:30 – Care Advantage is all over the country 04:50 – Payment for the services is by the hour 05:12 – Care Advantage reimbursed in the state they’re in 05:44 – Care Advantage doesn’t do a lot of Obamacare 06:40 – Debbie started years ago 06:47 – Debbie was running out-patients in a hospital 07:34 – Debbie first used Care Advantage to his brother-in-law and parents 09:05 – “We can’t put a price on a peace of mind” 09:50 – Care Advantage has different price for each service 10:30 – Each office has 3-5 people 11:40 – Number of people Care Advantage has served is over 10,000 12:30 – The need of an RN will depend on the patient 12:49 – Some people want 24 hours of an RN a day 13:38 – Secret Millionaire picked Debbie 13:56 – Debbie likes the producer so she said yes 14:14 – “It was one of the hardest things I have done in my life” 14:40 – Debbie was proud after it was aired 14:51 – Debbie has worked with charities like Reach International 16:28 – “It’s what we do that makes me happy, giving someone peace of mind makes me happy” 16:55 – Connect with Debbie through her Facebook and website 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Giving someone peace of mind can be a source of happiness. You can’t put a price tag on perfect health care. Starting your business earlier could make more differences in the future. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. DebbieJohnston.com – Debbie’s website Facebook – Debbie’s Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/13/2016 • 22 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 476: NomadicMatt 1.6M Monthly Views, $400k Travel Insurance Sold Monthly with Matt Kepnes
Matt Kepnes of NomadicMatt.com, the man who went from everyday worker to travel writer. Matt grew up in Boston and he didn’t take his first trip until he was 23—a cruise to Montreal. After he started a life as a young professional, he decided to travel the world, so he headed to Costa Rica in 2004, Taiwan in 2005, and never looked back. Listen as Matt talks about the success of his blog and how he grew it from a simple online journal. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Value eating healthy” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Matt to the show 02:53 – Matt was working in administration 03:16 – Number of unique website users on average per month is 1.2 million 03:27 – Matt started the blog in 2008 after 14 months of traveling 03:50 – Matt built the blog as an online resume 04:17 – Matt is getting more visitors in 2010 04:29 – Matt wanted to write guidebooks so he made his blog a guidebook 04:56 – 2/3 of Matt’s income comes from affiliates 05:30 – Matt’s book is The Ultimate Guide to Travel Hacking 05:40 – Matt self-published the book 05:46 – Matt’s book with a publisher is How to Travel the World on $ 50 a Day 05:53 – Matt is only getting royalties from the book 06:18 – Matt met the publisher in 2012 06:40 – How Matt negotiated with the publisher 07:51 – Sold around 50,000 to 60,000 copies 08:30 – Royalty percentage per book 09:50 – Matt shifted the blog from an online journal to a website generating money 10:44 – The affiliate offer page in the website are in the home page 11:35 – Average percentage people spend on travel insurance 12:10 – Matt sells 400-500 plan policies per month 12:45 – Other affiliates of Matt 13:21 – Matt is already with the affiliate for years 14:18 – Matt spent some of his time guest blogging 14:38 – Matt does 2-3 guest blogs per month 15:03 – Matt is always traveling 15:11 – Matt’s email list size 15:54 – Matt has a team in different places 17:00 – Connect with Matt through his website, Twitter and Instagram 19:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Travel not only de-stresses you, it opens your eyes to global opportunities. Having affiliates is a good way to increase revenue. Eat healthy. You are what you eat. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @NomadicMatt – Matt’s Instagram account @NomadicMatt – Matt’s Twitter handle NomadicMatt.com – Matt’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/12/2016 • 24 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 475: VayStays Helps 150,000+ Quickly Plan Vacations, $5M In TTM Transaction Volume with CEO Chris Brusznicki
Chris Bruznicki, CEO of Vaystays, which is a vacation rental marketplace tool used by propriety manager like Wyndam. He has been featured in Entrepreneur and was awarded the bronze star. Listen as Chris tells us how Vaystays is earning and what made him decide to raise capital. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Steve Jobs Favorite online tool? — DocuSign Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Networking is super important and consider raising capital” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:20 – Vaystays is used by professionals managing a vacation companies 02:27 – People who have houses in Tahoe and the like will have the vacation companies manage their properties 03:44 – Vaystays gives them a marketplace for distribution 03:55 – Vaystays provides open cable like service 04:17 – Team size and location 04:26 – Vaystays is making 5 million transactions and Chris is earning 13% of every transaction 04:51 – Vaystays was founded in 2010 06:10 – Average order value is $ 2000 07:10 – Vaystays’ software automates all the check in procedure 08:15 – Vaystays takes percentage both from the traveler and seller 09:15 – Vaystays is transparent in their website about the pricing 09:30 – Pricing varies depending on the season 10:30 – Vaystays is connecting specific needs to specific supplies 10:40 – Total transaction volume 11:55 – Vaystays business model 12:20 – Vaystays is in the process of creating subscription fees 13:50 – The marketplace still has lifetime value 15:09 – Vaystays currently has 2000 propriety management companies 15:15 – Average is 10 units per company 16:10 - 25,000 stayed in their properties in September 16:30 – Now is a slow period for Vaystays 18:03 – 312 bookings in September 18:48 – Vaystays has been self-funded for a long time 19:05 – Did a price round for fundraising 19:33 – $ 650,000 revenue in the last 12 months 19:47 – Valuation 20:56 – Chris has 2 co-founders 22:30 – Chris and his co-founders thought about a high valuation 22:53 – They came up with something between $ 3-6 million 24:24 – Connect with Chris through his LinkedIn and his email 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for quality partners who can support you. Networking is important – it can lead to tons of opportunities. Consider raising capital if you see a reason to do so. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Vaystays.com – Chris’ website Chris@Vaystays.com – Chris’ email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/11/2016 • 31 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 474: SharkTank No Deal, $6M Raised, $4.2M in 2015 Revenue, 10,000 Customers To Help Clean Up Your Online Image with Brandyourself CEO Patrick Ambron
Patrick Ambron, co-founder and CEO of BrandYourself.com, which helps people look better online. He’s an instructor at General Assembly and was included INC’s 30 under 30 list. Listen as Patrick talks about his experience on SharkTank and how it boosted his company’s revenue. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Made to Stick What CEO do you follow? – Reed Hastings Favorite online tool? — X.AI Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish that when I was building my business, I knew how important it was to have people who don’t have your strengths” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Patrick to the show 02:00 – Patrick got a $ 2 million deal on SharkTank but didn’t take it 02:11 – Patrick didn’t take the deal because they wanted 25% 02:30 – Patrick’s episode was aired 2 years ago and it was a good exposure 02:40 – Patrick did over $ 1 million in revenue while they were on SharkTank 03:10 – Patrick said No on-air 04:07 – BrandYourself provides software and services that helps someone look good online 04:28 – Users buy BrandYourself’s subscription 04:40 – User base is from college students to high level professional 04:55 – BrandYourself is a SaaS business 05:03 – Half of the revenue comes from professional customized services 05:10 – BrandYourself handles issues online that is affecting the customers’ livelihood 05:30 – 10,000 paying customers for software 05:35 – A few thousand paying customers for professional services 06:12 – $ 10,000 annual RPU for professional services 06:40 – MOR is $ 7,000 on the software 07:19 – $ 533,000 per month in revenue 07:35 – BrandYourself has advisors 08:30 – The professional services customers problems that BrandYourself is getting 09:10 – One example is an employee who was fired and ranting online 09:20 – One of the usual problem is what they call “You Shot Yourself in the Foot” 10:36 – BrandYourself was founded in 2009 10:40 – 2015 revenue 10:50 – Target for 2016 10:52 – BrandYourself has raised about $ 6 million recently 11:19 – Team size 11:28 – Team location 12:30 – Gross monthly customer churn 13:30 – Lifetime value 13:40 – Customer acquisition cost 13:45 – All of their leads are organic 15:30 – BrandYourself won’t theoretically spend for a customer 15:40 – BrandYourself do retargeting 15:56 – Paid acquisition is not a necessary channel for BrandYourself 16:31 – What if Reputation.com buys BrandYourself for $ 40 million, will you say yes? 16:40 – “That’s not the goal right now” 16:55 – “What we really want to do is help people prevent issues and be pro-active” 18:26 – Current valuation 18:58 – Connect with Patrick through his website and Twitter 21:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find someone who can fill your gaps. Help people prevent issues and make them pro-active. Saying “No” on national TV can also be beneficial and increase your revenue. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. BrandYourself.com– Patrick’s website @PatrickAmbron – Patrick’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/10/2016 • 25 minutes, 3 seconds
EP 473: Raising $500k To Help Charity Event Organizers, $16M Donated with DonationMatch CEO Renee Zau
Renee Zau, co-founder and CEO of DonationMatch, a product donation network for school and charity events that works similarly to match.com. She’s obsessed with increasing a win-win partnership between brands and non-profit that don’t cost money but can generate more for everyone involved. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – E-myth Revisited What CEO do you follow? – Craig Newmark Favorite online tool? — Streak and Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Almost If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Believe in yourself and talent even if it is different from someone else’s’ idea on what you should do” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Renee to the show 02:08 – It takes 300 hours to secure in-kind and other donations from a benefit event 02:31 – DonationMatch streamlines the product for companies and reduces the work for school and charities 02:50 – Sahara Sam’s receives 100s to 1000s requests of tickets a year to raffle off at charity events 03:26 – Doing a research and checking legitimacy takes time for companies 03:55 – DonationMatch has matched $ 16,000,000 worth of donation goods 04:14 – DonationMatch offers premium model 04:22 – DonationMatch can be used for free 04:35 – Companies can upgrade to premium which is $ 49 a month 04:48 – DonationMatch is a SaaS business 04:54 – DonationMatch has around 100 active companies at the moment 05:02 – DonationMatch has a low customer churn 05:40 – DonationMatch still get a value from their non-paying customers 06:09 – DonationMatch started in 2010 but officially launched in 2013 06:37 – DonationMatch is bootstrapped 06:49 – DonationMatch had $ 100,000 credit card debt 07:10 – Renee and her co-founder are also doing stuff outside of the company 07:33 – 2015 revenue is $ 19,000 07:37 – Goal for 2016 07:49 – As of October 2016, they have around $ 40,000 revenue 08:00 – DonationMatch is usually getting an annual payment from non-profit organizations 08:25 – Holiday season is when companies usually hire DonationMatch 08:40 – September 2016 revenue 09:10 –Total number of paying customer 09:44 – DonationMatch has 100 customers 10:12 – DonationMatch is currently raising $ 500,000 10:40 – Renee feels their valuation is $ 1.5 to 2 million 10:47 – Based on their traction 11:05 – Customer acquisition cost is about $ 1 11:55 – DonationMatch has 13,000 non-profit users 12:30 – DonationMatch has about 10% of non-profits in San Diego 13:25 – They also have national brands in their system 14:05 – DonationMatch is open to offers and already talking to people and investors 14:30 – Connect with Renee through her email, website and Twitter 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can create a win-win partnership if you know the right ingredients. Believe in yourself and your talent even if it is different from someone else’s idea on what you should do. Take the risk – even if it means having a $ 100k debt. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Renee@DonationMatch.com – Renee’s email address DonationMatch.com – Renee’s website @ReneeZau – Renee’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/9/2016 • 19 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 472: $65k Crowdfunded on Angel List and 75,000 Pre-Launch Email With Youngry CEO Ash Kumra
Ash Kumra, an award-winning entrepreneur, author, public speaker, and talk show host recognized twice by the White House as an entrepreneur making an impact. Listen as Ash shares how he runs Youngry, a media company he co-founded that informs, inspires, and elevates young and hungry minded entrepreneurs to thrive. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Inside Steve’s Brain What CEO do you follow? – Mark Benioff Favorite online tool? — Lead.com Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “To not be worried about other people’s things” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Ash to the show 02:10 – Youngry is an entrepreneur media company 02:27 – Youngry provides helpful information from successful entrepreneurs 02:38 – Youngry’s business model provides e-commerce product 03:40 – Youngry provides a community for early stage entrepreneurs to get the best content to help them thrive 05:04 – Ash and his team decided to launch Youngry with an equity crowd funding 05:12 – The new law stating that both credited and uncredited can invest in a deal 05:27 – Difference of credited and uncredited 05:48 – Worked with AngelList 05:53 – AngelList launched an equity crowd funding called Republic 06:15 – Republic.co 06:40 – Minimum amount to invest is $ 10 06:50 – Minimum goal to hit is $ 50,000 06:55 – Youngry hits $ 65,920 07:00 – Crowd safe is a form of a safe note 08:25 – What if people want to donate but think that valuation is crap? 08:30 – “It is not a donation but an actual investment” 08:45 – Questions about crowd funding should go to the crowd forum 09:08 – Youngry made a $ 2 million value 10:00 – Ash and his partner had $ 50,000 as a side money 10:30 – Youngry already made $ 65,000 revenue 11:00 – Youngry is various focus 11:23 – Influence remarking as an e-commerce marking 11:28 – Bigger brands see the value of audience that Youngry is generating 11:32 – In 60 days, Youngry generated 50,000-75,000 audience 12:05 – The crowd funding campaign helped Youngry get fraction from the larger brands 12:28 – Youngry’s event sponsorship 13:15 – Launch date of Youngry is December 1 2016 13:30 – Connect with Ash through Ash@Youngry.com 15:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Equity crowdfunding can be beneficial to both startups and investors. Study and learn the process before investing – even the legal matters. Mind your own business. Don’t worry too much about other people’s problems. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Ash@Youngry.com – Ash’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/8/2016 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 471: He Just Exited, Now Landds $500k Customer for New Content AI Business ComnPlus with CEO Karan Chaudhry
Karan Chaudhry, a serial entrepreneur and co-founder and CPO of Comnplus, a company building advanced machine learning based personalization and recommendation engine focused on online digital content industry. He received his MS from Stanford University and is an active mentor and advisor at StartX, advising entrepreneurs on topics like fundraising, team building, data product management and product marketing. Prior to Comnplus, Karan was the co-founder and CEO of DropThought, a machine learning based instant feedback and text platform for voice over applications. Listen as Karan explains how DropThought was acquired last year and how he started Comnplus. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Take risk. Failures are highly over-rated. It just makes us stronger” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Karan to the show 02:35 – DropThought was acquired last year 02:43 – DropThought is doing feedback-based analytics 02:58 – Karan raised a couple of rounds for DropThought 03:10 – DropThought was acquired by Bahwan CyberTek 03:22 – Karan was in the process of fundraising for DropThought when Bahwan CyberTek approached him 03:50 – There were other companies who want to acquire DropThought 04:33 – Valuation of DropThought 05:24 – Team size for DropThought is 15-20 05:35 – Comnplus is taking the machine analytic context to the content industry 05:50 – Companies find it difficult to recommend similar content to their customers 06:30 – Comnplus is only 3-4 months old 06:42 – TVF funded Karan $ 500,000 to start Comnplus 07:09 – Comnplus is creating clusters of users with similar habits for TVF 07:28 – Comnplus handles marketing and contact targeted users 07:48 – Comnplus reaches out to users with customize recommendations 08:35 – Comnplus market is the large content providers 08:58 – Comnplus price point 09:15 – Comnplus is currently bootstrapped 09:50 – Comnplus has a small but qualified team 10:35 – Karan is willing to spend 50-70% of revenue for customer acquisition 11:35 – Target RPU is $ 500,000 12:15 – Comnplus is currently not fundraising and TVF as their only client 12:43 – Biggest competitors are Rich Relevance and Gravity R&D 13:48 – Get in touch with Karan through his email 15:28 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find the right people and they will acquire your business. It’s about quality and not quantity. You can never “lose”. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments. Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Karan@Comnplus.com – Karan’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/7/2016 • 18 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 470: How He Got 10,000 Interested In Product Before Launch with Scorely CEO Shawn Porat
Shawn Porat, founder of Scorely, Judgment Marketplace and Fortune Cookie Advertising. He’s a VP at Mark Echo Enterprise and a contributor to Forbes, Time, and Money Magazine among others. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Never If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Work with others and meet as many entrepreneurs as you can” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Shawn to the show 02:17 – Scorely is a business credit bureau 02:23 – Started 6 months ago 02:35 – Shawn is trying to get more small businesses in the platform for free 02:53 – Subscription plans 03:15 – Scorely is currently on pre-revenue and will launch in 3 weeks 03:25 – 10,300 people in their launch list 03:48 – The idea of Scorely started 3 months ago 03:54 – They’ve partnered with different government agencies and businesses 04:25 – The chamber of commerce 04:30 – The members have been informed they can get access to business reports through email blast 05:11 – Scorely is the first in the industry 05:25 – Scorely charges between $ 120 to $ 200 per report 06:04 – Scorely focuses on small businesses 06:10 – Recovery of Judgement’s credit report 07:25 – Some companies charges small businesses too much for credit reports 07:45 – They are now free as they want more small businesses to learn about Scorely 08:06 – Small businesses want credit reports because of a lot of reasons 08:08 – Small businesses need loans 09:00 – Scorely can recommend small businesses to banks 09:15 – Goal is to get a loan with the smallest interest 09:30 – Shawn telling Nathan how Scorely works in Nathan’s business scenario 10:28 – Shawn gets 1% - 5% from the loans 10:52 – Number of business loans made yearly in the USA 11:45 – Shawn is still learning a lot 12:20 – Judgment Marketplace 13:48 – Scorely raised $ 250,000 14:05 – Team size 14:30 – Toptal as a freelancing site for developers 15:48 – Connect with Shawn through his website 18:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can’t do everything alone. Bring your ideas to life. Make a good action plan in starting a business. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments. Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. ShawnPorat.com – Shawn’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/6/2016 • 20 minutes, 57 seconds
EP 469: SharkTank Sunk Him, Then He Won Big With $1.4M with Revestor CEO Bill Lyons
Bill Lyons, a successful real estate entrepreneur. He is the founder and CEO of Revestor.com. Revestor is in the business of helping real estate investors find profitable properties to rent out as short and long term rentals. He also helps identify properties for quick profits. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Slash What CEO do you follow? – Tony Robbins Favorite online tool? — Rapportive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “That when you get to your 30’s, a week is like a day, a month is like a week and year is like a month and slow down. Do what you can today” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:48 – Nathan introduces Bill to the show 02:27 – Revestor started in 2012 02:37 – Revestor is now focused short-term Airbnb properties 03:08 – Bill is asking $ 250,000 for 10% in short-term properties 04:10 – Bill was in Shark Tank in November 2012 04:25 – Bill got 15,000 users but never got over 1,000 paid users 04:38 – Bill can’t raise money after the show 05:02 – In 2013, Bill started a mortgage company 05:06 – In 2014, Bill did $ 500,000 in revenue 05:10 – In 2015, Bill did $ 1.7 million in revenue 05:14 – 2016, Bill is about to hit $ 5.5 million in revenue 05:34 – Bill has been investing for the past few months in Revestor 05:58 – Revestor did 0 revenue in 2016 06:10 – The subscription plans were not working so they refunded them 06:24 – Bill built a better platform to invest in Airbnb 06:33 – Revestor re-launches on November 1st of 2016 07:10 – Customers can see daily rent data in the website of Revestor 07:20 – Revestor’s main data source 07:34 – Revestor is paying $ 6,000 a month for the API 08:25 – The properties in Revestor are for sale 08:35 – The website will show you how you will earn when you purchase a property 09:22 – Users can enter their own interest rate in the website 10:00 – Revestor is pulling data from resources to come up with average daily rent 10:40 – “You’re not going to get a good cash flow in San Diego on a long term basis” 11:18 – They are working with a PR company 11:38 – Mortgage is Bill’s passion 12:13 – Email list is 30,000 13:40 – Connect with Bill through his Instagram and website 15:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Learn from your experiences. Don’t let other people predict your business. Start from where you’re good at. Things are far easier when you already know what to do. Do what you can today. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments. Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @bill_lyons – Bill’s Instagram account Revestor.com– Bill’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/5/2016 • 18 minutes, 3 seconds
EP 468: $6M in 2015 Revenue With Health and Wellness Infoproduct with CEO Craig Ballantyne
Craig Ballantyne, a productivity and a success transformation coach and the author of The Perfect Day Formula: How to Own the Day and Control Your Life. He’s been a contributor to men’s health magazines since 2000 and in 2001, he created a home popular work out program, Turbulence Training. Listen as Craig tells us how he overcome his anxieties using the 5 pillars of transformation and how he managed to make his users stay. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rockefellar Habits What CEO do you follow? – Matt Smith Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I should stop drinking before I’m 30 years old” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:54 – Nathan introduces Craig to the show 02:43 – Craig uses the 5 pillars of success 03:06 – Craig started in the fitness industry in 1999 and he started selling Turbulence Training online 03:19 – In 2011, Craig bought the business, Early to Rise, a success wealth building newsletter 03:31 – They have 100,000 email list for Early to Rise and 120,000 for fitness 03:38 – Early to Rise did $ 6 million in 2015 04:27 – The Perfect Day Formula is their best-seller 04:45 – They have Early to rise University where online courses are 05:00 – PerfectDayFormula.com 05:05 – It was launched in January 2016 05:18 – 35,000 purchases at the moment 05:21 – They have their email list, affiliate email and Facebook ads for marketing 05:30 – Price point is $ 200 05:46 – Only a small portion of customers came from the affiliate email 06:00 – Customers receive a box full of materials when they purchase 06:31 – The cost of produce is $ 21 07:02 – They are not making a lot from paid advertising 07:43 – Craig is finding a way to send traffic on Facebook to an offer that works to prevent crashed after the launch 08:30 – $ 100,000 MRR mostly from the fitness stuff 08:35 - $ 7 price point on monthly fee 09:12 – People stick with them for at least 3 months 10:44 – People want results 11:26 – The usage pay wall 12:20 – What the user will get from the course 12:23 – There’s a template to change your bad habits 12:40 – They will help the user create a vision 12:50 – One of the pillars is plan and prepare 13:25 – Craig has a video of walkthrough on what they can get in the kit 13:56 – Goal in 2016 14:11 – Tools that Craig uses for his website 14:30 – Tools that Craig uses to run his business 14:43 – Team size 14:59 – Follow Craig on Twitter and LinkedIn 17:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Show people results. Show them how to consume a product to get the results. Having an email list of the target market can boost your revenue tremendously. Be healthy. Cliché as it sounds, health is wealth. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments. Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. @Craigballantyne – Craig’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Craig’s LinkedIn account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/4/2016 • 19 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 467: $60M Raised To Help CIO's Manage Their Cloud with CEO Ben Nye
Ben Nye. Ben joined Bain Capital Ventures in 2004 and leads their infrastructure software team. Listen as Ben talks about how he became Turbonomic’s CEO and how they got to Series D. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs Book What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew about the power of equity” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Ben to the show 02:00 – Ben joined Bain Capital Ventures in 2004 02:15 – Capitalized Turbonomic as an investor in 2009 and first delivery of product in GA in 2010 02:30 – Joined the company full-time in 2013 02:40 – Bain Capital Ventures is a sector focus 02:55 – They want something with a prepared mind 03:17 – They cover multiple sectors 03:38 – Total capital raised 03:59 – Ben is the lead investor at Bain Capital Ventures for Turbonomic 04:17 – There was 3 CEO in Turbonomic 04:46 – There was an issue between the founder and the CEO that was hired 04:58 – The board made a decision, making Ben the CEO 06:15 – Passive equity in the company 06:22 – They kept the best people 06:42 – The company has to retire passive shares and it is covered by investors right agreement 07:00 – They have bought people’s equity, who left the company 07:15 – Turbonomic is a soft managing self-organizing control system 07:40 – They have the capability to provide enhance performance for high workloads 08:15 – They have on-premises and off- premises sectors 08:30 – In on-premises, there is per socket and per core based pricing 08:35 – In off-premises, there are no sockets so you work virtually in public cloud 08:55 – They are not SaaS, but users can purchase on term basis 09:20 – Some users request how to acquire the software 09:35 - They measure the environment based on sockets and core count 09:52 – 91% of the customers have a 3-month full payback 10:19 – Ben offers a scenario how the model works 11:34 – At Bain Capital Ventures, they research the companies and pick which they think will win 12:53 – The startups competing in the market 13:15 – In Turbonomic, there are 16,000 CIO who invested in them 13:28 – They have 400 employees 14:00 – Revenue growth in 2016 14:36 – In November of 2014, they did a $ 50 million series-d 15:35 – Going to series-d will depend on the nature of the company 15:41 – Ben’s company is an intellectual property strategy company 16:30 – Connect with Ben through his website and join Green Circle Community 18:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: People can voluntarily sell their equity when the leave a company. Getting to series-d will depend on the nature of the company. Know your market. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Turbonomic.com – Ben’s website Green Circle Community – Ben’s online community Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/3/2016 • 20 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 466: Agency Loses Money in 2015, $500k In Black in 2016 Helping Copmanies Market Online with CEO Greg Shanken
11/2/2016 • 20 minutes, 31 seconds
EP: 465: 120,000 Customers, About $200k MRR, $10M 2017 ARR Goal with RocketReach.co CEO Amit Shanbhag
Amit Shanbhag, co-founder of RocketReach.co, a company that allows users to lookup email addresses, phones, social links, etc. for over 250 million professionals worldwide. Amit bootstrapped to RocketReach from zero to over a hundred thousand customers including Apple, Google, and Morgan Stanley to name a few. He has more than a dozen patents and started his professional life writing code for geo-stationary satellites. He loves open water swimming, watching cricket, and spending time with his 4-year old son. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Marissa Mayer Favorite online tool? — Google Drive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Live the moment and enjoy what you have” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Amit to the show 02:33 – RocketReach is a sales management tool 02:54 – RocketReach was founded in 2015 03:03 – Amit and his co-founder used to work for a SaaS business 03:15 – They tried to get information from www.data.com for user acquisition 03:25 – They realized that the data is 85% inaccurate 03:31 – They tried different tools 04:25 – Team size 04:40 – Completely bootstrapped 04:51 – They tried to raise a small round 05:18 – Went to institution investors 05:27 – The terms were not profitable 05:40 – Amit stopped fund-raising after 6 months 05:58 – They had 10,000 customers in March 06:40 – Companies that are the competition 07:35 – RocketReach is SaaS and has monthly subscription 07:40 – Plans are $ 49, $ 99 and $ 299 07:46 – Salespeople and recruiters are the biggest user base 08:30 – Most of the users are from the $ 99 plan 09:10 – MRR 09:40 – They were doing a lot of outbound in January 10:04 – Most of their users now are from SEO 11:18 – Customers who buy access to RocketReach API 11:38 – They are considered as competition 12:29 – First year revenue 12:45 – Total of $ 15 from October 2015 to December 2015 13:02 – March 2016 is when the growth started 13:40 – Did a deal with 500 startups companies 14:40 – Gross monthly churn 16:40 – Lifetime value 17:17 – Company expenses 18:09 – The quality of data that RocketReach has sets them apart from their competitors 18:30 – Comparison of RocketReach and Email Hunter 19:50 – Goal for 2016 20:53 – Decent offer in the SaaS space 21:15 – 2-digit percentage average monthly customer growth 22:15 – Connect with Amit through his website and Twitter 24:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: First year revenue is not always what you’re expecting. Improve your product to the point it makes your competitors, your customers. Live for the moment and enjoy what you have. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. RocketReach.co – Amit’s website @RocketReachco – Amit’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
11/1/2016 • 28 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 464: $1.7M In Book Sales After Being Dead for 6 Minutes
Hal Elrod, a husband, father ,and the best-selling author of 8 books including one of the best self-published book of all time, The Miracle Morning, which sold over 200,000 copies and has been translated into 21 languages. He is an entrepreneur and international keynote speaker, podcaster, and co-creator of best blueprint ever life experience. Listen as Hal talks about his life after a car crash and how it paved his future. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Love is the Killer App What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Hoffman Favorite online tool? — Five Minute Journal iOS App Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Have patience” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:53 – Nathan introduces Hal to the show 02:30 – The Miracle Morning now has 240,00 copies sold 02:40 – It was published in 2012 03:00 – When Hal was 20, he was the top sales agent for a kitchen knife company 03:25 – Hal was in car accident on his way home and broke 11 bones 03:36 – Hal was pronounced dead for 6 minutes and in a coma for 6 days 04:00 – Three months after the crash, Hal was told by the doctor the unexplainable – that he can walk again 04:45 – Some people go through traumatic experiences to learn a lesson and share it to other people 05:11 – “Don’t make the same mistakes. Learn from other people’s action and learn from it” 05:28 – “Accept all things that you can’t change while you focus on what you can” 06:26 – Hal’s sister died when he was 8 years old 06:46 – After a few months, Hal’s mother created a support group to help parents cope with a child loss 06:55 – You can use adversity. Turn it into an advantage by finding a way to make it benefit other people 07:30 – Hal conditions himself for the 5-minute rule 07:58 – Why is The Miracle Morning, the best self-published book 08:02 – It changes behavior 08:40 – It adds value to your life and changes your daily life 09:43 – Ask yourself “how can I take this and turn into a daily ritual” 10:47 – Give the readers a quick win 11:30 – The 30-day challenge in the book 12:15 – Hal is coaching people to get an accountability partner 13:30 – Hal thought he could go to a traditional publisher 13:43 – The Miracle Morning is not a title. It is the practice that Hal made in his life since 2008 14:32 – Hal learned that self-publishing for authors is (99% of the time) the way to go 15:09 – Hal had an email list for publishing 15:54 – Hal sold 7000 copies in the first month 16:53 – Hal is averaging 10,000 copies every month 17:12 – Hal is charging $ 25,000 (+ travel) for speaking events 17:36 – Hal did an audiobook and it was worth-it 17:45 – Hal had no ghost writers and co-author 17:51 – Hal didn’t spend on advertising for the first 3 months 17:59 – Hal got his first 100 sales through pre-selling to his personal network with additional offers 19:45 – The sales of the other books of Hal is only a fraction of his original 20:15 – Get in touch with Hal through his website and Twitter 22:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t make the same mistakes. Learn from other people’s actions. Self-publishing is the way to go. You can turn adversity into advantage. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. @halelrod – Hal’s Twitter handle MiracleMorning.com – Hal’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/31/2016 • 25 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 463: Close.io More Than $200k MRR, 500 Customers, $400 ARPU with CEO Steli Efti Who Wont Sell for $40M
Steli Efti, CEO and founder of Close.io. Listen as Steli talks about how he uses sales and communication to his company’s advantage and why he won’t disclose their churn rate—his answer WILL surprise you. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Paypal Wars What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew how to manage my own emotions and focus on consistency” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan introduces Steli to the show 01:52 – Steli’s entrepreneurial power is in sales and communication 02:02 – Close.io is Steli’s biggest success 02:15 – There are less than 20 people in the team 02:21 – Steli is competing with massive organizations 02:40 – They launched their first product in 2013 02:56 – First year revenue is $ 200,000 03:10 – They started as a services business 04:08 – There’s a common pattern with SaaS companies building product 04:45 – Close.io is a CRM 04:55 – Focused on inside sales team 05:12 – Paid monthly 05:26 – RPU 05:58 – The average per month is $ 400 to $ 500 07:01 – Total number of customers is between 500 and 5000 07:54 – They are self-funded but they did raised for the business 08:45 – CAP table 09:29 – Raised a little after graduating 10.08 – They raised $ 1 million 10:32 – They are not currently in any acquisition talks and not raising capital 11:09 – They have all the funds they need 11:35 – There are 2 co-founders 12:00 – Monthly gross churn is horrible 12:26 – “Every customer we are losing is a tragedy” 12:50 – They don’t share churn numbers 13:11 – Their sales tactics 13:41 – When they launched Close.io, it doesn’t have any record in it 14:15 – People will buy the product even if it’s not sufficient 14:54 – They are now doing a ton of blog posts, public speaking, etc 16:20 – Consistently improve your product 17:22 – Fully-weighted CAC 17:55 – “The most important thing in trying new channels is to determine what a success and failure look like” 19:30 – Steli won’t accept sample acquisition offer 21:00 – Connect with Steli through his blog and Twitter 22:30 – Steli’s podcast has thousands of followers 23:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you have the solution to your customer’s problem, they will stay longer. Plan your failure scenarios. Know what to do when you succeed AND fail. Every business is different. The value of your business is determined by what the market is willing to pay for it, and what you’re able to create in terms of market demand. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Blog.close.io – Steli’s blog site @Steli – Steli’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/30/2016 • 26 minutes, 58 seconds
EP 462: $8.8M 2015 Sales of iPhone Repair Parts with CEO Chris Koerner
Chris Koerner, founder and CEO of LCDcycle – a company that recycles broken iPhone screens and supplies wireless repair shop with wholesale electronic parts. Aside from being a motivational speaker and winner of the Entrepreneur of the Year award, Chris is a guy who appreciates the haters. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Delivering Happiness What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Flipboard Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I try but I don’t If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Tell myself to appreciate the haters” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:46 – Nathan introduces Chris to the show 02:31 – LCDcycle was founded in 2013 02:43 – Chris opened a smartphone repair shop in college in 2010 02:51 – Sold it for $ 30,000 03:50 – They started in Alabama 04:10 – They got more customers in the Texas market 04:45 – The supply parts to repair shop 04:58 – First year revenue 05:08 – Did $ 2.1 million for the first full year 05:13 – For 2014, they did $ 4.8 million and $ 8.8 million in 2015 05:36 – They are doing cold-calling to get customers 05:57 – Uses a lead generation tool to scrape the repair shops details 06:25 – Gross margin average is 31% 06:55 – Team size is 12 07:08 – They are self-funded 07:31 – Started with $ 30,000 07:41 – Chris asked his family and friends for a loan 08:16 – Total volume of parts shipped 08:27 – About million parts 08:45 – Most of their shipments are iPhone screens 08:53 – Average price point for the shops 09:17 – Spending $ 23 for raw material 10:15 – 8% net margin 10:30 – Supplies are coming from China 10:49 – LCDcycle sells new screens and buying the broken screens from the repair shops 11:05- Broken screens are being sent to China 11:27 – Their revenue is shrinking this year to $ 6.5 million 11:41 – There’s a shortage in supplies last year so there was a spike in sales 12:25 – They’re supplying to 700-800 unique shops 12:36 – Reorder rate 13:45 – Chris raised money last year 14:21 – Chris would sell to a bigger company 15:20 – Connect with Chris through his Facebook 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You have a good chance of developing a great company—you just need to be willing to navigate through the failures. Believe in yourself. Expansion—even in the face of risk—is worth it. Always appreciate the haters. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Facebook – Chris’ personal Facebook account. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/29/2016 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 461: $2m Raised, SpokenLayer Turning Blogs Into Audio Content with CEO Will Mayo
Will Mayo, founder of SpokenLayer. Being dyslexic led Will to find an alternative to written text and he thought of an audio solution. Listen ad Will talks about how SpokenLayer changes mainstream reading and how it helped him personally. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The E-Myth What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Streak Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Just keep trying and you’ll figure it out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Will to the show 02:05 – How is a podcast different from SpokenLayer 02:28 – “Spoken edition is a different interpretation of what audio can be” 02:44 – It caters to listeners first then letting them choose the experience 02:53 – Working for about 30 properties 03:13 – SpokenLayer distributes articles for Playboy 04:10 – Different publishers work in different ways 04:15 – Some publishers would pay to have a spoken edition 04:27 – SpokenLayer help publishers sell advertising and sponsorship 04:50 – “In the long term, the growth of ad revenue will be the largest component of a business but it takes a while” 05:05 – They make more revenue from the SaaS side 05:15 – The other side of the business works with non-media clients 05:50 – The pay depends on volume of content 07:05 – SpokenLayer started as an iPhone app in 2012 07:17 – They didn’t pursue the app idea 07:35 – They did Angel finance and tapped family 07:50 – Price rounds and notes 08:08 – Raised over a bit of $ 2 million for the past 6 years 08:20 – Expenses for the team and the studio 08:37 – Technology and infrastructure fund the SpokenLayer 08:52 – Handling 40 or 50 clients at the moment 09:16 – Getting customers through inbound 09:25 – They’re getting more requests than they can handle 09:55 – Focused on English and other local languages 10:27 – Focused on clients that has over 10 million audiences 11:25 – Content analyzing 11:35 – Not all content is worth voicing 12:00 – “There are great content and great stories that people want to consume” 12:06 – Example of phenomenal contents and stories 12:19 – “Anything that is written as a first person is a personal story destined to be an editorial or an opinion” 13:05 – There are different types of distribution 13:30 – Some people use different platform to consume the audio 13:50 – They’ve been working with Time, Reuters, and ZY to name a few 14:24 – Some of the team members are based in Manhattan 14:40 – 10 full time 14:50 – Raised capital 15:03 – The core team is interested in raising capital 15:20 – Their another product Audio 16:06 – How much do you want to raise? 16:25 – “Somewhere between third or half of the round” 17:05 – Connect with Will through his website and Facebook 18:17 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Disabilities can turn your life around—it all depends on your attitude and ingenuity. Not all content is destined to be vocalized. Keep trying until you figure it out…whatever that it may be. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. SpokenLayer.com -Will’s business website Facebook – Will’s business Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/28/2016 • 21 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 460: One Man Agency Does $500k Recommending Health Plans with Michael Chapman
Mike Chapman, an author, speaker and subject-matter expert for both healthcare and insurance matters. Listen as Mike talks about helping self-employed and small business owners take control of their health. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Approach What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Acuity Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Make the leap—start a business earlier.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Mike to the show 02:10 – Why people should listen to Mike? 02:25 – “There are so many basic things that people can do that will save money and provide better options for healthcare” 02:37 – Mike is a consultant for small businesses and individuals. He’s also a broker 03:13 – Total revenue in 2015 is under $ 1 million 03:38 – Sometimes, Mike will hire people, depending on the season 04:04 – Average annual net profit 04:45 – Mike has been in the business for 15 years 04:54 – First year revenue 05:20 – Mike is a marketing guy 05:34 – Mike used to do SEO for insurance 06:13 – Goal for 2016 revenue 06:36 – How Mike gets paid 07:01 – Mike gets paid directly from his recommendation 07:43 – Mike recommends Nathan alternatives for healthcare providers 07:54 – Consider a small group plan or business plan 08:24 – A short term plan can get coverage for you 08:50 – Why do you get penalize for not having health plan? 08:53 – Part of Obamacare 10:02 – Mike would get 3% - 6% per plan 10:47 – September expenses 11:00 – Marketing expenses 11:30 – Mike had signed-up hundreds to thousands of people 11:40 – Mike is based in Texas 11:58 – Mike does speaking to increase his network 12:03 – Email and web marketing 12:20 – Mike has about 6,000 subscribers 12:40 – Connect with Mike through his Facebook and website 14:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can save money and have better healthcare—it just takes planning and discipline. Entrepreneurship is the avenue to fulfilment. You can hit two birds with one stone – maximize your resources and network. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Facebook – Mike’s Facebook account TheMedicalInsuranceExchange.com – Mike’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/27/2016 • 20 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 459: Magically Make Paper Dissappear with $2m/yr Company Amipaperless CEO George Bandarian
George Bandarian II, CEO and President of AMI – The Paperless Company. He has a mission of eliminating paper and a vision for simplifying work for companies such as SpaceX, Walt Disney, MBC Universal, schools and colleges. Listen as George explains their unique culture and what he and his team are working on to disrupt the document management industry. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Bold What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Headspace and Calm Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Fail fast, fail often, and fail forward” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces George to the show 01:58 – “In this day and age, there shouldn’t be any paper documents” 02:20 – It is senseless to route documents from desk to desk 02:43 – They automate business processes and digitize the paperwork 03:28 – The price will depend on what the client wants them to do 03:40 – Provide full-service solution 04:22 – “It feels like we’re handing them a new car key” 04:38 – They’re an agency 04:50 – Product range is from $ 10,000 to $ 400,000 05:35 – Number of unique customers 05:50 – Team size is 25 05:59 – It should be 40 by the end of 2016 06:05 – The breakdown of work 06:20 – They have BPO service who does organic services 06:47 – Are you trying to build robots? 07:10 – George’s father founded the company in 1968 07:28 – When George’s father passes, his mother took the business over 07:36 – George went to ULC and finished early 08:10 – They started as micro-fund company but have gone through iterations 08:23 – First year revenue in ‘68 08:33 – 2015 revenue 08:42 – They might end at $ 2.5 million this year 09:08 – George’s passion is in software and SaaS companies 09:21 – Some companies got bloated and expensive 09:43 – “We think that it is always a good time to think what customers really care about” 09:54 – They have a 45-day implementation guarantee 09:58 – Their number one core value is “follow the light” 10:50 – Working life as a bootstrapped business 11:08 – They’ve been profitable for decades and never had to raise funds 11:25 – Help people achieve breakthroughs 11:46 – Connect with George through his email at george@amipaperless.com 12:47 – George’s focus on the business 13:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Go with your passion. Fail fast, fail often, and fail forward Technology is always changing—adapt to the change and stay ahead of the curve. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. George@amipaperless.com – George’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/26/2016 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 458: 1200 Pay Her $47/Mo, Will do $2M This Year with Boom Social CEO Kim Garst
Kim Garst, CEO of Boomsocial. She’s also best Selling author of Will the Real You Please Stand Up, Show Up, Be Authentic and Prosper in Social Media. She’s internationally recognized and regularly contributes to www.Entrepreneur.com Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean In What CEO do you follow? – Sheryl Sandberg Favorite online tool? — Slack, Canva and Buzzsomo Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I would tell myself to become an entrepreneur” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Kim to the show 02:57 – Kim was earning $ 3,000 per month 03:32 – As of the moment, they are generating $ 56,494 a month 03:50 – Kim asked her staff about the numbers before the interview 04:17 – www.KimGarst.com – where her new product is 04:43 – Focus on how you can truly make money from social media 05:20 – Kim runs a 3-lane, 3-stage sales funnel 05:28 – 3 different premiums 06:10 – Starts with a free offer then a mini course 06:50 – In just an hour, they can learn something and implement it in their business 07:24 – “We try to over deliver and give great content” 07:58 – About 11.2% of the people who take the free offer took the $ 9 upsell 08:07 – 70% take the free trial directly and the 30% will eventually take the 3-stage series 08:45 – Three landing pages and their conversions 09:57 – Kim explaining the process of landing pages conversion 10:03 – People don’t immediately go to the $ 1 trial, they download the premium first 10:09 – First upsell is the mini-course 12:44 – The landing page that converts 40% 13:50 – 10% take the membership trial 15:00 – 30% monthly churn 15:15 – Customer value is $ 263 15:22 – Customer acquisition cost 15:25 – ROI 15:30 – Spent on Facebook ads 15:55 – 18% of profit is organic 16:16 – You can get traffic for free from social media 16:38 – Been using Facebook ads for quite a few months 17:00 – Average opening cut-through rate 17:12 – Open rate used to be 18-20% but right now it is 15-17% 17:25 – “I’m always wanting more” 18:20 – 2015 Boomsocial’s total revenue 19:30 – Connect with Kim through her website and Boomsocial.com 21:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: People will come back to you if you have good content. Increasing traffic through organic campaigns is free and effective. Don’t be content—always find ways to improve. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Boomsocial.com – Kim’s business website KimGarst.com – Kim’s personal website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/25/2016 • 25 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 457: 4000+ Units Sold Teaching Kids How To Code, $2m+ Raised with Piper
Tommy Gibbons, a former employee of both Goldman Sachs and Fundera. Listen to learn how Tommy met his Princeton bosses, and how he used those connections to get into Piper. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – N/A What CEO do you follow? – Mark Pavlyukovskyy – his boss Favorite online tool? — Zapier Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20-year-old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew how I could” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Tommy to the show 01:41 – Piper is a guide for kids ages 8 – 12 to build their first computer 02:02 – Apple’s co-founder review on Piper 02:16 – Piper has more than 4,000 customers since launching last year 02:28 – Looking into subscription plans in the future 02:45 – Piper was launched in Kickstarter in June 2015 03:10 – Sold their first product in December 2015 03:20 – They had craigslist posters 03:40 – Title of craigslist poster was “Workers needed for packing of children’s toys in Long Beach” 04:23 – Total funding raised is $ 2.3 million 04:47 – Tommy does customer service, retail partnership and ran all school app design 05:10 – Tommy has an equity In Piper 05:40 – Piper has 3 founders 06:20 – Tommy’s approach to Mark regarding his interest in Piper 06:55 – Tommy told Mark about how he can be an advantage to the company 07:30 – Tommy was working for free for a couple of months 09:00 – The Piper question 09:30 – Cost of goods sold 09:45 – Gross margin 10:00 – Reselling 10:23 – Reseller’s price and markup 10:36 – Facebook Ad 11:00 – Reorder rate 11:30 – They are now focusing on the development of Piper computers 11:52 – Revenue goal for 2016 12:00 – Big expectations for Christmas 12:15 – Order baseline 12:55 – Baseline now per month 13:32 – They will be very happy with 8,000 units sold 13:54 – Connect with Tommy through Playpiper.com 14:55 – They do retargeting 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t just tell your future boss how you can be an asset to the company – show them what you can really do. Because businesses start small, there’s always room to grow. Your degree doesn’t define your future. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Playpiper.com – Tommy’s company website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/24/2016 • 18 minutes, 3 seconds
Ep 456: $700k Agency Enters Group Coaching Space. Why? With CEO AriMirza
Ali Mirza, used to sell personal insurance door to door in Canada before getting fired and electing to venture out on his own. Listen to learn how he transformed his floundering sales career into a winner that he now sells to other companies. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Henry Ford Favorite online tool? — Mixmax Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Stop being so afraid and just go do it. Work hard and smart.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Ali to the show 02:06 – Ali build sales processes for mid-market companies 02:22 – Ali charged based on the work that he has to do 02:40 – His program ranges starts at $ 20-25,000 to $ 130,000 03:00 – Typical retainers 03:43 – HH Land Developments as a client 03:53 – Didn’t pay retainers 04:20 – Ali has 4 employees 04:33 – Ali’s business was founded in 2011 04:42 – First year revenue 05:25 – Total 2015 revenue 05:35 – 2016 target revenue 05:58 – They are back on startup level now 06:20 – Number of customers at the moment is 5 – 6 06:45 – Ali wants to be a consulting space 07:17 – Why would people choose Ali? 08:20 – “It doesn’t matter what you’re selling. What matters is what your client is buying” 08:41 – Need to figure out what the client exactly need 09:24 – Ali is launching a new business 10:30 – Building an online platform where we can do Monday morning meetings 11:27 – Is a webinar based hosting a sales meeting 12:45 – People will pay Ali a subscription fee to meet him in Monday morning meetings 12:50 – Will be launched in Canada in January 13:00 – First year goal 13:33 – Net margin in consulting business 14:17 – “In the long term, I may have thousands of people in Monday morning meeting” 14:45 – Reach Ali through RoseGardenConsulting.com 16:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take your failures and turn them into inspiration. Be your own self. Adjust to your client’s needs and don’t just stick with what you can offer. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. RoseGardenConsulting.com – Ali’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/23/2016 • 19 minutes, 17 seconds
EP 455: Exited in 2013, Now Moving From "Job" To Startup CEO Again. How? with Ariel Camus
Ariel Camus, a product builder, 500 startups alumni and the CEO and Founder of TouristEye, acquired by Lonely Planet in 2013. Today, Ariel is building a new education system called HackerPath that utilizes collaboration between peers and bots. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Founders at Work What CEO do you follow? – Favorite online tool? — Google Apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Relax, you’re doing well. Have more fun” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan introduces Ariel to the show 01:35 – TouristEye is Ariel’s first company and exited it in 2013 01:45 – TouristEye is a travel guide for mobile devices with all information offline 02:03 – Revenue is from referral fees and premium features in application 02:24 – Raised funding for TouristEye 02:55 – Acquisition price of Lonely Planet 03:18 – Why did you sell TouristEye? 04:50 – Ariel was 26 when he sold TouristEye 05:00 – Ariel joined Lonely Planet after selling TouristEye 06:00 – Ariel is starting a new project related to teaching 06:30 – Building a new platform online 06:46 – The project is called HackerPath 07:04 – Still in the process of building the database 07:18 – Goal is to make it open to everyone 07:37 – Recruiters are charging companies a 20% fee 07:53 – Currently pre-revenue 08:20 – No retainers for TouristEye 09:00 – “Do something you really love. Don’t waste time and just do it” 09:24 – Ariel and his friends talk about ideas and how to make to make it happen 10:00 – What salary would be giving up should you decide to quit completely? 10:12 – A 6-digit salary 10:35 – “I can start a new business and pay developers to help me” 11:04 – Most of the money that were spent so far was for an experiment that was launched last week called Coderoulette 11:25 – Did it to validate the interest 11:33 – Did well on the launched 11:45 – Used existing technologies 12:00 – Put in $ 10-15,000 for the project 12:19 – Connect with Ariel through Twitter 13:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Do something you really love. Don’t waste time and just do it. Selling a business is a crucial choice – make sure you won’t regret it. Relax and have more fun. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. @arielcamus - Ariel’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/22/2016 • 16 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 454: $6.9M Movie Tickets Sold In Discount Marketplace DealFlicks with CEO Sean Wycliffe
Sean Wycliffe, CEO of Dealflicks – a company that helps movie theaters move tickets at discount prices. Listen as Sean breaks down how he uses affiliate-driven system to drive a $ 240,000 per month business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Laws of Leadership What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Wish I would have got to real estate earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Sean to the show 02:10 – What is Dealflicks and how it makes money? 02:15 – Dealflicks is partnered directly with movie theaters 02:27 – Currently all over the country 02:47 – Number of ticket moving per month 03:20 – Average ticket price 03:45 – 70,000 tickets per month and 70,000 from concessionaires 04:05 – 2 tickets per transaction 04:16 – Average order value is around $ 13 04:25 – People buy them as gift cards 04:44 – The $ 13 can be for a ticket and a concession 05:05 – Marketplace 05:13 – Movie theaters are allowed to have inventories in the platform 05:24 – Sellers are the theaters; buyers are the movie-goers 05:31 – There’s around 800 movie theaters and 6000 screens on the platform 06:02 – Number of unique buyers since the Dealflicks started 06:41 – Dealflicks was launched in 2012 06:48 – First year revenue 07:17 – Dealflicks takes a pre-arranged percentage per ticket sold on the platform 07:36 – An average of around 15% 07:58 – Gross margin 08:30 – Current team size 08:40 – 8 full-time employees 09:21 – Raised $2.9 million and opened up a bridge net recently 09:58 – Aiming on getting Series A next year 10:20 – They’re willing to take investors 10:27 - “If you’re a startup, you can always raise money but it’s not always necessary” 11:07 – Dealflicks is making $ 50,000 per month 11:24 – No other expenses 11:30 – In July, they crossed over $ 480,000 for revenue 11:50 – Spending more on marketing and team 12:13 – Valuation of the company 13:45 – They recently expanded internationally 14:18 – It’s a big proof point 14:43 – 2015 total transaction volume 16:16 – 2016 growth goal 16:36 – Number of unique buyers per month 17:40 – Reach Sean through Twitter and Facebook 19:50 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’re a startup, you can always raise money but it’s not always necessary. Aim for a healthy growth. There’s no age limit in entrepreneurship – you can start as early as you want. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. @dealflicks – Sean’s business Twitter handle Facebook – Sean’s Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/21/2016 • 23 minutes, 11 seconds
EP 453: $2M Agency Helps Brands Raise Capital, IPO, Sell, with ROIworks CEO George Revutsky
George Revutsky, CMO for Soothe – the world’s largest on-demand massage service. He’s also the CEO of ROIworks – a growth agency that runs growth and build growth agency teams for funded startup and Fortune 1000 companies like Headspace, TriNet and Original Stitch just to name a few. Listen as George talks about how he generated double digit revenue for Soothe in straight 11 months. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Don’t Make Me Think What CEO do you follow? – Aaron Levie Favorite online tool? — Optimizely and Hotjar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Knew the value of moderated user testing and customer development when founding companies or evaluating product” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces George to the show 01:48 – ROIworks started as an agency 10 years ago 02:12 – Used digital tools such as aid acquisition, A/B testing etc. for a series of experiment 02:40 – Typically, they would make some kind of retainer 03:15 – They used to have 3-6 months contract 03:40 – Shifted to monthly 03:51 – Average pay per customer 04:00 - $ 240,000 per customer 04:05 – Number of total unique customers 04:25 – Worked for hundreds for the last 15 years 04:45 – First year revenue 05:05 – ROIworks is making roughly around $ 2 million a year 05:15 – 12 people in the team 05:30 – ROIworks changed their model 05:43 – Used to have smaller retainers 06:16 – Now they’re getting larger retainers and less clients 06:25 – They’re getting deeper with these Series A and B clients 06:30 – Monthly head count expenses 06:50 – Agencies should retain a 25% percent after all the expenses 07:20 – What George does with the cash flow as the CEO 07:40 – “We like to be conservative and be safe for our team members” 07:50 – Keeping some cash in the bank 08:04 – Give bonuses to team that is coming from the cash flow 08:54 – How Soothe works with ROIworks 09:00 – The founder of Soothe invested in one of George’s startup 09:15 – George takes a leave from 6-12 months 09:27 – George co-founded SplendidLabs during his leave 09:50 – It is a machine-learning based personal shopping assistance 10:08 – Sold it because they can’t find a particular market fit 11:13 – Became friends with the owner of Merlin of Soothe 11:40 – George started providing ROIworks’ discounted marketing services to Soothe to help the beta testing 12:21 – Soothe grew steadily and Merlin got Angel funding 12:33 – Soothe got Series A for $ 10.6 million 13:00 – Merlin asked Gerry if he can worked with Soothe in Hollywood 13:35 – They got 3 months of dramatic revenue bills 13:51 – Merlin hired George directly as the contract CMO 14:30 – Able to put together 11 straight months of double digit growth 14:45 – The growth led to their Series B which is for $ 35 million 14:55 – ZEO is their biggest competitor 15:10 – Created a playbook to acquire customer 15:30 – Doing Facebook advertising, AdWords, re-marketing and a lot of paid ads 16:00 – Paid acquisition is foolproof 16:17 – Soothe was in the Ellen show for Mother’s Day 16:59 – Who to approach with the Ellen team 17:45 – Connect with George through george@roiworks.com and ROIworks.com 19:00 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Make your team members happy – it will boost their confidence and will reflect to their work. Be happy on being a part of one’s success. There are tons of ways to acquire customer – you just have to find what works best. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. ROIworks.com – George’s business website george@roiworks.com – George’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/20/2016 • 22 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 452: 70k MRR, CSTOREPRO, Data play, <1m Raised, <5% monthly churn
Arif Momin, CEO and co-founder of CStorePro technologies – the leading provider of mobile and cloud based operations management for retail businesses. He has an MBA from University of California. Berkley and BS in Computer Engineering from Michigan State University. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? – Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — JIRA Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Move fast and willing to fail a little quicker. Don’t regret the old stuff” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Arif to the show 02:05 – Arif used the network that his MBA provides 02:16 – What is CStorePro and how it generates revenue 02:22 – CStorePro modernizes the operation of a single-operated store 02:50 – Customers pay CStorePro $ 59 a month 03:02 – Arif was from a different company 03:40 – Raise under $ 1 million 03:45 – All convertible note 03:48 – Number of unique customers as of September 2016 is 32,000 04:09 – Number of paying customers is about 15,000 04:20 – MRR 04:30 – CStorePro was founded in 2011 04:44 – Arif’s first business turned into a lifestyle company 05:04 – Zero first year revenue 05:33 - $ 350,000 revenue in 2015 05:40 – Revenue goal in 2016 06:07 – CStorePro clients are store owners 06:17 – Gross monthly customer churn 06:33 – Current churn is 5% 07:25 – Lifetime value 07:41 – Calculated lifetime is 3 years 08:40 – Best number to quantify CStorePro’s data 09:00 – Number in August is 13 million 09:10 – Team size and based in Houston 10:25 – Current customer acquisition cost 10:31 - $ 180 to get a trial customer 10:45 - $ 360 per paying customer 11:04 – Currently not in a capital raise 11:11 – Not raising funding and not selling 11:25 – “We don’t need it and the time is not right” 11:33 – There’s a huge opportunity in the business 11:50 – Total head count cost per month 12:24 – They’ve got access to financial resources 12:40 – Connect with Arif through CstorePro.com 14:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Give your business more time to grow. Tracking your churn has its advantages. Be prepared to fail – the earlier you fail, the earlier you learn. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. CstorePro.com – Arif’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/19/2016 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 451: 5000 Smart Jewelry Units Sold, $5.1M Raised with WiseWear CEO Jerry Wilmink
Jerry Wilmink, a recovering bio-engineer turned entrepreneur and CEO and founder of Wisewear.com. Listen how Jerry fuses fashion and technology to keep people safe. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Startup CEO What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Strategyzer Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Go for it. Don’t be scared” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Jerry to the show 01:33 – Jerry was connected with Nathan through Twitter 01:51 – Jerry is a startup junkie 02:16 – What is Wisewear and how it generates revenue 02:29 – Wisewear is a propriety smart jewelry product that allows women to stay safe 02:41 – A fusion wearable product 03:00 – Develop a jewelry product that transmits Bluetooth through metal 03:15 – Iris Apfel is the designer of Wisewear 03:35 – Each piece is priced at $ 295 - $ 345 depending on the collection 03:59 – Currently sold online but will be available at Saks 04:05 – Wisewear was founded in 2013 04:15 – They just started selling this year 04:20 – Current sales is close to $ 4 million this year 05:04 – Started shipping late March 05:19 – No problems with P.O 05:55 – There’s more risk in international market with P.Os 06:00 – Wisewear demands 30% upfront payment for bulk P.Os 06:22 – Average number of devices sold 07:40 – They are initially bootstrapped but raised a little over $ 5 million from friends and families 08:03 – Note from friends and families and they’re doing equity now 08:15 – Raising $ 10 million from equity 08:40 – Fashion brand is not a traditional tech-play 09:05 – Retailers that can potentially pull down the brand 09:49 – Expenses per piece of jewelry is quite expensive 10:55 – Retailers are selling the jewelries at the same price with them 11:05 – Distributor price 11:25 – 8 people in the team from San Antonio and New York City 11:45 – They can track online orders easily 12:08 – Goal for 2016 revenue 12:34 – They have multiple products 12:48 – The initial product was a medical device 12:56 – Jerry’s grandfather was suffering from a type of dementia 13:13 – When Jerry’s grandfather passed away, that’s when he started Wisewear 13:15 – Developed a hearing aid device 13:50 – 65% of their sales is from college women 14:35 – Biggest market is 20 – 35-year old women 14:49 – There’s a lot of burglary and sexual violence on college campuses 14:58 – There’s a panic button on the jewelry 15:14 – There’s a big market on realtors too 15:25 – Most realtors show homes and there’s a safety concern 15:51 – Connect with Wisewear through Instagram and Facebook. Jerry is more active on Twitter 17:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can take inspirations from the people around you. Fashion retail brand is not a traditional tech-play. Choose your business partners wisely. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @Wisewear – Jerry’s business Instagram account Facebook – Jerry’s business Facebook account @GeraldJWilmink – Jerry’s twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/18/2016 • 19 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 450: 14 Ag Companies Raise $32M Using AgFunder.com with CEO Rob Leclerc
Robert Leclerc, co-founder of Agfunder – an online investment market place for global agriculture industry. He is a Forbes contributor and has five degrees including a PhD from Yale. Listen as Rob talks about the global agriculture industry and how important Agfunder is for the investors. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Mini MBA What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — MailChimp Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely not If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – N/A Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Robert to the show 02:24 – Agriculture represents about 10% of global GDP 02:40 – Agfunder’s idea is to create an online investment platform that made this space mainstream 02:53 – Like AngelList in agriculture 03:28 – Agfunder focus is food and agriculture technology 03:40 – Eventually, they will be able to offer farm lands and agri-business 03:55 – Technology is needed to centralize management and scale the opportunities 04:10 – Started as a pure market place 04:28 – Taking the transaction fees 05:00 – Revenue in the first quarter of 2016 05:11 – Raising capital funds 05:35 – Total revenue In 2015 05:43 – They are on venture-funding 06:10 – Business was founded late 2013 06:20 – $0 revenue for the first year 06:40 – “We just need to know that the market works for the first year” 06:58 – Number of investors 07:38 – Investors seek them out 07:56 – Number of sellers/companies 08:10 – They are series A companies 08:30 – Take 5% transaction fee to make money 08:48 – Nathan’s sample scenario how to get the 5% 09:45 – They we’re not taking any transaction fees for the first year 10:07 – “In August 2016, how many investors put money into how many companies?” 10:25 – There’s a deal timeline 10:50 – Average raise size 11:05 – Notes and actual equity funding 11:18 – The companies set the market rate term 11:45 – What’s so special with Agfunder? 12:10 – When they started Agfunder, it was the dark ages of food and agriculture technology 12:30 – Built a very progressive business model 13:18 – 17 team members based in SF 13:23 – Connect with Robert through Agfunder.com 15:33 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It is important for customers to know things about your company – transparency is the key. Agriculture is as important as food. There’s always a trial period – you either make or break it. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Agfunder.com – Robert’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/17/2016 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 449: SMB SaaS <3% Churn, $5M Raised, $200k MRR Helping SMB's Manage Relationships with Hatchbuck CEO Don Breckenridge
Don Breckenridge, a life-long entrepreneur and the founder of Hatchbuck. Listen as Don shares how he made Hatchbuck a successful company and the struggles he endured to bring it to life. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Lean Canvas Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I had mentored earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Don to the show 02:00 – What is Hatchbuck and how it generates revenue 02:05 – Sales and marketing software that helps small businesses grow their revenue 02:11 – CRM + email marketing 02:39 – Price point starts at $59 a month 02:50 – Subscription model as recurring revenue 02:55 – Discount for semi-annual and annual subscriptions 03:17 – Price increase is based on number of users and contacts 03:55 – Average revenue per customer per month 04:10 – When customers see results, they’ll start to use more of the product 04:23 – Launched in 2012 04:40 – Don had a SaaS company prior to Hatchbuck 05:10 – The business was running smoothly 05:20 – Don saw the need for SMB apps that could actually help businesses 06:04 – Number of current users 06:20 – Average number of users per customers 06:40 – First year revenue 06:58 – Self-funded before raised capital 07:10 – Raised over $5 million 07:28 – Series A or series B 07:45 – Their investors are great supporters 08:18 – The market of SaaS is an attractive business to invest in 08:30 – Under $2M revenue in 2015 09:00 – MRR computation 09:32 – Churn 09:59 – Have a product customer fit 10:16 – “We tried to focus on who our customer is” 10:51 – Gross customer monthly churn 11:15 – Around 3% churn 11:34 – In SMB, there’s an average of 3-4% churn 12:00 – Hubspot 0% revenue churn 12:25 – Companies that has negative churn that are not MSB 13:00 – Fully inbound marketing 13:10 – Produce a lot of content on the web 13:40 – CAC ratio 13:50 – “If your MRR churn rate bounces around, it starts to be really difficult” 14:25 – Healthy ratio 14:44 – Lifetime value 14:48 – Acquisition cost 15:00 – Paid media 15:10 – Marketing courses, Google Adwords 15:29 – Don is based in Missouri 15:34 – Team size is 30 15:40 – Some remote employees 15:55 – The $5 million funding 16:06 – “We’re always raising funds” 16:32 – Goal for the company 17:10 – Monthly revenue growth 17:35 – Connect with Don through Hatchbuck.com 19:05 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a space to fill. Aim for positive results – that is what will make customers hold onto your product. It’s never too late to learn. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Hatchbuck.com – Don’s company Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/16/2016 • 21 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 448: "Day of Glass" Comes To Life, $1.8M Raised, $1.2M Revenue with Nobal CEL Pieter Boekhoff
Pieter Boekhoff, the 2016 Startup Canada Entrepreneur of the Year and one of Calgary's top 40 under 40. He’s also Mount Royal University’s Horizon Winner and one of Canada's 10 Mentor Rock Stars. Listen as Pieter talks about the company he founded, Nobal Technologies, and the success of their flagship product – iMirror. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Wave Accounting Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I do If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish that entrepreneurship and startups was more of a thing and I’d known where to get into it” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Pieter to the show 02:25 – What is Nobal Technologies and how it generates revenue 02:28 – Software company based in Calgary, Canada 02:40 – Selling iMirror for retail and hospitality 03:03 – 70% revenue from the one-time cost of the iMirror 03:27 – Launched in 2014 03:44 – The idea was inspired by the video made by Corning in 2011 04:02 – Started to build prototypes 04:23 – First year revenue is around $75,000 04:37 – Total of 10 units sold 05:15 – Each unit cost about $15,000 05:38 – They’re looking into a sustainable monthly recurring business model 06:05 – 40% gross margin 06:23 – Net margin 06:28 – Low overhead on the backend 06:28 – They raised a $1M 2 years ago and $800K in grants 06:50 – Process of government funding 07:03 – Partner with NRCIRAP 07:12 – They need to know you’re legit 07:44 – 9 people on the team, based in Alberta 08:00 – Pieter made $1.2 million in 2 years 08:20 – Pieter’s focus now is only iMirror 08:36 – 2016 revenue goal 09:34 – Some clients have more than 1 mirror 09:44 – Pieter wants to expand on the retail side 10:10 – Long sales cycle 10:40 – This is Pieter’s second business 10:53 – Pieter saw the need for the iMirror from his previous business 11:14 – Connect with Pieter through his Twitter and Instagram. Visit his website at Nobal.ca 13:23 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be willing to jump outside the box—ideas are everywhere. Expanding doesn’t always mean adding more people. Learn from your experiences and find ways to share them. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @pieterboekhoff – Pieter’s Twitter handle @pieterboekhoff- Pieter’s Instagram account Nobal.ca – Pieter’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/14/2016 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 447: $0 to $13M Agency Revenue in 10 Years with RaizLabs CEO Greg Raiz
Greg Raiz, founder of Raizlabs – a technology innovation firm for design custom applications, web platforms and other cutting-edge software. Listen how Greg earned the respect of startups and Fortune500 companies through his business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Blink What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Invision Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Just make sure to stop and smell the roses” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:41 – Nathan introduces Greg to the show 02:10 – What Raizlabs does and how it makes money 02:14 – It is a software design company 02:21 – Build iphone and android apps 02:45 – Average project size and price 03:10 – Raizlabs as a product business service 03:22 – Raizlabs helps with the technology side of the business 03:35 – Greg started Raizlabs in 2003 03:47 – Greg was making $ 60-70,000 when he was working with Microsoft 03:57 – Greg was 23 when he left Microsoft 04:11 – First year revenue in 2013 04:25 – Greg was living off his savings 04:55 – Total revenue in 2015 05:10 – 80 people in team 05:35 – Business has been cash deposited for more than a year 05:44 – Margin and business capital 06:09 – “Paying yourself as a CEO has always been a challenge” 06:23 – Reasonable salary 06:58 – Total annual personal expenses 07:37 – Total savings back then 07:53 – Greg had a day job when he was just starting his company 08:20 – Total monthly headcount expenses on an average 08:55 – Greg uses Basecamp and other tools 09:24 – Spending on tools 09:47 – How Greg feels when their client earns more than them 10:00 – They did some good stuff for HubSpot 10:25 – Just released an interesting product for The Perkins School for the Blind 10:35 – Challenge for micro-navigation 10:50 – How to get people to the bus stop 11:10 – Launched earlier this week 11:30 – RunKeeper as a client 11:37 – Fitness mapping idea 12:10 – Design development of the product with the iphone GPS 12:40 – Success to take in-house 13:04 – Equity with the companies 13:25 – How much RunKeeper pays Greg 13:40 – Charged 15K early on 14:20 – Exploring apps that can help the employees betterment 14:41- Methodology on how to facilitate feedback 14:48 – Product exploration and incubation 15:05 – Connect with Greg on his website and Twitter 16:40 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: As an entrepreneur, you have to manage your stability and your company’s. It is not about how much other companies earn – it is about how you become a part of their success. You can never turn back time – pause and enjoy the beauty of the present. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @graiz – Greg’s Twitter handle Raizlabs.com – Greg’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/13/2016 • 19 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 446: $200k In Branded Placement Deals, How To Monetize Your Creative Brain with Ben Uyeda
Ben Uyeda – a respected architect and creative genius. Listen to hear how Ben makes money off YouTube, earns serious subscriber numbers, and acquires some pretty sweet assets. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Accidental Billionaires What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Steller Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— About 6 and a half If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Just to be nice and patient with people” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Ben to the show 02:21 – What Ben does on Youtube and how he is monetizing it 02:28 – Ben wanted to give affordable design to the masses 02:43 – Started to make videos of how to make affordable modern furniture 03:00 – Product immigration into the video content itself is how you make money 03:20 – Producing a video product is more difficult 03:45 – First branded deals 03:55 – Homemade-modern.com 04:15 – DIY concrete design deal 04:30 – Home Depot is Ben’s biggest client 04:40 – Created a series of content packages 04:50 – Step by step video instructions and social media posts 05:10 – Creating a bunch of products at once 05:18 – It is often rare for big brands to have a real YouTube presence 05:38 – Ben started in this field in 2013 05:45 – First year revenue 05:50 – First 6 months get Ben 10-15,000 subscribers in Youtube 06:00 – Brands that gave Ben donations 06:10 – Ben made a deal of 10 videos per brand after getting 20,000 subscribers 06:38 – “You can’t get paid cash until you have 100,000 subscribers” 06:48 – Making a whole package of content 07:00 – Ben’s deal on brands versus traditional commercial 07:40 – Total 2015 revenue 07:50 – Adsense money 08:15 – Ben buys his own equipment 08:44 – Long format video is what Youtubers doesn’t usually do 09:00 – Long format video is an over 20-minute video 09:09 – Youtube to TV 09:45 – Offering brands full-length videos 10:05 – Person to contact if one needs a full length videos 10:10 – Brands have agencies that they work with 10:20 – Do reverse engineering to find a person 10:30 – Message on Instagram 11:20 – Show the brands that you can do it 11:33 – Put their tools in the video and get positive response 11:45 – Projected revenue this year 11:55 – 68 clients 12:05 – How to scale a business? 12:20 – Scaling would be finding the right people 13:07 – Find 2 to 3 brands that are compatible 13:16 – You can get promotional ad even if the brands didn’t pay you 13:43 – Collecting and acquiring assets 14:26 – Ben’s content is instructional 14:55 – Connect with Ben through Instagram 17:44 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you know you can do it, just do it – approval isn’t always necessary. There’s a right recipe for everything. Be creative – it can get you somewhere. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @benjaminuyeda – Ben’s Instagram account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/13/2016 • 23 minutes, 54 seconds
EP 445: $20M in 2015 Infoproduct Revenue With "Degenerate" Customers with Timothy Sykes
Timothy Sykes – the Penny Stocks Guru. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Losing My Virginity What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Business Insider Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—“I wish. I really wish” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t be so cocky” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Timothy to the show 02:05 – Tim trades penny stocks and people attack him for doing it 02:12 – Most people in a company fail 02:53 – Tim was 17 when he got into business 03:00 – Turned $12,000 into nearly $2 million 03:30 – He’s getting more conservative now 03:58 – First splurge 05:00 – The price was $ 17,000 per share 05:20 – Crazy volatility 05:40 – ISCO stock price now 05:50 – Causes of stocks going down 06:03 – Tim is a short-seller 06:25 – Tim defines short squeeze 07:00 – “In order to cover your short, you have to buy it back” 07:10 – Shorts are getting squeezed when the stock goes up too quickly 07:25 – The stock market is not always logical 08:25 – Penny stocks 09:10 – Stocks are not scalable 09:25 – Shorting requires a loan from a broker 09:40 – “If there’s a scam, everybody wants to short it” 09:45 - Tim’s strategy is ideal for people with small accounts 10:05 – Stock of sponge company 10:40 - HUSP 11:07 – Research that Tim is doing to find out things about the scams 11:17 – Created a tool StocksToTrade.com 11:35 – Playing the volatility 11:57 – Tim was on a TV Show that led him to start teaching stocks 12:41 – First year revenue 13:10 – Total revenue is 2015 13:40 – How Tim uses the people who attack him to his benefits 14:01 – Tim attacks companies and scam 14:48 – Tim’s blog 15:50 – Tim’s list size 16:00 – People have to learn how to read the materials 16:30 – Total number of unique customers since 2007 16:41 – Selling DVDs and streaming DVDs 17:31 – Tim made an apology posts 18:05 – Tim’s parents work with him 18:30 – Tim is giving to charities and foundations 19:15 – Tim made $27M in 2016 20:16 – Connect with Tim through his Twitter and Instagram 21:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s not always about the money – sometimes, imparting your knowledge is more important. Don’t let people bring you down. Try to find the good in the all the negativities. Make impossible, possible. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @Timothysykes – Timothy’s Twitter handle @Timothysykes – Timothy’s Instagram account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/12/2016 • 26 minutes, 1 second
EP 444: $1.5M in MRR, SaaS, Helping Studios Render Film Faster with GridMarkets CEO Mark Ross
Mark Ross, a man who’s spent 20 years working in senior level global technology management, and owns board-level experience with Fortune 500 financial services companies. He’s the co-founder of GridMarkets and senior level advisor for a number of startups. Listen as Mark discusses why he jumped into entrepreneurship and how it differs from big-time corporate life. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Tipping Point What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Never” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Startups are a whole lot harder than you think” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Mark to the show 02:07 – What is GridMarkets and how does it generate sales? 02:18 – Power extensive engineering applications 02:40 – Serve studios that make animations and simulations 03:33 – Similar with dark-power concept 04:08 – Agreements with the suppliers 04:20 – GridMarkets has their own grid 05:00 – Idea of GridMarkets started in 2011 05:47 – SaaS in the sense of push-button 06:39 – Give credits to new customers 07:20 – Offering credit hours at $ 1.60 07:30 – Credit numbers per month is over a million at the moment 07:57 – GridMarkets is self-funded and 10 people invest in the company 09:46 – Valuation of GridMarkets 10:15 – Investors’ different valuation 10:40 – Number of current customers 11:00 – Fantastic feedbacks from customers 11:20 – MRR 11:48 – Team size 12:26 – There’s a lot specific skills and knowledge needed 12:50 – The demand would justify having our own machine 13:10 – Amount a computer can handle per month 14:00 – Millions of computer hours needed to serve studios 15:00 – Spinning up machines 15:45 – Connect with Mark through his email 18:06 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It won’t hurt to give your customer something for free to start off. Invest in your people. Value your customer’s feedback and learn from it. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Mark.Ross@gridmarkets.com – Mark’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/11/2016 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
NathanLatka.com/private
10/10/2016 • 2 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 443: SaaS $20M 2015 ARR, 150K Customers Giving People Quality Video, Photos, Audio with Joel Holland, CEO of VideoBlocks
Nathan interviews Joel Holland, founder of VideoBlocks - a company that distributes over a million clips of royalty-free stock video and audio each month to over 150K customers in the television and video production industry, ranging from professional outlets like NBC to video hobbyists and enthusiasts. They're a 5x INC 500 out of 5000 fastest growing company, and Joel has been named one of the Top 25 under 25 by Business Week, and INC magazine’s prestigious 30 under 30 list. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Mailchimp Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “I do now” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I have lived my college life” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Nathan introduces Joel to the show 02:57 – What is VideoBlocks and how does it generate sales 03:00 – Stock media company 03:22 – Elements that creative professionals can incorporate to their projects 03:45 – VideoBlocks was founded 2010 04:00 – Idea of VideoBlocks 04:40 – VideoBlocks’ model 04:50 – Started selling by the collection 05:10 – Launched subscription plan as a test in 2010 05:20 – 150,000 paying members 05:38 – Monthly and annual plan 05:43 – Total revenue in 2015 06:15 – Royalty-free 06:30 – 6,000 videographers now shooting for VideoBlocks 07:10 – RPU 07:37 – Created more premium plans 08:00 – The 80/20 rule 08:30 – How much would a videographer get if National Geographic buys his clip? 08:40 – Standard pricing 08:50 – “If National Geographic bought it for 49 bucks, the videographer will get a check” 09:00 – 2 types of libraries 09:38 – VideoBlocks buy clips to put in the library 10:10 – Customers only need to download 2 clips in a year to avail unlimited clips 11:00 – “We want shooters to make as much money as possible” 11:24 – A few million dollars to acquire creative lights 11:40 – “Content is king” 12:00 – MRR 12:09 – Annual churn 12:16 – Subscription business is like a puzzle 13:05 – Churn on monthly plan 13:26 – Returning cost acquisition 14:10 – Customer insights operation 14:25 – Direct response marketing 14:33 – Million dollars spent monthly 14:40 – Example of direct response marketing 14:58 – Joel has a huge number of list 15:15 – Launching other products 15:42 – Weighted average cap 15:55 – Lifetime value on average 16:16 – Blended channels 17:17 – 80 team members 17:25 – Based in Virginia 17:36 – Funding history: Raised under 20 million to date 18:02 – North Atlantic Ventures 18:11 – SBA gives you leverage 18:40 – Interest rate 19:35 – “Currently, we are not raising nor in any acquisition talks” 20:15 – “Going public is a tough process” 21:07 – Connect with Joel through his LinkedIn and website 22:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work hard but don’t forget to live your life. Give life to your ideas if you want your business to grow. Know your customers and the people who supports your products. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Joel’s LinkedIn account VideoBlocks.com – Joel’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/10/2016 • 25 minutes, 40 seconds
EP 442: $803k In 2015 Revenue from The Hardcore Closer, Ryan Stewman
Ryan Stewman, CEO and CTO of Clyxo.com – the world’s only opt-in social media search engine. Ryan has one of the top online training resources for sales people worldwide, and is a best-selling author/contributor to Forbes Entrepreneur, Huffington Post, and The Good Men Project. Listen as Ryan talks about his new book, Elevator to the Top and how he is addicted to success. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? —Leadpages Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I was at the right place at the right time 20 years ago. Just following the path that led me to where I’m at today.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:38 – Ryan’s focus 02:40 – Focus on Hardcore Closer 03:10 – Modern ways to close sales 03:30 – Founded Hardcore Closer in January 2012 03:45 – 35,000 people on his list 03:57 – Content strategy 04:35 – Reasons why Ryan writes for publications 05:15 – Use ads for Facebook 05:25 – Spent $250,000 to grow his page 06:08 – 4,000 unique buyers for Hardcore Closer 06:25 – Elevator to the Top 06:40 – People love Ryan’s products and they keep coming back to buy more 07:18 – First year revenue 07:40 – Ryan had an app 08:10 – Total revenue in 2015 08:30 – “I want to be transparent with the numbers” 08:55 – Free cash flow in 2015 09:25 – Other expenses 09:34 – Facebook ads costs has toned down 09:48 – Most significant cost 10:11 – Affiliate marketers 10:23 – 57 people in 30K per year program 10:36 – Estimate revenue in 2016 10:50 – Ryan’s salary 11:00 – Ryan talks about his cars 11:30 – Team size 11:40 – Revenue stuff: one-time or monthly? 11:45 – 99.99% one-time 12:32 – Hardcore Closer app to 42222 12:39 – Backend of the app 12:50 – It is a website that is mobile optimized 13:40 – The Hardcore Closer podcast 13:47 – Downloads per month 14:16 – No guests 15:05 – Ryan’s book is self-published 15:20 – Connect with Ryan through his Facebook, podcast and website 17:45 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Keep your customers happy and you’ll gain more. It’s good to let people know about your numbers – it gives them an opportunity to learn from them. Do what you love to do. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Facebook – Ryan’s Facebook account Clyxo.com – Ryan’s website HardcoreCloser.com/podcast – Ryan’s podcast Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/9/2016 • 20 minutes, 11 seconds
EP 441: $605k Revenue Agency Spins off $35k MRR SaaS Products with Sujan Patel
Sujan Patel, an entrepreneur and a marketer who’s made a career out of learning how to keep an eye on ALL the moving pieces of his business. He's the co-founder of two successful digital marketing companies, ContentMarketer and Web Profits. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Never Eat Alone What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Buzzsumo Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “No” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew that I could work harder” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:43 – Nathan introduces Sujan to the show 02:03 – What is Web Profits and how does it make money? 02:09 – Marketing agency 02:20 – Average retainer is $ 10,000 a month 02:40 – Reject 90% of the people 03:00 – 20 clients at the moment 03:05 – Web Profits is founded earlier this year 03:12 – Consulting firm 03:40 – Joint venture with a big company in Australia 03:55 – 90 team members 04:09 – 8 people are in Austin 04:21 – Total revenue at the moment 04:28 – Goal in 2016 is to hit a million 04:50 – Sujan’s thoughts on distractions 05:05 – Sujan likes to do a lot of things 05:12 – Additional 4 SaaS businesses 05:28 – ContentMarketer, Narrow.io, Quu.co, LinkTexting.com 06:40 – Sujan helps in strategy 07:37 – ContentMarketer has a few products 07:44 – Email and twitter outreach 08:09 – Great for bloggers and podcasters 08:30 – Just hit a million email sent 09:00 – Finding an email is an art 09:26 – Total number of customers on all the business 09:27 – Average pay per month 09:55 – MRR 10:15 – “It is definitely worth it” 11:20 – RPU 12:00 – Number of paying customers on Quu.co 12:10 – Quu.co as SaaS and an advertising content 12:53 – Number of customers per promotion 13:09 – ContentMarketer is a bootstrap 13:15 – Founding date 13:25 – First year revenue 14:00 – UX designs 14:25 – Launching a new product 14:55 – Gross customer churn for ContentMarketer 15:10 – No upselling 15:30 – “We know what product to sell” 15:48 – 4 team members for connector 15:56 – Goal for the business 16:10 – Grow as big as possible 16:31 – Sujan owns half of LinkTexting.com 16:38 – Acquired the whole company with a partner 17:16 – Connect with Sujan through his blog and Twitter 18:50 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It is easier to promote your products if you know them well. Have a bigger goal for your business. Creating a great email is like creating great art – you need the right tools and the right artist. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. SujanPatel.com – Sujan’s blog @SujanPatel – Sujan’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/8/2016 • 21 minutes
EP 440: $700k MRR, 100,000 Pay $7/mo For Gay Dating App Hornet, Will Beat Grindr?
Sean Howell, the founder of Hornet - the second largest gay social network with 15 million members worldwide, known for its ongoing “Know your Status” HIV campaign. He's a speaker on mobile technology and his opinions have been featured all over the place, even the New York Times. Outside of work, Sean likes to serve on various non-profit boards and committees like the World Affairs Council, PFLAG, and UNAIDS, Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Alibaba What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — Insightly Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I started earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Sean to the show 02:13 – How Hornet generates revenue 02:23 – Premium subscription model 02:53 – Direct deals 03:08 – Premium subscription service 03:29 – No restrictions 03:43 – 5% of their user base 03:37 – 15 million user base 03:53 – Hornet was founded in October 2011 04:13 – MAU 04:22 – Metric 04:42 – Total revenue in 2015 04:50 – Fundraising 05:17 – Multi-million revenue last year 05:32 – Traditional advertising and mobile setting 05:55 – Gaming companies are buying display ads 06:20 – Direct deal with Uber 06:34 - CPM 07:10 – Demographic data for users 07:40 – Churn number that is being tracked 07:51 – Focus on user growth 08:20 - Monetization 08:32 – Total churn number 08:37 – Different subscription packages 09:00 – Monthly renewal 09:33 – Users buy in at a lower amount 09:49 – Average monthly churn is 20% 10:00 – Raised $ 1.5 million in the first year 10:26 – Costs in acquiring new paying customers 10:32 – 40 employees 10:44 – Getting customers through organic discovery and viral co-efficients 11:00 – Viral co-efficient technique 11:27 – Attribution links for social sharing 11:53 – Sean is based in San Francisco and his team members are in other parts of the world 12:27 – No revenue for the first year 12:33 – Started making revenue in 2013 12:48 – 2 biggest competitors 13:00 – Looking to raise several millions 13:08 – Valuation 13:47 – Connect with Sean thru AngelList, LinkedIn and his email. 16:05 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be motivated – use your competitors as inspiration. There are tons of ways to make your brand known without spending much. Start early – if you want to do something now, do it now. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. AngelList – Sean’s AngelList account LinkedIn – Sean’s LinkedIn account sean@hornetapp.com – Sean’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/7/2016 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
EP 439: $9m Raised, GoShippo Helps Little Guy Drop Ship 1,000,000+ Packages Per Month Already with CEO Laura Behrens Wu
Laura Behrens Wu, the co-founder and CEO of Shippo. Listen as Laura talks about how a laundry list of shipping obstacles with her previous e-commerce store birthed the idea for Shippo. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Things About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? – Patrick Collison Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “I wish” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Trust that things will turn out right” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:45 – Nathan introduces Laura to the show 02:13 – E-commerce business Laura had 02:27 – Started at Shopify 02:40 – Sourcing unique items from NGO 03:07 – Shipping problem 03:32 – Revenue with the e-commerce business 03:50 – Laura was 21 when she started her business 04:13 – Financing with Shippo 04:17 – Drop shipping 05:08 – Typical shipping pricing 05:30 – Shippo shipping rates 05:58 – Volume metric 06:07 – Doing millions of packages a month 06:30 – Negotiation with shipping providers 06:44 – Based on projected volumes 07:00 – Shippo is a pay-as-you-go; not SaaS 07:20 – Sample price per package shipped 07:30 – What if I’m shipping a 10 lbs. dumbbell? 07:44 – “We only provide the software” 08:06 – How Shippo works in an e-commerce website 08:10 – Will compare different shipping providers 08:30 – Not a standard shipping rate 08:47 – How the shipping providers get the package from the seller 09:07 – Why clients use Shippo’s service 09:37 – Shipping providers are not tech company 09:55 – Number of unique customers 10:12 – Average shipping volume per month 10:29 – Memebox 11:10 – Nathan’s proposed deal for Shippo and Memebox 11:54 – They raised $9M in 2014 12:20 – Team size 12:50 – Use of the extra money 13:23 – Minimum monthly revenue 13:33 – Upselling 13:50 – Shipping insurance 14:11 – Tracking as a product 15:28 – Bigger revenue stream 15:37 – $ 7 million in series A round, March 2016 16:00 – How to keep the balance when you have a big account 16:38 – Travel expenses last month 17:25 – Will you sell the business for $ 47 million? 17:45 – Ideal exit assuming there’s a good fit 18:03 – Built an app on top of Shopify 18:11 – Connect with Laura through her Twitter, LinkedIn and email 20:00 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Keep your customers updated and excited. Spend money on the right things and appreciate what you have. Don’t get upset on your first try – everything falls into place given patience and time. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @LauraBehrensWu – Laura’s Twitter handle LinkedIn – Laura’s LinkedIn account laura@goshippo.com – Laura’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/6/2016 • 22 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 438: Dancing His Way to $100k+ Business with Instagram Genius, Dancing Wizard Zach Benson
Zach Benson, an award-winning dancer who travels around the world running instructional clinics. He's been featured as a Round 4 finalists on FOX TV’s “So You Think You Can Dance,” and he’s also the founder and CEO of Assistagram.co. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Slide Edge What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Olson Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Usually 7 and a half” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew everything then that I know now” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Zach to the show 02:13 – How the dance clinic works 02:20 – Place, schedule, and class pricing 03:06 – Total revenue of the dance clinic in 2015 03:35 – Zach talks about how he partners with dance studios 04:25 – CTA 05:14 – Number of students per class 05:53 – Assistagram.co 06:07 – Team in the Philippines 06:27 – Hashtag optimization 06:58 – How to find hashtags to use 07:14 – There’s no database 07:40 – Follow/unfollow process 08:38 – ROI 09:04 – Sample of Zach connecting and making a deal 10:17 – Cold marketing and prospecting 10:40 – Finding people on your niche 11:03 – Working with Four Seasons 11:14 – Regular hotel room rate 11:40 – How Zach got a free stay at the hotel 12:35 – Writing a free blog post 13:00 – Benefits of a good Instagram profile 13:26 – Current number of Assistagram clients 13:40 – Average pay a month 13:53 – Assistagram’s services 14:28 – How to get people go to your Instagram account 15:38 – Reach Zack thru his email, website and Instagram. 17:58 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s all about timing. Find the mentor who can help you grow. Be consistent and persistent. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistagram.co - Zach’s business website @thetravellerslist – Zach’s Instagram handle Benson.zach@gmail.com - Zach’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/5/2016 • 20 minutes, 32 seconds
EP 437: SaaS $10m Raised, $8m+ 2015 Revenue, The Algorithmic Mckinsey with CB Insights CEO Anand Sanwal
Anand Sanwal, CEO and co-founder of CB Insights, a company that provides predictive intelligence for emerging technology trends, startups, and corporate. Their customers include Cisco, Marketo, and Red Hat, just to name a few. Prior to CB Insights, Anand managed the $50 million Chairman’s Innovation Fund at American Express. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “I wish” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Be patient” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Anand to the show 02:45 – “If you buy something for 2 and sell it for 1, you will not make it up in volume” 03:12 – He was in-charge of spending money 03:25 – Sent to London for Cosmo Europe 03:40 – Overspent 04:00 – Rationalizing the expenses 04:45 – Worked in American Express after Cosmo 06:25 – Salary in American Express 06:55 – “Decided to take the plunge” 07:30 – CB Insights 07:46 – Every industry is under attack by technology 08:09 – Monthly customer pay 08:34 – “Use our data to create a sense of urgency” 09:20 – Tracking the competitors 10:00 – Using algorithm on the data 10:30 – Number of paying customers 10:45 – Average of pricing 11:25 – Total MRR last August 11:40 – Hoping for 8-figure revenue this year 12:12 – Team size 12:25 – Some are based in New York 13:05 – Exact MRR last month 13:30 – “Everybody pays upfront” 14:14 – Individual customer acquisition 14:40 – Gross revenue churn 15:20 – Lifetime value 15:29 – 20% churn just to be conservative 15:49 - $200,000 lifetime value 16:16 – Funds raised 16:46 – Most customers are VCs 18:18 – Jon Sherry is the other founder 19:18 – No current acquisition talks 19:32 – Connect with Anand through his website and Twitter 21:05 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Do not be afraid to take the plunge—there are risks but just do it. Things happen for a reason and believe in your life plan. There’s no absolute certainties in life—only right places and right times. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. CBInsights.com – Anand’s website @cbinsights – Anand’s business’ Twitter handle @asanwal – Anand’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/4/2016 • 23 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 436: $4.5m on Ebay, Now SaaS Hits $25kMRR to Help Sellers Sell on Ebay with Crazylister CEO Victor Levitin
Victor Levitin, co-founder and CEO of CrazyLister. Prior to CrazyLister, Victor ran a retail business that he drove from $0 to $4.5M in revenue in just three years. In fact, it did so well it won an eBay award for highest conversion rate. Victor channels his eBay retail experiences through a blog called “eBay Sellers Journey to $100K a month” where he helps eBay sellers avoid mistakes and grow their business the right way. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Elon Musk Biography What CEO do you follow? – Alex Turnbull Favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “About 7” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Teach myself how to code and learn the balance” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Victor to the show 02:08 – What is CrazyLister and how does it make money? 02:16 – Created for sellers 02:50 – Similar with creating websites 03:28 – Built-in to eBay’s API 03:40 – You have to know how to code to use CrazyLister 03:49 – Pricing scheme 03:54 – Plans based on the number of listings 04:05 – Monthly RPU 04:20 – CrazyLister is founded in late 2013 04:33 – Victor was 29 then 04:40 – Victor has always been an entrepreneur 05:05 – He was a seller before 05:14 – Shifted to software because of the entrepreneurial bug 06:20 – Shared equity 06:40 – Number of paying customers 07:02 – Total revenue in 2015 07:15 – January 2016 – from premium to paid 07:40 – 14-day free trial 07:55 – MRR 08:50 – Pricing on the website 09:15 – Actively doing customer development 09:41 – Metrics customers have to hit 09:58 – Growth churn per month 10:08 – Typical monthly churn of SaaS companies 10:35 – First month with monthly churn 11:40 – Lifetime value 12:00 – What are you going to pay for a new customer? 12:28 – Team size and located in Tel Aviv, Israel 12:45 – Self-funded or crowd raising 13:01 – Equity round 13:22 - Valuation 13:33 – Victor feels they’ve exceeded the valuation 14:20 – Will never sell 14:45 – Content marketing drives traffic to Victor’s company 15:47 – August expenses 16:20 – Connect with Victor thru his LinkedIn or Facebook 18:40 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Know your priorities and maintain a balanced life. Keep moving—don’t stay in your comfort zone, stagnation is death. Take care of your customers—know their needs and find out how you can help them. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Victor’s LinkedIn account Facebook – Victor’s personal Facebook account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/2/2016 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
EP 434: Top SaaS Planning Tool Hits $600k in MRR, 1800 Customers, $13M Raised, Growing Fast With CEO Liz Pearce
Liz Pearce, CEO of LiquidPlanner–a fast-growing, Seattle based, maker of dynamic project management technology—and an active member of the Seattle startup and technology community. Listen as Liz talks about her passion in mentoring and advocating for technology and leadership. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Search Inside Yourself What CEO do you follow? – “My Top 5 Customers” Favorite online tool? — Mint Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t let go of your interest and you will always get something back when you give” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:38 – Nathan introduces Liz to the show 02:02 – What LiquidPlanner is and how it generates revenue 02:08 – Project management software 02:28 – How does the customer use Liquid planner 03:13 – LiquidPlanner is a SaaS business model charge per user 03:30 - Pricing 03:52 – First year revenue in 2007 04:01 – Worked as a marketing contractor of the business 04:32 – What happened to founders 05:13 – Raised total of $13 million 05:39 – Liz raised the $10 million 06:05 – Former CEO still active in the company 06:30 – 2015 revenue 07:16 – Negative revenue churn 07:35 – Inbound driven model 08:05 – Transactional business 08:37 – Document storage 08:50 – Team function 09:16 – Average revenue 09:29 – Gross monthly churn 10:01 – Negative revenue churn 10:09 – SMB market 10:30 – CLTV 10:48 - Lifetime value 11:30 – Some are remote 11:37 – Total team size 11:43 – Number of customers 12:01 – How many are enterprise? 12:18 – Talking about acquisition or raising the next round? 12:45 – Interested in raising more capital in the future 14:07 – Microsoft project 14:45 – Invest in scheduling engine 15:03 – Revenue goal in 2016 15:20 – Acquisition money expenditure 16:05 – Total monthly expenditure 17:15 – @lizprc 19:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Believe in your product and what it can do to change the industry. Remember that karma bus drives in circles. Keep priority focus tight. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @lizprc – Liz’ twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/1/2016 • 22 minutes, 17 seconds
EP 435: Consultant does BIG league $600k Last Year, Now Has Unique Model and Coffee with Brad Costanzo
Brad Costanzo, an entrepreneur, investor, and business consultant who built (and sold) two digital businesses. Today, Brad helps companies use proven marketing methods, innovative branding campaigns, and form strategic alliances to grow their revenue. He also hosts the “Bacon Wrapped Business” podcast on iTunes. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – One Simple Idea What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — MindMeister and XMind Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Typically 7” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Don’t seek comfort, seek challenge.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Brad to the show 02:06 – Brad sold two digital businesses 02:30 – Dating and relationship product, real estate product etc. 03:10 – Fun bar tricks 03:38 – Sold it for six figures 04:05 – Pigtones.com 04:23 – Sold it for less than $100,000 04:36 – Brad now focuses on consulting, crowdfunding, and coffee 04:50 – Equity crowdfunding 05:08 – What he did after selling his businesses 05:34 – Launched consulting firm in 2013 05:40 – How the firm grew over time 03:30 – Pricing 06:05 – Average retainer 06:22 – Total revenue in 2013 07:15 – Total revenue in 2015 07:34 – Revenue goal in 2016 08:11 – Total price per deal 08:38 – Equity product campaign 09:00 – Where Brad base his consulting fee 09:29 – Team size 09:35 – Full-time 09:51 – Number of unique customers in 2016 10:10 – First equity crowdfunding campaign 10:39 – Brad talks about his client who is from the real estate field 11:23 – Reww.com 11:45 – Different funnels 12:54 – Brad likes 2-3 steps funnel 13:08 – Magnified message 13:30 – MVF funnel 14:10 – Selling DVDs for real-estate market 15:14 – Cost of driving a sale and the return 15:26 – Brad’s coffee business with wife 15:41 – StilettoCoffee.com 16:14 – Coffee is a commodity 16:32 – His wife’s idea of selling coffee to women 17:35 – Build a brand using story-telling 18:18 – Total sales as of the moment 19:14 – Hillary Clinton coffee 20:26 – Potential for an exit 20:46 – Check StilettoCoffee.com and use the code BRADVIP on checkout to get a discount. Follow Brad on his website and podcast 22:35 – Launch of Brad’s podcast 22:55 – Total downloads 23:50 - The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Listen and learn from the people that belong to your market. You only get one shot in life—make sure your aim is true. Keep things simple. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. StilettoCoffee.com – Brad and his wife’s coffee business Costanzomarketing.com – Brad’s website BaconWrappedBusiness.com – Brad’s podcast channel Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
10/1/2016 • 27 minutes, 11 seconds
EP 433: $19M Raised, 0 to 1M Active Users for Copmetitive Intelligence Platform Owler with CEO Jim Fowler
Jim Fowler, the founder and CEO of Owler– the crowd sourced competitive intelligence platform business professionals are using to out-smart their competitive insights and uncover the latest industry news and alerts. Prior to Owler, Jim founded Jigsaw in 2003 and was the CEO until it was acquired by Salesforce in 2010 for $ 175 million. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Owler Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “How to plan for the worst case scenario and hope for the best case scenario” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:43 – Nathan introduces Jim to the show 02:12 – Jim was at NathanLatka.com/thetop73 02:45 – Where is Owler now? 03:23 – New product of Owler 03:41 – Do I need to build manually or you scrape the data out of searches? 04:32 – Most data input by users 05:00 – HeYo’s data on Owler 05:24 – Data sources 06:00 – Howler’s challenge 06:47 – Data sources without human input 06:53 – “No data set is perfect” 07:15 – Benchmark start 08:05 – Number of active users 08:45 – Making money by selling the data on the backend 08:47 - Crowdsourcing 09:21 – Total revenue in 2015 09:41 – Jigsaw’s success 10:20 – Active user definition 10:50 – Data pricing 11:13 – Licensing deals 11:50 – Competitive proximity 12:30 – Type of company who’s willing to spend millions on the data 12:46 – 3 buckets of types of big partners 13:33 – Resellers 14:05 – Financial services institution 14:40 – Goal in 2016 in terms of numbers to hit 16:20 – Why are the people willing to pay regardless of the accuracy of the data? 16:35 – “Everything that is out there is an estimate” 16:56 – No SLA 17:27 – Why is it illegal to disclose the revenue? 18:42 – “Do crowdsourcing well” 19:00 – Collective intelligence of people: Better or Worse? 21:05 – Role-playing with an angry CEO with inaccurate data on Owler 21:20 – If the data is not correct, fix it. 22:37 – Connect with Jim thru his website. Follow Owler on Twitter and Facebook 24:30 – Estimated number of employees 25:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Plan for the worst and hope for the best. Sometimes, business is give and take – customer takes something that is valuable and we get data that we can sell. Change is constant and we should improve on keeping track of the changes. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Owler.com – Jim’s business website @owlerinc - Owler’s twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/30/2016 • 27 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 432: Boostrapped SaaS Hits $75k MRR, Viral Campaigns, 1000 Customers with KickOffLabs CEO Josh Ledgard
Josh Ledgard, co-founder of KickoffLabs to The Top. KickoffLabs is a viral lead generation platform with amazing landing pages, lead capture forms, and e-mail marketing rolled into one seamless package. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 4-Hour Workweek What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — https://www.helpscout.net/Help Scout Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Working smart is way more important than working hard” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Josh to the show 02:03 – What KickoffLabs does differently and how it makes money 02:15 – Engage customer as a form of marketing 02:43 – Online advertising 03:12 – KickoffLabs is a SaaS business 03:58 – Pricing plan 04:20 – Customer churn for HeYo 04:40 – Josh’s monthly churn rate 05:10 – How to mitigate churn rate 06:00 – Paid acquisition 06:08 – Types of paid acquisition 06:48 – Monthly spent on blog content promotion 07:18 – Bootstrap or fund raised? 07:23 – Bootstraped since 5 years ago 07:45 – How did Josh get into the business 08:00 – Josh and his co-founder’s ideas 09:02 – Promoting 6 ideas 09:49 – Total number of paying customers 10:25 – Monthly revenue 10:49 – First year revenue 11:50 – 2015 revenue 12:07 – Goal for 2016 12:21 – Adding 30% to annual revenue 12:43 – Lifetime value 13:14 – What are you willing to spend as a CEO for an acquisition? 14:10 – Total value per new customer 15:01 – Total team size 15:10 – 100% remote 15:32 – Long-term goal for the business’ 16:20 – “Will you take a million dollar deal?” 16:47 – Ownership percentage 17:42 – Connect with Josh thru his Twitter and you can send him an email at josh@kickofflabs.com 19:58 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Evaluate your progress and study your growth. If you want to start with a business – explore on different ideas. Be a goal-oriented person. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @joshaledgard – Josh’s twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/29/2016 • 22 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 431: Agency Does $6m 2015, 41 Employees with Publisher/Advertiser Network CEO Nathan Putnamof Monumetric
Nathan Putnam, an entrepreneur who’s currently working on a company called Monumetric. Their focus?—help people unlock the earning potential behind online content through data analysis and optimization strategies. As Nathan says, “What we do is not magic. It’s science.” Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Start with Why, Reality Check, Leaders Eat Last What CEO do you follow? – Brian O’Kelley Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “No. Not close” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Look stop listening to music as entertainment. Remember, whatever you put in your brain, that's what's going to come out” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Nathan Putnam to the show 02:27 – Monumetric functions 03:44 – Current number of publisher partnerships 04:05 – Why people use Monumetric and not Google Analytics or AdSense 04:29 – Second price auction 04:58 – “Google is our best partner but also our greatest competition” 06:55 – Business was founded in 2014 07:07 – Started entrepreneurship in 2012 08:23 – Total revenue in 2014 08:40 – Got a few good publishers 09:18 – Sixsistersstuff.com 09:44 – Driving customers acquisition 10:20 – Monetize traffic 11:10 – Biggest costs 11:38 – Number of buyers and advertisers 11:43 – Six top-tier providers 12: 36 – The publisher on the six sisters’ site 13:04 – Integrated with 5 largest agencies 13:30 – Percentage that goes back to the seller 14:20 – In 2015, total amount of ads spend that went through the platform 14:35 – Cost structure of revenue 14:50 – Social or website traffic 15:19 – Disenchanted with agency’s space 15:45 – Use it in a way that reinforces the platform’s model 16:46 – “What you can monetize is what you own” 17:05 – Self-funded or boot strap 17:08 – Bootstrap 17:04 – Current team size 17:35 – Connect with Nathan thru his LinkedIn 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Utilize your platform to maximize its full potential. Build honest and genuine relationships. Always seek the opportunity. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Nathan linkedin Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/28/2016 • 22 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 430: $400k in 2015, Focused $30k Funnels In 2016 For Instagram Help with Sue B. Zimmerman
Sue Zimmerman, the creator of the online Instagram course Ready, Set, Gram! In addition to her popular instruction, Sue is also a powerful speaker on prominent stages like Social Media Marketing World, and a highly sought after business coach. She's passionate about teaching business owners and marketing professionals how to leverage the power of Instagram to get tangible business results. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Book Yourself Solid What CEO do you follow? – Sophia Amoruso Favorite online tool? — Dropbox Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Absolutely. I have to” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I knew how to collaborate with people who I knew, like and trust.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Sue to the show 02:40 – Sue’s focus at the moment 02:45 – How to leverage power of Instagram stories 03:04 – How Sue makes money in teaching 03:17 – Successful online courses 03:56 – Paid webinar 04:18 - Sent email to list of a little over 21,000 05:24 – Registration from the list 05:50 – Thousand seats for webinar 05:58 – UTM links 06:20 – Maximum revenue for successful campaign 06:26 – Between $5,000 and $10,000 on a week preparation 07:10 – How to manage priorities with the team 07:23 – Nurture sales funnel 07:48 – Ready, Set, Gram 08:43 – Partnered with trusted affiliate 09:27 – Business model 09:35 – Online marketing educators 09: 58 – Payment per student 10:09 – $700/month on a 6-month plan 10:33 – Create a micro community 11:25 – Total revenue for 2015 11:35 – Goal for 2016 12:03 – Closed her store last year 12:27 – Started her store in 2007 12:52 – Sue’s payment per speech 13:05 – First paid speaking gig 14:04 – Different ways to get compensation when you speak 14:40 – Connect with Sue thru her Instagram and use the hashtag #suebmademedoit and tag her and Nathan 17:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take the risk—removing something valuable from your live is worth it if that valuable thing keeps you from growing. It always feels good to be able to help and empower people. Focus on your priorities – teamwork always come in handy. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @suebzimmerman – Sue’s Instagram SueBZimmerman.com – Sue’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/27/2016 • 20 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 429: SaaS w/ 16,000 Customers, 2007 Launched to Help Schedule, with CEO Gavin Zuchlinski
Gavin Zuchlinski, the founder of Acuity Scheduling—the slickest way for businesses to automate and manage their appointments online, allowing clients to schedule themselves. He’s a self-professed tech geek and an espresso-maniac who wholeheartedly believes that business should be totally fun. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Anything You Want What CEO do you follow? – Andy Grove Favorite online tool? — Canary Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “8 and a half hour is my ideal number” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Spend more time doing the things you enjoy doing.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Gavin to the show 02:09 – Gavin is on his 4th espresso for the day 02:25 – How Acuity Scheduling generate sales 02:30 – SaaS to manage scheduling appointments online 02:48 – Developed for Gavin’s mother 03:00 – 2006 started 03:21 – Start of Gavin’s business 03:48 – 2007 first year in business 04:05 – Only a side project 04:54 – First year revenue 05:21 – Transition from working as a government employee 05:50 – Organic search results and SEO 06:24 – Had friends’ sign up on private link 06:45 – 2013 decided to shift 07:15 – Hired the first employee 07:50 – “Keep things small” 08:20 – Number of users on free trial 08:50 – Number of users at the moment 09:25 – 10% month over month increase 09:50 – Number of users in the past week 10:54 – 85% active users on paid accounts 11:46 – Most SaaS count their total base 12:57 – Growth from organic results and referrals 13:54 – “When the rate of growth gets too high, that’s when I need to hire” 14:07 – Total team size 14:18 – Everyone is remote 14:40 – Support works for only 6 hours a day 15:18 – Team size question is Gavin’s pet peeve 16:06 – Growth customer churn is about 8% per month 16:18 – Dashboard churn 16:40 – Current customer acquisition cost on average 16:55 – 10 dollars to acquire for paid acquisition 17:12 – Total marketing spender 18:07 – Total expected earnings from a new unique customer 18:58 – Monthly RPO 19:37 – Gavin’s bootstrap 19:50 – Goal for the company 20:08 – “Create a company where I enjoy working” 20:47 – Connect with Gavin thru his website and LinkedIn 22:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Sometimes, you just have to choose – and choose what makes you happy. Small team has advantages too – it’s easier to manage. Just be patient and let things grow slowly. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. AcuityScheduling.com – Gavin’s website LinkedIn – Gavin’s linkedin account Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/26/2016 • 25 minutes, 18 seconds
KitCRM, $38K MRR, 2000 Customers
9/26/2016 • 12 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 428: Super Creative Dad of 4 Buys Time By Minimizing Expenses, Launches Drone Info Company with Egbert Oostburg
Egbert Ootsburg, onto The Top. Egbert runs a company that designs apps for the scalding-hot consumer drone market. Listen as Egbert talks about his strong ambition to make a difference in the world and how he takes advantage of the drone market. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Andy Stanley Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “Are you kidding?” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “To get started faster and not to wait for something to occur before giving yourself permission to succeed” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Egbert to the show 02:06 – How Egbert generate money 02:18 – Open Skkye App 02:45 – Helps Drone pilots find places where to fly versus not fly 03:25 – 2015 total revenue 03:44 – Drone Aviator 05:00 – Leaving the corporate world 05:10 – Worked with Pfizer in 2009 05:38 – Biggest recommendation 05:55 – “There’s always a way to bootstrap something” 06:20 – Egbert did a consulting job 06:31 – Consulting revenue 07:07 – The gap between the pre-revenue and 2009 07:35 – Drone industry 08:25 – Creative ways to decrease expenses 08:36 – “Live on the basics that you need” 08:52 – Cut the monthly expenses to 45% of previous total 09:09 – 4 kids 09:46 – How much money you keep is NOT how much money you make 10:05 – Reason why Egbert’s business attracted investors 10:24 – Experience in aviation from Navy 11:05 – Anticipated revenue in the next quarter 11:55 – About half a million registered users 12:17 – New items every week 12:37 – Connect with Egbert thru his LinkedIn and Twitter 14:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Believe in the vision of what you’re doing and create value. It is about how much money you keep, not how much money you save. Get started faster. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Egbert’s linkedin account @EgbertOostburg - Egbert’s twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/25/2016 • 17 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 427: $1m+ Agency to Launch SaaS Product SegMetrics.com with CEO Keith Perhac
Keith Perhac onto The Top. Keith is a marketing expert, developer, and designer. His goal is to take complex things and make them simple, understandable, and actionable for business owners. Today he is the CEO of SegMetrics and DelfiNet, technical marketing agencies that help companies create highly optimized sales funnels. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Work the System What CEO do you follow? – N/A Favorite online tool? — HarvestApp Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s not as scary as jumping off and leaving the company that you’ve been working on for 6 years to start on your own.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:13 – Focus: DelfiNet or SegMetrics 03:02 – Founding day of SegMetrics and first revenue 04:20 – How SegMetrics is built 04:50 – Focused on building the greatest product 05:48 – Margins are better in SaaS 06:19 – Average sales per customer per month 07:10 – August Revenue 09:40 – 50% gross margins 10:15 – Biggest lever to increase profitability 11:02 – Traffic increased drastically 11:55 – Acquisition cost 12:16 – Biggest affiliate 12:33 – Second biggest affiliate 13:54 – Bootstrap 14:26 – Similar with Angel Investing 15:10 – The business’ worth 16:13 – Keith was based in Japan 16:38 – Developyourmarketing.com 18:57 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take advantage of your on-peak time. Turn your previous challenges into positive experiences. Don’t just focus on sales, focus on creating a great product. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Developyourmarketing.com – Keith’s website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/24/2016 • 22 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 426: 1500 Customers and Profitable, $5.5M Raised with Pablo Fuentes of Proven.com
Pablo Fuentes, founder and CEO of Proven—a company that specializes in small business HR solutions. In addition to his passion for helping both minorities and women start businesses, Pablo also owns a BA from UCLA and an MBA from Stanford. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Art of Learning What CEO do you follow? – Richard Branson Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Start Jiu-jitsu earlier” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Pablo to the show 02:04 – How Pablo’s business generates sales and collaborates with talent managers 03:21 – First year revenue in 2009 versus revenue in 2015 03:45 – How do you make money? 03:55 – When small businesses post a job 04:30 – Average pay per company location 04:51 – Average revenue per user 05:00 – Lifetime value 06:10 – Average churn = of 2 years 07:10 – August Revenue 08:10 – Subscription vs. pay as you go pricing 09:40 – 50% gross margins 10:15 – The biggest lever to increase profitability 11:55 – Company is fully remote 13:55 – Revenue goal for 2016 16:56 - @provenpablo 19:44 – What were you trying to raise before you stoped last year? 22:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t give up just yet – give your company a time to grow. Balance is everything. Have a goal and focus on pursuing it. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @provenpablo – Pablo’s Twitter handle. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/23/2016 • 25 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 425: $300k Webinar Sales Funnel Like You've Never Seen with Yuri Elkhaim
Yuri Elkaim, a nutrition fitness and fat loss expert, onto the podcast. Yuri is a New York Times best-selling author of “The All-Day Energy Diet” and “The All-Day Fat Burning Diet”. He's a former soccer player turned health crusader, and is most famous for helping people who've tried everything to lose weight but enjoyed very little success. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? – Peter Teal Favorite online tool? — Google Docs Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— About 7-8 If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Focus on one thing” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:34 – 25 million Youtube views 03:06 – Yuri’s focus on building now 03:59 – Webinars 04:11 – Conversion from the webinar 04:30 – Shut down the sales page 04:39 – Facebook Ad expenditure 05:21 – Totalwellnesscleanse.com 05:40 – Facebook ad look and landing page 06:17 – Eyelid test guide 07:00 – Number of webinars per month 08:00 – No domain for webinar 08:30 – Webinar sell price 09:05 – Webinar is a great tool for teaching 09:26 – Ways to normalize the funnel 09:30 – Cost per lead 10:38 – Number of viewers needed to get one new sale 11:00 – One webinar, they get 5 sales 15:14 – Call to action in Youtube videos 16:03 – Sample video titles from Youtube 16:50 – Get people to click on the ad before 30 seconds 17:10 – Youtube ad overlay 17:40 – Webinar Jam 18:02 – Total sales of cleansing product 18:35 – Yuri’s first episode with Nathan 19:05 – Check Yuri’s website and his group 21:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Gaining the trust of the customer is a like having a relationship—let them know you better. Utilize your online resources. Don’t be scared of changes—they can lead to a better opportunities. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. YuriElkaim.com – Yuri’s website Healthpreneurgroup.com – Yuri’s group Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/22/2016 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 424: SaaS Teckst Passes 65 Enterprise Customers, $2.5M Raised with CEO Matt Tumbleson
Matt Tumbleson is the founder and CEO of Teckst – a New York based startup that's transforming customer service by directly connecting consumers with businesses via 2-way text messaging. His own frustrations with lengthy hold times and incompetent customer service representatives are why he decided to launch Teckst. Prior to jumping into entrepreneurship, Matt worked as the Creative and Marketing director of Seamless (now Grubhub), and worked as a graphics journalist at The Miami Herald. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Delivering Happiness What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — WorkFlowy Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Stick to one thing long enough to see it through” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:37 – Nathan introduces Matt to the show 02:31 – What Matt does and how they make money 03:09 – Selling ROI 03:15 – Created software in a house in NY 03:33 – They have monthly subscription plan 03:50 – Currently have 5 clients 04:10 – How a client used Matt’s product 05:37 – Created encrypted SMS 06:40 – Works with Memebox 05:22 – How does Betterment use you? 06:40 – 65% gross margins on labor 06:55 – Matt put his own equity for the company 07:30 – How old were you when you launched this and did you feel comfortable leaving your job? 07:40 – Started in his late 20s 08:20 – 6 months deal 08:51 – Reason Matt left his job 09:13 – Launched Teckst in 2012 but officially launched in 2013 10:06 – First year revenue 10:45 – Total funding raised 11:40 – Enterprise client pay per month 11:50 – Thousands or tens of thousands monthly 12:05 – Number of team members 13:12 – Acquisition costs and churning 13:35 – Lost a client once 14:15 – Did Google Adwords 14:50 – Matt’s lifestyle 15:50 – Average the customer have to pay to get them on board 18:39 – Upside on quarterly business review 19:13 – MRR last month 21:17 – Connect with Matt on his LinkedIn and twitter @teckstco 23:53 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Think 10x. That’s how you should think regarding business. Even if you’re the CEO, you still need to learn and grow. If we can do everything right, we can hit all the numbers. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Matt’s LinkedIn account @teckstco – Matt’s Twitter handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/21/2016 • 26 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 423: Nigeria Agency Business $230k 2015, $1M+ 2016, 17 Employees and Growing Fast with Johnson Emmanuel
Johnson Emmanuel the founder and CEO of Clients Attraction, a company that specializes in online marketing strategies engineered to attract big-ticket clients. Listen as Johnson shares his story of starting a business in Nigeria, and how he used his passion for marketing to start chipping his path to the top. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Ultimate Sales Machine What CEO do you follow? – Richard Branson Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Focus on your marketing and charge more sooner. Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:20 – $230K in revenue in 2015 03:00 – How Johnson’s company makes money 04:00 – Johnson uses a lot of Infusionsoft with his clients 04:30 – When you’re selling a high value product, you don’t list your prices you have a conversation 05:15 – Johnson charges his clients between $5k and $20k per month 05:55 – Johnson’s top client paid $25K last year 07:30 – It’s important to learn, but don’t overstimulate yourself 08:15 – It’s normal to be afraid of raising your prices, but it’s a part of good business 08:45 – During Johnson’s first year in 2013, the company’s revenue was about $32K 11:08 – The catalyst to Johnson’s success was helping his clients understand the flaws within their marketing systems 12:39 – Johnson is based in Lagos, Nigeria and he employs 17 people 13:08 – The company’s goal is to hit $1M in 2016 14:00 -- $5k per day on PAID media 15:40 – Average cost per employee per month in Nigeria? $500 16:12 – To date, the business has worked with 30 unique customers 18:54 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you want to sell to high-value clients, you need to engage them in a conversation. If you engage in too many educational inputs, you’ll inhibit your own success. Charge more sooner. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/20/2016 • 22 minutes, 14 seconds
KitCRM, $38K MRR, 2000 Customers
9/19/2016 • 17 minutes, 24 seconds
EP 422: $2.6M 2015 Free Cash Flow On Luxury Car Business
Pejman Ghadimi, a self-made entrepreneur and best-selling author born in Iran, raised in France, and crushing it in the United States since 1997. Listen as Nathan and Pejman talk bottom-line numbers, exotic cars, and what it takes to build a multimillion dollar business from scratch. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Start With Why What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — N/A Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Take life more seriously. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Pejman to the show 02:15 – VIP Motoring 02:45 – At its core, VIP is an automotive investing service 05:00 – Legal bribery 06:30 – Pejman sharing his payout 06:56 -- $2.6M net cash flow 07:12 – What Pejman does with the money he takes from VIP Motoring 07:45 – Buying luxury assets 09:05 – The exotic car market allows people to get in and out of it quickly 09:34 – These cars aren’t meant to be driven, no one ever drives the cars, they never see public roads 11:10 – The industry and room for growth is limited by demand…the people buying these high-value cars are limited in supply 12:38 – Secret Entourage— A mindset, attitude, and a way of life. The relationships you form that revolve around yourself. The network that helps you be successful. The movement that. 13:30 – The entrance fee is $200 14:20 – Secret Entourage was not established as a revenue generating business 14:50 – As many as 36,000 sign ups in 2015 15:36 – How Pejman drives signups and facilitates exposure for his brands and drives new customers 17:50 – Pejman’s email list has 100K people, but he doesn’t use the list very often 19:40 – Nathan drill Pejman on the definition of “his movement” 20:59 – @ICreateMillionaires 23:16 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Obscure industries can be extremely profitable. Just because you have a massive email list, doesn’t mean you should exploit it. You will always be limited by demand so be aware of what that demand is. Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. @ICreateMillionaires – Pejman’s Instagram Handle Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/19/2016 • 27 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 421: SaaS Accounting $238k MRR, $4.2M Raised, 200 Customers with Ceterus CEO Levi Morehouse
9/18/2016 • 21 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 420: $70k 2015, $100k 2016 Infoproduct for Writers with Jordan Hayles
9/17/2016 • 20 minutes, 14 seconds
EP 419: 30 yo does $6m 2015, taking over $5b+ Moving Industry with Cam Doody of Bellhops.com
9/16/2016 • 26 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 418: Executive Recruiter Made $1.1M 2015, Super High Profit Margin with Matt Schwartz of MJSearch.com
Matt Schwartz, the president of MJS Executive Search –a 13-year old, New York based retained executive search firm that specializes in placing transformational talent to global Fortune 500 companies. His clients are included but not limited to Pepsi Co, American Express, Fidelity, New York Life, Equinox, and Pitney. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Profit First and Rework What CEO do you follow? – Gary Vaynerchuck Favorite online tool? — Send Later and Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I do If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Don’t follow the herd. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:44 – Nathan introduces Matt 02:44 – Why MJS Executive Search is different 02:51 – The trends have changed 03:45 – The roles placed for Pepsi Co 04:30 – Engineers for reinventing equipment 05:30 – We are there to tell the story 05:40 – The pitch MJS delivers 06:42 – How MJS make money through placing people on roles 07:41 – Our competition bills the entire fees in 90 days 08:15 – Founded MJS Executive Search in 2002 08:32 – First year revenue was $85,000 08:45 – Matt left Heidrick & Struggles with an $280K salary including bonuses 09:24 – They changed the complain significantly 10:35 – “I had nothing to lose.” 11:01 – MJS’ revenue in 2015 was $1.1M 11:14 – Revenue goal for 2016 is $1.4M 11:39 – Working with a team from Less Doing’s Virtual Assistance Services 12:19 – Nathan hates humans 12:40 – Matt spends $700 to $1000 monthly for a virtual assistant 13:17 – Bottom line profit in 2015 was $600K 13:31 – What the entrepreneur does to create wealth for himself 14:00 – Meeting with Michael Michalowicz 14:25 – I struggled with not knowing where my cash wash 14:34 – Bank balance accounting 15:57 – Matt wants to make sure he has security, funding, and business health 16:23 – Nathan’s struggle with his investments 17:04 – Matt can save up to $53,000/year from his bank balance accounting 17:24 – All on the profit first 17:43 – The average contract value from $80K to $100K 18:05 – Working with an average of 5 to 6 customers per year 18:21 – MJS is competing with the largest firms in the world 19:06 – Connect with Matt thru his email address and website 21:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: We are there to tell the story. Struggling without knowing where your cash is at. All on profit first. Resources Mentioned: Toptal– Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks– The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Profit First and Rework – Matt’s favorite business books Send Later and Trello – Matt’s favorite online tools Connect with Matt thru his email address and website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/15/2016 • 27 minutes, 24 seconds
EP 417 SPECIAL: Warner Interviews Latka: Con Artist or Brilliant Genius?
Sweeney Daniel, a partner at Hustle and Grow and Click Bank University. He launched his first company in high school which lead him to working full time in digital marketing. He decided to leave the corporate grind and is now focused on helping others create their digital business while maintaining a fun lifestyle. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday What CEO do you follow? – James Schramko Favorite online tool? — Clickfunnels and Drip Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Most of the time 7 and a half If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Spend money and invest in assets Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:34 – Nathan introduces Sweeney 02:04 – What Hustle and Grow is and how it generates revenue 02:11 – Marketing list, promoting digital products, and an agency 02:20 – Selling marketing and affiliate products and working closely with ecommerce partners 02:28 – Founded in 2016 02:38 – Hustle and Grow’s website 02:53 – 2016’s revenue will be close to $1M 03:17 – The most successful thing sold 03:39 – Partnership with Click Bank 04:01 – Providing digital products to Click Bank customers 04:48 – How Hustle and Grow landed the deal 05:05 – The pay and the partnership 05:50 – Commission based income 06:36 – Online Course Academy 07:25 – Sold about 100 07:03 – Sweeney worked with 4 7-figure businesses 08:06 –Why not another line of business? 08:21 – Sweeney was an employee earning $60K+commisions 08:55 – Sweeney’s tragedies in college 09:09 – “You need to have your ducks in a row in order for your business to grow.” 09:28 – If Sweeney’s dad didn’t pass away 09:53 – The before and after 10:51 – The trend from tragedy to realization 11:46 – Tragedy –one if the things that makes or breaks people 12:01 – Sweeney had 2 podcasts in the past 12:36 – Nathan’s experience with podcasts 13:08 – The big thing is that people puts out a course but doesn’t build a brand. 14:07 – Brand first, product second 14:17 – Connect with Sweeney on Facebook 15:53 – The Famous Five 18:32 - Grab FREE Facebook Ads and Ecommerce Guide for The Top Tribe 3 Key Points: You need to have your ducks in a row in order for your business to grow. Tragedy –one if the things that makes or breaks people. The big thing is that people puts out a course but doesn’t build a brand. Resources Mentioned: Toptal– Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks– The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday – Sweeney’s favorite business book Clickfunnels and Drip – Sweeney’s favorite online tools Connect with Sweeney on Facebook Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/14/2016 • 1 hour, 13 minutes, 1 second
EP 417: 26 yo goes from nothing to $1M with big partnership with Sweeney David
9/14/2016 • 20 minutes
EP 416: 4000 New SaaS Customers From Youtube On $100K Spend with Neil Patel of CrazyEgg
9/13/2016 • 26 minutes, 3 seconds
Datanyze $500k MRR, 500 Customers
9/12/2016 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
Ep 415: Phone Accessory Company Hits $2.5M Revenue 2015 with Noah Rasheta of iStabilizer
9/12/2016 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 414: $70M Raised, $30k ACV, SaaS Success VidYard
Michael Litt started his first video company, Redwoods Media, as his undergraduate thesis project. He then evolved with his partner to create another successful video software company, Vidyard. He has learned the value of supportive family and friends throughout his life as an entrepreneur. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Behind the Cloud What CEO do you follow? — Mark Benioff Favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — I try to. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – If you want to be an entrepreneur, surround yourself with people who love and support you. Focus on those relationships. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Michael 02:15 – He started at the University of Waterloo and Research in Motion 03:00 – He graduated at 25, and the Redwoods Media was built as his undergraduate thesis project 03:50 – He contracted businesses to sponsor their company 04:50 – They were passionate about the video company, and turned down jobs at places like Google 05:30 – Vidyard is a video platform for business 05:50 – They sell that technology to businesses on a monthly basis 06:10 – Average revenue per customer is about $30k 06:35 – They have an inside sales team 07:25 – Four categories of businesses and sales teams 07:50 – 132 people on their team, and they have almost doubled in the last year 08:15 – Growth pains are opportunities to learn 08:55 – Looking at retention instead of churn 09:25 – Gross retention is 95% 09:45 – Net retention is 135% 10:47 – They have raised $70 million in funding 11:00 – Customer acquisition cost is paid back in 1.5 years 11:15 – Average customer acquisition is $40000 11:45 – Customers stay for quite a long time, according to the numbers 13:27 – Why lifetime value is tricky 13:45 – They focus on payback period for their customers 14:25 – Being honest about their business and their numbers for customer acquisition costs 15:10 – They include hard costs, like any work supplies 15:40 – Total customers is private 16:05 – They are looking to triple the business for two years, and then double the business for the next three years 16:40 – It would show their potential to go public 17:00 – Building a fast growing, high-value business 17:25 – Tom Tunguz’s Blog 17:45 – Revenue is private. 18:15 – They broke through $1 million for their first full year of sales 18:45 – Michael has a holiday party every year at his office. 19:00 – Project Christmas has carried throughout their business 19:28 – The Fall is a great time to raise money 19:55 – Connect with Michael at Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn 22:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your first business ideas will develop into bigger, better projects. Be honest about your company and spending. Surround yourself with people who love and support you as you pursue your entrepreneurial dreams. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app Behind the Cloud - Michael’s favorite business book Gmail – His favorite tool, besides his own Tom Tunguz’s Blog – Learn about the best models that public companies use Connect with Michael at Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/11/2016 • 26 minutes, 46 seconds
EP 413: SaaS, $242k MRR, $13 Million Raised to Re-Invent Business Email with Mathilde Collin of FrontApp
Mathilde Collin, CEO and co-founder of Front. Her app has developed email and inbox features meant specifically for teams. Growing up in France, Mathilde realized that being an adult wasn’t fun—that getting a job usually meant a life of misery. She would not settle for that. She knew from the beginning that she had to create a job that she loved, and so Front was born. Famous Five: Favorite Book? - The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Patrick Collison Favorite online tool? — Front! and Slack. Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — Yes. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – We can be happy at work. Get a job you love. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Mathilde Collin 02:00 – Front App is an inbox for teams. 02:25 – A SaaS company founded in 2014 02:50 – She started the business when she was 22. 03:05 – She realized a lot of people didn’t like their job, and she wanted to solve that issue for herself. 03:35 – 2015 revenue was $1 million 04:00 – 1210 companies use Front 04:20 – A large variety of company sizes 04:50 – Why they raised millions in capital. 05:25 – Email is complicated, so you need to invest in resources and good engineering. 05:45 – She already had a loan from studying in France. 06:15 – They raised with key people who could help. 06:37 – They wanted to invest in hiring super qualified people. 07:05 – Team of 21 in San Francisco 07:15 – Monthly expenses are about $200k 07:50 – How did you get over the psychological barrier of that red line? 08:20 – Spending money when you have money. 08:35 – A more rational spending plan. 09:05 – She will keep that money in the bank. 09:45 – That extra money has allowed for growth. 10:20 – She has people under her responsibility. 10:55 – She has one cofounder. 11:05 – How they determined equity. 11:15 – An even split for people who will be there for the whole life of the company. 12:05 – They have no marketing team. 12:25 – She publishes content at blog.frontapp.com and @CollinMathilde on Medium and Twitter. 13:10 – Customer lifetime value: Customer churn is 3% 13:35 – Revenue churn is negative. 13:45 – They sell three plans. 14:10 – Selling the upsell versions to new teams in the same companies 15:00 – An inbound sales team 15:15 – Monthly and annual plans 15:35 – Lifetime value is about 33 months, or $6300 16:15 – Valuation was not disclosed 16:45 – Her goal is to make as many people possible happy at this company. 17:20 – They will try to go public eventually. 17:40 – They want to keep their product as it is, which would be difficult if it were acquired. 18:15 – Why customers churn 18:25 – They dislike how often changes happen. 19:05 – They grow 10% each month 19:30 – They would like to hit $300k this year. 19:45 – Connect with Mathilde on Twitter at @CollinMathilde 21:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get a job that you love. Starting a business is hard—all entrepreneurs go through challenges. In the early stages of your company, keep perfecting your product. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app blog.frontapp.com and @CollinMathilde on Medium and Twitter – Follow Mathilde and her company! The Hard Thing About Hard Things – The business book that completely changed Mathilde’s outlook on her business. Slack – The tool that Mathilde and her team use a ton at Front Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/10/2016 • 24 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 412: 5 Kids, $5 Million 2015 Agency Revenue With Joe Apfelbaum of AjaxUnion
Joe Apfelbaum of Ajax Union. Joe has had several successful six-figure businesses, and Ajax Union is no exception. The company did $4 million last year, and they have plans to hit $6 million for revenue this year. Take a few notes from Joe’s playbook and take your own business to six-figure success. Famous Five: Favorite Book? - Think and Grow Rich, Traction, and The Miracle Morning. Getting Things Done What CEO do you follow? — Tony Robbins Favorite online tool? — Google Docs, Trello and MailChimp Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — I sleep when I’m comfortable. Last night I got 9 hours of sleep If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – The importance of reading and studying books. Relationships matter. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Joe 02:35 – Joe just had his fifth kid 02:55 – Ajax Union was not his first six-figure business 03:30 – It started as a side gig 04:05 – They did $500000 in revenue in 2009 04:25 – 2015 revenue was $4 million 04:45 – They shifted to focusing on their bottom line 05:00 – Revenue per client is $10000 05:15 – A focus on giving better service, not bringing in more clients 05:25 – 20 employees 05:55 – Their goal for 2016 is 6 million 06:10 – Bottom-line margins were small in 2015 06:35 – He wanted to run a smaller business and lose less money 07:15 – The underlying cause of a lifestyle business 07:35 – Paying himself well and living a good life 08:00 – Take-home income was over $200k 08:50 – First year revenue was $500000 09:15 – Paid on a retainer basis 10:25 – Unparalleled marketing support 10:45 – Churn is irrelevant for this stage of the company 11:20 – They turn down clients. 11:35 – A focus on bottom-line growth this year 11:55 – Working with Jacobtime 12:30 – Joe is a killer marketer! 13:00 – Taking stable businesses and helping them take off 13:30 – An investor put in $1 million 14:05 – They wanted the partnership 14:45 – Valuation for his company was very good 15:30 – An angel investment 15:45 – Profit sharing 16:15 – His podcast, CEO Mojo 16:30 – Doing weekly interviews and figuring out the obstacles of getting to having six-figure businesses 17:10 – A goal to grow a database of content 17:25 – In the process of writing a book based on that content and creating courses 18:30 – The true value of documenting the stories of entrepreneurs 19:00 – He wants people to see that success in your business, life, and family is possible. 20:00 – People can follow Joe at Facebook.com/joeapfelbaum and on LinkedIn 20:20 – Snapchat and Instagram 22:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start your business as a side gig, and make the transition to owning your own business easier. Create a lifestyle business that gives you more freedom to live a happy life. Focus on the quality of the service you are providing before you start drawing in more customers. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app Think and Grow Rich, Traction, The Miracle Morning and Getting Things Done – Wherever you’re at with your life or your business, one of these books will be right for you! Google Docs, Trello, and MailChimp – Joe’s favorite online tools CEO Mojo – Follow Joe’s podcast to hear the stories of successful six-figure entrepreneurs Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/9/2016 • 28 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 411: She Made $1.1M 2015 Performance Arts Center, Now Coaching with Stacy Tuschl
Stacy Tuschl, who has maneuvered her way to the top with a brick-and-mortar business and has now entered the online world. She just launched her Level Up group coaching program, another step in the right direction as a true entrepreneur. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Virtual Freedom What CEO do you follow? — Amy Porterfield Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar’s gTasks Pro Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — Always. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Find a coach to work with immediately. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Stacy 02:15 – She has been in business since she was 18 02:40 – Her performing arts center and her online world are both sources of revenue 03:05 – She started teaching dance in her parents’ backyard when she was 18 03:25 – The business snowballed, and people started to pay her 03:45 – The company is now 11 years old 04:05 – Total revenue was 1.4 million 04:15 – Tons of expenses with a brick and mortar business. 04:35 – Profit margins were not great 05:15 – She pays herself a salary and does distributions 05:50 – She strategizes with her CPA 06:15 – A team of 14 06:25 – Payroll was $350000 last year 06:40 – Unique sales were 2000 in a week 07:20 – Her coaching started the last couple years 07:25 – She wanted to challenge herself and help other people 07:55 – Selling one-on-one calls evolved into group coaching 09:00 – One-on-one coaching helps you get to know your customers and their needs 09:35 – Group coaching was launched last week 10:15 – Using Facebook 10:35 – She has about 2000 people on her list 11:05 – People could trust her and get behind her 11:24 – Spending on Facebook ads is $1200 for the first two weeks 11:50 – How her consulting business is doing. 12:50 – It was launched in November 2015 14:00 – A win-win and a partnership with her affiliates 14:35 – Writing a book was not to make money. She wanted to establish her expertise 15:05 – She wanted to help people get their businesses on track. 15:20 – Her last speaking gig 15:35 – About 50 people attended 16:00 – She made that event perfect, to attract attention for the future 16:20 – Her last paid speaking was for $1000 17:05 – How to know if a speaking opportunity is right for you 17:20 – Look at the audience and the connections 17:40 – Epic Launch is going to help her relaunch the book 18:20 – Connect with Stacy and follow her podcast, Business Rescue Roadmap. 18:35 – Text “Levelup” to 24587 to join her free Facebook community. 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find ways to strategize and save with your brick-and-mortar business. Don’t be afraid to challenge yourself and take on new business ideas. Get to know your customers’ needs. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app Virtual Freedom – Stacy’s favorite business book gTasks Pro – A new Google Calendars application that syncs your tasks to your calendar Business Rescue Roadmap – A podcast to help you save your startup from going under Epic Launch – Help to launch your book to the top of Amazon Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/8/2016 • 23 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 410: From Worker to Owner Does $5m in 2015 Franchise Model with Josh Herron of 1800GotJunk
Josh Herron, one of Bryan’s best franchisers at 1-800-GOT-JUNK. Josh and his partner Tyler have been through the grinder as entrepreneurs, but they have now created a franchise worth millions. Learn about franchising and if it’s the right path for you to become a business owner and start seeing dollar signs. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Start with Why What CEO do you follow? — Jack Welch Favorite online tool? — iPhone Notes Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – All of your hard work will create something magical. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Josh 02:15 – Franchisers must be entrepreneurial by nature 02:35 – Josh got an opportunity to get into two franchises, and that was his first leap into entrepreneurship 03:10 – Wanting to be your own boss and becoming successful 03:40 – Josh was managing a 1-800-GOT-JUNK location when it got bought out by another owner, his friend Tyler 04:45 – It was an opportunity for Josh to work with someone that he got along with 04:58 – The business did $750000 the year before it sold to his friend 05:30 – It was very immature when Tyler was looking to buy it 06:15 – The deal was more about what was needed for the business to grow 06:30 – The previous owners were very motivated to get rid of it 07:15 – As the business progressed, they bought an OxiClean franchise as well 07:45 – They bought the company to add more money to their bottom line 08:35 – Starting from the ground up 09:23 – What should people look for when buying a franchise? 09:40 – You can learn from people who have done it before 09:57 – You have a lot of support from others 10:10 – You have more freedom than you might think 10:25 – Some franchises have more upfront expenses 11:20 – OxiClean did $200000 the first year, top line 12:00 – They sold the business for $100000 and broke even 12:35 – Last year he did $5.5 million top line 13:00 – How to expand it 13:10 – Buying out other partners 13:20 – Advertising and good employees 13:40 – A huge opportunity even in a small town 14:14 – What do you do with the bottom line? 14:30 – A lot is reinvested 14:40 – They want to expand their footprint 15:05 – How to become a millionaire as a franchiser 15:20 – You have great support and you can maximize your business 15:50 – He’s doing better than some of the other people he knows 16:10 – Connect with Josh on LinkedIn 16:30 – Follow their Facebook Page, 1-800-Got-Junk? Kansas City 18:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Franchisers must think like entrepreneurs to be successful. Owning a franchise will give you more freedom than you’d expect. If you run your franchise right, it can become a million-dollar business. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app Start with Why – Josh’s favorite book Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/7/2016 • 21 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 409: $250 Million 2015 Revenue with 1800GotJunk Founder Brian Scudamore
Brian Scudamore, who launched 1-800-GOT-JUNK. Brian’s unique perspective on his business drives him to take opportunities for growth, but he never wants to sell his company. He believes he must foster his vision to help others grow and evolve. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The E-Myth What CEO do you follow? — Robert Herjavec Favorite online tool? — All his iPhone apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – All the failures needed to happen so that he could learn. Never compromise on the people you bring into your organization. Take hiring seriously. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Brian 02:00 – How did you get into 1-800-GOT-JUNK? 02:20 – He needed to make money for college, and that was the beginning of his business 03:10 – First year revenue was super low 03:30 – He dropped out of university four years later and made $100k 04:00 – 1997 was his first million-dollar year 04:15 – He makes money by hauling away junk 04:30 – 2015 revenue was 215 million 05:05 – 250 franchise partners 05:50 – Charges to franchisers are population based 06:40 – Helping franchise owners to be successful by keeping fees low 07:10 – The average owner varies from $200000 to $1 million 08:10 – Why go into the franchise model? 08:20 – Building together instead of going it alone 08:40 – Collaboration between entrepreneurs 08:55 – A crowdsource model 09:30 – It is a private company, focused on growth 09:45 – He did not raise capital. 10:15 – He generates personal wealth by collecting dividends 10:45 – He doesn’t care so much about pulling money out for himself 11:05 – Wealth is watching people grow and evolve 11:20 – He has no board of advisors 11:30 – He likes one-on-one advice from mentors 11:45 – He is going to have a month-long stay-cation with his family 12:15 – A legacy plan is in place, but there is no formal board 13:00 – They get emails on a daily basis from people who want to pay him for the company 13:30 – His business is like his child—he wants to watch it grow 13:55 – He is open to partnerships, but he does not want to sell and risk losing his vision 15:00 – Go to o2ebrands.com 16:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Help your employees be successful Collaborate with a team instead of going it alone. Take hiring very seriously. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app The E-Myth – Brian’s favorite business book. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/6/2016 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
Cirrius Insights $640K MRR 100,000 Customers
9/5/2016 • 22 minutes, 40 seconds
EP 408: $100M Funds, $30k/mo Real Estate Cashflow, Conference Sales with Cole Hatter of Thrive
9/5/2016 • 19 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 407: 10,000+ $50 Museum Tour Tickets Sold with Nick Gray of Museum Hack
Nick Gray, founder and CEO of Museum Hack. Nick thought museums were SO BORING!! Before he launched Museum Hack, he used word of mouth to advertise his idea and give free museum tours to his friends. Now his business is making over 1 million dollars per year. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Power of Full Engagement What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Revue Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. Use SleepTracker. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Do less drugs. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Nick Gray 02:15 – How did you get into museums? 02:25 – “Renegade museum tours.” 02:40 – Revenue comes from charges for live tours 03:00 – Launched in 2013 03:10 – Over 10000 tours sold last year 03:20 – Total revenue was 1.3 million 03:30 – Average cost is $75 per tour 03:45 – Labor cost is $88 per person 04:15 – Net margin relies on high-end tours 04:40 – In the beginning, they got new customers from word of mouth 05:25 – First year revenue was $60k 05:45 – They want to attract people to keep coming back 06:00 – They need to up their repeat rate 06:15 – There are plenty of people to target 06:40 – He just started paying himself a salary 07:20 – His mom is his accountant 07:40 – He is learning to be a better CEO 07:50 – He supported himself with a full-time job at the beginning of the business 08:15 – He built up savings and committed to his museum business 08:40 – His last job gave him a very healthy salary 09:15 – He has always been a big saver 09:45 – His advice: Treating your passion like your job, and creating a demand by providing that product for free 10:30 – Some passions are worthless 10:45 – His team size is 12 full time and 25 part time, along with remote staff 11:15 – Expenses are up to $80k per month 11:40 – The pressure to break even does not worry him 12:10 – Moms and their lectures on receipts 13:10 – A connection with Trip Advisor 13:50 – “It was just a fluke.” 14:05 – His goal for this year is 2.2 million 14:15 – Museumhack.com and NickGray.net 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create a demand for your product by offering it for free. Treat your passion like your job until you can transition to that passion full time. Build up your savings, and be willing to take risks. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app The Power of Full Engagement - Nick’s favorite business book Revue – Nick’s favorite online tool NickGray.net – Read Nick’s weekly newsletters Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/4/2016 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 406: The Ad Genius Behind Amy Porterfield and Melanie Duncan with Chris Evans of Traffic and Funnels
Chris Evans, cofounder of Traffic and Funnels. Surrounded by incredible entrepreneurs, Chris decided that it was his time to build a success empire. His business Traffic and Funnels has taken a smart approach to business: They have focused on their strengths to get revenue, and now they are ready to expand. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – King Icahn What CEO do you follow? — Trump and Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Find and invest in a mentor Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Chris 01:55 – Chris worked with a lot of amazing entrepreneurs and decided to build his own empire 02:40 – He helps experts built client acquisition systems 03:00 – 1 $5500 product, and an upsell 03:25 – Traffic and Funnels is a slick website 03:40 – The numbers 03:50 -- $660000 in revenue for 2016 so far 04:30 – The problem with paid marketing 04:50 – Understanding the market and validating the product 05:15 – The biggest mistake is not understanding that market. 05:40 – The higher value products had a larger margin for error 06:00 – Cost to acquire a client is $400 to $700 06:15 – Solid revenue goals 06:40 – Advice for the info-product space 07:00 – Have clarity 07:30 – You need a target and a specialization 07:50 – Track your numbers and know what you need to break even 08:00 – How do you think about stages for scaling? 08:25 – The revenue must keep up with the spending. 08:50 – Know your business model and your plan. 09:10 – Work your way backwards. 09:25 – Take out any emotion. 09:45 – An evergreen business 10:00 – A launch-style business is more stressful up front 10:20 – You have to be smart and build credibility. 10:50 – Why this model? 11:10 – To build up a kiddy and launch their own evergreen info product 11:35 – Starting with their biggest strength 11:45 – Building stability and growing 12:10 – Taking on more employees does not scare him. 12:30 – They can get through adversity. 12:44 – Go to trafficandfunnels.com and Facebook.com/chrisaevans 14:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start with your biggest strength until your business has stability. Create a plan and work your way backwards. Understand the market and validate your product. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. King Ichahn - Chris’ favorite business book Slack – Chris’ favorite online tool Toptal – Great for people to get access to software developers Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/3/2016 • 17 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 405: 409A Valutions, Cap Table Pro-Formas and More with Jonathan Gass of NomadFinancial
Jonathan Gass of Nomad Financial. Jonathan founded his company because he decided to focus his career on entrepreneurship and startups. His business works with startups to help them make smart financial plans and fundraising decisions. Today we’ll learn from him about what pitfalls to avoid in our own startups. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Give and Take What CEO do you follow? — Johnny Rockefeller, of the book Titan Favorite online tool? — Audible Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — I try for 7 to 8. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – Listen to your gut when you are making decisions. Focus on culture. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:35 – Nathan introduces Jonathan 02:10 – His main focus is entrepreneurship 02:25 – He saw the same problems with most startup founders 02:50 – They weren’t setting up their accounting systems to support decision making 03:10 – He worked for Vimeo a few years ago 03:25 – They had to pitch what set them apart from YouTube and other companies 03:55 – Building tools to support video makers 04:10 – Nomad Financial generates revenue for a number of services, paid for by the hour. 04:30 – Their employees specialize in helping startups 05:25 – A role as an advocate 05:45 – Pushback from auditors 06:00 – Staying on top of trends 06:20 – What is a 409a valuation? 06:58 – Startups mix that up with a valuation for selling stock. 07:30 – Mistakes early entrepreneurs make with cap tables 07:40 – No consistent terms 08:15 – Even the software can’t always solve those problems 09:00 – Understanding the implications of sale 09:15 – One man who had an option to sell his company, but wasn’t really going to make any money 10:10 – Nathan’s interview with Teachable (Episode 117) 11:00 – Explaining preferred shareholders 11:35 – Investors that ask for really aggressive terms 12:00 – Be careful with the terms in your agreement 12:35 – Smart money vs. “plain dollars” 12:55 – People who are there to actually help the business 13:25 – Understanding the goals of your investors 14:50 – The importance of a fit culture and a fit vision 14:40 – The friendliest investor for the entrepreneur 15:00 -- Great term sheets, and providing great value 15:15 – Interplay investors 16:10 – Jonathan is making about 4 or 5 investments each year. 16:35 – Seed-stage and a-round investments 17:00 – Why put a portion of your portfolio into startups? 17:20 – You keep that portion for that, and you use the other portion for other things. 17:45 – Living for entrepreneurship and believing in these startups. 19:00 – Connect with Jonathan at j@nomadfinancial.com and nomadfinancial.com 20:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Set up your accounting to support decision making in your startup. Be aware of your investor’s goals and what value they will contribute to your company. You need a cohesive culture and vision, among founders and investors. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Give and Take – A business book that teaches philosophies Jonathan lives by Interplay – A reliable team of investors and partners Toptal – Great for people to get access to software developers Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/2/2016 • 25 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 404: $360k June 2016 MRR, $4M ARR, 5000 customers paying $72/mo on average with DaPulse founder Roy Man
Roy Man, CEO of Dapulse. Dapulse is a tool designed to solve “inherently problematic” management strategies in businesses. The company has a philosophy of being transparent with their revenue and numbers, all of which you can find on their Instagram page. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Avishai Abrahami Favorite online tool? — FullStory Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — No regrets. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Roy Man 01:50 – What is Dapulse? 01:55 – A management tool for your company 02:20 – Solving something that was “inherently problematic” 02:30 – A SaaS business launched in February 2014 03:00 – Currently over 5000 customers 03:20 – Each company, or customer, pays a certain amount, depending on their team size 03:50 – Total MRR in June was $360k 04:15 – See screenshots of their numbers on Instagram 04:50 – They have raised $9 million 05:00 – They started with raising $1.5 million 05:40 – The startup mentality 06:20 – Their valuation was 3.53 million 07:00 – A solid product with a good market 07:15 – A year of product marketing and finding what people were using for management 07:50 – “People think in tables.” 08:25 – The product market fit 08:45 – They started to launch and scale and did a convertible note 09:10 – Their last round of funding was $5 million, with a post valuation of $28.5 million 09:45 – First year revenue was less than a million 10:20 – Customer acquisition cost varies 11:10 – Average is about $600 11:55 – Monthly customer churn is 2% 12:20 – Negative revenue churn 13:30 – Lifetime value is great 14:20 – Churn is not relative in terms of money 14:40 – As you scale, some customers will leave 15:10 – Expand your customer circle as much as you can 15:25 – Team size is about 35 15:40 – Total 2015 revenue was about 3 million 16:35 – Connect with Roy at roy@dapulse.com 17:05 – Roy’s Blog on Medium 19:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create a product that has strong market potential. Spend time getting to know what your customers will want out of your product or service. Expand your customer circle as much as you can. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. FullStory – Roy’s favorite online tool The Hard Thing About Hard Things – Roy’s business book recommendation Toptal – Great for people to get access to software developers Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
9/1/2016 • 22 minutes, 52 seconds
EP 403: $650k Raised, Finland SaaS Copmany, 600 Customers with PromoRepublic.com
Max Pechersky, co-founder of PromoRepublic. His company focuses on helping marketing freelancers get new ideas and strategies for content marketing. As PromoRepublic continues to grow, the company is stretching its boundaries to provide more products for freelancers. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Intercom on Product Management What CEO do you follow? — Favorite online tool? — Wunderlist Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — Almost never. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — It’s ok if someone doesn’t like me. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Max 02:05 – The co-founder of PromoRepublic 03:00 – He owns thirty percent of the company 03:20 – It’s a software service that helps with content marketing. 03:45 – Solving the frustrations of marketing freelancers 04:10 – The business was founded at the end of 2013 04:45 – First year total revenue – 30000 euro 05:00 – Now he has 10k in recurring revenue 05:50 – Total customers: 600 06:10 – Customer pricing is about $12 per month 07:00 -- $650000 raised 07:30 – It was a grant and a soft loan. 08:00 – Churn monthly is 8% 08:50 – They had to decide which customers to focus on 09:30 – They moved to freelance marketers 09:50 – It’s about $100 in acquisition cost 10:30 – The average person stays for about a year. 11:14 – Additional revenue streams 11:25 – Social media templates 11:40 – Like stock photos for social media posts 12:00 – Max@PromoRepublic.com 13:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Channel your product toward a specific market. When you start to see success, look for additional revenue streams. Come up with an idea that solves a fundamental problem. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Toptal – Great for business people to start building their app Wunderlist – Max’s favorite online tool Intercom on Product Management – Max’s favorite business book Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/31/2016 • 16 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 402: 25 Years Old, $32 Million Raised, $11 Million 2015 Transaction Volume with Brian Wong of Kiip
Brian Wong, who started his company Kiip after getting laid off. As his company has grown and matured, his cofounders have moved on. But Brian is incredible grateful for his company and believes in sticking to your decisions and putting your whole heart and soul into your business. Now Kiip is on track to make $20 million this year, so he must be doing something right. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Predictably Irrational What CEO do you follow? — Evan Spiegel Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Stop taking everything so seriously. Everything is going to work out. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan introduces Brian 01:50 – Kiip is embedded into apps, and it rewards you for achievements in those apps 02:45 – 50/50 revenue share with brands who provide the rewards 03:20 – The economics of partnering with a brand like Gatorade 04:00 – Customers must claim the award for either company to get money 05:00 – Why they use email to deliver the awards 05:38 – Brian’s journey to where he is now, at age 25 06:00 – He found himself in business development 06:55 – Laid off in 2010 07:00 – He met with a few venture capitalists, and a startup seemed like the right direction 08:00 – He and his two cofounders got started 08:30 – They started with $300k 09:30 – Total capital now is $32 million 09:45 – Last year’s revenue was $11 million 10:00 – Margins are increasing as they are becoming more efficient 10:40 – Reducing server costs, marketing costs, and creating different revenue streams 11:25 – They have a unique revenue model that brings in “new money” 12:35 – Engagement rate is 10% 13:10 – Both of Brian’s cofounders have left to do other things 13:45 – How Brian feels about his company’s growth 14:15 – “At the end of the day, it’s what your exit is.” 14:50 – He feels thankful for what he has with his company 15:15 – “Make your decision and don’t look back.” You can always dream about what could be better or different, but follow through and stay committed to what you have. 16:50 – Goal for 2016 is $20 million 17:00 – Hopes to grow the margin more 17:15 – Twitter @brian_wong and Snapchat at bwong91 19:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you make a decision, completely commit to that decision. It does no good to daydream about what could be better or different. Channel that energy into improving what you have. Take advantage of an opportunity when it is put in front of you. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Evernote – Brian’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/30/2016 • 22 minutes, 51 seconds
LeadGenius $700K MRR, 200 Customers
8/29/2016 • 17 minutes, 24 seconds
EP 401: Quit $180k Microsoft Job to Launch Own Startup with KarmaCircles CEO Deepak Goel
Deepak Goel, the mastermind behind his new company KarmaCircles. Deepak says the company is the next-generation LinkedIn. He believes he has found his calling in life as an entrepreneur in the social networking niche. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Give and Take What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn Favorite online tool? — Mint, Appear.in Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — Absolutely. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t stay in a company for more than two years. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Deepak 01:50 – KarmaCircles is an app that connects entrepreneurs with successful business people 02:55 – Pilots with business schools and corporate companies 03:15 – No money the first year 03:30 – What companies are similar to KarmaCircles 04:20 – A LinkedIn of the future 05:00 – All free pilots right now 05:45 – Why they are not charging for the app now 06:40 – Will the customers pay when they make that shift? 07:10 – If customers like the product, they will stay 07:40 – Target annual contract value size 07:55 – 500 users per month for business schools 08:45 – It can be used by any company that does networking 09:00 – Much larger contracts for corporate companies 10:10 – Capital from six angel investors 10:40 – 6 people on their team 10:50 – They pay $3000/month for six engineers 11:40 – Differences between them and the company Clarity 12:00 – Social networking is Deepak’s “life calling” 13:00 – Karmacircles.com/Deepak 15:00 – Giving of yourself for free will circle back to you 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find the industry that you were made for. If you give to others freely, you will see karma come back around to you. Believe in your business and set high expectations. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Mint – Deepak’s favorite online tool Appear.in – A video conversation tool that requires no download Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/29/2016 • 21 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 400: AdEspresso Hits $20M Valuation, 4000 Customers, $400k MRR with CEO Massimo Chieruzzi
Massimo Chieruzzi, CEO of AdEspresso. His company, founded in 2013, is now so profitable that he says they don’t need fundraising! Massimo sees only growth for AdEspresso in the future as Facebook ads continue to evolve and improve. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Predictably Irrational What CEO do you follow? — Rand Fishkin Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t start a startup. Get some experience for a corporate business first. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Massimo 01:30 – AdEspresso was first on The Top on Episode 70 01:50 – Focus on growing and reducing churn 02:25 – Revenue is about $400k/month 02:38 – 2015 total revenue was $3M 02:50 – Fundraising has reached $1.8 Million 03:30 – “We have been profitable this last year, so we don’t need the money.” 04:00 – More than 4000 customers 04:45 – Learn about AdEspresso at Adespresso.com 05:00 – Churn is 7% and is decreasing 06:00 – How long their customers stay 07:10 – 35 people on their team 07:20 – Monthly expenses are around $280k 07:45 – They are growing by at least 15% every month 08:00 – How the company is sustainable 08:30 – Customer acquisition is less than $10 08:45 – Paid acquisition is only content promotion 09:20 – They were founded in 2013 09:30 – What would Massimo sell his company for? 10:20 – @MassimoCw on Twitter or massimo@adespresso.com 12:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Allow yourself to gain knowledge from different experiences. Find ways to lower your acquisition costs. Get into an industry that has a long life ahead of it. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. HubSpot – Massimo’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/28/2016 • 16 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 400: AdEspresso Hits $20M Valuation, 4000 Customers, $400k MRR with CEO Massimo Chieruzzi
Massimo Chieruzzi, CEO of AdEspresso. His company, founded in 2013, is now so profitable that he says they don’t need fundraising! Massimo sees only growth for AdEspresso in the future as Facebook ads continue to evolve and improve. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Predictably Irrational What CEO do you follow? — Rand Fishkin Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t start a startup. Get some experience for a corporate business first. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Massimo 01:30 – AdEspresso was first on The Top on Episode 70 01:50 – Focus on growing and reducing churn 02:25 – Revenue is about $400k/month 02:38 – 2015 total revenue was $3M 02:50 – Fundraising has reached $1.8 Million 03:30 – “We have been profitable this last year, so we don’t need the money.” 04:00 – More than 4000 customers 04:45 – Learn about AdEspresso at Adespresso.com 05:00 – Churn is 7% and is decreasing 06:00 – How long their customers stay 07:10 – 35 people on their team 07:20 – Monthly expenses are around $280k 07:45 – They are growing by at least 15% every month 08:00 – How the company is sustainable 08:30 – Customer acquisition is less than $10 08:45 – Paid acquisition is only content promotion 09:20 – They were founded in 2013 09:30 – What would Massimo sell his company for? 10:20 – @MassimoCw on Twitter or massimo@adespresso.com 12:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Allow yourself to gain knowledge from different experiences. Find ways to lower your acquisition costs. Get into an industry that has a long life ahead of it. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. HubSpot – Massimo’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/28/2016 • 0
EP 399: $1m+ Mattresses Sold using Toptal.com with Adam Tishman of HelixSleep
Adam Tishman, cofounder of Helix Sleep. His company gives every customer a custom-made mattress that is even more affordable then retail brands. With several options, customers can come up with hundreds of different combinations to build their perfect, individualized mattress. Learn about Helix Sleep’s goals to continue expanding and to provide the best customer experience. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Made to Stick What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Gross Favorite online tool? — Moat.com Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—About 7. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Learn about customer lifetime value and customer acquisition. Take risks earlier. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Adam 01:45 – Helix Sleep 01:55 – Custom-made mattresses 02:20 – The price is always the same for the consumer 02:50 – Costs to produce are up to $500 in the mattress industry 03:50 – Net margin 04:20 – Growth of the business 04:35 – Founded a year ago 04:45 – Thousands of mattresses already sold 05:10 – Acquisition 05:40 – Podcasts and radio 06:30 – Really successful in the mattress industry 07:05 – A business model that they can scale 08:10 – A simple game, with one product 08:30 – They use their revenue to fuel growth 09:50 – Capital 10:10 – Seed round just under $1M 10:45 – Team of 16 11:00 – First year revenue was lower than their monthly revenue now 11:55 – The technology 12:10 – An algorithm to make the customized mattresses 12:25 – Coding is outsourced 13:10 – The process for finding a developer on Toptal 14:25 – Everyone is pre-screened 14:50 – Legally, you still own the code 15:20 – More affordable 16:10 – Why they chose Toptal 17:00 – Churn is not a focus for this type of business 17:40 – Focus on building the brand 17:55 – The customer experience 18:14 – Hundreds of skews 19:35 – Goals for 2016 20:35 – helixsleep.com, blog.helixsleep.com, and Adam Tishman on LinkedIn or adam@helixsleep.com 23:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a way to provide high-quality products at a more affordable price. Take risks earlier, and jump up the business ladder. Come up with a business model that can be scaled. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Moat.com – Adam’s favorite online tool to see how he compares to his competitors Toptal – A platform for finding freelancers Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/27/2016 • 27 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 398: 5 Million Users, $250k in MRR, SaaS Founder Michael Hollauf of MindMiester.com
Michael Hollauf, cofounder and CEO of MeisterLabs. The company works to provide resources to collaborate across digital platforms. Now they are introducing a new service, MeisterTask, which focuses on better task management and a fun user experience. Hear about how MeisterLabs has hit the ground running and is continuing to introduce new tools to help businesses and entrepreneurs succeed. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rich Dad Poor Dad What CEO do you follow? — Stewart Butterfield Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Buy a flat in London. Be bold. Do it earlier. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Michael 01:35 – Managing director of MeisterLabs 02:20 – MeisterTask 03:10 – Trello was their inspiration 03:40 – Better task management 04:00 – Something more fun to use and focused on tasks 04:15 – 550000 users 05:10 – 60% of the downloads are through the app store 05:30 – Some features only available in the premium model 06:00 – 5000 paying customers 06:50 – Why people upgrade 07:00 – Better integration 07:20 – Funding 08:00 – MeisterTask revenue for 2015 was $20k 08:20 – MindMeister was $2.5 M 08:35 – Monthly recurring was $220k 09:00 – 5 million users 09:15 – 30000 paying customers Collaboration for mind maps 10:10 – Cost to acquire a new customer is about $30 10:30 – 27% annual churn 11:50 – Average customer stays for about 20 months 12:05 – Monthly plan was changed to a longer plan, which increased retention 12:30 – How MindMeister is growing 12:40 – about $25k/month on Google Ads 13:00 – best keyword is “mind mapping” 13:30 – Competitors 14:00 – Goal for the business is to create a suite of products 14:50 – MeisterTask valuation 16:00 – Michael Hollauf on LinkedIn 16:22 – michael@meisterlabs.com 28:35 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to draw from ideas of existing companies. Establish your end goal for your business. Be bold. Start your business early. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Trello – A similar service to MeisterTask that inspired Michael Slack -- Another online tool that inspires Michael and his team Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/26/2016 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 397: ProsperWorks SaaS 40k Paying Customers, Announces New Funding Adding to $10M Already
Jon Lee, CEO of ProsperWorks. Jon has jumped to many different industries, from gaming to tech to banking. As an entrepreneur with success in multiple companies, he believes in going after your business goals as soon as possible. Listen to his journey through his businesses and how he ended up with ProsperWorks. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? — Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Google Apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Start your companies earlier. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Jon Lee 02:10 – “Banking to tech to Yahoo to gaming” 02:40 – He saw a need for advertisers when he worked for Yahoo 03:10 – Bizarre Advertising 03:25 – They automated the business 04:10 – How they got revenue 04:35 – Started in their apartment in Palo Alto 04:50 -- $47-million business in two years 05:10 – Applied algorithms to find success 05:35 – Bound to confidentiality on the exit value 06:00 – Balance between cost and revenue 06:40 – How he got into the gaming industry 06:45 – Background in mathematics 07:00 – DNA games 07:15 – They could provide different gaming experiences according to the customer 08:00 – Stickiness is measured according to a customer’s engagement 08:20 – Lifetime value helped companies build better games and make more money 09:10 – They sold when Facebook changed their gaming policies 09:50 – They partnered with a larger company 10:10 – ChefVille 10:40 – A good exit for the investors and the company 11:00 – ProsperWorks 12:00 – CRM 12:10 – Partnering with Google Apps 12:30 – Problems with bad data 13:00 – Automating the data entry 13:30 – They have raised of $10 million 14:20 – Founded in 2011 14:30 – A SaaS platform 14:40 – 40000 customers 14:55 -- The Famous Five 15:00 – Profitable sales and marketing 15:15 – Free two-week trial 15:45 – You want a profitable acquisition 16:00 – Focus on building great partnerships and relationships 16:35 – For every $1 spent, they get a $6 return 17:10 – A less mature product needs funding to get customer feedback 17:35 – Team of 67 17:50 – Diminishing marginal returns 18:15 – Invest and get the right type of customer 18:30 – Building up the sales team 19:15 – Average customer pays $49 19:50 – Majority of their contracts are annual 20:30 – Focus to build a useful product 21:00 – Attracting small and medium-sized businesses 21:30 – Revenue churn is negative 23:00 – Jon Lee on LinkedIn or Twitter @prosperworks 3 Key Points: If you have an entrepreneurial spirit, pursue your ideas immediately. Be realistic about what is best for your company. Partner with big companies to gain credibility. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Google Apps – The online tool that has partnered with ProsperWorks Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/25/2016 • 28 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 396: Why He Raised $3m Then Merged With #1 Competitor
Kevin Davis, who came up with a creative solution for tech support. After waiting weeks to get his computer back from the Geek Squad, he thought there had to be a quicker, better solution. He created Geekatoo as a platform for people to find tech experts in their own neighborhoods. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Jason Calacanis’s Podcast What CEO do you follow? — Not really, I look at other marketplaces. Favorite online tool? — Base Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Make sure that you get your startup out as soon as possible. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Kevin 01:50 – Musician, tech guy, and geek 02:10 – Geekatoo, “like an Uber for tech support” 03:00 – They started out aiming for a nationwide company 04:10 – A platform 04:50 – Founded in 2010 04:55 – First-year revenue was literally nothing 05:30 – It took over a year to get the product out 06:20 – He supported himself by living back home 07:00 – Now it is much quicker to bootstrap a launch 07:45 – They take a percentage for every job that comes through 08:00 – Switched to solving larger-level problems 08:50 – Three different plans and other services 09:30 – Customers are covered for the long term 10:00 – Onboarding takes people from one service to a monthly plan 10:30 – Total customers is 40000 10:50 -- $2.7 M in capital 11:10 – 2015 revenue was almost $4 M 11:25 – Biggest costs 11:50 – Provider payout and overseas center 12:25 – Ad words 13:20 – A focus on positive economics 14:15 – Average project value is about $130 14:40 – Acquisition cost is $20 to $30 15:15 – A large volume of customers had $0 acquisition cost 16:00 – Reasoning behind the merger with HelloTech 17:35 – “A bigger pie” 18:00 – New partners coming forward 18:35 – kevin@hellotech.com or @geekatoo on Twitter 21:15 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t worry about perfecting your business—get it out there as quickly as possible Do what is best to help your business grow. Find a simple way to communicate with your customers. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Base – Kevin’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/24/2016 • 26 minutes, 40 seconds
EP 395: Survival Frog Does $4.7M in 2015, 25% Gross Margin, 10% Net with Founder Byron Walker
Byron Walker, owner of Survival Frog. Byron is passionate about scaling businesses that will change the world. Hear the breakdown of Survival Frog and what launched this company into huge success. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Ready Aim Fire! What CEO do you follow? — No Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Welcome adversity. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Byron 01:40 – Survival Frog 02:00 -- $4.7 million last year 02:20 – Started in 2009 02:30 – Info publishing company 03:00 – One product exploded in 2012 03:30 – 500000 purchases 03:50 – How they got the first sales 04:00 – Paid traffic 04:10 – Banner ads and paid email 04:20 – What is paid email 05:15 – Conversations are around 3 to 5 percent 05:20 – Split testing to find the right price 05:55 – Upsells make money for them 06:15 – Average profit is $5 06:30 – Over a million spent on paid marketing 07:00 – How to buy email lists 07:15 – List brokers 07:40 – Dedicated Emails, Bryan Litman 07:50 -- James R. Whalen 08:30 – Short emails get people to the landing page 08:55 – Now they are 100% physical products 09:50 – Gross margin is up to 35% this year 10:15 – 15 team members 10:40 – Products are sourced and bought in bulk 11:50 – Buying power with companies 12:10 – Forecasting the right amount of inventory 12:45 – LinkedIn or survivalfrog.com 14:40 – Discovery Channel on Blue Collar Backers 16:30 – Hundreds of thousands of units moved 17:00 – Profit in 2015 was $500k 17:35 – Valuation for the business 18:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Adjust your business model to improve your margins. Challenges in your life will put you on a better, more rewarding path. Continue doing what you are passionate about. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. James R. Whalen and Dedicated Emails – Email list brokers Evernote – Byron’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/23/2016 • 21 minutes, 4 seconds
EP 394: Create SnapChat Stories Like Featured Brands, 20k Views Each Snap
Hamza Amir, who is the CEO of Blurbiz. As a marketing guru working for household names like Disney and Coca-Cola, Hamza saw a problem in the industry with mobile videos. He kept hearing the same complaints, but no one was doing anything about it. Hamza came up with the solution when he created Blurbiz. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Mark Suster: msuster on Snapchat Favorite online tool? — Scoutapp Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Move to Silicon Valley faster. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Hamza 01:40 – He is not the guy behind the Chewbacca mask 02:00 – Blurbiz assists with mobile ad videos 03:00 – Up to $5000/month per account 03:20 – 20 customers right now 03:40 – He used to do influencer marketing work 04:05 – He saw a gap in mobile content 04:35 – Blurbiz was the solution to that gap 04:40 – Expected to raise $2 M by the end of the month 05:05 – They are working out terms with a new investor 05:20 – Angel funding 07:00 – His advice for entrepreneurs about investing 07:20 – Competitors 08:00 – “Fundraising is more of an art than a science.” 09:05 – How to use the service 09:20 – Create and publish a video from your mobile device 09:50 – Creating a Snapchat through Blurbiz 10:50 – Allowing companies to use different platforms 12:20 – Funds go to the business first. Anything left over goes to salaries. 13:00 – Salary was $2500 last month 13:20 – Twitter: @hamza3amir and Snapchat: hamza3amir 16:00 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If there is a persistent problem in an industry, come up with a solution. Understand the best types of fundraising for your new business. Make a business that stems from your expertise. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Scoutapp – Hamza’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/22/2016 • 19 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 393: How to Do Your Own Thing at 22 with Danavir Sarria of CopyMonk
Danavir Sarria. After working as a freelance copywriter, Danavir wanted to stop working with clients and start working for himself. He created CopyMonk, a service that teaches people how to increase sales by producing effective copy. At only 22 years old, Danavir is making a place for himself as an expert copywriter. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rework What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuck Favorite online tool? — MindMeister Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Focus on your efforts, and not on your passion. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Danavir 01:40 – CopyMonk 02:15 – Total revenue is $6k in two months 02:30 – How he became a copywriting expert 03:00 – 1700 people on his email list 03:40 – 40 sales over four days 04:20 – How to manage his email list 04:45 – Teach people and build a relationship 06:00 – How you know if someone is a good copywriter 06:30 – Sales and good engagement 07:00 – Knows copy and marketing 08:00 – Connecting with people who read your content 08:15 – Freelance copywriting 09:30 – Working with clients makes it hard to see results 10:20 – How he improved one business 11:30 – Client work vs. working for himself 12:25 – Copymonk.com or their Facebook page 14:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on your efforts and your expertise. If you don’t like working under someone else, start your own business. When you write copy, find ways to connect to your audience. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. MindMeister – Danavir’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/21/2016 • 18 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 392: 3M Publishers Use Issu, 100,000 Have Paid with CEO Joe Hyrkin
Joe Hyrkin, CEO of Issuu. Joe enjoys working in the publishing industry because it is driven by passion. It is a collective space for people who are moved about something to experience that thing together. Listen as Joe talks about Issuu, which has brought the publishing industry into a modern, digital context. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing about Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Not now. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Put in effort to make an impact. Have a broader learning perspective. Care and effort matter over anything else. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Joe 01:40 – Issuu is a modern media company 02:20 – Tools for publishers 02:45 – Access to premium tools brings in revenue 03:05 – Revenue from Issuu itself 03:40 – Started in Copenhagen 03:55 – A more current platform of digital media 04:15 – He was not part of the original founding team 04:50 – A focus on giving great content to people who are passionate about it 05:20 – It grew through word of mouth and digital marketing 05:30 – Over 3 million publishers have used Issuu 06:20 – Almost 100,000 publishers had paid for the service 06:40 – Primarily recurring revenue payment 07:30 – 90% of revenue is recurring revenue 08:15 – The new subscription plan 08:45 – Most pay $35/month 09:30 – Publishers come and go 10:00 – Customer churn is 2%/month 10:30 – Focus is to help the customers 10:50 – The new plan helps with collaborative efforts 12:00 – Center of the business is in the west coast 12:40 – Raised $21 million 13:30 – His focus is to create products that have an impact 14:40 – Team of 60 people 15:20 – Acquisition costs 15:30 – Not much is spent on marketing 15:50 – They are found through search engines and word of mouth 16:10 – “We’re clearly the leader in the space.” 16:40 – About $40/customer 17:30 – Customers see the value 18:00 – Why publishing? 18:20 – “It’s about what moves people in their lives.” 18:50 – Example of Malala’s birthday celebration 19:35 – Getting publishers into podcasting 20:00 -- @yankeejoe or jhy@issue.com 22:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get into an industry that you are passionate about. Take an ancient product or service and update it for today’s world. Focus on doing what’s best for your customers. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack – The online tool Joe uses Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/20/2016 • 27 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 391: Why Gary V Led $1.5M Round In This Cosmetics Company
Julie Fredrickson from Stowaway Cosmetics. Have you ever felt like your purse was so heavy it could take someone out with one swing? Every lip gloss, concealer, and eyeliner really adds up! Julie has a found a solution to this problem with Stowaway Cosmetics, which focuses on creating a more mobile product for women on the go. Listen as she tells us how she has transformed the beauty industry with products that actually get used. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Five Dysfunctions of a Team What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuck Favorite online tool? — Google Apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Religiously. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t be a jerk. Being kind costs you nothing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Julie 01:30 – Stowaway Cosmetics is about mobile products that women can use anywhere 02:10 – Launched 18 months ago 02:25 – Learning to run an effective ecommerce business 02:35 -- $1.5 M in capital 02:45 – Equity 03:15 – Valuation is private at an early stage 03:45 – A good valuation is a balance 05:15 – Gary Vaynerchuck 05:40 – The beauty industry has been giving out products that people don’t finish 06:50 – Brands need to see more repeat purchasing 07:25 – Margins for a palette of eyeshadow 08:10 – Effective and a better value than their competitors 08:30 – Direct consumers 08:45 – A normal margin is about 50% through retailers 09:20 – Their margin is about 85% 09:45 – Monopolies in the makeup industry 10:15 – “You should have a choice as a consumer to carry a product that fits your lifestyle.” 11:00 – Weighing down your purse with cosmetics 11:35 – Launched in Feb 2015 12:00 – Fundraising started in early 2014 12:15 – Valuation was based on pre-sales 13:25 – Influence in the marketplace 14:05 – Passed $100k in lipsticks sold 14:20 – Their focus changed to repeat purchasing and having a comfortable growing rate 15:20 – Now they spend nothing on marketing 16:25 – They care more about repeat customers than getting more customers 17:30 – On average, women come back to purchase again in 90 days 18:20 – 40% have made at least 3 purchases 19:00 – minimalists vs. maximalists 19:30 – Follow at Julie at @stowaway on Twitter and on Anchor 21:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a problem and do the research to come up with a good solution. Look at a particular industry and evaluate where its setbacks are. Develop a relationship with your customers. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Google Apps – Julie’s favorite online tool for her business Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/19/2016 • 26 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 390: Is This The Most Successful InfoProduct Ever?
8/18/2016 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 389: ConceptDrop Raises $1.1M, Helps You Get Creative Work Done Quick with Phil Alexander EP389
Phil Alexander, founder and CEO of ConceptDrop. His company has a mission to get your projects done while you’re sleeping. You can send your project to ConceptDrop and expect to see the end result within mere hours. Listen as Phil tells us about the incredible growth of his business and what he sees for ConceptDrop in the future. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Wall Street Journal What CEO do you follow? — Sundar Pichai Favorite online tool? — Hubspot Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — You’re not going to learn everything in business school. Start selling as soon as you can. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan introduces Phil 01:40 – ConceptDrop 02:05 – Servicing over 300 brands 02:25 – A global network of sellers 02:58 – About 30% taken from the sellers 03:25 – They set the prices 03:48 – Upselling to the buyers 04:10 – The average buyer 04:25 – Started in 2012 04:50 – First-year revenue was a couple thousand 05:10 – Funds raised 06:00 – Valuation was between $5 to $7 million 06:20 – Reasons for the valuation come down mostly to growth rate 07:15 – Investors 07:30 – 300 buyers, and under 100 sellers 08:00 – Average seller makes $500 per project, with 4 to 5 projects each month 08:55 – Seeing great growth 09:40 -- $10,000/month to much higher 10:35 – Repurchase rates 11:24 – Total revenue for 2015 was just under $300k 11:55 – Last month, 50 companies used the platform 12:45 – Small, high-quality pool of freelancers 13:10 – A lot of potential in the near future 14:20 – phil@conceptdrop.com, @philalexander1 on Twitter 16:30 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: There is no perfect formula for starting a business. High-quality service is a great way to make your business stand out. Assess your business for its potential. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Hubspot – Phil’s favorite online tool for marketing and sales Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/17/2016 • 21 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 388: TrueBill Saves You $ On All Those Monthly Subscriptions You Pay
Yahya Mokhtarzada, co-founder of Truebill. Truebill is a free online tool designed to keep track of all of your monthly subscriptions and find ways to save you money. With so many products requiring a subscription fee, Truebill keeps your bills more organized and paid on time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Onward What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos Favorite online tool? — Ahrefs Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No chance. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Take bigger risks. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Yahya 1:30 – Truebill keeps track of recurring bills and subscriptions 2:00 – Free for users 2:20 – Looking at transactions and making recommendations 2:50 – Business development deals 3:20 – Launched in January 2016 03:40 – Healthy growth each month 04:00 – Up to $50k/month at the end of the year 04:20 – Saving other people money 04:45 –$1.75 million in capital 05:15 – Agreement for future equity 06:20 – User data 06:40 – Deals with businesses for advertising 07:50 – Introducing users to the products of those businesses 09:00 – Total users signed up are 50000 09:25 – Activation metrics 09:50 – Different options to explore for the future 10:30 – “the low-hanging fruit” 11:10 – blog.truebill.com 13:10 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Consider taking bigger risks when you can afford to do so. Focus your business model on helping other people. Start with “the low-hanging fruit” to get your business going. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Ahrefs – Yahya’s favorite online tool for assistance with SEO. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/16/2016 • 17 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 387: Restaurant Founder Hits $2m+ Revenue, Doubling Locations
8/15/2016 • 20 minutes, 1 second
EP 386: Hurdlr Saves You Tax Money, 10,000+ Users
Raj Bhaskar, CEO and cofounder of Hurdlr. Hurdlr is an online tool that helps freelancers and entrepreneurs track their income and taxes. It helps people save money by calculating deductions within seconds. Nathan and Raj will discuss the beginning of Hurdlr and where they are headed in the future. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The One Thing What CEO do you follow? — Gary Keller Favorite online tool? — Google Drive, Freshbooks Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t be so serious. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:03 – Nathan introduces Raj 02:15 – VisualHOMES acquisition price 02:35 – Revenue model 03:10 – Using proceeds from that as an investor and for Hurdlr 03:25 – Hurdlr launched a couple years ago 03:40 – It tracks finances and taxes for freelancers 04:25 – Competitors 04:40 – “Like Mint but for business.” 05:15 – Quick process compared to competitors 05:55 – They integrate with Freshbooks 06:20 – The business model 06:30 – They are currently pre-revenue 06:45 – Monthly or annual fee 07:10 – Other mobile solutions are different 07:40 – They have no desktop product 08:00 – Mobile is fast 08:30 – Founded 2.5 years ago 08:50 – Costs started in 2014 09:10 – Capital has been over $1.5 million 09:50 – 16 fulltime employees 10:25 – Usage metrics 10:45 – Mileage tracking 11:15 – Syncing with credit card 11:30 – Tens of thousands users, with 70% active once a month 12:00 – Pricing plan 12:20 – Simple and “part of the customer experience” 12:40 – “Pricing should bring a smile to your face.” 13:00 – Referrals 13:15 – Tracking savings through deductions 13:40 – The option to continue paying a monthly fee 14:10 – hurdlr.com with real-time chat 16:15 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Come up with a pricing model that you would feel comfortable paying. Find a niche that sets you apart. Use new technology to come up with helpful solutions. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Google Drive and Freshbooks -- Raj’s favorite tools, besides Hurdlr Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/14/2016 • 21 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 385: 1,000's Pay Him $9/mo for Fitness Membership Site with Cory Gregory of Corygfitness.com
Cory Gregory, a fourth-generation coalminer who has made it to the top in the fitness industry. Cory has now developed his personal brand on his website where people can pay $8.99 per month to get his top workout plans and his daily articles and videos on how to get into incredible shape. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Rich Dad Poor Dad What CEO do you follow? — Bill Phillips Favorite online tool? — Quickbooks Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Have a strong strategy early. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:03 – Nathan introduces Cory 01:30 – Most money is in selling memberships and books on his internet business 02:00 -- $8.99/month membership 02:15 – Products in 100 countries 02:30 – Cofounder of MusclePharm 02:55 – Now a public company 03:15 – “A lot of Wall Street and a lot of boardrooms just really wasn’t for me.” 03:40 – Now owns 3% 04:00 – Went public in 2010 04:30 -- $40 million raised in capital 05:35 – “I learned a ton…. It changed my life forever.” 05:50 – He left the business about 9 months ago. 06:20 – “That thing’s bleeding cash.” 06:35 – Cory was in the programming and products side 06:50 – Proper management was a downfall 07:20 – “It was a rise to the top.” 07:40 -- $160 million in revenue 08:00 – Marketing was huge 08:40 -- Creating a personal brand 09:00 – “I feel blessed.” 09:20 – First gym started for $5000 09:30 -- The Old School Gym 09:40 -- $100k in memberships 10:00 – Biggest expenses 10:40 – six-figures in profit 11:20 – Revenue is more than $100k 11:40 – MusclePharm started at 30 years old 11:55 – corygfitness.com 12:05 – five 4-week plans every month 12:30 – Articles and videos every day 13:00 – Thousands of people use his monthly plan 13:20 – The reason for his vagueness 14:10 – Total revenue was $34k in his first month for his personal brand 15:20 – “There is nobody on the planet who can say they have done what I’ve done.” 16:20 – corygfitness.com, Snapchat, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram 16:40 – Business and Biceps podcast 19:00 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be confined to the environment you were raised in. Develop your personal brand. Find ways to make your service stand out. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Quickbooks -- Cory’s favorite invoicing tool Business and Biceps – Cory’s podcast Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/13/2016 • 23 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 384: $105k on 1 Facebook Live, The New Webinar with Carissa Hill Ep 384
8/12/2016 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
EP 383: Prospect.io $0 to $17k in MRR in 6 Months, 400 Customers
Vincenzo Ruggiero, founder of Prospect.io. Vincenzo has a wife and two children, with one born just days ago. With the chaos of a new baby, Vincenzo has still found a way to support himself and his family and manage a new and growing business. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Getting Real, Rework What CEO do you follow? — Joel Gascoigne Favorite online tool? — Freshbooks, Slack, Trello, Appear Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Be humble. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Vincenzo 01:40 – Prospect.io is a sales software 02:00 – Recurring revenue from monthly plans 02:20 – Launched in January 2016 02:40 – June revenue was $17k 03:15 – Customer pays more the more they use it 04:10 – Average is $45/month 04:30 – How they have driven customers 04:50 – word of mouth 05:50 – Different types of customers 06:20 – Self-funded 06:45 – Team of 3 07:30 – The system in Belgium makes Vincenzo the sole founder 08:00 – Vincenzo started with other web businesses before he started Prospect.io 09:10 – His family (two kids) 09:35 – How he supports himself 09:45 – He lives off of savings and a very low salary 11:10 – The company breaks even 11:30 – Growth each month 11:50 – How they got such fast growth 13:15 – Customer churn is 6% monthly 14:25 – Customer acquisition cost is $50 15:00 – Lifetime value is $570 15:30 -- @VincenzoR on Twitter 17:35 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Plan out financially how you be able to afford to start a new business. Don’t let your arrogance get in the way of your success. A success work life does not have to take away from a success home life. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack, Trello, and Appear – Online tools that Vincenzo uses for his business Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/11/2016 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 382: Virtually Place Furniture In House, $900k Raised with Andrew of Pair3d.com
Andrew Kemendo, founder of Pair. Andrew was in Guam as an Airforce Intelligence Officer when he came up with an augmented reality idea to try out furniture and materials without having to buy or ship anything. The Airforce needed to build new facilities, and Andrew thought his idea would save a lot of money and headache. Now his company Pair is used by several large manufacturers to help people find the right furniture for their homes. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? — Justin Kan Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Never. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Keep learning about paradigm shifting technologies. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Andrew 01:40 – Pair is a tool to try out home furnishings before you buy them 02:30 – Free for consumers 02:45 – Andrew’s experience in Guam and how he came up with Pair 03:45 – They started working with architects 04:10 – Launched fulltime in 2015 05:00 – Funding over $900k 05:20 – First-year revenue was $10000/month 06:20 – Pilots in big cities 06:30 – Monthy and up-front fees 07:15 – Revenue in 2016 07:50 – 15 manufacturers and over 2000 products 08:30 – Transition for the company 09:10 – Architects to home furnishers 10:20 – Larger adjustable market 10:40 – Projection for $1.5M 11:20 -- 20000 products placed each month by app users 12:15 – CPC and CPM 12:55 – Ability to scale 13:25 – Pair on Twitter and Facebook 13:45 -- @andrewkemendo on Twitter and andrewkdot on Snapchat 15:45 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Embrace new technology to create a solution to a problem. Don’t be afraid to change your business model to help your business grow. Adjust your product to benefit a larger group of consumers. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack – The online tool Andrew uses to stay organized at Pair Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/10/2016 • 19 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 381: Make Beautiful Snaps With BlurBiz, $60k MRR
Timur Daudpota, cofounder of Blurbiz. His business allows companies to create and edit videos and post them directly to Snapchat. Listen to Timur share his journey as an entrepreneur. He started out with skateboards, and now he’s jumped to Snapchat. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Sketch Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Read more books. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Timur 02:00 – Blurbiz is a SaaS platform 03:00 – They found a gap in Snapchat 03:35 – Customers can link their Snapchat account and post videos through Blurbiz 04:20 – Working with publishers 04:40 – They charge $2k to $5k per month 05:00 -- $60k in revenue last month 05:15 – Too early for churn 05:45 – Customer acquisition 06:20 – They pay themselves a $60k salary 06:35 – Fundraising is $425k total 07:15 – Valuation 08:20 – Team size is 8 08:30 – Commission based 09:45 – Based out of Mountain View 10:00 – Started with a skateboarding company 10:40 – Bringing back a classic skateboard design 11:00 – LED skateboard wheels 11:30 – Received prize money for their company 12:00 – Finding a better way to sell 12:20 – They connected their product with social media and sales jumped 13:00 – Equity for Blurbiz 13:45 – Follow Blurbiz on Snapchat 14:00 – 20000 views for every post on Snapchat 16:40 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Constantly find ways to improve your business. If you find a gap in a certain company or industry, fill it. Once an entrepreneur, always an entrepreneur. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Sketch – Timur’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/9/2016 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 380: She Makes $500k On Lice Treatments Franchise
Cody Bradstreet. Cody has a background in accounting and was working for Dell when she realized she needed a backup plan for work. She opened up her own franchise of The Lice Place, where people can have lice manually moved without harsh chemicals. Find out how an accountant got her hands into the lice industry. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Her own future book What CEO do you follow? — No Favorite online tool? — Quickbooks Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Love yourself. Forward fixes everything. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:00 – Nathan introduces Cody 01:20 – Started in accounting 01:40 – Worked at Dell 02:10 – She left Dell to “chase my dreams in the lice industry.” 02:30 – Started as a backup plan for possible layoffs 03:20 – She approached a small business, The Lice Place 03:50 – The transition 04:25 – Franchising 04:40 – Total revenue for the year before she bought it was under $50k 05:10 – Service to manually remove lice 05:50 – She did her own valuation 06:50 – Royalties 07:10 – A standard franchise model 08:00 – A goal to buy the whole business 08:50 – Why to buy instead of build 09:10 – Revenue for the last year was $250k 09:50 – Employees are the biggest expenses 10:10 – Advice for future franchisers 10:40 – “Get a good lawyer.” 10:55 – Connect with Cody on LinkedIn 12:45 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Put yourself out there to get into a certain industry or business. Consider buying a business instead of building a new one. Make sure you read the fine print before you start your own franchise. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Quickbooks – Cody’s accounting tool Evernote – Nathan’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/8/2016 • 16 minutes, 46 seconds
EP 379: Secret Travel App, $120k 2015 with Kenneth Lee
Kenneth Lee, founder of TravelFlan. Kenneth has a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering and has developed a business that makes travelling easier. TravelFlan has partnered with major airlines as well as thousands of individual customers to give them a personal digital travelling assistant. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Quit school faster. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Kenneth 01:30 – TravelFlan 01:55 – Customers pay on average $15 02:30 – Three sources of revenue 03:05 – History of the business 03:30 – He and his partner loved to travel 04:14 – First-year revenue in 2015 $120k 04:50 – They have a free service and a premium service 05:15 – 2000 customers 05:25 – May 2016 revenue from commissions from airlines was $25k 06:00 – Two large airlines use their data 06:30 – May total revenue was $50k 06:55 – Fundraising 07:30 -- $5 Million valuation 07:40 – Most of the team is in Asia 08:25 – Churn is not as applicable in this type of business 09:30 – Customer acquisition 09:57 – Team of 11 people 10:10 – travelflan.com or Kenneth.lee@travelflan.com 23:40 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start with a very focused business and then expand as you see success. If you have a good idea, pursue it immediately. Find different ways to make revenue. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Evernote – Kenneth’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/7/2016 • 16 minutes, 6 seconds
EP 378: $750k InfoMarketer Sells 130k Books with Peter Voogd
Peter Voogd. Peter helped several millennials make six figures and realized he could make a business out of it. His Gamechanger’s Academy helps promising entrepreneurs become successful within months. Under 30 himself, Peter is a best-selling author and a recognized leader for entrepreneurs and millennials. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Millionaire Fastlane What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Infusionsoft, ScheduleOnce, Kajabi Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Stay strategic and intentional. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Peter 02:05 – Gamechanger’s Academy 02:30 – Launched in 2013 02:45 – Connections for young entrepreneurs 03:10 – His past experience 03:30 – “Built a culture of excellence” 04:20 – He helped several young professionals become successful 05:00 – “I wanted to shift the culture for millennials.” 05:15 – gamechangersmovement.com 05:25 – Payment system 06:05 -- $297/month for the Platinum plan 06:50 – About 70% are on a yearly plan 07:10 – The Rookie plan 07:30 – Churn 08:00 – People typically stay for 7 to 8 months if they’re not on the yearly plan 08:50 – A focus beyond just the numbers 10:10 – Good retention for the industry 10:30 – How to get new people to find the site 10:50 – Podcast, book, content 11:05 – Referral program 11:20 – Biggest expenses 11:30 – Affiliate costs 11:45 – Organic traffic 12:30 – 6 Months to 6 Figures 13:00 –Self-published 13:15 – 135000 books sold, plus audio books 13:30 – Marketing 14:45 – Bulk purchases 15:25 – Peterjvoogd on Instagram and peterjvoogd.com 17:45 – Peter’s email list 18:00 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It starts with your own effort and drive. Consider how you can improve your own culture. Make a business out of what you are good at. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Infusionsoft -- Peter’s favorite online tool ScheduleOnce -- Peter’s scheduling tool Kajabi – Peter’s membership site portal Gamechanger’s Academy – A top source for millennials and entrepreneurs Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/6/2016 • 21 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 377: 6M Shoes Designed, $24M Raised, By Customer Shoe Maker Shoesofprey.com
Jodie Fox, a woman who has solved the problem of constantly hunting for the right pair of shoes. Her company Shoes of Prey has raised over $24 million for its system that allows every pair of shoes to be completely customized. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Getting Things Done What CEO do you follow? — Tom Ford Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Do everything before you’re ready. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Jodie 01:50 – Shoes of Prey—Women can design their own shoes 02:20 – Peer play 02:55 – Women wanted a physical interaction with their shoes 03:15 – First offline store 03:40 – Costs for stores 04:14 – Launched in 2009 04:20 – Funding to date is $24M 04:35 – Every pair is custom made 04:58 – Their website has a gallery for inspiration 05:10 – It’s a social interaction about shoes 06:05 – Customization can start with an inspiration shoe or from scratch 06:40 – Customers have complete freedom 07:25 – How much time people spend making a shoe 08:15 – Acquisition costs 09:45 – Mass-produced shoes are cheaper to produce 10:30 – Pairs of shoes sold 10:55 – Some people design and never buy 11:15 – Their investors 12:00 – Competitors 12:25 – Average sale is $225 13:03 – Team of over 220 13:30 – Production in China 13:40 – They built their own factory there 14:15 – A video of the process at their factory 14:40 – First-year revenue was less than $50k 15:00 – Jodie was not in the fashion industry when she started her company 16:40 – She was brainstorming with friends on the beach 17:15 – Her cofounders are her ex-husband and their groomsman 18:10 – Shoes of Prey wants to eventually grow to other clothing 19:20 – Pay per customer 19:40 – 75% is word of mouth 20:05 – Campaigns 20:50 – Testing offline methods 21:25 – youtube.com/jodiefox 21:35 – jodieannfox on Instagram or @jodiefox on Twitter 23:40 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a niche and you’ll have a business with no real competitors. Don’t let complicated relationships get in the way of your business’s success. Make your business a unique experience for the customer. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack – Jodie’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/5/2016 • 27 minutes, 20 seconds
EP 376: $5M on $15M Pre Money Goal For BlockChain Based BurstIQ
Frank Ricotta, CEO of BurstIQ, which helps professionals and businesses in the healthcare industry connect. Frank has been through the grinder as an entrepreneur. Huge crash-and-burn businesses have gotten him to this point. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Executive in Action What CEO do you follow? — PayPal Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Trust your instincts, and don’t lose your balance. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Frank 01:44 – BurstIQ is a platform service 02:00 – They help their customers create a network 02:53 – Founded in April 2015 03:05 – Frank had been working in health and saw an issue 03:24 – There are three founders 03:52 – First-year revenue was $150k 04:05 – Involvement in several other startups 04:25 – His “crash and burn” story 05:29 – The cofounders 05:55 – May 2016 customers: 10 06:20 – Average pay per customer is $250k to $1M 06:35 – A focus on the base plan 07:00 – $75k/month 07:35 – No patterns yet for churn 08:45 – Customer acquisition cost 09:00 – Inside sales and partners 09:15 -- $150k to $200k 09:40 – 12 team members 10:00 – What ratio Frank likes to see 10:40 – “Work to keep your head above water” 11:09 – The company’s capital 11:37 – Valuation for BurstIQ 12:40 – They want to raise $5M 13:10 – Based in Denver 13:55 – Techstars 14:25 -- @fricotta or Frank Ricotta on LinkedIn 16:26 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Come up with a business that makes something simpler. Being an entrepreneur means experiencing failure along with success. If you don’t stretch yourself to reach high goals, no one will believe that you can ever achieve them. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack – Frank’s favorite online tool to connect with coworkers and customers Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/4/2016 • 20 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 375: Dad of 4 Holds Secret to Buying Time, Clearing Your Calendar With Ari Miesel of LessDoing.com
Ari Meisel, host of the Less Doing Podcast. Ari’s book Less Doing, More Living has sold over 30,000 copies and has been translated into six other languages. Even with four children, Ari stays on top of his consulting business that continues to bring in more revenue every month. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Art of War What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Inbox by Google Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Test ideas before you jump into them. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan introduces Ari 02:00 – Ari is a productivity consultant/coach 02:20 – Virtual company has brought in the most revenue 02:35 – They offer on-demand project managers 03:00 – Customers pay a membership fee and then an hourly fee for service 03:30 – First-year revenue was $200000 04:15 – 170 current customers 04:40 – They find customers through Ari’s following and the podcast 05:50 – Ari is involved with his customers 06:10 – It’s an expensive service because of the quality and variety of what they can do 06:45 – Ari likes connecting resources for other businesses and finding talent 07:15 – They are really involved in all of the businesses that hire them 07:35 – “An easy-bake oven for a business” 08:40 – Average customer pays about $1150/month 09:20 – In May they had $46000 in revenue, and they are growing every month 10:00 – His business takes care of a lot of the daily tasks for business owners and companies 10:50 – The company is self-funded 11:05 – They decline anyone who wants to invest in the company 11:58 – Less Doing Podcast 12:10 – 30000 downloads per month 12:20 – A weekly show 12:35 – Average downloads per episode for the first couple months: 3000 13:30 – Sponsorship revenue for the podcast 14:08 – Ari’s books, Less Doing, More Living and The Art of Less Doing 15:00 – He got an advance with Random House/Penguin for Less Doing, More Living 15:15 – How he got an advance as a first-time author 16:20 – 30000 copies sold 18:00 – Lessdoing.com 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create the best service and business that you possibly can. Find your specific talent and put yourself in that industry. It is possible to balance a busy life with your business. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Inbox by Google – Ari’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/3/2016 • 23 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 374: 13 yo Starts Business, Now $1.2M in 2016 with Nick Kullin
Nick Kullin of Second Flight Consultancy. Nick started his first business at just thirteen years old. As he continued with tons of other jobs after high school, he realized he wanted to go back to how he felt as a thirteen-year-old. He wanted to be an entrepreneur again. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Yesware Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Instead of working for people, just start your business at a young age. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan introduces Nick 01:35 – He started his first business at age 13 02:15 – He connected people to new music artists 02:45 – He automated his system 03:05 – He got around $100 to $150 from each band 03:30 – He made over $20k with that business 03:50 – Then he worked for a golf resort doing marketing and sales 04:50 – He helped the resort get a lot more publicity and better marketing 05:25 – Then about a year later he went into health and fitness 04:45 – He wanted to surround himself with successful people 06:30 – He got an opportunity with Time Warner Cable 06:40 – Later, he got out of corporate and worked with a small business 07:10 – His next job paid him $120000, but he realized he wanted to get back into entrepreneurship 07:55 – A lot of money does not make you happy. 08:40 – Marketing was his passion, and people saw the value of his skills 09:20 – His business was called Second Flight Consultancy 10:00 – First-year revenue was $12000 10:40 -- $175k in 2015, and projected to be over a million in 2016 11:13 – Nick developed a “sales robot” that works with LinkedIn 12:00 – Ten team members 12:25 – Profit is usually 70% of the revenue 13:10 – He started out doing a lot of the work on his own 14:00 – You need to do really great work with proven results 15:10 – He has a variety of customers 15:40 – Nick’s academy is a coaching product 16:00 – 30% of their revenue 16:15 -- secondflightacademy.com 18:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to start your own business from a young age. A large salary doesn’t necessary buy happiness. Make your passion and your skills into a business. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Yesware – Nick’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/2/2016 • 21 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 373: $1m+ On Green Contracting Company and Tech Executive
Lillie Cameron, a brand new mom who also runs her own business. She started EcoSafe Spaces with her now husband. The company provides design and building services for green, eco-friendly construction. She also works with Rackspace, which has recently revamped its policies for maternity and paternity leave. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Advantage, with its six-question model What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Surround yourself with people who lift you up. Don’t be afraid to fail. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan introduces Lillie 01:50 – Green construction 02:10 – They had a friend who lost a child during pregnancy because of construction chemicals 02:30 – EcoSafe Spaces 02:40 – Design and building services 03:10 – Their recent project in downtown Austin 03:50 – Around $500000 jobs 04:15 – “The most energy efficient homes in the city” 04:30 – The sales pitch 04:50 – People in Austin understand sustainability 05:35 – Opened in 2007 05:45 – Margins vary – fixed rate vs. cost plus contract 06:10 – Fixed rate 06:45 – The contract is much more flexible 07:20 – Fixed rate deal that went bad 07:35 – Now they do mostly cost plus contracts 07:50 – Up to 7 projects at a time 08:30 – The plan for EcoSafe 08:55 – There are benefits to being a small business 09:20 – Lillie also works with Rackspace 09:25 – Recruited in 2009 by a former boss 09:55 – She did project management work, but wore multiple hats 10:45 – It is utility-based computing 11:10 – How this type of service was first received 12:30 – There are many different types of customers 13:20 – They have a unique angle 13:35 – Rackspace is a great place for new parents to work 14:10 – Maternity leave in this country 14:45 – Canada does a year of leave 15:00 -- Paternity and maternity leave needs awareness 15:55 – ecosafespaces.com and Lillie Cameron on LinkedIn 17:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a business idea that solves an important problem. Consider maternity leave in the US and how it needs to improve. You can balance it all, as a business owner and a parent. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Trello – Lillie’s favorite online tool for staying organized Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
8/1/2016 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
Ep 372: How to Run A Small, Happy, Profitable Agency With James Turner
James Turner, of Turner Creative. James started his business after the company he worked for picked up and moved five hours away. He didn’t want to make the move, so he took his skills and created his own conversion rates optimization company. Now he’s starting out another company, called Snap. He has caught the entrepreneurial bug and is making more money now than when he was working in the corporate world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Airstory Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — “I am trying really hard, but I also have a toddler.” If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — “You’re not going to miss out if you stay home to work on yourself.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:36 – What is conversion rate optimization? 02:05 – Turner recently worked with Conversion Sciences 02:45 – Getting more signups for a free trial 03:45 – Good and bad conversion rates 04:50 – “People have a hard time putting themselves in the heads of their customers.” 05:25 – The value of customer research 06:20 – How to collect data 06:30 – Talk to your customers 07:04 – Using testimonials and reviews 08:05 – Find which problem is most common in your reviews 08:20 – How Turner Creative got started 09:00 – First-year revenue was $36000 09:30 – 2015 total revenue was about $45000 09:40 – Payment per project: $10000 for 3 months 10:00 – He will revamp/renew a company’s website 10:45 – Currently 2 customers 10:55 – “I only want to do two retainers at a time.” 11:05 – James is starting a new company, Snap 11:25 – Focusing on quick copy 11:50 – His partner is Lianna Patch, of Punchlinecopy.com 12:00 – “Conversion optimized copy on demand” 12:20 – Contact him at turnercreative.ca or snapcopy.co. 14:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take your skills and find a way to be financially successful. Take time to consider customer reviews and testimonials—utilizing this information will make your company better. Set aside time to take care of yourself and better yourself. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Airstory – A new online tool for content writing Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/31/2016 • 18 minutes, 33 seconds
EP 371: $1M Raised, $40k/Mo Marketplace For Class Notes with Sieva Kozinsky
Sieva Kozinsky, founder and CEO of StudySoup. The online marketplace now has over 5000 buyers and 1000 sellers. These sellers provide their notes and study guides for college courses. StudySoup helps their sellers learn how to be entrepreneurs and provides a unique service to college students everywhere. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Elon Musk’s biography What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — “I get 6.5 to 7.5 hours.” If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — “Pay attention to the signs. If something isn’t working, ditch it and move forward.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:05 – Nathan’s introduction 02:25 – StudySoup is “an education marketplace for college students” 01:55 – It’s a monthly subscription 02:25 – Sellers take notes, and the buyers use those class notes 03:10 – Students get “karmas” to access notes and study guides 04:10 – the “karma” system 05:10 – The backstory 05:45 – StudySoup was tested at a few schools and took off 06:10 – Year-one revenue was $45k 06:25 – Now they have over 5000 subscribers 06:45 – 1000 note takers 07:09 – Funding is over a million 07:35 – They used convertible notes 08:15 – Team size 08:30 – The team is distributed and remote 09:05 – Slack, Google Hangouts 09:25 – Trajectory 09:55 – They will hit almost $4 million this year 10:05 – A focus on getting more note takers 10:40 – The revenue is seasonal according to class schedules 11:15 – Revenue February to May is pretty consistent 11:45 – About 4000 buyers used the service in March 12:25 – All buyers and sellers are very active 12:45 – Average purchase size is $42 13:15 – A study guide is the best-selling item 13:40 – What happens after a student graduates? 14:15 – Expanding into grad school and high school in the future 14:40 – Buyers pay 15 to 20 dollars each month 15:25 – Churn is 8% to 12%, lower than the average for the industry 16:20 – Acquisition cost 16:30 – Training sellers to be entrepreneurs 17:10 – It’s too early to see lifetime value of a customer 17:40 – Contact Sieva on Twitter: @SievaKozinsky 19:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you find an idea that works, go for it. Distributed, remote teams are very doable with today’s online tools. Look for the signs that tell you the direction your business is headed. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Slack and Google Hangouts – The online tools that StudySoup uses to stay in touch with a distributed team. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/30/2016 • 22 minutes, 54 seconds
Ep 370: $120k 2015 Revenue, Private Chefs for Elderly with Kate Toews of Chefs for Seniors
7/29/2016 • 20 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 369: 22 Customers Pay $50K/Year SaaS AppZen.com with Anant Kale
Anant Kale, cofounder of AppZen. Anant had a job that paid him $200000 a year when he decided to go off on his own and start a business. Hear the success story of his artificial intelligence software which has “transformed the back office” for companies everywhere. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? — Rapportive and Calendly Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Start a business earlier than you think you should. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Anant Kale 01:55 – AppZen uses artificial intelligence software in offices 02:45 – It detects information on employees and statistics automatically 03:30 – Founded in 2013 04:00 – 2015 revenue was just under $1 million 04:45 – They have 22 customers 05:00 – Average contract price is $150000 05:20 – Capital raised is $14 million 06:10 – 14 people on the team 06:40 – No churn so far 07:15 – Average customer acquisition cost is very low 08:15 – Too early for lifetime value 09:05 – Evaluation for the company 10:15 – Goal is to double revenue in 2016 13:00 – Anant is a cofounder 13:50 – The company was split according to responsibilities and contributions 14:40 – He always wanted to really build a company on his own 16:00 -- The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t put off starting your own business. A large salary doesn’t mean that you will be satisfied with your job. If you have an entrepreneurial spirit, follow that desire. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks – The online tool Nathan uses to keep track of receipts Hostgator – The program Nathan uses for his website Rapportive and Calendly – Anant’s favorite online tools Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/28/2016 • 21 minutes, 57 seconds
EP 368: From Blog to $40M/Yr, 23k Customers At Moz With Rand Fishkin
Rand Fishkin, who calls himself “The Wizard of Moz.” He founded Moz in 2007, and they made $39 million in revenue in 2015. Join us as Rand shares his unique journey with Moz and his own insights to what makes businesses like Moz successful. Listen as he tells hid difficult experience of deciding to handover the reigns of CEO for his own company. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The Billionaire Who Wasn’t What CEO do you follow? — Heather Brunner Favorite online tool? — Buzzsumo Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Not quite. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Software engineering. Stick with the girl you’re dating—she’ll be a great wife. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Rand Fishkin 01:35 – Moz is a software company that assists with SEO 02:05 – Founded in 2007, but first existed as a blog 02:35 – The blog was an advertising tool for Moz 03:20 – They had 400 people sign up in 6 months 04:00 – 2007 revenue was $850k 04:25 – Rand admits to being an amateur at the beginning of Moz 05:20 – Great marketing and retention are super important to consider 06:25 – 2015 total revenue is $39 million 06:40 – Churn was 6.3% in April 2016 07:30 – The logic behind good and bad churn rates 08:00 – Churn is not the only thing that matters 08:45 – It’s ok to start out with a higher churn 09:15 – Different types of churn 09:35 – Upsell revenue 10:08 – They have not hit net negative revenue churn. 11:00 – Customer churn and revenue churn 12:10 – Average customer cost is $119/month 12:33 – Customer acquisition is more complicated because Moz has several different products 13:25 – Lifetime value 14:20 – They want to be conservative with marketing 15:00 – They want to lower churn 16:05 – The Costco example 16:48 – Rand replaced himself as CEO 17:05 – His own decision due to issues with his mental health 17:45 – It was a painful experience 18:00 – Now he is feeling much better 18:15 – He now runs a couple of their products and does promotion and content creation 19:05 – moz.com/rand or @randfish on Twitter 20:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: A churn rate is much more complicated that one month’s percentage. Find ways to have conservative marketing costs. Let your challenges take you to new and more fulfilling places. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Buzzsumo – Rand’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/27/2016 • 25 minutes, 7 seconds
How To Build a $30k/mo Membership Site with Kim Garst of Social Boom E2
Ep 2 Kim Garst Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
7/26/2016 • 19 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 367: $94M Raised, Car Marketplace, 270 Employees with George Arison of Shift
George Arison, founder and CEO of Shift, an online marketplace that has transformed the experience of buying and selling a car. George saw a problem with the process of buying a car, and he wanted to make it simpler. He utilized virtual technology to create a completely unique service for buying and selling a vehicle. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – I don’t really have one. What CEO do you follow? — Tim Cook Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — That I should learn how to code. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces George 01:44 – Shift is a new way to buy or sell a car 02:05 -- There is no physical lot, everything is virtual 02:35 – They will sell cars locally, to people in that car’s area 03:20 – “Car enthusiasts” 03:38 – Great design and transparency 04:10 – How they make money 04:25 – They agree on a minimum price with the seller, and they make money on any higher price that they sell the car for. (They split the difference) 05:00 – The buyer pays a fee 05:45 – They help buyers with car insurance and warranties 06:10 – Founded in 2013 06:30 – They started selling cars in 2014 06:45 – They are selling hundreds in a month 07:25 – Capital has been successful 08:05 – Their service is unique 09:15 – They offer cars that are several years old, because people can test drive them 09:55 – First-year revenue involved car inspections for sellers 10:45 – That revenue was $2000 11:00 – $150k in 2015 11:20 – Pricing cars is complicated and takes a lot of trial and error 12:00 – Mispriced cars effected their revenue in the beginning 12:30 – They are growing quickly and have focused on increasing revenue 13:35 – 20% growth month to month in 2015 14:15 – Team of 270 people 14:50 – Why he got into this business 15:05 – He started with Taxi Magic 15:25 – He had to get a green card, so he moved to a bigger business, Google 15:55 – He then left Google to start Shift 16:30 – He had a leased car, and when he wanted to buy it he found that financing a car is very complicated 17:50 – Find George Arison on LinkedIn 19:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you see a problem in a particular industry, find a solution and make it your business. Offer a service that is unique. Use today’s technology to redefine industries with an up-to-date approach. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – George’s favorite tool to find the best people to work for Shift Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/26/2016 • 23 minutes, 55 seconds
EP 366: Her Cheese Shop Does $1m+ Annually, EBITDA Low, Why?
Kendall Antonelli, who started a cheese shop with her husband. Antonelli’s Cheese Shop has taken off, and last year their revenue was $1.9 million. Kendall and her husband have found that they secret to their success is storytelling. They share the personal stories behind their cheeses and other products. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Good to Great, Uncontainable, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits Favorite online tool? — QuickBooks Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Keep an adventurous spirit. Do something every day that betters yourself. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan introduces Kendall 01:40 – Kendall and her husband got the idea on their honeymoon 02:25 – Her husband wanted to find a better job, in cheese 03:00 – He decided to look into the business 03:40 – Kendall was working in social work 04:20 – They always wanted to work together 04:45 – She grew up in a farm town, and they “fell in love with the story of cheese.” 05:10 – They looked at their strengths 05:35 – Antonelli’s Cheese LLC 06:00 – Their rent 07:10 – Multiple business models 07:20 – Her and her husband have separate roles 08:25 – Open-book management 08:40 – $1.9 million in 2015 09:05 – “Passion with Purpose” 09:25 – Their retail is the most successful 10:00 – Cost is per pound 11:00 – Making cheese is a labor-intensive industry 12:15 – They decided to not be cheese makers, but be out of the kitchen and “storytelling” 13:15 – All the costs behind a wheel of cheese 13:40 – Team of six or seven people 14:05 – An artisanal journey 14:30 – Telling the story of the cheese 14:45 – Skews were as high as 2000 15:15 – Most lucrative products 16:15 – Wholesale in 2015 was about half of their revenue 16:45 – Cheese of the Month Club 17:15 – Parties and catering 17:45 – Their wholesale market is more flexible for clients 18:25 – Dealing with a perishable item/shelf life 19:00 – They are looking into investors 19:25 – What they pay themselves 20:20 – They travel to cheese conventions around the world 20:55 – They want to be in control of their business 21:30 – Professional and personal life can coexist 24:00 – Antonellischeese.com 26:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Make your passion your business. Design a career that lets you accomplish your life goals. Your professional and personal life can coexist. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. QuickBooks – The accounting tool for Antonelli’s Cheese Shop Good to Great, Uncontainable and Mastering the Rockefeller Habits – A series of great business books that Kendall recommends. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/25/2016 • 31 minutes, 39 seconds
Ep 365: From Consultant to $300k SaaS with Amit Kotharie of Tallyfy
Amit Kothari. He spent ten years in London dealing with some of the largest companies and organizations in the world and helping them with collaboration technology. After seeing a lot of failures in that industry, he realized he needed a very structured process with unstructured, human conversations to make his business succeed. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? — Jack Welch and Warren Buffett Favorite online tool? — DropBox, Xero Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — “Never confuse movement with action.” –Hemingway Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Amit 01:45 – Tallyfy 02:05 – The company’s program helps remove routine processes throughout the day 02:30 – They started in Chili with a grant in 2014 03:00 – Then they got a grant from the US 03:30 – First year had no revenue 03:45 – $300k in 2015, with $600k total 04:15 – Paying customers 04:50 -- $39/month is the average that customers pay 05:15 – Monthly revenue 06:00 – They have several different services and processes 06:35 – Pure MRR in April -- $4000 07:10 -- Professional services is a huge chunk of revenue 08:20 – Starting out with professional services brings in a lot of revenue 08:50 – Team size is 5, with a few freelancers 09:05 – Total capital $500000 10:10 – Amit and his wife are cofounders 10:25 – They have a rule to stop talking about work after 6 pm 11:00 – They believe in their business 11:45 -- tallyfy.com and @tallyfy on Twitter 12:00 – Consistency is the secret to a growing company’s success 14:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start a business that you believe in. Look for grants and funding opportunities. If you want to scale your business, you have to put effort into consistency. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Innovator’s Dilemma – Amit’s favorite business book DropBox – One of Amit’s favorite online tools, that allows businesses to share files online Xero – Online accounting tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/25/2016 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 365: From Consultant to $300k SaaS with Amit Kotharie of Tallyfy
Amit Kothari. He spent ten years in London dealing with some of the largest companies and organizations in the world and helping them with collaboration technology. After seeing a lot of failures in that industry, he realized he needed a very structured process with unstructured, human conversations to make his business succeed. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s Dilemma What CEO do you follow? — Jack Welch and Warren Buffett Favorite online tool? — DropBox, Xero Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — “Never confuse movement with action.” –Hemingway Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan introduces Amit 01:45 – Tallyfy 02:05 – The company’s program helps remove routine processes throughout the day 02:30 – They started in Chili with a grant in 2014 03:00 – Then they got a grant from the US 03:30 – First year had no revenue 03:45 – $300k in 2015, with $600k total 04:15 – Paying customers 04:50 -- $39/month is the average that customers pay 05:15 – Monthly revenue 06:00 – They have several different services and processes 06:35 – Pure MRR in April -- $4000 07:10 -- Professional services is a huge chunk of revenue 08:20 – Starting out with professional services brings in a lot of revenue 08:50 – Team size is 5, with a few freelancers 09:05 – Total capital $500000 10:10 – Amit and his wife are cofounders 10:25 – They have a rule to stop talking about work after 6 pm 11:00 – They believe in their business 11:45 -- tallyfy.com and @tallyfy on Twitter 12:00 – Consistency is the secret to a growing company’s success 14:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start a business that you believe in. Look for grants and funding opportunities. If you want to scale your business, you have to put effort into consistency. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Innovator’s Dilemma – Amit’s favorite business book DropBox – One of Amit’s favorite online tools, that allows businesses to share files online Xero – Online accounting tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/24/2016 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 364: $300,000 Per Year Worth $15 Million?
7/23/2016 • 29 minutes, 35 seconds
Ep 364: $300,000 Per Year Worth $15 Million?
Jonathan Gillon, the founder of Roost. His unique business costs almost nothing to run, and is taking over the nation. Though he has experienced failures along with success in his business endeavors, Jon is a self-proclaimed optimist. He sees the potential growth of his business and wants to be the one to take it to its full potential. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing about Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Andy Dunn Favorite online tool? — Geckoboard Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t get kicked out of college. Stop getting in trouble. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:25 – Jonathan explains Roost 01:45 – Profits come from a percentage of transaction fees 02:55 – They focus on storage and parking spaces 03:15 – Mostly garages 03:45 – His first-year revenue was zero 04:10 – He found an opportunity with a storage unit that was closing 05:45 – Numbers of buyers and sellers 06:55 – He has a team of 17 people in San Francisco 07:30 – His rent in San Francisco 08:25 – $4.9 million in capital 09:35 – Roost uses a “targeted approach” working with car-share companies 10:55 – Total revenue 2015 - $80000 11:25 – Revenue is now 25k/month 12:10 – Reasoning behind the company’s evaluation 12:50 – Potential of the company 13:30 – Jonathan sees great value in Roost 14:00 – They are still in “beta mode” 15:00 – They have virtually no competitors 16:10 – Jonathan prefers to “build something big and fail” than build something small 17:05 – His experience with Droperty Tax 17:40 – He lost everything he earned from that company 18:30 – He wants to grow revenue and get Roost to its potential 19:25 –Jon’s blog about his experiences as an entrepreneur 21:20 – Average revenue per buyer – about $41 22:20 – “We’ve got almost no churn.” 23:10 – Cost to find a new space is almost nothing 23:30 – Money is spent on marketing 24:35 – He pays himself $64k 25:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for a business opportunity that requires low upfront costs. Don’t be afraid to stand behind your business and be optimistic about its potential. If your company gets bought, don’t go on a spending spree. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Geckoboard – Jonathan’s favorite online tool Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/23/2016 • 29 minutes, 35 seconds
EP 363: Google AdSense for Physical BillBoards Does $250k with Douglas Lusted
Douglas Lusted, the CEO and co-founder of Linkett. Douglas is an incredible individual who earned his way onto the Forbes’ “30 Under 30” list at the age of 19! He’s taken his company, which specializes in out-of-home advertising, from an idea on paper to an unstoppable force that’s taking on big-time enterprise clients. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Lean Analytics What CEO do you follow? — Kurtis McBride Favorite online tool? — Calendly or Prospect.io Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Absolutely not. If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — Keep on doing what you’re doing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 –Linkett is an analytics platform 02:20 – It is sold as an annual subscription 02:35 – Company was founded in 2013, and it was his first business venture 03:05 – First-year revenue was $100000 03:50 – Money and capital raised 05:00 – Their team now 05:20 – Growth for the company over the past year and a half 06:10 – Monthly recurring revenue (about $25k) 06:50 – The company’s churn 07:40 – Advertisers’ pricing systems 09:35 – The future of billboards 10:18 – What Douglas would do as a billboard owner 10:45 – Customer worth 11:40 – The company is focused on growth 12:00 – Connect with Douglas Lusted on LinkedIn 14:010 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to redefine an industry and how it operates When you have a great idea, go for it. Create a product that improves an industry’s integrity. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Prospect.io – Douglas’s favorite online sales tool based out of Canada Lean Analytics – Douglas’s favorite business book. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/22/2016 • 17 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 362: 10,000 Nurses Pay Him $110k/mo To Get Certified with Tony Leonard of NurseVersity.com
Tony Leonard, founder and president of nurseVersity—a company that uses next-generation tools, cutting-edge research, and adaptive, personalized learning structures to help nurses and physical therapists prepare for the respective industry exams with maximum efficiency. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Who Moved the Cheese What CEO do you follow? — Bill Gates Favorite online tool? — There are several Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — Sleep more; eat less. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:25 – Tony’s company operates under a monthly subscription format 01:45 – He helps people pass their qualifying exams the first time 02:15 – 10,000 customers, with $152,000 in revenue last month 03:00 -- $35.50/month per customer 03:30 – Scholarship program 05:00 – One-time payments 05:40 – How they manage churn 07:30 – Cost to get a customer 08:40 – Company is based in Louisville, Kentucky 09:00 – Churn for their company 10:15 – Lifetime value is about $300 per customer 10:30 – They are looking to raise capital 11:00 – Capital to date is $4 million 11:15 – Connect with Tony Leonard on LinkedIn, or at Nurseversity on Facebook, or tony.leonard@nurseversity.com 13:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Show your customers you care. Think of ways you can increase capital and scale your business. Sleep more, and eat less. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Who Moved the Cheese – Tony’s favorite business book Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/21/2016 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 361: 61 Customers $700k In Revenue, The Ultimate Sales Training Tool with Sam Caucci
Sam Caucci, founder of Sales Huddle, a training and development team using gaming technology to help organizations better prepare their people for the workforce. With work delivered across North America, Europe, and Asia, Sales Huddle has impacted people across organizations in a wide array of sectors and clients, that include professional sports teams, politics and government, hospitality, retail, colleges, and many more. They’re applying an innovative approach to people preparing for the workforce, and Sam is over the creation of the training game platform. It is the first game-based platform that transforms the way an organization on-boards, trains, and develops team members. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Emotional Intelligence What CEO do you follow? — Someone who’s not living right now Favorite online tool? — Rapportive and Mixmax Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? — Not to think I knew everything. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:55 – Training that isn’t boring 02:50 – Money is made from a license fee 03:22 – Company was founded in 2010 3:55 – It went from consulting to a product 4:15 – First year’s revenue was $250000 4:45 – They are self-funded 5:15 – Total customers is 61 5:45 – Learning-based vs. game-based competition 6:35 – The product requests annual pay 7:05 – Pay is upfront 07:30 – Average pay per year is $15000 per customer 07:55 – 100% retention and why 10:05 – Customer acquisition costs 11:00 – They have just started raising capital 11:50 – How to get more people and scale the business 13:20 – How much money they want to raise 13:40 – Team is six people 14:00 – Saleshuddlegroup.com, Twitter - @saleshuddle or @samcaucci 16:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Businesses and progress run off of incentives. Consider the most efficient and cost-effective way to provide your service. Learning and training systems shouldn’t be boring. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Rapportive and Mixmax – Sam’s favorite online tools for organization and productivity Sales Huddle – A training program that uses gaming technology Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/20/2016 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 360: Two 33 yo Men Selling Baby Products with HUGE Re-Order Rate at BabyMori.com
Cam and Akin, founders of Baby Mori. Their business was started in 2015, and it is already seeing 50% growth each month. Learn about Cam and Akin’s recipe for success as we discuss their products and how their business is run. They are showing incredible numbers for their startup, so let’s take some notes on how these two single guys saw financial success in the baby industry. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? – Google Hangouts Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Go for it, in terms of entrepreneurship Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 - Nathan introduces Cam and Akin, founders of Baby Mori 01:44 – Cam and Akin target gifters 02:20 – Cam and Akin explain the company 02:51 – Revenue came mostly from parents and gifters buying directly 03:22 - They talk about their multiple skews and how they manage them. 04:43 – Their sleep suits are their best sellers. 05:25 – Margins are 1:4 or 1:5 06:35 – They talk about their other expenses and their net margin, which is very low. 07:32 – Sales and marketing are limited costs. 08:21 – Their shipping is free to the UK only, but they are finding other ways to get to the US and other countries with low shipping costs. 09:15 – The business was launched in 2015, and is a very new startup. 10:21 – Their goal for this year is about $600000 10:51 – The business has strong numbers and statistics 11:23 – They discuss their number of buyers. 12:00 – The business owners talk about their subscription system. 13:20 – Their latest success is to have raised $1 million in priced equity. 14:50 – Their growth is 50% each month. That and other characteristics make them appealing to investors. 15:29 – Nathan discusses data in the baby business. 16:44 – People can connect at babymori.com 19:04 – Nathan goes over the Famous Five 3 Key Points: Cam and Akin have low costs to produce their products. Baby Mori focuses on getting the product to the client in an affordable manner. A company with significant monthly growth, like Baby Mori, is appealing to investors. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/19/2016 • 22 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 359: Hit $2m Revenue Buy/Sell Other Athelets Gear On Cheap with Brendan Candon of SidelineSwap.com
Brendan Candon, cofounder and CEO of SidelineSwap, a community market where athletes buy and sell their sports gear. Most of their users are middle school, high school, and college athletes selling online for the first time. They’ve got revenue and traction with gross sales running close to $2 million. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? — Kevin Plank, founder of Under Armour Favorite online tool? — Slack and Appear Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— 7 – 10 If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —“Be sure, with whatever you’re doing, that you can do it for five years.” Time Stamped Show Notes: 02:22 – Nathan introduces Brendan 01:40 – SidelineSwap makes it easy for athletes to buy and sell sports gear. 02:25 – SidelineSwap was launched in 2012, and really took off in 2015 03:22 – The company takes 12 percent from the seller to make money. 04:33 – They didn’t make any money for the first couple years, but in 2015 they did $400000 in sales. 05:04 – They are now on track to do $2 million in sales 05:25 – The site is transactional and social. 06:15 – Average order value is $75 before shipping 06:30 – They have been growing about 15 percent each month, but they started growing by 50 percent 07:15 – Users are accustomed to the conditions of used sports gear, and it’s a smart route for parents. 08:30 – The site is for usable gear, but we also get gear sold for charity or signed gear. 09:47 – Instagram is their main account, and they have separate accounts for different sports. 10:34 – They get new followers by finding great content that kids enjoy. 11:39 – Their goal is to be the marketplace for athletes. 12:50 – Follow Brendan personally on Twitter @brendancanden or contact him through email at sidelineswap.com 15:18 – Nathan does the famous five 3 Key Points: Be sure to look ahead for the next five years with your business. Up your Instagram followers by finding great content for your audience. Start a business that fills a niche, like SidelineSwap, which is an online marketplace specifically for athletes. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/18/2016 • 19 minutes, 45 seconds
EP 358: This SaaS Did $10MM In 2015, Helps Sales People Win, Raising Capital
Khuram Hussain, founder of Inbox 2 and now Fileboard. The two companies reached multi-million-dollar worth, and Khuram provides insight into his two businesses and how they have succeeded. He gives us an idea of Fileboard’s revenue and what factors go into his company, which has grown to be worth millions in just a few short years. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? —Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Not to go and run for corporate Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:16 – Nathan introduces Khuram Hussain 01:44 – Khuram started Inbox 2 in his twenties. 02:31 – Khuram explains the history of how Inbox 2 started 03:15 – Inbox connects everyone from one single platform (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) 03:44 – Inbox grew to 60 million users 04:22 – Inbox was bought by MyLife 04:44 – Khuram valued the business by user base and engagement 05:05 – Inbox was a team of 12 people and self-funded when it sold. 05:46 – Inbox was a 6-figure sell 06:20 – Then Khuram moved to starting a new business, Fileboard 08:44 – Fileboard is a sales tool to improve the sales process of a company. 09:40 – It was launched in 2012. 10:03 – First year’s revenue was $0, and they grew over the years to about $10 million 11:06 – Khuram shares about a typical process with a company that purchases File Board 11:54 – Khuram explains their customer base. 12:35 – Average business pays $20k to $30k per year 13:14 – Khuram explains Fileboard’s investors 13:52 – Customer worth is two to three years 14:56 – Customer acquisition cost. 15:50 – Nathan talks with Khuram about MRR 17:30 – The company is based in Europe. Khuram discusses his team. 18:00 – You can connect with Khuram on LinkedIn 19:22 – Nathan goes over the Famous Five with Khuram 3 Key Points: Khuram had decided that the money from his first business would not mark the end of his business endeavors. Fileboard’s profits increased from nothing to millions within just a few years. The company’s customer acquisition cost is extremely low compared to what each business will pay to use Fileboard. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/17/2016 • 23 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 357: He Quit His Job, Lost His Life Savings, Then Hit it Big With SaaS Business
Hank Leber, founder and CEO of Vytamin. Vytamin is a marketing technology software that provides an end-to-end marketing solution. The business made $460,000 the first year and is excelling in its industry. Hank will share his insights from failing with his first business to succeeding with the next. He is a great example of an entrepreneur who has persevered to create a service that works. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? —Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Google Apps Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No way If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Cheat a little Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan introduces Hank Leber, founder and CEO of Vytamin 01:55 – Hank worked with Travelocity before Vytamin 02:16 – Vytamin is marketing technology software for an end-to-end marketing solution 02:47 – The service starts at $1000/month 03:24 – Vytamin is a SAS company 03:54 – Hank’s first business was founded at the beginning of 2015, because Hank wanted to move to greater things beyond his original goals 05:14 – You can get out of the corporate world, but it is a leap of faith 06:45 – Hank quickly exhausted his life savings with his first startup, Gonnabe, and the company failed 09:14 – His cofounders found outlets at other successful companies. 09:52 – Hank then took a year in the agency world to make back the money he lost and get on his feet again. 11:05 – First year revenue for Vytamin was $460,000 11:30 – They now have 85 paying customers, with $102,000/month coming in. 12:41 – Gross churn is about 4% per month, but at first it was over 20%. 13:48 – Their goal is 4% annual churn 14:49 – They don’t have to spend on marketing because they use their own software. There is no real inside sales team. 16:08 – There are nine on the team now, with $650,000 revenue last year. 18:26 – Monthly headcount is about $10k 18:53 – Revenue is 18% 19:30 – Hank does the Famous Five 3 Key Points: Even if a business idea fails, use your new knowledge to continue seeking a concept that works. Starting a business will require savings or funding as well as a big leap into the unknown. Give appropriate value to your employees and they will work harder and stick around. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/16/2016 • 25 minutes, 1 second
EP 356: $1M In Guitar Sales From CrowdFunding, Whats Next? With Adam Lee
Adam Lee, cofounder and CEO of Bohemian Guitars. The business sells guitars made out of recyclable materials, and the majority of its sales in through the website bohemianguitars.com. Nathan and his brother are now making over $1 million per year, and their initial marketing strategy focused on crowdfunding. Their marketing strategy has found the secret to making money through these crowdfunding sites. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Tribes by Seth Godin What CEO do you follow? — Nick Woodman Favorite online tool? — Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely not If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — I wish I wasn’t caught up in saving for the future Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:16 – Nathan introduces Adam Lee, cofounder and CEO of Bohemian Guitars 01:40 – The company is a retail brand and manufacturer, with guitars made out of recyclable materials 2:20 – A guitar costs about $250, with $50 cost to produce 02:48 – Most sales go through the website 03:05 – They started in 2012 and have over 100 skews, for all custom guitars 03:22 - They have partners in China and a facility in Atlanta 04:07 – The first year, their revenue was $16000 04:55 – Their 2015 revenue was just under $1 million, due in part to success with a ukulele 05:58 – There are a lot of players, and they are new to the space, so they try to draw people in with accessories. 06:55 – They do a lot of crowdfunding to raise funds and test the crowd 07:31 – Kickstarter and Indiegogo were both used, and are fairly comparable 08:24 – They did a soft launch on Indiegogo with a party and low price initiative as well as an official launch online the next day 10:39 – Their campaign was run for 30 days, with a goal to manufacture 1000 guitars. 12:04 – An online campaign requires a lot of work and preparation—you need a story to tell. 13:03 – You can pressure people to still buy after reaching the Kickstart goal by adding incentives. 14:00 – When you agree to purchase, Indiegogo and the company will email you, and you will be invited to an exclusive online community. 14:44 – They will now try to run a campaign on their own website. 15:21 – Follow Adam on Twitter 17:19 – Adam does the Famous Five 3 Key Points: Nathan and his brother came up with a unique idea and are now making over $1 million per year. Bohemian Guitars focused a lot on crowdfunding, and is continuing to try out new online marketing methods. The company gets buys with incentives that have short deadlines. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/15/2016 • 21 minutes, 34 seconds
Ep 355: Why He Spent $1M to Sell 55k Copies of His Book, "Ask" with Ryan Levesque
Ryan Levesque, author of business methodology book Ask. Ryan wrote his book as a unique type of “business card.” It was a marketing tool for his “Ask Method” for businesses. After putting $1 million into his book, Ryan is now seeing the benefits, with tens of thousands of copies sold and a viable business in the education industry. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t be so afraid, man Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:16 – Nathan introduces Ryan Levesque, author of Ask 01:55 – Ryan wrote the book as a business tool, “a business card.” 02:40 – The first half of the book tells his personal story, a polarizing element for the book. 04:08 – more than 55,000 copies have sold. 04:35 – He was introduced to a publisher with no royalty, and his second book will have an advance 05:18 – He spent $1 million of his own money 05:42 – The biggest expense was advertising 06:28 – “If you’re writing a book to make money on the book, you’re going to be disappointed.” 07:16 – His advance for his next book is a six-figure advance--around $250,000 to $500,000 would be ideal. 08:15 – One mistake was to use partners to sell the book. 09:00 – Podcasters were the one group that understood giving out free books. 09:30 – He met with several podcasts each week. 10:20 – Ryan originally wanted to drive traffic to the “Ask Method” 11:30 – They are now exclusively an education company. 12:05 – He made over $1 million a year on his different platforms, and eventually a business hired him for $50,000 up front and 5 % royalty. 13:00 – He shifted to focusing on larger businesses. 14:00 – He works with different markets and learns about how to refine his business. 14:50 – Today they help students apply the methodology to their business. 15:28 – The book and the program work hand-in-hand. 16:28 – Go to askmethod.com for articles and downloads. 18:36 – Ryan does the Famous Five 3 Key Points: Make your story personal. Don’t write a book to make money—if you do, you’ll be disappointed. Considering using a book as a promotional or marketing tool. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/14/2016 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 354: $1.3M in Monthly Revenue to Get You Leads with Alex Berman of Inspired Beats
Alex Berman, cofounder of Inspire Beats, a B2B lead generation company that focuses on cold emails to help businesses succeed. The business took off quickly and is now worth about 1.3 million. With no money raised, Inspire Beats’s secret recipe is clearly working. Listen to Alex and I discuss a few ingredients in his recipe for success. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – 10X Rule What CEO do you follow? — Chris Hardwick Favorite online tool? — Streak Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Almost 4 hours of sleep at night If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Power emailing Time Stamped Show Notes: 1:20 -Nathan introduces Alex Berman, cofounder of Inspire Beats 01:54 – Alex explains Inspire Beats, a B2B lead generation company 02:39 – Form Stack used Inspire Beats to reach people in the US 03:15 – Alex talks about their different price packages 03:55 – They have over 700 clients 04:20 – Revenue is about 1.3 million per month 05:35 – There are thousands of companies who do the same thing. 06:34 - They have an advantage with higher quality and an American base. 07:26 – They are growing about 20% to 25% per month 08:33 – Gross customer churn is sporadic. They will stay for a long time or leave quickly. 09:42 – Numbers are different in every industry. 10:10 – Customers mostly come from cold emailing. 10:44 – The cost is about $40 per customer. 11:25 – Most customers stay indefinitely. They move to different models in Inspire Beats. 13:20 – They are bootstrapped, with nothing raised. 13:57 – Emailers are paid on salary. 14:30 – 150 emails are sent per day. 14:57 – Their first year the company took off quickly 15:50 – They don’t need to raise money--they want to increase cold emails and marketing. 17:10 – People can connect at inspirebeats.com or youtube.com/alxberman 19:28 – Nathan does the Famous Five with Alex 3 Key Points: Inspire Beats is a leading business in its industry. It is bootstrapped, with no money raised. The company hires cold emailers, and they pay very little for each new client that they take on. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/13/2016 • 23 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 353: $880k '15 Real Estate Agents Paid Her - For What? With Amanda Newman at ParkBench
Amanda Newman, who opened her first store in high school. She became a realtor, and went on to create Park Bench - a SaaS business that creates neighborhood-focused websites for realtors who want to connect to their community. She and her partner made $880k in revenue last year and this year they’re shooting for a million. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Predictable Revenue What CEO do you follow? — Grant Cardone Favorite online tool? — Unbounce Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Take some computer programming and design courses Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan’s introduction 02:22 – Park Bench creates neighborhood-focused websites 02:47 – Amanda wanted to create value for the communities that she worked in - so she built a neighborhood website 03:34 – Local businesses put deals and promotions on the website 04:15 – “After the first one, it was easier to create the second one” 04:40 – Amanda sells neighborhood sites to realtors so that they have the opportunity to build relationships 05:20 – Realtors pay between $3000 and $6000 per year 06:15 – “Realtors want to be known as the neighborhood realtor” 06:57 – Started in 2014 - first-year revenue was $450k 07:11 – Revenue in 2015 was $880k - they’re on track for over $1 million this year 07:30 – 215 unique customers 07:53 – Customer Acquisition Cost? 08:44 – Facebook marketing is paying fantastic dividends 09:20 – 80% of realtors who buy their product buy it on the first call 09:35 – MRR in May is around $70k per month 10:00 – Revenue per user per month is $350 10:25 – Customer Acquisition Cost is around $400 10:50 – Customers sign on for a year - many sign on for a 2nd year as well 11:15 – Around half of realtors dropped out last year - but they’re immediately replaced 12:22 – The average realtor stays around 1.5 years 13:04 – Team of 8 people based in Toronto 13:50 – Park Bench sells directly to real-estate agents 15:20 – “Being bootstrapped, we have to move fast” 15:40 – $70k monthly run rate 15:45 – Connect with Amanda on Linkedin 18:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find the customers that fit with you Understand your market and what they want Everything starts with creating value for the people around you Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/12/2016 • 21 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 352: Marketplace Takes 40% To Create High End Websites At Little Cost
Mike Wilner, the co-founder and CEO of Compass, a web design marketplace for small businesses. Mike’s a Venture For America fellow and has secured funding for his startup - a platform which handles marketing and project management for web designers and connects them to small business clients. Listen in to find out why you should forget the startup hype and focus on putting one foot in front of the other. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – The Servant What CEO do you follow? — None. I prefer following athletes. Favorite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Close If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Don’t believe all the hype in the startup world. There are just as many falls as there are success stories. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Compass works with network of freelance web designers - they connect small businesses to designers, manage projects, and take a cut 03:23 – Compass takes a 40% cut of everything that comes through 04:07 – People who need a project completed come to Compass - they take the details and then invite designers to the project 05:15 – Designers make around $40-60 per hour, after the 40% cut 06:24 – Started in late 2014 and have been launched full-time for just over 1 year 06:46 – First-year revenue in 2014 was $4k 07:40 – Total 2015 revenue was $40k 08:00 – 4 people in the core team, plus 40 designers on contract 08:30 – Around $250k worth of projects processed 09:15 – Designers have a lot of flexibility on how many projects they take on 09:43 – Growing 40% month over month 10:30 – Compass manages standardized rounds of revision to prevent scope creep 11:10 – “The technology is the easy part - the harder part is managing humans and expectations” 12:08 – Raised a $300k angel round via convertible note last year 13:20 – “There’s still a huge need in the marketplace for people who need a professional web designer” 13:40 – Connect with Mike on Twitter or at Compass 15:38 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t believe the startup hype The hard part of startups is managing humans and expectations: work on having great soft skills Leadership is about service Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/11/2016 • 20 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 351: $50K Monthly Revenue, Finally Designers Can Quickly Give File to Developers with Anh Vu of Avocode
Anh Vu, the founder and CEO of Avocode - a tool to connect front-end designers and back-end developers and make fantastic collaboration simple. Anh’s background is in design, but he’s building a SaaS business with negative churn and great profits by being totally on top of his numbers. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – The Startup Playbook What CEO do you follow? — Hiten Shah Favorite online tool? — Chart Mogul Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Measure everything, be really data driven, and focus on retention Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Avocode makes it easy for front-end designers to share information with back-end developers 02:50 – The designer uploads the design into Avocode, where all the team can access it, leave notes, and make revisions. Then the developer can access all the design assets through Avocode 03:25 – As of May 2016, $50k MRR 03:57 – Launched in February 2015 03:54 – $250k annual revenue in 2015 04:20 – Currently working with the 500 Startups accelerator 04:53 – 2800 customers on one of two plans 06:00 – Average revenue per customer is $27 06:40 – Some users were on boarded in a pre-order process and pay less than average 07:17 – User churn is 7% monthly 07:28 – Net revenue churn is -1% 07:50 – Some users stay and purchase more and more seats - so revenue churn is negative 08:40 – Upselling more seats to your current customer base is a KEY SaaS strategy 09:23 – There are 14 people in An’s team, based in the Czech Republic 09:43 – Monthly expenses are $35k 10:10 – They’re profitable 11:20 – Currently spending nothing on customer acquisition 12:01 – The average business-plan customer stays for 18 months 13:12 – Most of the customer base is startups and enterprise businesses 14:00 – Growing at 15% month over month 14:18 – Planning to start their first capital raise in August 2016 15:20 – Discussing partnerships with companies like Adobe and Sketch 16:07 – Follow Anh on Twitter 18:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Upsell your current customer base Plan partnerships and exit strategies - early Measure everything Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/10/2016 • 24 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 350: Toronto Based SaaS Doing $25k MRR with 10 Clients with Amanda Parker
Amanda Parker, the founder of Simply Insight - a high-end data analysis service that’s six months old and making $30k in MRR from just 10 clients. Amanda previously ran a successful marketing agency whose clients included Pepsi and 20th Century Fox, and she’s leveraging that experience to build her SaaS business incredibly fast. Listen in to hear how Amanda’s managing her first angel investment round, how she signed her first client before even having a software platform, and how she’s getting unbelievable return on CAC. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Predictable Revenue What CEO do you follow? — Jason Lemkin Favorite online tool? — Zoom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Relax and stop worrying: do the work, but stop stressing about it Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – “We found that data was a huge problem for our clients, and a huge opportunity” 02:54 – Amanda shut down her growing marketing company to focus on Simply Insight 03:09 – They make money from monthly subscription of $2.5-5k 03:57 – Simply Insight started 6 months ago - they got their first client before even building their platform 04:53 – Clients are on annual contracts that pay monthly 05:14 – Currently cash flow positive 05:35 – Growing over 20% month over month 06:07 – Currently at an MRR of $25-30k 06:20 – Hoping for an MRR of $50k by the end of the year 06:50 – They have around 10 clients 07:01 – CAC? Currently paying one sales rep salary and commission - ‘He’s almost paid for himself for the year and he’s been around for 6 weeks” 07:43 – Amanda’s been able to sell to her old client list from her agency to keep her CAC low 08:40 – Paying less than $5k to acquire a $30k contract 09:13 – “We currently have no churn at the higher levels” 09:43 – Revenue in 2015 was $7k from deposits 10:12 – Team of 6 people based in Toronto 10:45 – Doing an initial round of angel investment 11:01 – “You’re married to angel investors - so you need to find people that you really want to work with. It’s all about the team.” 11:52 – Finding a lead investor is the hardest part 12:12 – Raising $500k via convertible note 14:00 – “It’s never been a better time to start a company” 15:05 – The risk of convertible notes? 15:56 – Hustle, drive, and personality are everything 16:07 – Follow Amanda on Twitter or connect with her at Simply Insight 18:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a pain point. Test the market to see if other people feel it. Market your solution. Don’t be scared to do what you really want. If you’re going into a changing market, you’d better understand how it’s going to change. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/9/2016 • 22 minutes, 9 seconds
EP 349: He's Really Smart So Why'd He Quit for Startup?
Pavan Boob, the founder of Fuel Panda, a weekly subscription service that means you’ll never have to hunt for a gas station with an angry fuel light again. Fuel Panda refuels commuters’ cars while they’re parked. It’s in the early stages of the 500 Startups accelerator - but Pavan has big ideas. Tune in to hear how he plans to keep up with the Tesla, how he bootstrapped from the bottom up, and why it’s crucial to give your ideas 100%. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? —Mark Zuckerberg Favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Go for what you want. Pick something and give it 100% Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Fuel Panda is a weekly gas refueling service 02:15 – They’re a SaaS business that charges a subscription fee plus a margin on the gas 02:40 – Started in January 2016, working with over 100 customers and doing around 80 refuels per week 03:10 – Close to 1,000 refuels 03:24 – Made close to $15k 03:36 – Originally bootstrapped - they’re now in the 500 Startups accelerator 03:57 – Investment from 500 startups - $125k for 5% of the business 04:21 – Why go into the refueling business? 05:00 – “I had an 80 mile commute...I was stuck in traffic and I didn’t want to take 20 minutes to refuel when I saw the dashboard light” 06:44 – How do you prevent people from stealing gas when the lid is left open? 07:31 – Nathan: “I’m skeptical...I think that very soon the asset of a car is going to live on the balance sheet of a company” 08:00 – “Well, anything that moves on the road is going to need refueling...I think it will be possible to adapt” 09:11 – What does the business look like when people switch to autonomous electric vehicles? 10:00 – They’re investing in mobile charging stations that could carry anything from gasoline to batteries to hydro fuels 10:10 – Pavan’s invested around $25k in the business himself 10:20 – Less than $200k total investment - and the company is cash flow positive 10:45 – Monthly RPU is $20 per month plus fuel margin - around $50 total 11:00 – MRR is around $6k 11:34 – Churn is around 4% - though the company is so new that it’s hard to tell 12:13 – CAC is $5 12:26 – Targeting consumers, and also building managers and company managers 14:17 – Connect with Pavan via email and at the FuelPanda website 14:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a pain point. Test the market to see if other people feel it. Market your solution. Don’t be scared to do what you really want. If you’re going into a changing market, you’d better understand how it’s going to change. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/8/2016 • 19 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 348: 11,500 Paying Him To Manage One-Piece Wardrobe with Blake Smith
Blake Smith, CEO of Cladwell - a SaaS business that helps you to dress exceptionally well with the smallest possible wardrobe. Blake and his team tried over 20 different revenue models before they perfected their business - and they’re hoping to hit $1 million in revenue this year. Listen in to hear how to stay friendly with ex-co-founders, why you need to test and test your ad channels, and why Blake wishes he’d bootstrapped his company. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Anything in the HBR series What CEO do you follow? —Sheryl Sandberg Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That it was okay to follow my curiosity Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:47 – Cladwell helps you do more with fewer items of clothing 02:11 – They sell a tool that helps you to dress each day and cut down your wardrobe 03:19 – Founded 2 ½ years ago 03:20 – Over 200k people have filled out their initial questionnaire 03:42 – A B2C SaaS business - women’s side pays $15 per quarter and men’s side pays $21 per quarter 03:55 – Launched as a men’s business but women now make up 60% of business 04:15 – 11,500 customers in March 2016 04:46 – Customer Acquisition Cost is about $17 05:05 – Almost profitable - currently spending $30k per month on marketing 05:30 – Monthly Revenue Per User is about $6 05:40 – MRR is about $70k per month 05:57 – Have raised $1.8 million in funding 06:22 – Started with 3 other founders, and ended up with 1 other 07:00 – “My closest co-founder...we both realized that we were made to lead companies. We’re still really good friends” 07:55 – “If I could do it over again, I would have started bootstrapping” 08:54 – First year revenue was $1000 09:12 – Started out trying affiliate marketing and drop-shipping 10:00 – “We tested 22 different permutations of a business model until we came up with one that worked” 11:04 – First year revenue was really about $10k; second year $100k; “We’re planning to hit a million this year” 11:24 – They advertise in places where people are looking for advice 12:00 – Monthly churn is 5% - ‘It’s our worst number at the moment’ 12:43 – Based in Cincinnati, Ohio 13:10 – 6 employees 14:16 – What valuation would Blake want for his first priced round? “Around $10 million” 15:37 – Blake doesn’t want to scale ad spend until he’s seriously tested each channel 16:13 – “We killed it on YouTube last summer by doing revenue shares with all the influencers in men’s fashion” 14:17 – Connect with Blake via email 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Spend smart. Don’t put more money into ad spend until you really understand every channel you’re using. Test and test and test and pivot. It’s okay to follow your curiosity and see where you end up Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/7/2016 • 22 minutes, 15 seconds
EP 347: How Social Rank Hit $50k In MRR In Under 2 Years With CEO Alex Taub
Alex Taub, the co-founder of Social Rank. He and his co-founder created an algorithm to identify the ‘Most Valuable Follower’ on Twitter and other social media - and it went viral. Now they’re making over $50k each month from their social media analytics software. Listen in to hear why businesses are leaping on the chance to curate their followers, how Alex built his business so fast, and why you should work for someone else before you launch your big idea. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – I like blogs more - but I guess my book, Pitching and Closing What CEO do you follow? —Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Rapportive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Go to a medium sized startup and work there before you do your own thing Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:06 – Social Rank is primarily for brands and agencies 01:50 – “We found out that in many cases, the most valuable followers are public figures” 02:56 – Social rank allows brands to analyze their followers 03:00 – They generate revenue through a premium subscription model 03:50 – Social Rank Premium is $50 per month, while the Market Intelligence model allows organizations to view the whole ecosystem and costs from $100 to several $1000 dollars 04:20 – Over 250,000 users, and over 50,000 paying customers on the Market Intelligence model 04:40 – Social Rank doesn’t focus on user growth - they look at MRR and customer growth 05:34 – Revenue has grown by 30% each month in 2016 05:40 – In early 2015, MRR was under $7k per month, while it’s now $50k per month 06:55 – How many basic subscribers upgrade to the premium model? 07:20 – “We’re more interested in using it as a potential leads generator” 07:56 – “It’s a non-traditional SaaS model...we’re using the premium model as a loss leader to find leads” 08:50 – Premium model has only been out for 2 weeks 10:00 – “Most Valuable Follower”, “Most Engaged Follower”, and “Best Follower” metrics 10:33 – “Those metrics are a very small piece of what we do” 11:00 – It’s a way to rank more valuable, in-demand, and interactive followers 12:25 – How is it valuable to curate followers? 12:45 – People use it to find the right people for events in specific areas 13:20 – The primary use case is finding the right people for the right things 13:54 – Raised a little over $2 million in seed rounds 14:17 – Connect with Alex on Twitter or via email 15:47 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work for someone who knows what they’re doing before you strike out on your own Curate your social media followers and find the right people to promote your events If an idea works - run with it Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/6/2016 • 21 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 346: Non-Profit Builds 100+ Homes, Goal 1,000 Communities with Brett Hagler
Brett Hagler, the founder of New Story a charity that’s transforming slums into sustainable communities worldwide. Brett and his team are determined to change the way charities work, and they’ve created their own software platform to maximize transparency, accountability, and user experience. Listen in to hear how Brett plans to build 1000 communities in the next 10 years, why he chose charity over social entrepreneurship, and why it’s crucial to follow your own path. Famous 5: Favorite Business Book? – Insanely Simple What CEO do you follow? — Brian Chesky Favorite online tool? — Audible Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Don’t do what everybody else is doing. Spend time learning about the world and have an open mind. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:23 – New Story transforms slums into sustainable communities 01:50 – They created a platform to crowdfund homes and public buildings for communities in the Third World 02:29 – 100% of crowdfunded donations go to the people on the website - there’s a separate group of ‘Angel Donors’ who have invested philanthropically in their operations 04:30 – “Venture capitalists 05:00 – New Story is 17 months old and has already generated $3 million in donations 05:50 – “We don’t measure success by what’s in our bank account, but by the impact we’re having on the world” 06:26 – Brett went to Haiti after the earthquake...and couldn’t find a charity to work for that he was excited about 07:36 – “We took our frustrations and made a better product and a better experience” 08:09 – “I never knew where my money was going or where it was helping” 08:50 – Built a database software to be extremely transparent 09:50 – Why go into charity rather than social entrepreneurship? 10:17 – “We’re passionate about building a better type of non-profit” 10:50 – Their key metric of success is 4 communities 11:20 – Have so far built 4 communities - over 300 homes at $6000 per home. Aiming to have built over 1000 communities in 10 years’ time 11:56 – Connect with Brett on Twitter or at New Story 13:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t do what everybody else is doing. Open your mind. Follow your own journey - make a difference in the way that makes you fired up. Give to the world. Spend time with people who have less than you and work out how to serve them. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/5/2016 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 345: Replacing Property Managers With $79 Flat Fee, $31k in MRR with Max Nussenbaum of EnterCastle.com
Max Nussenbaum, co-founder of Castle and a Venture for America fellow based in Detroit. Max and his co-founders are revolutionizing property management in one of America’s most opportunity-rich property markets. Tune in to hear what Max is doing differently, why he defends splitting equity evenly with his co-founders, and why you should be investing in Detroit. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Anything You Want What CEO do you follow? — Henry Ward Favorite online tool? — Instapaper Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Relax a little bit Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan’s introduction 02:04 – Max is based in Detroit 02:20 – Castle manages rental properties for owners - they find tenants, collect rent, and coordinating repairs 02:29 – They make money by charging a flat fee of $79 per month per rental unit 03:00 – They want to simplify the pricing structures associated with regular property managers 05:30 – Founded in late 2014 and launched in 2015 05:47 – Currently managing 530 units, all in the Detroit area 06:10 – “Our target market is the regular-person property investor” 06:43 – First year revenue was around $100k last year 07:14 – The metric Max focuses on is MRR - the subscription model is similar to SaaS 08:12 – Raised around $3 million, most recently $2 million in a seed round 09:17 – Team of 10 people 09:35 – “Structurally we’re a lot like a SaaS business” 10:00 – Monthly RPU is $174, as the average customer has 2.2 units 10:35 – Switching costs are very high in terms of time and energy, so monthly churn is only around 1% 11:51 – “The bottom line is that we just don’t know lifetime value yet...we haven’t even been around for 2 years” 12:18 – They consider acquisition costs on a per-unit basis - and they’re willing to spend around $200 to acquire a unit 12:55 – Most customers are investing less than $1 million in property in Detroit in their lifetime 14:30 – There are a lot of cheap properties in Detroit - but generally you can’t get a mortgage for them 15:50 – The percentage of properties that have been vacant for more than 30 days is around 5% 17:17 – “There are still 700k people in Detroit and they’re regular people who just need places to live” 21:45 – Connect with Max on Twitter 20:04 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t stress too much when you’re young. There’s plenty of time in life. If you can simplify a complicated process, there’s a good chance you’ll make money You don’t have to be bullied away from splitting equity evenly with co-founders - what each of you brings to the table is less than what you achieve working as a team Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/4/2016 • 26 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 344: Business Did $15M in 2015, Weird Way David Fortino Got Job at NetLine
David Fortino, who discovered NetLine aged 26 and convinced the CEO to hire him. He’s now the head of Audience Development and has developed the Rev Response customer distribution network. Tune in to hear the inside story on the net’s biggest B2B lead generation and content publishing business. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Traction What CEO do you follow? — Gabriel Weinberg Favorite online tool? — Clearbit Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Focus on developing and refining cadence Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Why did David want to work for NetLine? 02:50 – Being able to monetize a base through contextually relevant inclusions really appealed to him 03:44 – Netline is the world’s largest B2B-specific content syndication and lead generation platform 03:55 – They work with large enterprise technology companies to distribute their content to specific audience segments 04:30 – Nathan: “If I gave you a finance eBook, how would you generate leads for me?” 05:55 – They have relationships with over 15k web publishers 07:36 – “We’re driving the sales funnel for thousands of businesses” 08:00 – A CPL-based model, with an average value of $40-50 per lead 09:01 – There are 100 employees 09:10 – David heads up Audience Development 09:37 – There are around 300-400 active client campaigns at any time 10:00 – Current annual run rate is upwards of $20 million 10:25 – How predictable is revenue? 11:03 – Biggest cost is payout to individual publishers - around 20-30% 11:36 – Netline has various products to handle leads, from simple top-of-funnel generation to lead development 21:45 – Connect with David on Twitter or LinkedIn 14:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Refine your cadence. Find a rhythm and drive that helps you keep going. Lead generation isn’t just about volume, but quality. Really refine your ideal customer - and hunt out exactly the people you want to connect to. Don’t be afraid to reach out to people you want to work with Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/3/2016 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
EP 343: The Fast Way to Make Money In RealEstate with Charles Gaudet
Charles Gaudet, founder of Predictable Profits and author of The Predictable Profits Playbook. Charles is a business coaching and online marketing expert who’s made money in real estate, self-publishing, and private coaching. Listen in to find out how he became profitable after going $1 million into debt overnight, why you’ll do better if you write a book, and why entrepreneurs should be staying in line. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Losing my Virginity What CEO do you follow? — Marcus Lemonis Favorite online tool? — AdEspresso Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Stick with one strategy and master it Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:55 – Nathan’s introduction 01:25 – Predictable Profits is a business coaching and marketing company 01:44 – Started his business on a pay-for-performance model, where he’s paid a percentage of the business increase he secures for his clients 03:00 – His pet health insurance company closed down in 2000 when the crash happened 04:10 – Ended up investing in real estate 05:30 –Bought his first property off his father on a financed loan 06:22 – “I found myself over $1 million in debt almost overnight” 07:36 – Attracted buyers with incentives for construction loans 08:38 – Developed affiliate relationships with tradespeople and related businesses 10:40 – “If you’re looking to get into real estate, align yourself with a private lender” 11:30 – How do you convince a private lender to invest in your deal? 15:00 – The Predictable Profits Playbook: why? 15:10 – “If you look at the most influential people in the world, they’ve got things in common, They’ve written a book, and they’re public speakers” 15:45 – If you want to be perceived as someone of influence...well, success leaves clues 16:15 – The book is published as a hybrid - it’s a combination of self-published and done through a traditional publisher 17:20 – The book sells for $17 on Amazon 17:44 – Around 1500 books have sold so far 18:24 – Charles sends copies of his book to potential clients as an advertising strategy 19:01 – Charles used a ghostwriter 20:10 – “Give the book away as much as you can. Give it away for free if you have to” 20:20 – Hard costs per book are under $3 per copy 20:43 – Most of Charles’s income last month came from private clients 21:45 – Connect with Charles at Predictable Profits 22:25 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Master one strategy at a time. Focus. Writing a book positions you as an expert - use that influence! Establish multiple income streams - you’ll be more financially stable Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/2/2016 • 27 minutes, 22 seconds
EP 342: How to Write a Best-Selling Book with Steve Olsher
Steve Olsher, sometimes called the world’s foremost re-invention expert. He’s known for the bestseller What Is Your WHAT? - helping businesses and individuals find the one amazing thing they were born to do. Steve writes, speaks, runs multiple businesses, and is the host of Reinvention Radio. Tune in to learn how Steve’s crushing it in e-commerce, the secrets behind his bestseller, and the one place where he’s generating 400k unique site visitors a month. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Guerilla Marketing What CEO do you follow? — Adam Braun Favorite online tool? — GetEmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — These are the golden years Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:30 – Steve’s working on multiple projects simultaneously 03:12 – Liquor.com is crushing things right now 03:40 – It’s a site that connects brands to bartenders and liquor-lovers 04:20 – The site has had its ups and downs - they lost the domain name at one point 05:30 – In 1999, when the site was still an e-commerce business, they were making $3.5 million in annual sales 05:51 – Since then, they’ve moved to a newsletter and content marketing model, monetised through paid advertising 06:15 – Annual revenue in 2015 was $3 million; this year they’re hoping to reach $7.5 million 07:30 – Works with big brands from Bacardi to Jack Daniels 09:12 – One of their biggest sources of traffic is ZergNet, which brings around 400k unique visits per month to the site 12:22 – Steve’s books: why’s he writing them? 12:57 – “I know people who are getting 6 or 7 figure advances on their books” 13:10 – “It’s about platform” 13:45 – Steve knows someone who had a 7-figure advance on their book: their platform is one of the top 250 podcasts, with 850k downloads per month 15:40 – What Is Your WHAT? Was published by Wiley with a $15k advance 17:05 – Sold 25k hard copies between 20/09/13 - 15/05/16, not counting the free eBook 17:24 – Get the free eBook at What is Your WHAT? 17:50 – Steve’s email list was 40k when he started marketing 18:10 – He’s the sole author 18:55 – Royalty income is $50k 19:40 – Given the income he’s made - was it worth spending six figures in book marketing? 20:43 – Most of Steve’s income last month came from real estate 21:45 – Connect with Steve at Reinvention Radio 28:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Build your platform. Success comes from having a tribe. Invest your time and money widely. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Want to write a book? Understand why you want to write it before you start. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
7/1/2016 • 29 minutes, 49 seconds
EP 341: 15 Year Old Sells Company, Creates and Sells 3 More for Almost $1M with Cody McLain of SupportNinja
Cody McLain, the founder of Support Ninja. Cody launched his first business at 15, and sold it 18 months later, having made $150k in revenue. He’s an entrepreneur with incredible drive who’s been featured in Forbes, Mashable, Entrepreneur and more. Tune in to hear how Cody sold two businesses before he was 24, why he’s set up and outsourcing company, and why this relentless entrepreneur thinks that everyone just needs to slow down. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Entrepreneur Rollercoaster What CEO do you follow? — Ben Casnocha Favorite online tool? — Droplr Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — It’s not always about making money. Slow down and explore the connections you can make with other humans. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:56 – Nathan’s introduction 01:25 – Welcoming Cody to the show 01:30 – Starting your first business at FIFTEEN? 02:01 – His friend proposed starting a hosting company to pay for the new XBox 02:40 – It took several years to move from on-selling HostGator’s services to starting their own hosting company 03:17 – At 16 or 17 he merged with another partner, having made $150k in revenue 04:41 – He was in foster care when he started his first business 05:11 – Aged 19, was screwed over by a potential business partner who ended up in a litigation battle 06:00 – Lost customers because the buyer damaged the company’s reputation 07:09 – Servers were shut down and customers quit 07:55 – Cody walked away and moved to Seattle 08:29 – He started a new business, PacificHost 09:40 – Put around $30k of his $70k savings into the business before it was profitable 10:11 – PacificHost was making around $650k in annual revenue when he sold it 10:51 – Margins tend to be low in the hosting industry. 12:06 – Sold PacificHost for a little under $1 million aged 24 12:35 – Started an outsourcing business with a partner in India 13:11 – “I always wanted to be a startup...but I’m very risk-averse. So I took the opportunity to work with startups” 13:53 – Support Ninja was founded to provide outsourcing services for small startups 14:09 – 14 months in, they have over $1 million in contracts 15:23 – First-year revenue in 2015 was less than $500k 15:44 – “We didn’t even know what we were selling the first few months” 16:01 – “I would say we provide Outsourcing As A Service” 16:37 – Support Ninja uses similar metrics to SaaS and they expect a 40% net margin 18:38 – Cody’s eager to use the skills and platform of Support Ninja to launch new projects 19:05 – They currently have 10 clients 19:30 – Average annual contract size is $100k - $400k 19:40 – Team size is 5 in the USA, 100 in the Philippines 20:20 – Follow Cody on Twitter or check out his website 22:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It’s not all about making money. Slow down. Connect with the people around you. Know your own skills. Always be looking ahead. Know where your current project can take you. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/30/2016 • 26 minutes, 47 seconds
EP 340: TigerProp Eliminates Real Estate Broker Fee, Did $800k in 2015 with Max Coursey
Max Coursey, a real estate broker and the founder of Tiger Prop - a real estate brokerage company that’s giving its buyers their money back. Tune in to hear about Max’s innovative brokerage model, how to create an insanely successful co-working space, and why you should be having more fun. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The E-Myth Revisited What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Paperless Pipeline Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — How to bite my tongue Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:04 – Nathan’s introduction 01:25 – Welcoming Max to the show 01:34 – Tiger Prop is a residential real estate brokerage in Boise 01:55 – They credit 20% of brokerage fees back to the buyer 03:22 – Why do people choose Tiger Prop over other brokerages? 03:25 – They standardize professional photography, signs, flyers, and videos 04:20 – They don’t take any money unless they move the property 05:30 – Tiger Prop was launched in 2013 06:04 – First-year revenue was around $200k 06:39 – Now have 39 agents 07:22 – 2015 total revenue was around $800k 08:20 – “We’re starting a new co-working space in downtown Boise” 08:45 – Sharing space with a designer furniture gallery 09:16 – All agents are on the same split - Tiger Prop takes 30% of the brokerage fee and agents take 70% 10:31 – The total revenue figures only include commission charged 12:09 – There are multiple revenue streams in the building: furniture, coffee, and - soon - printing 13:50 – Connect with Max on Twitter or at Tiger Prop 15:29 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’re in the business of selling, then find and pay the best agents you possibly can. The better your people, the better your business. Find ways to make the space you work in, pay. Have as much frickin’ fun as humanly possible Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/29/2016 • 21 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 339: The $10M Website Seller Empire Flippers
Justin Cooke, the co-founder and CMO of Empire Flippers - a brokerage platform that makes buying and selling websites incredible easy. After experimenting with website creation, Justin and his partner pivoted into brokerage in 2013 - and they’re handling millions in sales every year. Listen in to learn how the professionals value a website, how much the average site sells for, and why it’s best to be bold. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Built to Sell What CEO do you follow? — Clay Collins Favorite online tool? — HubSpot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — I should have been bolder. I could have made bigger business moves. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:29 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Empire Flippers helps people buy and sell online businesses and apps 02:05 – Their biggest sale was $550k last month 02:26 – A recent sale was Rave Aid - an Ecstasy hangover cure site 02:56 – Individual sellers are the most common listers 03:25 – $297 listing fee for the first listing and $97 for repeat listings 03:45 – Some users have portfolios of up to 60 websites that they buy and sell on a regular basis 04:15 – The listing fee acts as a filter to keep out scammers and time-wasters 04:40 – The site pivoted to brokerage in 2013 05:00 – First-year revenue was around $275k in total sites sold 05:24 – The charge a 15% fee on sales 05:38 – Use a basic algorithm to help with valuation, then look at subjective factors 06:24 – 95% of revenue comes from the 15% brokerage fee 06:50 – Made $4.56 million in sales on 176 deals in 2015 07:30 – In April 2016, made $1 million in sales - meaning $150k in revenue to Empire Flipper 09:04 – How did Justin start Empire Flippers? 09:56 – “We realised there was a huge market of people looking for mini-businesses” 10:09 – In April 2016, between 20 and 30 sellers listed their businesses for sale 11:05 – About 15-20 of those sites were sold 11:28 – About half of the buyers are repeat buyers and half are unique 11:45 – The average deal size is $76k 12:24 – They’ve sold well over 1000 sites since their inception 13:35 – How do Empire Flippers value a site? 14:30 – The business is entirely bootstrapped 15:00 – At the beginning of creating an investor program to bring people with lots of money and no time into the site 13:30 – Connect with Justin on Twitter or at the Empire Flippers blog 18:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be bold. Forge your own path - don’t be afraid to ignore what other people are doing. Be willing to pivot as better markets reveals themselves Listing fees and barriers to entry can add value to your business by keeping out tire-kickers and time-wasters Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/28/2016 • 24 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 338: He's 28 Investing From $600 Million Fund, $4.2 Billion Under Management
Michael Gilroy, a tech investor and partner with Canaan investment. Canaan’s an early-stage venture firm with $4.2 billion of capital under management. Michael moved there when he realised he wanted to engage with the companies he was investing in. Listen in to hear the ins and outs of technology investment, just how Michael secured an investment deal with Bellhops, and why we should be working less. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Fooling Some of the People All of the Time What CEO do you follow? — Dan Ruch Favorite online tool? — TD Ameritrade Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Try to work less and be in the moment more Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:02 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming Michael to the show 02:24 – Michael started his career working with M&A and private capital investment in Silicon Valley 02:50 – He was involved in the 2012 Oracle deal 03:58 – How did Michael get into technology investment? 04:28 – “I had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up” 04:50 – “You genuinely have to be passionate about investment banking...you see a lot of people churn out” 05:25 – Michael worked at GCA for 5 years in New York 06:39 – “The great thing about venture capital is that when you invest, that’s just the start of the deal” 07:35 – Canaan is an early-stage investor - meaning that they support the companies they invest in 09:30 – What are the roles in a venture firm? And what’s Michael’s next step? 10:29 – How can Michael move up the ranks at Canaan? 11:28 – How do you bring in companies like Bellhops for investment? 11:40 – “It’s all about your network...And it’s important to go deep on a couple of different verticals. You can’t do everything” 13:08 – Michael’s looking to start making fintech deals 13:30 – Connect with Michael on Twitter 15:15 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Work less. Enjoy life. Making good deals and bringing value to a company is all about your network. Nurture solid relationships with the people around you. If you’re looking for early-stage investors, find a partner investor who’ll bring more than just money to the table. You’re building a long-term relationship! Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/27/2016 • 19 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 337: How'd he Sell 12,000,000 Books and What About "The Other"?
Dr Henry Cloud, a psychologist, business consultant, and bestselling author of over 45 books. His most recent book is The Power of the Other - offering powerful insights into how relationships shape our success. Listen in to hear about Dr Henry’s enormous experience in writing and publishing, why you need an agent, and exactly what the “power of the other” means for your business. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — OneNote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — I wish I’d known what’s in this book: that I need other people to get me through life and turn me into my best self Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:07 – Welcoming Dr Henry to the show 03:10 – Why does Dr Henry write so much? 03:35 – “The books come from the work...when I see an issue that multiple people are having, I write a book” 04:50 – Dr Henry’s latest book is The Power of The Other 05:05 – “People only get past the current limit of their performance when they build relationships that take them to that higher level of performance” 06:50 – The last book that Dr Henry published was Boundaries For Leaders 07:30 – Even the highest performers tend to lose control of their lives 08:09 – “If everything’s important, then nothing is” 08:40 – Published by Harper Collins 09:25 – “The publisher doesn’t sell the book - the author and their platform sell the book” 10:55 – What was the path that Dr Henry took with his publisher? 12:40 – Why it’s important to have an agent 13:15 – Agents have specialist knowledge about the business side of books 15:15 – “Ask yourself one question: why am I writing this book?” 16:09 – A book is a way of getting your message out 16:45 – It’s a product line, a way of spreading your message, and a calling card 17:00 – When you’re just starting out, royalties are probably the wrong reason to write a book 18:50 – Beginning authors will be offered lower royalty percentages than established authors - around 10% would be normal 20:17 – An advance is roughly the royalty percentage for a first year of sales 21:12 – How did Dr Henry sell copies of his first book? 21:50 – Dr Henry sold copies of Changes That Heal at speaking events 23:25 – He got a $10k advance on that first book 24:35 – He took around 12% of the $20 sale price in royalties 25:55 – Publishers are more likely to pay for ideas where they see a market 26:44 – Dr Henry sold around 40-50k copies of his first book before he was offered another deal 27:20 – Self-publishing works well for some people - but if you don’t want publishing to be your day job, then it’s worth looking at other options 29:02 – Connect with Dr Henry at Power of The Other 32:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The publisher doesn’t sell the book: the author and their platform sell the book Other people, and the relationships you form, are absolutely vital to bringing out your best performance Want to write a book? Understand why you want to write it. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/26/2016 • 39 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 336: Ash and Anvil Sells Clothes To Short Guys, 25% Ecommerce Re-Order Rate
Steven Mazur, co-founder and CEO of Ash & Anvil, a clothing company for short guys. Steven co-founded the company last year and he’s excited about how many dedicated customers their store already has. Tune in to hear how Steven’s getting inventory orders right; the importance of connecting with the entrepreneurs around you; and why everything always takes longer than you think. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – How To Win Friends And Influence People What CEO do you follow? — Andy Dunn Favorite online tool? — Wunderlist Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Everything takes longer than you think it will Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:51 – Welcoming Steven to the show 02:06 – “I’m 5’ 6”, my business partner’s 5’ 8” - we decided to be the ones to make clothes for shorter guys” 02:56 – Started with an IndieGoGo campaign with a $10k goal, and ended up generating $26k in pre-orders 03:40 – The bestseller is their blue gingham shirt 04:55 – The price of the shirt is $69 - what are the margins on that? 05:20 – Base unit cost at a low volume is around $25 05:35 – Around a 55% gross margin at this point 06:00 – First run of shirts was 1000 units 06:35 – Steven doesn’t have a figure for net margin at this point 07:30 – How do you handle the challenge of ordering the right amount of inventory? 07:50 – The company is self-funded 08:31 – “It always takes longer than you think to order” 08:53 – Founded in 2015 09:11 – The team is currently just Steven and his co-founder Eric 09:37 – The most important metrics for them are revenue, number of customers, and re-order rate 10:50 – Close to having 1000 unique customers at the moment 11:24 – The next order is 1,250 shirts 12:10 – Average customer buys 1.5 shirts 12:32 – Total revenue in 2015 was $50k 13:30 – What’s Venture For America? 14:00 – It’s a startup program that places entrepreneurs in struggling American cities, like Detroit, and helps them connect with investors and other start-ups 16:03 – “It’s been a big part of our story” 10:45 – Connect with Steven at Ash & Anvil 18:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: It takes 10 years to build an overnight success: focus on the long-term and be patient Engage with the smart people around you. Be part of your community and your ecosystem Start the company that you want to exist - but check that other people want it too Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/25/2016 • 23 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 315: Mom Just Had Baby, $100 Million Raised Augmented Reality, 65 Million Users
Jess Butcher, the co-founder of Blippar. It’s a mobile visual browser that lets you search the internet without words, simply by scanning the objects around you. As Chief Marketing Officer, she’s led Blippar to over 60 million app downloads. Listen in to hear about the crazy future of augmented reality and why Jess thinks that “blipping”, like “googling”, will become a verb before too long. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Anything by Seth Godin What CEO do you follow? — Aaron Levie Favourite online tool? —Twitter and Linkedin Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Fake it til you make it. Stop being so cautious. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Jess to the show 01:53 – Blippar is a mobile visual browser that can recognise anything in the physical world and search for information on it - “Search without words” 03:15 – “We could play an audio file on the artwork you see - or open a link to buy the handbag that you see someone holding on the train” 03:40 – Currently working with Coca Cola and Lucky Charms to create interactive experiences with their physical products 03:35 – Founded in 2013; went to market in 2014 05:20 – Raised just over $100 million in funding 06:00 – “We’ve been in the market long enough that we have entrenched relationships with many of our clients. It’s a combination of consultancy and technology fixed fees” 07:30 – Mostly 7-figure retained relationships 08:15 – “Increasingly we’re moving the creative side onto agencies and focusing on tech” 08:30 – Average annual contract is in the mid 6 figures 08:45 – Currently working with well over 500 brands and asset owners 09:40 – Founded in 2011 09:50 – Around 300 team members in 14 offices around the world 11:40 – In addition to the brands they work closely with, Blippar has self-service tools that let smaller companies access their technology 12:20 – Blipp Builder is an affordable and accessible way into Blippar 13:30 – How do you incentivise users to come on board Blippar? 13:50 – “We’ve never sold this as people having access to everyone that uses Blippar...the idea is that the partners themselves are getting people to download the app” 16:00 – What’s the long term goal? 16:15 – “We want to become a verb in common parlance” 18:02 – Within the year, Blippar will be able to recognise its surroundings with the same level of complexity as an adult brain 18:20 – Connect with Jess on Twitter 21:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Visual search recognition is the next level of engagement with the internet - visual recognition and augmented reality are going to take off rapidly in the next few years Fake it til you make it. Pretend you know what you’re doing and you’re where you want to be. Have ambitious goals. Know when you’re onto a big idea - and chase it. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/23/2016 • 25 minutes, 12 seconds
EP 314: He Just Sold His Company SkillBridge.co, But Why?
Saalim Chowdhury, a man who’s out to build the future of online talent sourcing. Saalim was CTO at Skillbridge - a premium talent-sourcing company that was acquired last week by Toptal. Listen in to hear Nathan and Saalim talk about why Skillbridge was keen to be acquired, how the human cloud economy works for high-level talent, and why sometimes you just need to keep going. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — No Favourite online tool? —Thingthing keyboard Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— I wish I knew the value of persevering no matter what Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Welcoming Saalim to the show 02:00 – Skillbridge is an online platform that brings management consultants to people who need them. 02:40 – “How do you make the human cloud economy work for people whose skills can’t be broken down into a 5-star rating?” 03:10 – Skillbridge breaks down what a company needs people to do, and then connects them with the people who have those skills 03:35 – Founded in 2013; went to market in 2014 04:30 – Saalim was the second customer of Skillbridge and found the exact person he needed there 05:50 – Skillbridge’s peak team size was 7 people 06:35 – Makes money from a 20% flat fee charged to the buyer 07:55 – Have been a total of 7.5k people listed; 1k people looking for skills 08:30 – Raised an angel investment round 10:00 – A typical project involve consulting, for example in the equity space - perhaps a week to 2 week project 11:00 – Typical project size is $5k-10k 11:50 – Deliberately high-quality, curated skills service 12:40 – In March 2016 just under $500k of projects placed on the platform 13:55 – Why sell the business? 14:15 – “We could either raise money and play catch-up, or we could sell to these guys and go in together” 15:10 – “Everybody was very happy with the deal” 16:00 – How is a business like Skillbridge valued? 18:02 – “Toptal are essentially building the future of on-demand talent” 18:20 – Connect with Saalim on Linkedin or via email 20:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Sometimes it’s best to join the people ahead of you instead of trying to play catch-up Persevere. Work through the hard times. The human cloud economy is complex - the platforms that manage it and connect people need to be able to handle the complexity of people’s skills and histories. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/23/2016 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 313: He's Not an Artist But Sold $5m Worth of Art in 2015
Ethan Appleby wants to get away from a world where everyone has the same Ikea print in their flat. He’s the founder of Vango - a startup that connects aspiring artists with novice art buyers. They’re currently making $1.6 million in revenue and hoping to grow this year. Listen in to hear Nathan and Ethan talk making art accessible, setting up a successful marketplace, and why Ethan’s raised three funding rounds via convertible note. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Stewart Butterfield Favourite online tool? —5None Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— To take the step sooner to get into entrepreneurship Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:51 – Welcoming Ethan to the show 02:00 – Vango is a marketplace that connects artists and art buyers. It makes money by taking 30% of every transaction 02:50 – “Art is something people are intrigued by, but intimidated by” 03:16 – Before starting Vango, Ethan was a Design Thinking consultant 03:54 – Started in 2013 - first-year revenue was zero 04:23 – As of March 2016, 20,000 sellers have an active profile 05:00 – Targeting new art buyers - around 100,000 buyers on their platform in total 05:45 – “We’re hustling every month to get new sales” 06:35 – Currently have a team of 12 06:44 – Raised around $3 million through 500 Startups 07:10 – All raised via convertible notes 07:55 – Convertible notes let you take funding without worrying about valuation 09:10 – “We like to help people engage with art directly” 09:44 – Total revenue in 2015 was $1.6 million 10:10 – Biggest cost is the team 10:45 – In March 2016, about 800 buyers and 320 sellers 11:25 – Once an artist sells 10 pieces, their likelihood to sell increases 12:18 – The benefit to artists comes from higher traffic 13:30 – Average order value on on Vango is $575 14:20 – Connect with Ethan via email or on twitter 16:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get started. Create your business now. To get sales, you need to hustle. Keep moving and building momentum Art is an area where a marketplace to connect buyers and sellers directly has room to take off Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/23/2016 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 334: Is He Creating The New Billion Dollar Direct Mail Industry?
Jake Jorgovan, founder of Outbound Creative: an agency that goes the extra mile to help consultants secure their dream clients. Tune in to hear why it’s worth spending to acquire your perfect clients; why Jake’s sending cakes to top executives; and how he’s planning to multiply annual revenue by 10x this year. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – How To Win Friends And Influence People What CEO do you follow? — Aaron Ross Favourite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To enjoy life more along the way. Don’t work around the clock. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:32 – Welcoming Jake to the show 01:37 – Outbound Creative make money be helping consultants secure their dream clients 01:48 – They create highly personalized outreach campaigns and charge a monthly retainer, plus commission 02:41 – Retainers are $2-4k, with a commission ranging from 0-15% 03:15 – One client is Lighthouse Conferencing: they’re sending cakes to Lighthouse’s potential clients with a URL to a personalized outreach video 04:21 – “If you’re doing deals that are $50k or $100k, you can spend a few hundred dollars to get in front of those clients” 04:55 – They also work on gifting and customer retention 05:30 – Started in July 2015 05:40 – This year’s revenue is around $50k 06:15 – First-year revenue was around $25k 06:25 – Hard costs of purchase and postage are passed on to the client 07:05 – One full-time employee and 3 sales reps 07:39 – Highly personalized videos on a landing page are a staple of outreach 08:00 – Have worked with 10 clients in total; currently have 5 clients on retainer and 3 more in the pipeline 08:39 – Averaging $15k per month in revenue 08:55 – They’re moving away from project-based work and towards building MRR 10:16 – Revenue goal for 2017? “Half a million” 10:45 – Connect with Jake at his website 13:11 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t work around the clock - enjoy life Go the extra mile to engage with your clients. Those are valuable relationships - invest in them Be ambitious about growth: make a plan and hire fantastic sales reps Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/23/2016 • 17 minutes, 30 seconds
He's 36 Year Old SaaS Dad of 2, Gets 8+ Hours of Sleep, Business Did $640k in 2015, EP 312: Dave Nevogt
Dave Nevogt is the co-founder of Hubstaff, has three kids, and gets more than 8 hours of sleep every night. Hubstaff is a SaaS company that helps virtual teams communicate better through online time tracking. They’ve just broken $1 million in annual revenue. Tune in to hear how Dave’s managing disagreements with his co-founder, a tight breakdown of his unit economics, and why you should be taking more risks. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The 80/20 Principle What CEO do you follow? — Hiten Shah Favourite online tool? —Google Docs Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— More If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— That taking risks is okay. Even if it doesn’t work out, you’ll learn from it. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:03 – Nathan’s introduction 01:28 – Welcoming Dave to the show 01:40 – Hubstaff is a SaaS business that helps track time and invoice clients 01:50 – Launched in 2013 - the business is entirely bootstrapped 02:20 – Split the original investment 50/50 with his partner 02:50 – What will Dave and his partner do if they disagree on something big? 03:15 – If there’s a disagreement, one person can buy the other one out 04:22 – Currently have 2600 paying customers 04:50 – Services track time and record activity, screenshots, what software is being used 05:35 – Average customer is paying $35 per month 06:22 – MRR in March 2016 was just under $88k 07:26 – 20 employees, with a head-count cost each month of around $46k 08:15 – Adding about 270 new customers each month 08:45 – Customer churn is 3.9% 09:12 – Lifetime value is around $660 09:55 – Founders based in Indianapolis, with a global team 10:50 – Paying around $90 on per-customer acquisition 11:14 – Spread through company to contractor to company 12:30 – Blog gets around 40k unique visitors per month 13:00 – Around a 7% conversion rate to free trial at the Hubstaff homepage 14:20 – Connect with Dave via email or through the Hubstaff website 16:25 – “We just want to build the business up to a healthy annual revenue and then live our lives” 16:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Always take risks. Even if things don’t work, you’ll learn. Find a partner who’s on the same page as you. And even then, make sure you’re prepared for disagreements. Have your numbers at your fingertips Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/22/2016 • 20 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 311: Memebership Site Secrets with Kat Loterzo
Kat Loterzo - a content machine who’s written 37 bestselling books and generates 3-4 emails for her list each day. Kat built her own 7-figure online fitness business before turning to coaching and writing. She now coaches businesses on how to have the same success she did. Tune in to hear how Kat brings people to her membership site, why she can’t get enough of writing, and the importance of listening to your gut. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Big Magic What CEO do you follow? — Grant Cardone Favourite online tool? —None, I’m pretty old school Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely not If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Listen to your gut and follow what you feel called to do Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Kat to the show 02:05 – Kat built Woman Incredible as an extension of her personal training business 03:10 – Started in 2007, became big in 2010 03:40 – She’s now dropped the business - but at its height it was making $80k a month 04:20 – Kat currently makes revenue from The Tribe, a coaching membership site 05:17 – First month is $97, subsequent months are $197 05:30 – Around 150 current members 05:50 – Made just over $500k from the site so far 06:20 – Membership gives free access to all of Kat’s content, and access to members’ community 08:22 – Keeping around 80% of members each month 08:50 – Average customer lifetime is around 5 months - but members will often buy other products 09:40 – Acquisition is mostly from referrals and social media. Kat’s only just now setting up a funnel 10:00 – Kat will email her list 2-3 times each day, and always includes links back to The Tribe website 10:55 – Kat also hosts the Success Smackdown podcast 11:20 – Produces several 4 or 5 minute episodes each week 11:40 – Each episode is hitting around 1,000 downloads 12:40 – Not monetising podcasts - just using them as content marketing 13:13 – Kat’s an Amazon bestselling author with around 1000 downloads per month 14:30 – “I can’t get enough of writing” - Kat’s written 37 books 15:30 – Publishing the next book through CreateSpace 16:20 – Facebook is Kat’s main source of traffic 16:50 – Connect with Kat on Facebook, Twitter, and at her website 19:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create the content and people will come Follow your gut and do what you feel called to do It’s not the size of your list that matters, but how dedicated your following is. Find people who love what you do. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/22/2016 • 22 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 310: You Won't Believe How Many Books This 24 Year Old Has Sold
Jake Ducey is 24 years old and he’s already written three books with Penguin Random House. Jake’s making money from his books - but he’s out to make a difference. Last year he raised 345,000 pounds of food for homeless people off the back of his book tour. Tune in to hear Nathan and Jake talk self-publishing, how to launch your writing career, and why patience is everything. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Pitch Anything What CEO do you follow? — Oren Klaff Favourite online tool? —Youtube Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Pretty close If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Patience Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Jake to the show 02:00 – Jake wrote a book not expecting to make money from it 02:55 – Wrote his first book, Into the Wind, aged 19 04:00 – Self-published; have now sold 30k copies 05:00 – Made around $100k from that book alone 05:40 – Got a literary agent because he wanted someone with experience and a mentor 06:30 – Founded in 2012 and had only $200 topline revenue 06:25 – Agent’s name is Bill Gladstone at Waterside Productions 06:50 – “I would recommend going through Amazon if you’re self-publishing” 07:35 – Next book, The Purpose Principles, was published by Penguin Random House 08:50 – Had an advance on the contract - around $30k 09:36 – Jake was starting to pick up momentum by this point 10:03 – “I want to influence people’s lives” 11:00 – Took Jake around 4 months to write his 60,000-word book 12:30 – “It’s nice to write a book with support and an editor and help” 13:37 – Having a publisher is also a credibility stamp for speaking engagements 14:00 – Jake mostly makes money through speaking engagements 15:13 – Hired Ryan Holiday for book launch strategy sessions 16:05 – The next book, Profit From Happiness, will be published in June 2016 17:40 – Plans to give away his book to underprivileged youth: for every book that’s bought, he’ll donate one 19:10 – Jake hopes to expand internationally and keep writing books 20:00 – Connect with Jake on Facebook 21:40 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to self-publish. Publishing houses are more likely to pick you up if you’ve already had some success. Profit has to intertwine with service and fulfilment. Make sure you’re helping other people. Most people overestimate what they can accomplish in a year and underestimate what they can accomplish in a decade. Be patient. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/22/2016 • 25 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 333: How Did He Make $15 Million from Managing Ads in 2015?
Warren Jolly, the CEO of Ad Quadrant, a social marketing agency that made $4 million in revenue in its first year. Warren’s an expert in leveraging social media and mobile marketing. Listen in to hear why you need to plan obsessively before you launch a business, why focus is the key to success, and how Warren aspires to scale massively...without becoming a SaaS business. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk Favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Focus on one business; be great at one thing at a time Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:27 – Nathan’s introduction 01:49 – Welcoming Warren to the show 01:56 – Ad Quadrant was founded in 2014 02:05 – It’s a managed services agency 02:35 – Ad Quadrant works in the social marketing niche, including social media and mobile advertising 03:12 – They make money by charging a percentage of the ad spend that they manage - if they meet their acquisition targets then the ad spend may be increased 04:00 – “First year revenue was $4 million” 04:23 – Spent a lot of time pre-planning and finding clients before they launched the business 05:14 – “It was a painstaking process...we failed a lot and spent a lot of time working out our niche” 05:25 – Revenue in 2015 was $15 million 05:46 – 33 employees, based in California and New York 06:01 – Take around 20% of ad spend on average 06:14 – Will take more than that if they arbitrage a campaign - and will take less from high-volume clients 07:02 – Have 35 active clients 07:17 – Most revenue comes from percentage fees from ad spend - and some comes from a different model where they take a fixed price-per-action from customers 08:24 – The metrics that are important to Warren’s team are new opportunities, growth, and churn and attrition 08:55 – “If you’re not carefully focused on churn, you’re just filling a leaky bucket with more water” 09:05 – “The two things you can control are flawless quality and fanatical customer service - those are what reduce churn” 10:30 – Ad Quadrant’s aspirations are to develop and incubate consumer products 11:05 – “If we can find verticals that are ripe for disruption and a good fit for social, then we want to use our expertise to get into that space” 12:08 – Warren believes in bootstrapping - he’s more interested in investing in the business than paying himself a large salary 13:16 – “Reach an inflection point and pay yourself a ratio” 13:45 – Don’t try to run 5 businesses at once - find the one that you really want to focus on. Passive investment is an option as well 14:50 – Warren’s generated his own wealth from prior exits 08:16 – Connect with Warren on Linkedin or Twitter 17:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on one thing at a time. If you’re in a service industry, you’ve got to control churn. Have astonishingly good customer service - otherwise you’ll bleed clients instead of growing. Plan. Plan painstakingly and obsessively before you try to launch your business. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/22/2016 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 309: Ad Tech Company Hits $500k in 2015 Revenue with 26 Year Old At Helm
Nicholas Haase, founder and CEO of Loot and Startup Drugz. Nick’s come out of the private equity industry and now wants to change the direction of marketing by tapping into the power of user-generated content. Tune in to hear what Nathan should invest his next million dollars into, why augmented reality is the future of tech, and where to buy a “9 to 5 is for the weak” T-Shirt. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – How to Win at the Sport of Business What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? —Shopify Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No. I’m trying. If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—I wish I knew how important computer science major would have been Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Nicholas to the show 02:20 – Worked in the private equity industry after an internship 03:10 – The people Nicholas worked with loved what they were doing 03:40 – Nicholas would invest $100 million in augmented reality if he had the juice 04:50 – Loot uses incentivised user-generated content to promote a brand 05:30 – People can upload photographs or actions and receive rewards according to their following 06:30 – Founded in 2012 and had only $200 topline revenue 06:50 – Topline revenue in 2015 was $500k 07:30 – Bootstrapped the app’s creation and raised capital following proof of concept 08:20 – Augmented reality can be many things - a Snapchat filter is augmented reality 08:46 – How do people value brands in the space that Loot works in? 09:30 – By recurring revenue or by number of contracts 09:55 – What’s Startup Drugz? 10:20 – An e-commerce company that sells merchandise based on entrepreneur humour 11:20 – In February 2016, total sales revenue was in mid-5 figures 12:30 – Connect with Nicholas via Twitter 14:05 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Understand some computer science. Even if it’s not your core competency, you’ll be grateful for the background. Nicholas thinks that augmented reality is the future of tech and entertainment Leverage your users and fanbase - marketing is effective when it connects users to other user-generated content Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/21/2016 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
He's Sold The Most CutCo Knives Ever, EP 308: John Ruhlin
John Ruhlin, the #1 distributor for Cutco and founder of the Ruhlin Group. John’s an expert on high-level gift giving, and accessing CEOs and top executives. Tune in to hear about why gratitude is so important, how to make your relationships work for you, and the secrets of effective gifting. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Give and Take What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk Favourite online tool? —Hatchbuck Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—I wish I understood that I didn’t have to do it all on my own Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming John to the show 01:56 – Interned with CutCo and created their corporate gifting program 03:00 – Made around $10k over a summer aged 20 03:50 – Sold about $35-40k in his first summer 04:25 – Sold over $500k in his best year with CutCo 05:20 – “We help leaders not suck at saying Thank You” 05:50 – John speaks, writes, and coaches on corporate generosity and gratitude 06:20 – Worked with the Chicago Cubs on gifting 07:20 – They were remodelling a stadium - so John suggested using the wood from the old locker room to create 400 custom speakers for their most important relationships 09:20 – 8 people in John’s team and a strong relationship with his suppliers 10:08 – “I really try to appreciate everyone in our circle...I don’t have a business without those people” 10:40 – Almost lost the business on 2008 because of embezzlement by his accountant 11:25 – Published Giftology through Book in a Box 12:40 – Book in a Box cut down around 90% of the work related to creating a book 13:30 – Execution, launch and publicity are all being managed by John’s company 15:00 – Aiming to hit the Wall Street Journal bestseller list 15:20 – The best way to sell a book is to create a great book and have a tribe who’ll promote it 17:50 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You are as strong as the people around you. Create strong relationships with your team, your suppliers, and your partners. You don’t have to do everything alone. Say thank you. Relationships thrive on gratitude and appreciation Be humble and be honest about your weaknesses, and you’ll find people to help you balance them out Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/21/2016 • 21 minutes, 40 seconds
South Asian Dating App Hits Surprising Revenue Target, EP 307: KJ Singh
KJ Singh left $300k a year as an options trader at Wall St to move to Silicon Valley. After leading growth at Union Metrics, KJ’s founded Dil Mil - the world’s fastest-growing dating app for South Asians. Tune in to hear why some of the country’s richest people are unhappy; how KJ’s growing his business with no paid advertising; and what the future looks like for Dil Mil. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Naval Ravikant Favourite online tool? —Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Don’t work on multiple projects at the same time Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming KJ to the show 02:16 – “I think some of the top traders at different firms are miserable with their life” 03:00 – “I think a lot of the hard work in the startup world is meaningful work” 03:22 – KJ left finance aged 24, earning $300k per year 03:58 – He joined Union Metrics because he was attracted to the idea behind the firm 04:30 – Moved to Silicon Valley only knowing one person 05:00 – Worked at Union Metrics for 1 year, in which time it grew from 14 to 23 people 05:40 – Left Union Metrics to create a dating app for South Asians - why? 06:00 – KJ’s sister was 28, a doctor and attractive - but had never found time to date 06:17 – 90% of South Asians date and marry within their community 06:40 – “The traditional model of arranged model has broken down” 07:18 – Raised $2.8 million altogether using two SAFE rounds 08:15 – Dil Mil makes money through a premium model. There’s a free base service; it’s possible to purchase more ‘likes’ 09:40 – Average income per user is $10 per month 09:55 – Just under 1 million downloads 10:13 – Run rate of around $500k; currently making around $44k per month 10:45 – “A lot of the metrics that SaaS companies use are relevant to us - but obviously, when we’re successful people leave.” 11:50 – Not using any paid advertising at the moment - growing through referrals 12:40 – Revenue goal for 2016 is $1 million 13:15 – Average customer stays for around 3 months, giving a $40 lifetime value 14:20 – “The point where you have revenue without investors is a great position to be in” 14:50 – Connect with KJ on Twitter 16:44 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Find a niche market with a need you can meet. Generate revenue. So many startups run a fundraising round with nothing but a great idea - then find they just can’t monetise. Focus on one thing at a time. Don’t try to work on every great idea at once. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/21/2016 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 332: This Agency Went form $30k to $1.3M in Annual Revenue with 14 Employees
Kevin Getch, the founder and director of digital strategy agency Webfor. He’s running a digital strategy agency that’s growing by 30% year on year - tune in to find out why he left his 6-figure job at the height of the financial crisis and how failures have given him the confidence to succeed. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? — Sarah Bird Favourite online tool? — Google Keep Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Get comfortable with being uncomfortable Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:02 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Kevin to the show 01:50 – Webfor makes money from developing digital strategy, from website design to SEO optimisation 02:58 – Kevin left a 6-figure job in 2009 to found a business 03:50 – What gave Kevin the confidence to leave his job? 04:05 – “I’d had some pretty big failures - and that gave me the confidence” 04:37 – Mix of project-based and retainer-based income 04:50 – Marketing tends to be retainer-based, while design tends to be project-based 05:20 – A project is around $10k, while an ongoing marketing retainer will be around $2k per month 05:40 – Team of 14 people 06:24 – Works with around 60-70 clients per month 06:52 – First year revenue was around $30k 07:12 – Revenue in 2015 was $1.3 million - they’re aiming for $1.7 million in 2016 07:35 – Revenue growth has been around 30% each year 08:52 – Biggest cost is payroll 09:20 – Connect with Kevin on Linkedin 11:04 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get comfortable with being uncomfortable - that’s how you know you’re pushing yourself. Take confidence from your failures - they help you to learn, and they show you how to get back up again Take the leap. If you hate your job, then find an alternative and go for it. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/21/2016 • 16 minutes, 2 seconds
4 Kids Under 8, Traveling Country, Runs 3 Businesses, How?! EP 306: Peter Awad
Peter Awad, host of The Slow Hustle podcast. Peter started an automotor business in college and now runs two startups, as well as hosting an in-depth entrepreneurship podcast that’s been featured on the Apple homepage. Tune in to hear Peter talk about entrepreneurship with 4 kids, how he makes money from his podcast, and what you can learn from the way successful people manage their lows. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Bold What CEO do you follow? — No Favourite online tool? —Pomotodo Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—I wish I had more confidence to do what I wanted to do Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:19 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Peter to the show 01:47 – Peter has a background in e-commerce 02:30 – Peter generates revenue from his automotor business 03:07 – Gross revenue in 7 figures, and gross margin of 20-30% 04:22 – Started an unsuccessful startup which he tried to run for 4 years 05:00 – Connections for Mission Meats were made through previous failures 06:05 – Entrepreneurship is full of highs and lows 06:40 – The Slow Hustle looks at the way that successful entrepreneurs manage their highs and lows and live a manageable life 08:30 – Has hour-long interviews that dig into people’s lives 09:20 – Show has 15 live episodes, and around 8-10k downloads per month 10:30 – Producing quality relationships with interviewees 11:45 – Just signed their first 2 sponsors 12:45 – Sponsored by a law firm and by the Iowa Startup Accelerator 13:16 – Sell an 8-show sponsor pack for $3k 14:25 – Sponsor pack buys you a 60-second ‘sponsor spot’ of pre-recorded conversation 14:40 – Around a $10 CPM 14:59 – “It’s a labour of love for me...if I can cover costs it’s fine with me” 15:20 – Connect with Peter on Twitter 17:03 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid or ashamed of failure. Your failures will set you up for future success. All entrepreneurs - even the most successful - struggle with managing their work and life, with fear of failure, and with emotional lows. You aren’t alone. Follow your passions and do what you love Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/20/2016 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
Look! A Book Author Who Actually Made Money! ($250,000 To Be Exact), EP 305: Ash
Ash is the co-founder of Tradecraft and an authority on entrepreneurship, social media, and branding. Ash has written a bestselling book, spoken to over 10,000 people and been cited in Forbes, TEDx, and Entrepreneur Magazine. Listen in to hear Ash and Nathan break down how to launch a successful business book, the fine art of self-branding, and how to capture an email list of half a million. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Inside Steve’s Brain What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? —Hootsuite Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Master the art of being fearless. Stick with your heart. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:19 – Nathan’s introduction 02:30 – Welcoming Ash to the show 02:45 – Right now Ash is making money through book sales and speaking engagements 03:08 – TradeCraft is Ash’s main business - but he drives traffic through self-branding 03:50 – Confessions From an Entrepreneur was published in 2012 04:02 – Ash makes $2-3 from each book sale; there have been over 150k volumes sold 05:00 – Ash focuses on a very niche market - and speaks to audiences to drive book sales 05:45 – Primarily promoted his book sales through Facebook 06:15 – Currently has a list of over 500k - captures emails by giving away the first volume of his ebook 07:10 – The reason that a lot of people don’t see returns on their books is that they don’t focus on one niche market 08:10 – Ash has a strong relationship with a lot of colleges through speaking 08:55 – Pushed programs to buy and distribute the book to students 09:45 – Speaking revenue in 2015 was around $90k for around 18 speeches 10:20 – Ash is stepping back from speaking while he works on a new book 10:50 – Works with some startups as a consultant to develop their pitch 12:10 – Ash has equity in 15 startups 13:00 – “Write an authentic book. Let your passion show.” 14:10 – Ash builds his by speaking engagements - and takes other people’s lists in exchange for co-promotions 14:10 – Connect with Ash on Facebook 17:35 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Promote yourself. Take speaking engagements, write, build authority. All of the self-branding work you do will drive your sales. If you want to write a book that sells - target your niche. Find the influencers there and push distribution through them. Work at being fearless. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/20/2016 • 19 minutes, 53 seconds
This Guy Might Be the Biggest Underground Growth Hacker Ever, EP 304: Vincent Dignan
Vincent Dignan is a growth hacking expert who was voted the best speaker at South by Southwest this year. He’s just launched The Growth Hacking Playbook and he’s turning marketing upside down by ditching the platitudes and giving people practical advice and tools on how to actually generate traffic. Listen in to hear about how to get to 1 million unique website views per month, how to find anyone’s email online, and why networking events are a waste of time. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – The 48 Laws of Power What CEO do you follow? — James Altucher Favourite online tool? —Audiense Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Don’t go to networking events. And start public speaking earlier. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:34 – Welcoming Vincent to the show 01:50 – Vincent provides consultancy, coaching, and speaking services that help them to grow their business 03:00 – Use Charlie app - it will find all of the publically available information from someone’s email address 03:33 – Email Hunter is a free tool to help you find anyone’s email 04:02 – Discover will show common connections on social media 04:30 – Profile Hopper visits people’s Linkedin profiles to generate return views to your profile 04:55 – Rebump is a Gmail tool that will re-send emails that haven’t been responded to 05:34 – Vincent has a small number of clients who pay him $5-10k per month 06:10 – Magnific is Vincent’s agency 06:40 – Vincent employs over 750 writers, editors, and marketers 07:40 – How could Nathan get to 1 million unique website views per month? 07:58 – Optimise his email list, and build his Twitter following 08:30 – Would create a tool to add “You like this, read this next” to the website 09:40 – Which articles do I send to which parts of my list? 11:10 – Start executing things - move your project along 12:45 – Vincent doesn’t take equity when it’s offered 15:20 – Connect with Vincent on Facebook 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Get in front of audiences. Start public speaking and sharing what you know. Use the right tools to build your list and drive traffic. The money’s in the list - so have the right tools to work it. Start executing. You can go to a hundred networking events and still achieve nothing. Move your project along. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/20/2016 • 18 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 331: Trump Suicide Predicted By Best-Seller Ryan Holliday, Sites Ego
Growth Hacker Marketing and The Obstacle Is The Way. Ryan’s an expert on media manipulation, resilience and growth - and his new book Ego Is The Enemy is due out soon. Tune in to hear why ‘fake it til you make it’ is terrible advice, why Donald Trump won’t last long, and what you can learn about business from Angela Merkel, Marina Abramovich, and Kanye West. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – “I’m fascinated with the accumulation of wisdom over the last thousand years” 02:25 – Ryan dropped out of college, and assisted Tucker Max and Robert Green 02:40 – Ryan was the director of marketing at American Apparel and has since authored 4 books 03:50 – He had a $250k advance on his first book, Trust Me, I'm Lying 05:35 – The economics of books - the advance might not be high, but sales can build 07:42 – The Obstacle is the Way has been used by the NFL, the military, and other competitive areas 09:06 – “If you can build multiple income streams, you can take more creative risks” 10:10 – Why write another book? 10:33 – “Writing is what I love...it’s what makes me feel fulfilled” 11:05 – Ryan’s latest book is Ego is the Enemy 11:55 – “You want a book to provoke a discussion” 12:30 – Almost every business book is based on the idea that “you’re doing great” - Ryan wanted to take that idea down 13:31 – “There’s a difference between confidence and ego. Ego is when you lose self-awareness and start living in illusions” 14:54 – “If you start believing in your own greatness, it’s the death of creativity” - Marina Abramovich 16:00 – It isn’t ego if you have a realistic confidence in your abilities - based on your own track record 16:40 – When ego becomes dangerous is when you act as though you’ve already accomplished the things that you’re really only starting to work on 17:50 – The problem with social media is that you can get credit for things that you haven’t yet done 18:43 – “If you tell a kid that they’ve done well because they’re smart, they’ll do worse than if you praise them for working hard” 19:28 – What about brainwashing yourself? Nathan: “Sometimes you can only achieve things by convincing yourself that you’re better than you are” 21:10 – Kanye West’s fashion line has failed because he didn’t apply the same work to it that he applied to his music. He made the mistake of thinking that he was successful because of who he was - not the work he put in 23:03 – Successful people aren’t successful because of their ego - sometimes it’s in spite of their ego 24:29 – “Passion is not a substitute for knowledge, it’s not a substitute for a plan or knowing what you’re doing” 27:15 – “You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do.” Would you want your doctor faking it until he makes it? Would you want a firefighter faking it until she makes it? 28:33 – “As a marketing tactic, talking about things before they happen is great - but don’t buy into your own crap” 29:39 – “Fear is a bad adviser” - Angela Merkel 30:58 – Fear of missing out and fear of risk are both bad advisers - focus on the data and you’ll make better decisions 32:08 – Donald Trump? “Demigods are successful in the short term - they’re very rarely successful in the long term” 3 Key Points: Confidence is great - but once you start believing your own hype, you’ll stop working effectively. Don’t let fear or ego make your decisions. Look at the data. You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do. There’s no substitute for sitting down and doing the work. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/20/2016 • 34 minutes, 47 seconds
Moms Secret Accounting Weapon, Growing Business, and 2 Year Old Son, Ep 303: Beth Milligan
Beth Milligan, a virtual assistant and online strategist who’s building her business from scratch. Tune in to learn from Beth about claiming back your time, tools to simplify accounting, and starting a business while looking after a toddler. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Big Magic What CEO do you follow? — Kim Garst Favourite online tool? —Tailwind Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—To be more confident, and that she could do anything she put her mind to Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 02:04 – Welcoming Beth to the show 02:50 – Beth helps entrepreneurs gain time back by carrying out the tasks they don’t want to do 03:40 – Beth charges a monthly retainer up-front 04:40 – Beth uses Freshbooks to manage her accounts 05:35 – She uses the time tracking feature to log hours and generate invoices 07:00 – Beth’s expenses are under $50 per month 08:55 – Beth has one young kid 09:20 – Beth’s still looking to build her product into something more scaleable 09:45 – Generates revenue of around $800-$1200 per month 11:12 – Tries to give people time back to focus on what they started their business for 12:00 – Connect with Beth at Milligan Strategies 15:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: You can do anything you put your mind to. Be confident. Your time and focus are valuable - use tools that help you claim back time Charge clients up-front to save problems later. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/19/2016 • 17 minutes, 51 seconds
How to Capture 150 New Emails Leads From Instagram Daily, EP 302: Nathan Chan
Nathan Chan, founder of Foundr magazine. Nathan’s a master of Instagram who generates around 400 leads a day from the channel. He’s rocketed the Foundr app to the top of the app store, beating out Entrepreneur magazine and other competitors. Listen in as the two Nathans discuss building an unbeatable list, tips to win at Instagram, and whether Nathan would sell his business for $30 million today. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Ready, Fire, Aim What CEO do you follow? — Vishan Lakhiani Favourite online tool? —SamCart Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Party more Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Nathan to the show 02:30 – Nathan’s already been featured on the show 03:10 – Instagram is probably the most valuable revenue driver that Foundr have 03:20 - Their account has around 700k followers 03:40 – Instagram account has generated around 150k email subscribers 05:25 – A VA generates the graphics: they recycle images from 6 months ago 06:20 – Use a tool called Latergram to queue posts 07:04 – The purpose of the Instagram account is to drive traffic and generate leads 07:30 – Capture around 300-400 leads each day from Instagram 08:55 – Nathan teaches an Instagram course 09:25 – The most lucrative funnel appears to be posting about Instagram on Instagram 09:50 – Nathan runs a live webinar every week 10:40 – 3 main revenue streams are from the online magazine; ebooks; and a membership site 11:40 – Courses and digital products are the main revenue generators 12:18 – Over 500k people have downloaded the magazine 13:10 – Nathan found his design team on Behance 14:02 – Foundr magazine is an authority-building product rather than a multi-million dollar product 15:00 – The magazine is making in the high six figures in revenue 15:15 – How does Foundr outrank Entrepreneur in the app store? 15:30 – “Look at keywords - the app name and description” 16:27 – ‘A young entrepreneur magazine” - hits multiple keywords 17:25 – Foundr has just started a weekly podcast 17:48 – Had around 70k downloads in April 2016 19:00 – Nathan would take $30 million for Founder magazine 19:58 – Hoping to have a 500k email list by the end of 2016 20:08 – The membership course - Foundr Club - has 400 paying customers 22:13 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Online media isn’t just about publishing content. Build a community, build a list, and work social media for all it’s worth Optimisation is about paying attention to the small things: Nathan started his app name with ‘A+’ to be at the top of alphabetical listings Use social media to capture leads, not to push sales Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/19/2016 • 24 minutes, 53 seconds
The Art of Getting 25,000,000 Unique Website Views Monthly, EP 301: Alex Skatell
Alex Skatell jumped into the incredible competitive online media space and founded the Independent Journal Review. Today it’s one of the top 50 websites in the country, with over 20 million unique views a day. Listen in to hear Alex and Nathan break down the future of online publishing, making money through news, and why you shouldn’t be afraid to go up against giants. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – David and Goliath What CEO do you follow? — Fred Smith Favourite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Go with your gut Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:32 – Nathan’s introduction 02:11 – Welcoming Alex to the show 02:25 – Why go into online publishing? 02:50 – Alex wanted to create a platform for self-published news in college 03:30 – “People aren’t looking at the front page of the paper to find what’s news” 03:50 – News is becoming more feed-driven: Alex’s company puts out content every 4 minutes 04:20 – 700k people on the email list 05:10 – “How can you reach people online, on your own terms?” 05:35 – Independent Journal Review was launched in 2012 06:08 – The company was initially bootstrapped, and has since raised around $2.5 million from friends and family 06:31 – 20-25 million unique views per day 07:20 – Around 50 people working in the newsroom 08:00 – There’s a technology company and a news company under Alex’s Media Group of America brand 09:00 – Alex believes in publically available tools like Wordpress and Google Analytics 10:00 – Total expenses each month are around six figures 10:30 – Largely makes money through advertising 14:00 – Nathan: Would you scale your technology into a SaaS platform? 14:30 – Alex: No, that’s not our focus 14:18 – Connect with Alex on Twitter and via email 17:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be afraid to go up against the big guys. Start-ups can be flexible and take risks, even in spaces full of giants. Go with your gut. Listen to your instincts. The way that people consume and publish news is fundamentally changing - it’s becoming more personalised, more immediate, and more feed-driven. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/19/2016 • 22 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 330: She Cranks $1 EPC 3x Per Day with 25,000 List in Dating Niche
Heather Havenwood, CEO of Havenwood Worldwide, and an authority on marketing and online business strategies. Heather’s the author of several books including Sexy Boss, and she’s making $900 a day from affiliate marketing emails alone. Tune in to hear how Heather’s crushing affiliate marketing, why you don’t need to build great funnels to be an online marketer, and how to build fantastic marketing relationships. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Game of Life and How to Play It What CEO do you follow? — Jim Rohn Favourite online tool? — Mobit Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Get into online marketing before others do. Start now! Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Welcoming Heather to the show 02:30 – In 2015, Heather made the most money from Dating Triggers.com, a product that claims to teach men “how to communicate with women” 03:27 – Heather focuses on email marketing 03:50 – Video is a key part of the funnel - the sale is a one-off $47 04:15 – Heather’s sold 1200-1500 of these packages since 2009 04:24 – Makes most of her money from coaching and affiliate marketing 04:53 – $56k from sales since 2009 - but there are multiple revenue streams in the business 05:28 – Email affiliate marketing is the big earner 05:58 – Digital Romance Inc.com is her highest-earning affiliate. 06:58 – 15-25% of her list will open - working out to around 3000 07:22 – 10-12% of total opens will click-through - working out to around 300 07:45 – Heather focuses on EPC (Earnings Per Click) 08:11 – Heather makes around $300 from each email - and sends 2-3 emails per day 08:44 – “I look at email as entertainment” 09:05 – Heather made around $250k from all her revenue streams in 2015 09:54 – “You can either be really good at creating funnels, or you can be good at pushing for the people who’ve already done that” 10:45 – What’s the key to getting other people to push your stuff? “Give first. Never ask first.” 11:40 – “I work with people on launches - in this space, people are always launching new stuff” 12:20 – Heather has a team of 3 people 13:10 – She’s based in Austin 13:45 – Connect with Heather at her website or text SEXY to 72000 16:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Give first. Approach other people to help them, not to ask for help. In online marketing, you can either be great at building funnels, or great at pushing someone else’s funnel. Pick whichever you’re better at, and become GREAT at it. Make your emails entertaining. In the digital age, inboxes are where people go when they’re bored. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/19/2016 • 20 minutes, 6 seconds
Where This VC Helps Put $3.7B Worth of Capital And Five $100M+ Companies He Loves, EP 299: Adam Valkin
Adam Valkin, managing director at General Catalyst partners. General Catalyst have invested in tech startups such as Air BnB, Stripe, Kayak, and ClassPass. Adam’s worked with top venture capital firms in Europe and the States, was the CEO of LoveFilm, and has many years of experience investing in startups. Listen in for a fascinating conversation on the future of online gaming, the process of investing in tech start-ups, and why it’s better to disrupt than be disrupted. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Good To Great What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos What is your favorite online tool? — GIPHY Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That it’s a young person’s world. In your 20s, everything is possible for you. Don’t wait. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:33 – Nathan’s introduction 02:43 – Welcoming Adam to the show 03:10 – How did Adam get started in venture capital? 03:40 – Got involved with European internet companies, looking for a new frontier 04:17 – After the dotcom boom, he helped incubate LoveFilm in 2003 05:10 – Was asked to be the CEO of LoveFilm, which he did for 2 years 06:40 – After iOS, Android, and social media in 2008, it became possible for entrepreneurs to rapidly develop a global reach 09:45 – “It’s difficult to break into content-rich areas like online film, because of the strength of big providers.” Companies like FlowSports are doing interesting things 11:00 – Adam worked with Excel, a venture capital firm based in London 11:50 – “I’ve always had more fun with disruption” 12:30 – Moved from Endemol to Excel after realising he wanted to be on the disruptor’s side 13:41 – Working with Hailo, a company trying to help commercial taxis catch up with Uber 16:45 – Moved back to the US in 2012 and began working with General Catalyst 17:40 – Met Payal, founder of ClassPass, in the very early stages of growth. Watched for a year and invested at the end of 2014 - highly successful. 19:45 – Currently investing in Super Evil Megacorp 20:30 - Super Evil Megacorp is a mobile game developer who believe the future of gaming will be driven by mobiles 21:35 - Believes that core gaming will be on mobile devices in the future 23:27 - The CCP investment: What’s Adam’s take on virtual reality? 24:33 - CCP developed EVE: Valkyrie - one of the most celebrated VR games 25:30 - EVE is driven by a subscription model 27:00 - When did Adam get involved with GIPHY and what’s the experience been like? 28:30 – Connect with Adam on Twitter and Facebook 31:30 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you’re young, don’t wait. Go and make things happen. It’s more fun to be the disruptor than the establishment. Know when the party’s over; be willing to move to new frontiers. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/18/2016 • 37 minutes, 17 seconds
$150k at 26 Years Old, Now Charges $50k-300k Per ECommerce Project, EP 298: Anshey Bhatia
Anshey Bhatia, founder of Verbal+Visual - a platform for optimising e-commerce that’s become one of Shopify’s top partners. Listen as Nathan and Anshey talk about what growth means, where e-commerce is going, and the importance of focus. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Traction What CEO do you follow? — Myself - I look at everything I’m spending time on during a day What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Very close If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To focus Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Anshey to the show 01:44 – Verbal+Visual is an agency that works with e-commerce brands to develop their user experience 02:09 – Recently worked with Uproot 02:20 – Anshey likes working with Shopify because it’s simple for both IT and management 03:30 – Worked with Shopify to create the first wine integration on their site 04:30 – Average e-commerce platforms go from an average of $50k to high-end $300k 04:54 – Initial development is on a project fee, after which optimisation services are offered on retainer 06:02 – Founded the business in 2009 06:13 – First-year revenue was around $150k 06:30 – Total revenue in 2015 was in the low 7 figures 06:41 – Team of 7 full-time employees and 5 part-time, based in New York 07:07 – Net margin of around 20% 07:31 – Anshey tries to leave profits in the business 08:28 – Goal is to reach a team of 40 people within 3 years 09:12 - Aim to have 2-3 new clients for each new hire 09:44 - The main area of growth has been partnerships, and building a portfolio 10:50 - Ideal customer is someone making $100k-$1 million; who wants to grow; and who is unsatisfied with their current e-commerce platform 11:20 – Connect with Anshey on Twitter and Linkedin 13:00 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Determine what growth means to you. Is it topline revenue? Team size? Customer value? Choose a measure that’s meaningful for your business. Improve the quality of every project you do. Your portfolio is your number one tool for finding work. Focus from the beginning on what you’re passionate about. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/18/2016 • 17 minutes, 7 seconds
At 24 He Quit His $115k Oil and Gas Job to Lanch $2MM Agency with 30% Net Margins, EP 297: Shawn Freeman
Shawn Freeman, a man who’s trying to make IT easy instead of infuriating. Sean’s the founder of TWT Group in Canada - a managed IT solutions company that’s making a 30% profit margin on its $2 million in revenue. Listen in as Shawn and Nathan talk creating great relationships, where to invest profits, and how Shawn plans to grow to $10 million in revenue in the next five years. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – A Leader Who Had No Title What CEO do you follow? — Dan Price What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —I wish I had the ambition to quit my job earlier and get started Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan’s introduction 01:49 – Welcoming Shawn to the show 01:57 – TWT sells managed IT solutions to businesses with between 10 and 100 employees 02:45 – “You’ve got to solve problems every day...most of those are to do with people” 03:18 – Started in 2011 03:20 – Revenue in 2011 was $75k 03:40 – Shawn gave up a $115k salary aged 24 04:40 – Revenue in 2015 was $2 million 05:20 – “Our growth has been 90% driven by referrals” 05:40 – Serving 150 customers with a team of 10 people 06:03 – 30% net margin in 2015 06:20 – What’s Shawn doing with his profits? 06:48 – Aiming to make $2.5 million in 2016 07:05 – Next investment will be purchasing an office space 08:05 – “We want to keep focused on our niche - small to medium business” 08:30 - “I think we could be a $10 million business within 5 years” 09:46 – Connect with Shawn at his website 11:55 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Build trust. Successful business relies on your relationships with real people. Think big. Make decisions that reflect the business you want to be Stay focused on your niche. Grow by dominating the area you’re fantastic at. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/18/2016 • 14 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 329: It Costs $500k To Call Everyone in Florida, He's Behind Ted Cruz
Bryan Bedera, an artist, business leader and founding partner at Amplify Relations. Bryan’s an expert in government advertising and PR strategy who’s received multiple awards for his work. Listen in to hear how Bryan started his business using his student loan, what startups can learn from Ted Cruz’s campaign, and why you’re better off being in the local paper than courting Buzzfeed. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – I don’t have one What CEO do you follow? — Steve Jobs Favourite online tool? — QuickBooks Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and let things work themselves out Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 02:23 – Welcoming Bryan to the show 02:36 – Bryan started out working for a political ad agency - was laid off when the recession hit but managed to keep a client for himself 03:25 – Has worked for McCain and Glenn Beck 04:17 – “Our speciality is mass-market relations” 04:40 – “First-year revenue was maybe $11k...we used student loan money to fund the entire startup” 04:55 – In 2015, 13 full-time employees and revenue of just under $2 million 05:19 – “We sell a change in public behaviour” 05:33 – Recently worked for a health centre to try to increase the number of people coming for STD testing 06:01 – Charge 15% of advertising spend 06:24 – Currently working for Ted Cruz with a robo-call product 07:11 – $500k would buy phone calls for every voter in Florida - Brian’s able to make a 90% margin on that 08:02 – “A political campaign will outsource everything” 08:37 – Our margins vary depending on the product 08:54 – “We can provide all the mass-market services you might need under one roof” 09:21 – Just had a contract with a British beer company ruled out because they didn’t want to work with Republicans 10:00 – How could startups take the robocall tool for corporate use? 11:06 – “The startup community overlooks the power of local and regional press. Go to papers in towns with 5000 people in them. They’re desperate for stories” 11:56 – It’s far easier to build a large library of content in local and regional press than by trying to go straight to Buzzfeed 12:45 – Connect with Bryan on Facebook 14:07 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be patient. Sometimes you just have to let things work themselves out Build exposure through local and regional media. You’ll be amazed at how fast your content library grows Know what you believe in, and why you’re doing what you’re doing Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/18/2016 • 19 minutes, 1 second
His Agency Has 30% Net Margin on 1,200,000 Top Line in 2015, EP 296: Rob Riggs
Rob Riggs, founder of Your Design Online: a business that helps non-profits and small businesses use big-brand tools to optimize their websites. Rob took his business from $5000 in revenue to over $1.2 million last year. Listen in as Rob and Nathan talk web optimization, driving growth through referrals, and how to get the most from your investments. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – anything by Marcus Buckingham What CEO do you follow? — Guy Kawasaki What is your favorite online tool? — SEOReview Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To stick with it. The harder you work, the luckier you get. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Rob to the show 01:53 – Works on web development and optimisation 02:25 – “We work on the front end to maximise revenue, or the back end to streamline functionality” 03:25 – Typically work on a project-by-project basis, but have some retainer clients 03:44 – Starts in $6-8k range for a small project 04:05 – Monthly retainers range from $500 to five-figure sums 05:15 – Launched Your Design Online in 2004 05:55 – “I started hiring people better than myself to replace me” 06:00 – Total revenue in 2004 was $5k 06:22 – Total revenue in 2015 was $1.2 million 06:43 – Driving growth through referrals 08:23 – “My strategy is growing to support” 08:46 – Profit was around $400k in 2015 09:45 – Investing some money into commercial real estate for long-term returns 16:57 – Connect with Rob at Your Design Online 12:55 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your best marketing tool is referrals. Provide fantastic quality and you’ll find your business growing. The harder you work, the luckier you get. Keep going and think long-term, even when things are tough. Think seriously about where the best returns are going to be. Don’t be afraid to invest in areas other than your business. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/17/2016 • 16 minutes, 53 seconds
MIT Grad Reinventing Clothes with $7,000,000 Raised and $500k on Kickstarter, EP 295: Aman Advani
Aman Advani, a man who’s bringing technological innovation to the fashion industry. Aman’s the founder of Ministry of Supply, a company that’s employing engineers alongside fashion designers to bring performance technology into the wear-to-work clothing space. Listen in as Nathan and Aman talk minimum wage, which numbers to focus on, and just how Ministry Of Supply made 14x their Kickstarter goal. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Good To Great What CEO do you follow? — John Carlson What is your favorite online tool? — Boomerang Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —In building a business, all the easy things are hard and all the hard things are easy Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:58 – Welcoming Aman to the show 02:08 – Ministry Of Supply generates revenue through selling products 02:40 – Company launched on Kickstarter in 2012, raising $429k - 14x their goal 03:34 – Sampler package sold for $150 03:53 – “We didn’t factor in packaging or shipping...we joke that we probably lost money” 04:24 – Shipped over 100k units 04:55 – Started with a repeat rate of 10-20% over 22 days - that’s now doubled 05:50 – Team of 20 people 06:00 – Taken $7 million in outside financing through 2 priced rounds and 1 convertible note 06:40 – Currently focused on growth: they aren’t profitable 07:05 – Hoping to be profitable later this year 07:30 – Made $500k in sales in 2012 07:35 – Nathan guesses around $4 million in topline revenue in 2015 08:40 – Aman would rather focus on numbers like margins and repeat rate than revenue 10:05 – A direct sales model; not subscription 10:44 – Around 50k customers so far 11:00 – Focusing on optimising gross margin 12:00 – “We’re infusing technology into a fairly stagnant fashion business” 13:00 – Acquisition: currently investing in podcast advertising and direct mail 13:40 – Currently have two brick-and-mortar stores that are a significant investment 14:15 – “What’s your position on $15 minimum wage?” 15:30 – We’ll automate certain tasks and re-allocate humans to higher-value tasks 16:10 – Optimising inventory turnover - “A good rate for us would be 4-5 turns a year” 16:57 – Connect with Aman on Linkedin 19:25 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Choose to focus on numbers that mean something to you. Put people in the highest-value positions you can. Make the most of your workforce. You don’t need to be immediately profitable - but know when you’re going to be profitable Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/17/2016 • 23 minutes, 10 seconds
He Can Get You 100,000 Quality Live Viewers Instantly, Ep 294: Eddie Vaca
Eddie Vaca. Eddie’s the founder of Amp Live, a company that can generate thousands of online viewers for your live event. Eddie worked for Youstream before deciding to take over the online live video space on his own. Listen in as Nathan and Eddie talk selling your first company, generating 300,000 viewers for a 20-minute show, and why live video is taking over the internet. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Jack Dorsey and Gary Vaynerchuk What is your favorite online tool? — Grope bots Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —You can’t do it by yourself. Surround yourself with great people. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:48 – Welcoming Eddie to the show 02:08 – Eddie created his first digital publication aged 24: it was an action-sports lifestyle publication that was published via DVD 02:45 – AOL bought it for $25k 03:20 – Eddie’s embarrassed about the price now - but it was a small win that got him some momentum 03:45 – Got involved in a digital out-of-home screens business 05:12 – Moved to Youstream aged 30 to learn everything he could about digital online 06:08 – Youstream raised around $60 million and sold for around $120 million - why didn’t it sell for more? 07:30 – “Video is huge - it’s taking over the internet. And live is everywhere.” 08:04 – “The biggest problem people see today is that driving live channels outside of sport is really tough. Amp Live helps people move into those channels.” 09:10 - Amp Live is largely bootstrapped. Have raised a small friends-and-family round of $100k 09:40 - Revenue in 2015 was $1.3 million. Generates revenue by “selling eyeballs” 10:15 – Charges broadcasters to generate viewers for an event 10:50 – Customers include Martha Stewart, Microsoft, runways shows for New York Fashion Week…”If it’s live and it’s video, we want to be in there.” 11:58 – Generated 300k viewers for a 20-minute runway show 13:30 – Aiming to make every broadcaster a direct distribution partner 14:05 – Hoping to make around $3.9 million in 2016 14:44 – Connect with Eddie on Twitter or visit Amp Live 16:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Video is taking over the internet. Live video is going to be the next challenge. Not everyone ends up on TechCrunch, selling their first company for millions. Be proud of the small steps you take and the gradual successes you build up. Surround yourself with amazing people and help them to grow. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/17/2016 • 19 minutes, 39 seconds
EP 328: She Bought 50% for $17k, Now Does $1M Per Year in iPhone Repairs
Erica Douglass, a techie-turned-marketer who’s started Austin’s top-rated chain of phone repair stores. Erica’s business is entirely bootstrapped and profitable - they’re currently in 7-figure revenue and planning to double their store count in the next year. Listen in to hear how Erica tripled revenue in just one year, why small businesses need to leverage Yelp, and how to tell if your phone repair shop is lying to you. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Seth Books What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? — Light Speed Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — That she had even more self-confidence than she did Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:38 – Welcoming Erica to the show 02:02 – Austin’s top independent repair shop 03:05 – 7 employees at 2 locations - currently making 7 figures in revenue 03:55 – Erika’s computer crashed during a conference - her friend repaired it 05:25 – Erica bought into his repair business for $17k in 2014 05:27 – Total revenue in 2014 was $62k 05:36 – Total revenue in 2015 was $380k 05:47 – Erica drove growth by opening a new location targeted at college students 06:05 – On track to make over $1 million in revenue this year 06:31 – Make around 25% gross margin 06:45 – Planning to open two more locations this year 07:16 – Highest margin is on services like data recovery 07:40 – Around 700 jobs per month, at around $100 per job 08:22 – Apple doesn’t sell repair parts - there’s a whole market linked to China that repairs and recycles parts 09:30 – Erica has the highest Yelp reviews of any store in Austin 09:50 – It’s not possible to buy parts from Apple 10:29 – How do you value a business like this? 10:58 – What are the triggers that Erica looks at now she’s trying to buy a business? 11:46 – Yelp tries to monitor reviews to stop people gaming the system 13:18 – How do you differentiate a business somewhere that there’s not much brand loyalty? 14:22 – Yelp is the main tool that differentiates 1Up from their competitors 15:21 – Connect with Erica on Facebook 17:02 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Yelp is a crucial tool for small businesses. Go the extra mile to make sure you’re getting those 5-star reviews. Have confidence in your skills and your abilities. Start your company sooner. You can drive incredible growth by tapping into the right location and market. 1Up took off after Erica found a location to target college students Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/17/2016 • 21 minutes, 16 seconds
EP 327: This B2B SaaS Companies Prevents Death With Wearables
Nathan Klarer, CEO at Bridgecrest Medical. Nathan’s building a B2B SaaS company that uses wearable technology to minimise accidents in mines and oil rigs. He’s 25 years old and has already raised $1.3 million. Tune in to hear about what’s next for wearable technology, how Nathan’s driving sales, and why he wishes he’d started sooner. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? — Larry Ellison Favourite online tool? — Nova Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To have more confidence in myself and start earlier Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Welcoming Nathan to the show 02:17 – Before Bridgecrest, Nathan worked in equity finance 02:51 – Bridgecrest is a B2B SaaS company that incorporates wearable technology into a platform that helps heavy industries prevent accidents 03:38 – Currently using wearable technology to minimise the fatigue risk of oil rig operators 04:20 – Sell directly to the operations or tech managers of oil and gas companies 04:50 – Annual contracts are in 5-6 figures 05:12 – Customers pay monthly 05:37 – Companies take 3 or 4 year contracts 06:02 – Nathan’s background is in engineering - he saw wearable technology being used for health and decided to bring it onto heavy industrial sites 07:10 – Nathan is the sole founder but has given equity to important team members 08:10 – Have raised about $1.3 million in total 08:36 – “We needed to raise that capital to build the product we wanted to build” 09:07 – Most of the costs are engineering for analytic software 09:34 – Launched the product last year 09:48 – Currently have 10-20 customers 09:40 – “We’re looking to build deep relationships with our customers” - no one has churned yet 10:50 – Sales can come through a single site in heavy industry - followed by upsales at the corporate level 11:30 – Launched in the last quarter of 2015, and made less than $1 million 12:40 – Keen to be adopted by big industry players in 2016 13:45 – As the CEO, Nathan now spends more time working on sales than engineering 10:30 – Connect with Nathan on Twitter 15:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’re building a product, raise enough capital to get it right Getting the right team around you is all-important. Make sure your founding team complements your weaknesses and buys into the company’s vision Have confidence in your skills and your abilities. Start your company sooner. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/16/2016 • 20 minutes, 53 seconds
The Math Behind Donald Trumps Brain, EP 293: Brian Ley,
Brian Ley, CEO of Alpharank: a start-up that uses heavy-duty mathematics to analyse brands’ word-of-mouth networks. Brian started out studying the spread of diseases - he’s fascinated by how everything from ideas to emotions is spread through human networks. Listen in to hear Brian and Nathan discuss how Donald Trump is memetically hacking your brain. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – High Output Management What CEO do you follow? — Richard Branson What is your favorite online tool? — Audible Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Most nights If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Not to drink alcohol, and to take as good care of your body as you can Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:56 – Welcoming Brian to the show 02:10 – Brian started out studying computational epidemiology - the study of how diseases spread. He’s fascinated by how anything - disease, joy, decisions - spreads through human networks 03:10 – Alpharank generates revenue by charging a data provider fee 03:40 – Analyse a company’s influence and network connections 04:25 – Analysed social structure at a nightclub for multiple weeks: realised that you could see connections by analysing time-series patterns 06:02 – Currently have no revenue: have raised $500k investment 06:40 – Will stay pre-revenue in 2016 06:52 – The network is very tech-heavy - currently have a team of 7 engineers 09:15 – “I have complete faith that someone is going to figure out a way to track network connections directly” 09:45 - Can you explain mathematically what Donald Trump is doing? 10:10 - “Donald Trump is memetically hacking people’s brains” 10:40 – Engaging directly with the mammalian centre of people’s brains - where emotions are directly processed. And emotion is contagious. 11:55 – “Talking about things spreads them” 12:17 – The viral coefficient: K= Invitations x Conversion Rate 12:50 – “Marketing is being turned to math” 13:46 – Connect with Brian on Linkedin or on Twitter 16:40 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your body is your limiting factor: take care of yourself Everything spreads through human networks: diseases, ideas, emotions Marketing is becoming mathematical Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/16/2016 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
Your $250 Ticket to Luxury Did $700,000 in 2015, EP 292: Carlo Cisco
Carlo Cisco, the founder and CEO of Select, a private membership community that offers discount deals with thousands of premier brands. Carlo was an early builder of Groupon. He’s also a canny investor who made $75k in stocks by investing during college. Listen in to hear Nathan and Carlo break down the numbers behind Select, discuss Groupon’s meteoric growth, and explain Select’s unbelievable CAC:LTV ratio. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Intelligent Investor What CEO do you follow? — Mark Zuckerberg What is your favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To get ready for some crazy stuff Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:43 – Welcoming Carlo to the show 02:00 – Carlo started an events planning business while he was in college 02:20 – Actively invested in tech companies while he was in college 03:16 – Carlo put about $9k into stocks and turned it into $85k 04:11 – Joined Groupon and helped build their operation in Japan 05:30 – Groupon hasn’t helped businesses enough...most businesses aren’t getting repeat customers from Groupon or LivingSocial deals 07:35 – Started Select in 2013 08:00 – The goal was to work with premier brands in an ongoing, sustainable way 08:50 – Select generates revenue through a $250 annual membership fee 09:55 – Currently have around 9000 members 10:20 – Annual revenue is $725k - average revenues are down because of a discount deal that generated members early on 11:20 – Currently at over $1 million run rate 11:45 – Annual retention rate is around 75% - which is unusually high for the sector 12:20 – Have raised just under $800k in funding 13:00 - Had equity funding from an accelerator programme - “The network is incredible” 14:00 - Currently happy to break even on customer acquisition 14:40 - Current lifetime value is around $900 per customer 15:22 - Currently have a CAC:LTV ratio of 1:7 15:40 - Ideal customer: High-income professionals, 25-45 years of age 17:02 – Connect with Carlo on Twitter and Linkedin 18:30 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Accelerators have value beyond just funding - their networks and support can seriously pay off Invest wisely and early If you want excitement: prepare for it. Life can be crazy if you’re only ready. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/16/2016 • 22 minutes, 4 seconds
He Invested in WeWork and Now Runs $150MM Israel Focused Fund, EP 291: Michael Eisenberg
Michael Eisenberg. Michael’s a canny investor who’s on the cutting edge of the VC scene in Israel. He invested in Wix and Conduit while working with Benchmark - now he’s set up his own firm, Aleph. Listen in to hear about Aleph’s investments in an AI dashcam, Michael’s journey from unemployment to top VC, and why scale-up is the new start-up. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos What is your favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —There’s so much to do in this world. Keep working. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming Michael to the show 02:06 – Started Aleph 3 years ago with a partner - wanted to invest in Israeli startups 02:40 – Michael’s been a venture capitalist in Israel for over 20 years 03:20 – Started a merchant bank for technology startups in Israel 04:00 – Invested in the first online photo-sharing site in 1994 and sold for over $100 million 05:00 – Worked at Benchmark in Israel for several years - invested in Wix, Conduit, and other startups 06:00 – Raised $150 million for Aleph in 2013 06:20 – Core mantra is: “Different is better than better” 06:50 – Aleph is an equal-partnership firm in terms of return and decision-making influence 08:15 – Invest almost exclusively in Series A 08:40 – The Thing About Cycles - Michael’s blog post about cyclical investing 09:10 – Currently investing in Nexar, an AI-powered dashcam 10:15 – Nexar can give you real-time information based on location and the license plates of the drivers around you - it takes information from drivers’ speed and location. 11:20 – Have already covered more mileage than Google Streetview 12:10 - Invested $4 million in Series A 13:08 - 15 months in; 9 months since the launch 13:18 - Collecting about 80k license plates each day 13:46 – Connect with Michael on the Aleph website or through his blog 16:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Invest in disruption: “Different is better than better” Michael’s currently investing in a smart dashcam that has an enormous capacity to collect data. Keep working. The world is full of opportunities. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/16/2016 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
She Quit Podcasting Now Does $30k/mo Membership Site, EP 290: Jill Stanton
Jill Stanton, co-founder of Screw The Nine To Five - a community that teaches people to take their online business to the next level. Jill’s built an incredibly engaged community around her website and online course. Listen in as Nathan and Jill talk engagement, creating multiple revenue streams, and why you need to be all-in or all-out. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Profit First What CEO do you follow? — Denise Duffield Thomas Favourite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—That community is everything Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan’s introduction 01:48 – Welcoming Jill to the show 02:10 – Screw The Nine To Five teaches people to take their online business to the next level 02:34 – Had the idea in 2012 when she and husband Josh started their own businesses 03:05 – Launched in April 2013 03:22 – Generate revenue from a membership site called Screw U 04:10 – Subscription is $69 per month 04:40 – Members access strategy sessions, conference calls with experts, Q and A 06:10 – Gone all-in on creating an engaged community 06:40 – Screw U currently has 361 paying members 06:55 – People stay 7 months on average 07:33 – Started as a one-off digital product: wanted to move into community building 08:33 – Over 500 people have signed up since the product started 09:17 – Other revenue comes from one-off courses 09:30 – Uses a series of tripwire offers that generate about $31k per month 11:36 – First live event is coming up - tickets open in May 12:10 – Jill had a podcast but closed it down 12:30 – 30k downloads per month after 114 episodes 13:10 – “It didn’t feel right any more...the business has grown hugely since we cut it” 14:25 – Connect with Jill by joining the Screw The Nine To Five facebook group 15:40 – Just over 16k people on their email list 17:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Set up multiple revenue streams that feed into each other. Find ways to package different elements of your product for different consumers. Go all in or all out. Cut what isn’t working and focus on what you love Community is everything. Build a community before you do anything else. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/15/2016 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
He Gave Up 30% Equity, Launched Own Gig, Winning with $800k/yr+ In Revenue. EP 289: Guillermo Ortiz
Guillermo Ortiz, the founder of Geek Powered Studios. Guillermo’s an ex-competitive gamer and the force behind a marketing and consulting company that focuses on data to take its clients from good to great. Listen as Nathan and Guillermo talk holistic marketing, investing in data, and why it’s good to be young and dumb. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Scaling Up What CEO do you follow? — Will Reynolds Favourite online tool? — SEMrush Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—I don’t know if I’d change anything. I was young and dumb and full of heart. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 01:49 – Welcoming Guillermo to the show 02:30 – Used to be 6th in the world at Counterstrike 03:05 – Set up strategic partnerships with small businesses 03:30 – “We try to do everything correctly rather than one thing really well” 03:40 – Monthly retainer package from $2k - $5k per month 03:55 – Handle landing pages, graphic design, facebook ads, SEO... 04:50 – Would only say no if they lacked time or resources to make the request happen 05:30 – Have 15-20 team members 05:45 – Based in Austin, Texas 06:08 – Total revenue in 2015 was $800k 06:30 – Biggest expense is subscription services 06:55 – Spent 30-40% of revenue on SaaS 07:15 – Profits last year around $100-200k 08:10 – Founded the company in 2009 while working full-time 08:30 – Left in 2012 to focus on Geek Powered Studios 09:14 – Currently around 55 clients 09:23 – MRR in 2015 about $110k 09:35 – Very high customer retention rates - focus on establishing relationships 10:15 – Optimised the keyword ‘deer antler spray’ for one client 12:20 – Now focusing on holistic awareness instead of only rankings 13:15 – Goal for 2016 is to clear $250k in profit 13:50 – Connect with Guillermo on twitter 16:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Data is the new oil. Invest in data about your company; invest in analytics. Master exactly what’s going on. Work yourself out of a job. Build a successful scalable business that can operate without you. Establish fantastic relationships with your customers. Retention and referrals come from real relationships. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/15/2016 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
He's Making How Much from Text Message Marketing? EP 288: Chris Brisson
Chris Brisson, the founder of Call Loop website. Call Loop is a voice and text messaging service that’s used by a huge range of clients. Listen as Chris and Nathan talk buying out a co-founder, building a company while working full-time, and how to pivot with an established product. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Stealth Marketing What CEO do you follow? — James Clear Favourite online tool? — ClickFunnels and ConvertFlow Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—That being young is an advantage - take the opportunity to make mistakes Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Chris to the show 02:00 – Call Loop is a voice and text messaging service 02:22 – Had the idea in 2009; business was founded in 2011 03:00 – It took 3 years to build the software as a side project 03:55 – Put in $10,000 to kick-start the project 04:12 – Bought out his business partners in 2015 04:50 – Two investors put in $90k total for 7.5% equity 05:55 – How did buying out his co-founders work? 06:20 – One co-founder had a full-time job and didn’t want to be hands-on 07:20 – Chris wasn’t financially experienced - hadn’t put caps of cliffs on the equity 08:10 – Co-founder had 25% 09:10 – Bought out for less than $100k 09:30 – “We have SaaS components but we’re not really a SaaS business” 10:00 – Different customers have extremely different needs - they buy credits differently 10:45 – Topline revenue in 2015 was $385k 11:25 – Reinvested $150k in the company in 2015 12:15 – Revenue goal in 2016 is $430-450k 12:35 – Around 1000 unique customers each month 13:54 – Sending around 400k text messages each month 14:34 – Goal is to develop the software behind the product, add features, and scale 15:45 – Chris hopes to pivot towards marketing automation 18:18 – Connect with Chris at the Call Loop website 19:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Youth is an advantage. Don’t be scared to act because you’re too young. When you’re distributing equity with co-founders, by sure to have a vesting schedule. You’ll hugely reduce the risk of problems down the line. Look for opportunities to pivot, even when you’re an established company. The market changes; technology changes: make sure you keep up. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/15/2016 • 25 minutes, 16 seconds
EP 326: Quit Job During Greece Financial Crisis to Launch Media Business
Ilias Tsagklis, co-founder of Excelexis. He’s a software developer-turned-entrepreneur who gave up a great salary to found his own company. Ilias blogs about entrepreneurship at Wealth Triumph. Listen in to hear why a developer built an ad company instead of a software company, and just what he’s doing to make 85% net margins. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Millionaire Fast Lane What CEO do you follow? — Marcus Lemonis Favourite online tool? — Asana Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — That the road to success is only through self-education. Don’t expect anyone else to help you. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan’s introduction 01:56 – Welcoming Ilias to the show 02:17 – Trying to monetise platforms like banner display 02:37 – Provided sponsored content for a recent customer - trying to move away from traditional banner displays 03:25 – Own Telecode Geeks, a content site, where they can place adverts 04:02 – Ilias started out as a software developer 04:18 – He quit his job after 7 years, looking for something new 05:02 – “I wanted to build something that could scale” 05:40 – Gave up a salary in the mid 5 figures - a high salary in Greece 06:40 – Started building a community writing technical articles 07:15 – Why monetise through ads using Java instead of building your own software platform? 07:30 – “We were more interested in building a steady income to replace the corporate job” 07:55 – Around 85% net margin in the business 08:22 – Multiple revenue streams: advertising; sponsorship; lead generation and affiliate marketing 08:47 – Total revenue in 2015 was in the mid 6 figures 09:15 – Two co-founders, several assistants, and some freelance writers 09:40 – Ilias’ revenue goal for 2016 is $500k 10:30 – Connect with Ilias on Linkedin or at his blog 12:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Success comes from self-education. Start investing time and energy in yourself. Build a community before you try to monetise. Once you have a tribe, everything else will follow. Define your goals as an entrepreneur. Explosive growth? Steady income? Early retirement? Once you know your why, you can worry about the how. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/15/2016 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
He's 27 and is actually making money as a social media consultant, EP 287: Kim Barrett
Kim Barrett, bestselling author and the founder of Your Social Voice - a marketing and lead generation agency that’s gone to $100k per month in sales in just one year. Tune in as Nathan and Kim talk lead generation, marketing, and building a killer sales team. Famous Five: Favorite Book? –Built to Sell What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk Favourite online tool? — Podio Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Trust what you think and don’t listen to what other people tell you to do Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:28 – Nathan’s introduction 02:25 – Welcoming Kim to the show 02:35 – Your Social Voice makes money through ‘done-for-you’ marketing services 03:22 – Focus on lead generation - driving traffic to a landing page 03:45 – Offering different packages 04:20 – Company started in 2013 04:40 – Total revenue in 2015 was a little over $450k 05:02 – Currently making around $100k per month in sales 05:30 – Cash received is 50-60% of sales 05:55 – Aim to be a recurring business: encourage clients to engage ongoing services 06:40 – 80% month-to-month retention rate 07:00 – 25 clients this month 07:10 – Always in sales mode - and aiming to bring ongoing clients on board 07:45 – Base their sales on strategy, not software 09:00 – Challenge of retaining service customers vs. SaaS customers 09:42 – Sales people make 15% commission on cash received, plus targets 10:30 – Kim’s also a bestselling author of Winning in Life and Work: New Beginnings 12:30 – Connect with Kim on Snapchat (therealkimbarrett) or through his website 18:58 – Connect with Finn at his website or through Linkedin 15:10 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: The difference between building a customer base in a service business and a SaaS business is that you need a fantastic sales team. Focus on what your own goals and ideas: don’t let other people’s opinions dictate your life Find ‘stretch’ heroes to study: people to follow who are several steps ahead of where you want to be Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/14/2016 • 18 minutes, 15 seconds
Frat Guy Takes 2K a Month Side Project to 10Mil a Year Media Company, EP 286: Madison Wickham
Madison Wickham, CEO and co-founder of Grandex - a media and content company that’s behind the sites Total Frat Move and Postgrad Problems. Madison’s also created two successful apparel companies, and is generating around $10 million in revenue a year. Listen in to hear Madison talk about the secrets of capturing an audience, quitting his job with a 10-day old baby, and how to turn content followers into customers. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Zero To One What CEO do you follow? — Jonah Peretti What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That I didn’t have to have a definitive plan...I just had to be doing something productive and learning stuff Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:50 – Yuri’s introduction 02:30 – Welcoming Madison to the show 02:50 – Started Total Frat Move as a one-liner comedy website with a fraternity buddy 03:40 – “Our business plan did not exist...we were trying to capture an audience” 04:56 – Started with advertisements but starting experimenting with other revenue streams 05:38 – T-Shirts worked extremely well - “We gravitated towards merchandise” 06:25 – At what point did Madison realise his project was a legitimate business? 07:20 – “In 4 months we had $2000 a month from ad revenue” 08:32 – Quit their jobs and dived in full-time 09:32 – Madison had a 10-day-old baby when he quit his job 10:11 – Went full-time in October 2010 11:20 – “It was the most liberating thing I’ve done in my life” 13:10 – Financing? “We always made more money than we spent - we didn’t have experience of doing anything else” 13:50 – About 3 years in, they formed a relationship with an angel investor in Austin 15:15 – Learned from him about the process of raising money to develop a team 16:25 – Raised $2.3 million over 12 months 16:44 – $20 million pre-money valuation 17:16 – 3.5x multiplier on topline revenue 18:00 – Grandex currently runs 5 websites 18:21 – Rowdy Gentleman designs, creates and sells apparel 18:54 – Male Outfitters is a premium online menswear store 19:40 – Grandex generated around $10 million revenue in 2015 21:10 – Revenue from TFM and related sites is through advertising and promotions 23:10 – “The media is the lifeblood of our business” 23:45 – Promote apparel products to their media audience 25:00 – What’s worked best for you when promoting online? 27:40 – Things change constantly - it’s vital to be tapped into the social media landscape 28:20 – What’s next for Grandex? 30:30 – Releasing their first feature-length film this year 31:20 – Connect with Madison at the Grandex website and the Inside TFM podcast 34:42 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Capture an audience. Profit will grow out of having people that follow you. Be hyper-aware of what’s happening online: social media changes in an eyeblink You don’t have to know what your grand plan is. Just start doing something productive. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/14/2016 • 38 minutes, 20 seconds
What if An Accounting Firm Was Built Specifically For Young Entrepreneurs? EP 285: Finn Kelly
Finn Kelly, co-founder and CEO of We Love Numbers, a smartbookkeeping and financial advice site that’s turning financialservices into SaaS. Finn’s been named three times as one ofAustralia’s top 30 entrepreneurs under 30, and is about to launchhis first fundraising round. Listen as Finn and Nathan talk goingfrom service to SaaS, the ins and outs of investment partnerships,and why you are what you think. Favorite Book? – True North What CEO do you follow? — Warren Rustand Favourite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No, but pretty close If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what wouldit be?— Look after your body, and focus on your thoughts. You arewhat you think. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:31 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming Finn to the show 02:20 – We Love Numbers - smart bookkeeping and advice forentrepreneurs 02:40 – Revenue is generated by a subscription model to 1 of 4different packages 02:49 – Packages cost $395 to $1695 per month 03:10 – Recent client was a wine importer - We Love Numbers helpedthem to look at different back-end processes and interpret thenumbers they needed to focus on 05:14 – What, strategically, can We Love Numbers help with? 05:35 – Answer questions to help optimise pricing models, salariesetc. 06:20 – They work with multiple clients so have a sense of what isindustry standard 06:30 – Currently work with 50 clients; have over 900 in thepipeline 06:57 – Started in March 2015 07:16 – Average customer pays about $1000 per month 07:22 – MRR in February 2016 was around $50,000 07:55 – Started out in wealth management - sold their first companyfor multiple millions 09:13 – About to raise their first capital round 09:30 – Raising because they want to scale quickly 10:00 – “We see ourselves as a SaaS business” 10:25 – Looking to raise $750k via convertible note 10:40 – Aiming for churn of 2% through month 11:00 – Worst churn rate they’ve experienced was 10% 11:40 – Aiming to pay no more than $1000 per customer acquisitioncost 12:20 – Currently 10 people in the team 12:40 – Head count expenses are about $60-70k per month 13:40 – A pre-money valuation of $6 million would make Finnextremely happy 14:20 – Looking for strategic partners, not just VCs 18:58 – Connect with Finn at his website or through Linkedin 16:54 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for strategic partners who can add value beyond money. Find a way to make your business scale. How can a service businessbecome a SaaS business? Focus on your body and your health. Look after yourself, and you’llbe prepared for anything. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices andaccounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names andhosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly createhis webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to SanAntonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/14/2016 • 19 minutes, 56 seconds
EP 325: She Sold Her Busines to Bill Gates
Beate Chelette. Beate went from being a single mother in debt, to selling her image licensing business to Bill Gates for millions. She’s a successful coach and speaker, and the author of Happy Woman, Happy World and The Women’s Code. Listen in to learn why equality and diversity are good for business, how to build a million-dollar company without owning any assets, and the hard story behind success. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Compound Effect What CEO do you follow? — Marc Benioff Favourite online tool? — Infusionsoft Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Don’t take it so personally. And it takes time. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Welcoming Ilya to the show 02:40 – Biyathe cornered the market in architecture and interiors photography 03:40 – Acquired by Bill Gates’ business Corbis 04:40 – Were at around $1 million in revenue from licensing 05:02 – “You can build a business where you don’t own any assets...we just had the rights to assets” 05:40 – Sold for a multiple on the gross margin 06:38 – “You come to the point where you ask: ‘What did I do it for? What drives me?’ 07:25 – Success comes with an obligation to share information 08:08 – When successful people tell their stories, they tend to gloss over the tough parts 09:12 – Co-founded the publishing company that published her book 09:44 – Happy Women, Happy World has sold in the low 1000s so far 10:14 – “I didn’t want to manipulate the system to get a bestseller” 10:55 – Published in September 2015 11:20 – It’s designed to be easy to consume in short chunks - “a purse or bathroom book” 12:40 – Started building an email list before her book - has around 17k engaged list members 14:30 – Beate’s started training and speaking on why gender equality and diversity is good for business 15:24 – Connect with Beate Chelette on Linkedin at the Creative Entrepreneur Forum or at her website 17:33 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Understand yourself. Understand what drives you. Equality and diversity are good for business Success does not come until you’re clear who you are, what you’re doing it for, and how you can sell yourself Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/14/2016 • 20 minutes, 18 seconds
How Did This Guy Retire at 35? EP 284: Todd Tresidder
Todd Tresidder's a serial entrepreneur who retired at 35 afterbuilding millions as a hedge fund manager. He’s the creator ofFinancial Mentor, a hugely successful financial coaching service,which is soon to become an online course. Listen as Todd and Nathantalk asset allocation, risk reduction, and how to createwealth. Favorite Book? – Essentialism What CEO do you follow? — Steve Jobs Favourite online tool? — None Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— It varies If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what wouldit be?— Buy more income-producing real estate Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Todd to the show 02:18 – Lasted about 6 months at Hewlett Packard - then he wasfired 03:20 – “Everything is quantitative” 03:45 – Invested $20 million through a hedge fund set up with apartner 05:00 – “One of the keys in investing is knowing what you don’tknow” 06:30 – Made a 3% management fee 07:20 – “It’s completely a numbers game” 07:55 – Why move to teaching others? 08:30 – “You reach a point where you’ve learned what you’re goingto learn” 09:03 – “I would have been repeating life over and over” 09:35 – Sold the hedge fund and travelled through the Middle Eastand Europe 10:45 – Todd’s currently working on his courses at FinancialMentor 11:00 – Started as a boutique coaching site 12:10 – “I’m trying to develop the one-on-one coaching intocourses” 13:00 – Nathan spends 10% of what he earns and spreads the restacross different equities 13:55 – “The top 12 asset allocation formulas essentially performthe same over 30 years” 15:00 – “The variance in return is to do with risk exposure” 16:00 – There are limits to growth in conventional assetallocation 16:20 – “Entrepreneurial strategies will blow the doors offconventional allocation” 17:30 – “Set yourself up so ‘heads you win, tails you win’ 18:15 – Play smart - risk can be unexpected 19:25 – The solution to risk management is “higher highs, higherlows” 21:00 – “I sold all my real estate in 2005 or 2006 - I waslambasted, but I didn’t want the risk” 22:00 – “Knowledge leverage has no downside” 18:58 – Connect with Todd at Financial Mentor - and receive a freeebook and course 24:18 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Know what you don’t know. Be aware of the areas you aren’t anexpert in - and either learn, or leave them to someone else. Manage risk. Unexpected things happen all the time - you need to bethinking about how to not just make your high returns higher, buthow to minimise your lows and losses. Know your numbers. Investing is absolutely a numbers game:everything is quantitative. Understand the numbers and you’llunderstand how wealth works. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices andaccounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names andhosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly createhis webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to SanAntonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/13/2016 • 28 minutes, 43 seconds
The Classy Way to Turn Down a $720k Shark Tank Deal Backstage, EP 283: Kim Kaupe
Kim Kaupe, a Forbes 30 under 30 and co-founder of custompublishing company Zinepak. Zinepak creates fan packs andmerchandise for artists and sports teams. They’ve worked withJustin Bieber, Katy Perry, and the Boston Red Sox. Listen as Nathanand Kim talk googling your way to success, making good investmentdeals, and Kim’s stint on Shark Tank. Favorite Book? – Rework What CEO do you follow? — Jim O’Shea Favourite online tool? — Pipedrive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I am If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what wouldit be?— Eat more chipotle and dance more, it’s all going to beokay Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 02:15 – Welcoming Kim to the show 02:30 – Started Zinepak in 2011 - found a fantastic niche 03:05 – Latest clients include Justin Bieber and Shawn Mendes 04:04 – Work as an agency - they’ll create the product and sell itwholesale 05:00 – Order size varies from 500 units to 200,000 units 05:20 – Average order would be around 5,000 - 20,000 units 05:41 – Packs sell to the client from $3-5 06:05 – Aim for a 30% gross margin - though sometimes work withartists for less 07:01 – Total revenue in the first year was $600,000 07:31 – Started the business after working in corporate for twoyears 07:50 – “It was pretty much a googling game” 08:50 – “Know what you’re good at and what you’re not so goodat” 09:11 – Total revenue in 2015 was $2.8 million 09:20 – On Shark Tank in April 2015 09:40 – “For us it was about moving into fanbases outside the musicindustry” 10:20 – “We wanted to get 5-10 solid business leads from theshow” 10:55 – “You’d be surprised how many CEOs and CMOs watch SharkTank” 11:45 – Ask on the show was $725,000 for 17.5% 12:30 – Due diligence starts a couple of weeks after theshoot 13:40 – Ultimately didn’t go through with the deal 16:10 – If Nathan and Lisa created a product together, what wouldit be? 17:05 – Maybe a product to do with goals and structure 18:10 – Maybe exclusive data - delivered at a live event 18:58 – Connect with Kim at her website, or on Twitter andInstagram 21:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Know your strengths and weaknesses...and outsource yourweaknesses. Be clear on what you want from an investment partnership. Is yourpartner bringing anything to the table apart from money? Don’t beafraid to walk away. Look after yourself and your health. You need to be on top form totake over the world. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices andaccounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names andhosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly createhis webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to SanAntonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/13/2016 • 24 minutes, 42 seconds
Shocked Subbu Wouldn't Accept my $10M Offer after Raising $1M This Year, EP 282: Subbu Rama
Subbu Rama, co-founder of BitFusion, a service that gathers unused processing power to create a decentralised supercomputer. Subbu’s hoping to create something as big as VMware. Listen as Subbu answers the hard questions about splitting equity, raising capital, and building sales at the beginning of a big idea. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Steve Jobs What CEO do you follow? — Steve Jobs, posthumously. Favourite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—I wish I’d started a company Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:45 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Welcoming Subbu to the show 02:35 – BitFusion grabs unused processing power to speed up clients’ processing 03:23 – Started in February 2015 03:36 – Based in Austin, Texas 03:50 – Subbu gave up a $250k salary at Dell to create BitFusion 04:20 – “The world is moving beyond CPUs...big computation is becoming more complex” 04:30 – “I thought - how do we bring hypercomputing to the normals?” 04:45 – Subbu’s co-founders quit Samsung and Intel 05:15 – The co-founders split their equity equally - 33% each 06:01 – “People don’t put the same energy in all the time...but in the end it all evens out” 06:45 – “I would recommend doing whatever you’re comfortable with” 07:26 – Raised $1.5 million in a seed round 07:42 – Went through the TechStars incubator 08:00 – Debt round via convertible note 08:40 – Nathan: “Are you making sales?” 09:05 – Have around 6 customers 09:40 – Customers pay $10-100k per year 09:55 – Looked for customers they could close with in 1-3 months 10:20 – Gained 6 customers in 2 months 10:40 – Revenue in the last year has been $100-500k 11:11 – Losing less than $100k per month in salaries - team of 9 people 11:50 – Hope to have enough customers in 2016 to run a Series A 12:25 – “I look at strategic investors, not valuation” 12:55 – “We want investors who will help us” 13:29 – Subbu wouldn’t sell for $20 million right now 13:50 – “We think this could be as big as VMWare” 14:18 – Connect with Subbu on Twitter 15:45 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Look for strategic investment partners who’ll bring something besides money to the table Sales are everything. Start bringing in customers as quickly as you can. Computation is becoming more complex: services that capitalise on super-fast processing are going to succeed Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/13/2016 • 21 minutes, 34 seconds
EP 324: CEO of Datanyze Shares $6m Revenue Number
Ilya Semin, creator of Datanyze - a sales intelligence platform that’s the only thing Hubspot and Marketo will use. Datanyze has reached an ARR of $6 million in just two years - and they’re growing incredibly fast. Listen in to hear why Ilya took his first round of funding, how to have the tough conversations about equity, and why emotional intelligence is crucial for tech entrepreneurs. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Alchemist What CEO do you follow? — None Favourite online tool? — Manny [link skyped to Nathan] Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — I wish that I’d started working on my EQ skills and learned how to communicate with people Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:58 – Welcoming Ilya to the show 02:12 – Datanyze is a sales intelligence platform that’s offered as a subscription service. Customers include Hubspot and Marketo 02:30 – 500 customers, with an average annual contract of $20k 02:55 – Founded the business in 2012 - launched officially in 2014 03:20 – First year revenue was around $50k 03:40 – Mostly serve B2B companies and enterprise companies 03:58 – Raised $1.8 million in July 2014 04:20 – “We were profitable even then...but enterprise customers don’t like dealing with small companies” 05:00 – VCs included Google investments and Mark Cuban 05:30 – Total revenue in 2015 was $4 million, and by December 2015 there was a monthly run rate of $500k 07:21 – Churn is less than 1% per month 07:44 – Customer Acquisition Cost is around $9k 08:20 – “Almost all our customers pay up front” 08:55 – Have about 60 people based in San Martel, California 09:18 – How does a typical customer use Datanyze? 09:30 – If a sales rep is making a call, they can use Datanyze to access information about a company 10:07 – Datanyze can also help to generate potential leads and their contact details 11:00 – Have an inside sales team who set up around 15 demos per month 12:57 – Current revenue growth is 7% month-over-month 13:30 – Team salary costs are close to $500k per month 14:16 – “We’re close to break-even all the time” 14:38 – One other co-founder. They had the difficult conversation and didn’t split equity evenly 15:01 – Connect with Ilya through Linkedin or his blog 17:12 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Zero in on the market you want to serve - and find partners or investment to help you in that market Learn to communicate. 85% of your success is down to emotional intelligence and ‘soft’ skills Have the tough conversations about equity. All that an even split proves is that you aren’t communicating well enough Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/13/2016 • 23 minutes, 6 seconds
How Miss Nevada Used Alcohol Cupcakes To Make $1MM, EP 281: Michael Mogill
Michael Mogill, president of Crisp Video - a company that bridges the gap between video production and video marketing. Michael started the business on his own three years ago, and now has 15 employees and clients including Coca Cola and Red Bull. Listen as Nathan and Michael talk return on investment, finding a marketing edge, and focusing on progress. Favorite Book? – Delivering Happiness What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk Favourite online tool? — Dropbox Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— To stop doubting myself, and not apologise for the standards I hold people to Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Michael to the show 01:45 – Generate revenue from video production and implementation 02:10 – The clients Michael’s most proud of are the small businesses 02:48 – One attorney in Nebraska doubled his business by using marketing videos 03:45 – He went from an average case value of $1,000 to an average case value of $10,000 04:00 – Created a brand video for him, as well as a series of educational videos 04:25 – A brand video costs around $10,000, a series of 26 videos over a year costs around $4,000 per month 05:40 – The firm has trained cinematographers in every market in the US 06:10 – Business founded in 2012 - originally just by Michael 06:20 – First year revenue was $100k 06:40 – 2013 revenue was $200k 06:50 – Crisp Video now has 15 employees in Atlanta, plus around 25 contractors 07:10 – Total revenue in the last year exceeded 7 figures 07:40 – Current goal is around $5 million for the end of the year 08:25 – Michael reinvests profits in the business 09:10 – “You have to consider the time you’re putting in, versus the salary you’re taking out” 10:01 – “If you can get to the point where you have a team, then there’s a higher return on investment than in a salaried job” 10:50 – “It’s not about the money - it’s about the next goal” 11:00 – Connect with Peter on his site or on twitter 14:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you start a business, be prepared to go from a 40 hour week to a 100 hour week. Once you build a team, those numbers will improve. Fulfilment doesn’t come from achievement - it comes from pursuing the next goal. Don’t apologise for the standards you hold people to, or the accountability you demand. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/12/2016 • 19 minutes, 40 seconds
Meat on Demand Does $1,200,000 in 2015, EP 280: Tim Ray
Tim Ray, the founder and CEO of Carnivore Club, a speciality meat subscription business. Tim sold his first company, Foodscrooge, within 4 months of starting it. He’s currently the CEO of two companies and is hoping to double Carnivore Club’s profits this year. Listen as Nathan and Tim talk earning out and buying, bootstrapping a business, and how to get the most from podcast advertising. Favorite Book? – 48 Laws of Power What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? — None Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Almost If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Swing for the fences. Be bold and swing big. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:01 – Nathan’s introduction 01:42 – Welcoming Tim to the show 01:58 – Tim started his first company, FoodScrooge, to allow consumers to buy bulk frozen food surplus 02:40 – Revenue in the first year was $150k - they were bought within 4 months 03:07 – Sold for $2.1 million on an earn-out scheme 03:45 – Tim acquired Broquet for $150,000 04:25 – Broquet’s a premium curated gifts company 05:30 – Carnivore Club has a subscription model, whereas Broquet is more traditional e-commerce 06:40 – Carnivore Club was launched via Indiegogo 07:10 – Crowdfunding raised $22,000 08:15 – First monthly order was 175 orders in the US and 250 in Canada 08:41 – The business is seasonal - in December 2015, they shipped around 8,000 boxes 08:51 – March 2016, sent just over 5,000 boxes 09:25 – Subscription is $55 per month - people often give gifts of a multi-month subscription 09:50 – Paid up-front and don’t have to ship for the next few months 10:40 – Around ⅔ of sales are fixed-term gifts - the other option is a rolling subscription 13:00 – In 2015, total revenue was $1.3 million 13:01 – Business was bootstrapped from an initial $100,000 13:24 – 35% average margin - currently investing all profits in the business 13:50 – 4 full time employees 14:15 – Currently focusing on podcast advertising 15:00 – The most successful podcast advertisement has been a 30-second midroll on Drinkin' Bros. Pay around $270 per episode. 17:34 – Connect with Tim on Linkedin 19:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Your consumer base might not be who you originally expected. Accept them and see how you can understand and serve them best. Think big. Timidity doesn’t serve anyone. You’ll benefit from creating a payment model that gives you cash up front. Traditional e-commerce requires sunk costs in inventory and storage - try being more creative. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/12/2016 • 21 minutes, 48 seconds
I Didn't Know a Video Production Company Could Make This Much Money, EP 279 - Michael Mogill
Michael Mogill, president of Crisp Video - a company that bridges the gap between video production and video marketing. Michael started the business on his own three years ago, and now has 15 employees and clients including Coca Cola and Red Bull. Listen as Nathan and Michael talk return on investment, finding a marketing edge, and focusing on progress. Favorite Book? – Delivering Happiness What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk Favourite online tool? — Dropbox Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— To stop doubting myself, and not apologise for the standards I hold people to Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:14 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Michael to the show 01:45 – Generate revenue from video production and implementation 02:10 – The clients Michael’s most proud of are the small businesses 02:48 – One attorney in Nebraska doubled his business by using marketing videos 03:45 – He went from an average case value of $1,000 to an average case value of $10,000 04:00 – Created a brand video for him, as well as a series of educational videos 04:25 – A brand video costs around $10,000, a series of 26 videos over a year costs around $4,000 per month 05:40 – The firm has trained cinematographers in every market in the US 06:10 – Business founded in 2012 - originally just by Michael 06:20 – First year revenue was $100k 06:40 – 2013 revenue was $200k 06:50 – Crisp Video now has 15 employees in Atlanta, plus around 25 contractors 07:10 – Total revenue in the last year exceeded 7 figures 07:40 – Current goal is around $5 million for the end of the year 08:25 – Michael reinvests profits in the business 09:10 – “You have to consider the time you’re putting in, versus the salary you’re taking out” 10:01 – “If you can get to the point where you have a team, then there’s a higher return on investment than in a salaried job” 10:50 – “It’s not about the money - it’s about the next goal” 11:00 – Connect with Peter on his site or on twitter 14:00 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: When you start a business, be prepared to go from a 40 hour week to a 100 hour week. Once you build a team, those numbers will improve. Fulfilment doesn’t come from achievement - it comes from pursuing the next goal. Don’t apologise for the standards you hold people to, or the accountability you demand. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/12/2016 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
EP 323: He took his company public for $1b
Kenny Hawk, the CEO of Mojio. Kenny made millions from iGo, a company he started in his dorm room in the 1990s. He’s now turning his expertise in wireless technology to good use at Mojio - a company backed by Amazon and Deutsche Telecom that uses cloud-based tech to link your car to the internet. Listen in to hear lessons from the dotcom boom, how Mojio can slash your garage fees, and why Kenny’s expecting to sell almost 2 million units in the next 2 years. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Built to Last What CEO do you follow? — Larry Ellison Favourite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — The most important choice in life is the people you choose to be around you Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:37 – Welcoming Kenny to the show 01:45 – iGo was Kenny’s first CEO gig - he started the business in his dorm room before graduation 02:30 – iGo created universal charging adaptors for mobile devices 02:50 – Started in 1993 and bootstrapped, followed by angel investment and VC rounds 03:30 – Raised $10 million and went public in 1999 03:50 – Acquired 3 companies and were then acquired themselves 04:40 – Moved from Silicon Valley to northern Nevada 05:20 – Top market cap was almost $1 billion 05:40 – Market cap was below $100 million - but they came out on the right side of the bubble 06:25 – Revenue was around $80 million when they sold 07:15 – Gross margin was around 30-40% 07:20 – iGo was profitable when it started, but VC investors were focused on growth rather than profit 08:30 – People who came in late in the dotcom boom tended to suffer 09:30 – Kenny did well out of his company sale 10:00 – People went bankrupt by paying tax on optioned gain - then losing everything 11:00 – The people who lost the most were the public market 11:26 – Mojio was launched in 2012 in Vancouver, backed by Amazon and Deutsche Telecom 11:50 – Kenny started in late 2015 12:05 – Mojio provides a cloud service to connect cars to the internet - track drivers and know where a shared car is at any time 12:53 – “When you’re not in your car, your cellphone’s not in your car” 13:23 – The device connects through the onboard diagnostic port - meaning that you know exactly what’s gone wrong 14:10 – Work on a revenue-share basis. Sell units and store data. 15:08 – Hoping to join the autonomous car ecosystem once it takes off 15:30 – Under 30 full-time employees 16:10 – Sales will be within the millions of units in the next 2-3 years 16:35 – Why did Kenny come on board instead of starting a new business? 17:12 – Kenny grew up in Detroit and loves cars - he also knew and respected the VC investors 17:55 – Deutsche Telecom has been a fantastic strategic partner 11:13 – Connect with Kenny through the Mojio website 20:22 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Surround yourself with the right people. The most important choice in building a successful life and business is who you join forces with. Find a strategic investor who brings more than just money to your business. Growth is not everything. The dotcom boom happened when growth outstripped profit - it’s important to know that your business can work. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/12/2016 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
He Helped Invent NYT Paywall in 2005, Predicts Future of Content, EP 278: Peter Himler
Peter Himler, the man who set up the New York Times’ paywall. Peter’s an experienced PR and media consultant, and the founder of Flatiron Communications. Listen as Nathan and Peter talk subscription vs. native advertising, the growth of content marketing, and the importance of influencers. Favorite Book? – The End of Big What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I absolutely do If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— How to be more assertive with my boss Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming Peter to the show 01:55 – Peter helped the New York Times launch their first paywall 02:45 – What can agencies do to make sure they retain talent? 03:00 – Large agencies have invested in digital strategies 04:00 – Flatiron create content marketing for their clients 04:35 – Content sites with a paywall are a growing trend 04:50 – How did you execute the NY Times paywall? 05:10 – The first paywall was unsuccessful - ‘Times Select’ in 2005 05:50 – “It was premature” - focused on driving advertising revenue 06:20 – When they fully embraced the paywall model it became more successful 07:45 – “The Times is a very strong brand in a sea of online content” 08:10 – “The voices of true journalism are fewer and further between” 09:40 – Do content paywalls cannibalise revenue from native advertising? 10:35 – Some paid subscriber sites provide a very targeted market for advertisers 11:40 – Are paywalls feasible for people who aren’t big brands yet? 12:41 – A trend of hiring influencers to create branded content 13:31 – A company called Niche matches brands with influencers - bought by Twitter for $20 million 14:24 – Flatiron has a team of 4 people 15:30 – Charges retainers of around $7500-12,500 per month 16:10 – Connect with Peter on his site or on twitter 17:55 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Subscription models can coexist with targeted advertising: be creative about how you’re generating revenue from your content. Be prepared to create a lot of free content in order to build your brand. Be assertive...and once you know what you’re doing, be prepared to strike out on your own. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/11/2016 • 21 minutes, 8 seconds
Giving Up on $1MM+ Consulting Business For $1B+ SaaS Idea, EP 277: Khalid Saleh
Khalid Saleh, co-author of the bestselling book Conversion Optimisation. Khalid’s an expert on conversion whose company, Invesp, has grown companies from tiny startups to giant powerhouses. Listen as Khalid and Nathan talk leaving a salaried job, turning a consulting business into an SaaS giant, and running a global fundraising round. Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? — Alex Turnbull What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Hell, no! If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— That I need to be laser-focused. There’s opportunity everywhere - you just have to focus on it. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Welcoming Khalid to the show 02:35 – Invesp makes money by consulting on conversion optimisation 03:00 – Companies pay a monthly retainer for ongoing optimisation services 03:45 – Charge a minimum of $8,000 per month 04:00 – Companies stay 15-24 months on average 04:25 – Invesp was founded in 2006 04:35 – Made around $15-20k in their first year 05:00 – Khaleed was 31 when he left his salaried job to launch Invesp 05:20 – “An amazing employee but difficult to manage” 05:40 – While working for Motorola, Khalid noticed the problem of conversion rates 05:52 – Gave up a $200k salary as one of the top software architects in America 06:30 – Khalid’s wife is one of his business partner 07:00 – 4 partners in the company 07:35 – Moving into providing a SaaS platform for conversion optimisation 08:30 – Made close to $700k in 2014 - the year they decided to take fewer projects 09:15 – “It’s been a gamble to focus on software development” 09:30 – Initially wanted to make an AB testing platform...but decided to move into other products 10:35 – Several companies are interested in funding - but many are asking for more equity than they want to give up 11:01 – A VC in Russia was willing to give $1.5 million for 45% equity 11:20 – “He said I could probably get the same offer for 25% in San Francisco...but it’s a different market in each country” 11:55 – The SaaS business will be a product that’s offered by Invesp 12:40 – Connect with Khaleed at the Invesp Blog or on twitter 15:30 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you want to expand, be willing to move sideways and think creatively about where your business can go. Consulting doesn’t scale the way SaaS can. Think very carefully about how much equity you’re willing to give up in a fundraising round. Interest means nothing without conversion. Optimising conversion rates for your business can boost your growth enormously. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/11/2016 • 18 minutes, 56 seconds
He Was 26 And Gave Up a $400k+ Salary for HourlyNerd.com, EP 276: Rob Biederman
Rob Biederman, founder of HourlyNerd - a platform that bypasses traditional consultancies to help companies hire just the experts they need. HourlyNerd serves more than 4,500 companies, including GE, Microsoft and American Apparel. Listen as Rob and Nathan talk about spotting a market gap, dividing equity, and why you should have studied computer science. Favorite Book? – Only the Paranoid Survive What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Immelt What is your favorite online tool?— Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Take some computer science papers Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Graham to the show 01:56 – “Companies use us when they have a pressing need for a solution that can’t be provided by their current workforce” 02:00 – HourlyNerd makes money by taking a small percentage of transactions 02:30 – Example: connected GE to a robotics professor who could educate them about commercial robotics 03:30 – Around 80-85% goes to the consultant, the rest goes to HourlyNerd 04:00 – Rob worked in private equity before starting his business 04:34 – Had the idea of bypassing traditional consulting to connect people to talent directly 04:58 – Rob started in private equity aged 21, and founded the company aged 26 05:40 – He gave up a $400-600k salary 06:40 – “I’d saved a tremendous amount...I could mitigate the risk” 07:20 – How did Rob and his founders divide equity? 07:30 – They used a vesting schedule to accommodate any changes 09:15 – Worked with 5,000 customers in 2015 and had 21,000 nerds 09:31 – Nerds actively making money would be “in the low single-digit thousands” 09:50 – “We work with clients from GE down to a woman called Jenny in Massachusetts” 10:40 – Founded in 2013 10:51 – Total revenue in the first year was $150k 11:00 – Total revenue in 2015 was above $5 million 11:20 – Have raised about $10 million in capital 11:25 – “Nobody on our founding team could code...we needed to pay a development firm” 12:40 – Gave up around 20% of equity via convertible note to fundraise 13:30 – Auditioned for Shark Tank: dropped out but ended up with Mark Cuban as an investor 14:40 – Connect with Rob at HourlyNerd or on Twitter 3 Key Points: Be wary of how much equity you’re giving up in the early stages of your company. Make choices that minimise dead equity. Don’t be afraid to give up a salary to follow your ideas Learn some computer skills as soon as you can Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/11/2016 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 322: What if you could get paid $8k/mo for a blog post?
Preston Lee, the founder of Millo. He’s making $8,000 per month from a website and newsletter that started as a side project. Millo is a business resource and newsletter for creative entrepreneurs. Preston’s built an incredibly engaged community and a list that actually thanks him for sending out sponsored emails. Listen in to hear how to make sponsorship deals that your audience love, how to build revenue from a side project, and why it’s important to think like a business from the start. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The $100 Startup What CEO do you follow? — Ben Chestnut Favourite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — How to think more like a business Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:07 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Preston to the show 01:43 – Millo is a blog and a newsletter for people who are interested in becoming entrepreneurs, freelancers, or creators 02:30 – Email list of about 30k, and a high level of engagement 03:10 – In 2009, Millo started as a graphic design blog, Graphic Design Blender 03:35 – In the first few years, made less than $500 per month 04:00 – In the last few years, pivoted to become a sponsor-based business that makes around $8k per month 04:50 – Highly tailored sponsorship packages 05:05 – Between 3 and 7 sponsors per month 05:24 – Design Cuts is a long-term sponsor 06:08 – Send out dedicated emails advertising Design Cuts bundles 06:33 – Millo is a side project for Preston and he’s happy with that 07:11 – “Right now it’s a very exciting side project” 07:35 – Lowest sponsorship package is $400 per month; highest is $1850 08:55 – If Nathan wanted to work with Preston, what could he do? 09:51 – The Freelance Report is a side project in the Millo newsletter 10:51 – Preston’s full-time job is content marketing for a magazine website 11:13 – Connect with Preston on Twitter 12:52 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Start side projects and things that you love. You never know what opportunities content will lead to. Once you’ve built an audience, you can build a business. Think like a business. Focus will connect you to opportunities. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/11/2016 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
How Fun Fun Fun Fest Went From 3,000 to 16,000 Attendees in Under 5 Years, EP 275 - Graham Williams
Graham Williams, one of the creators of Fun Fun Fun festival and head of Transmission Events. The festival’s first year had only 3,000 attendees...now it lasts 3 days and welcomes 20,000 people. Listen as Nathan and Graham talk about building up an event, the economics of festivals, and why you should start building your dream sooner. Favorite Book? – I’ve never read a business book… 1984 What CEO do you follow? — None What is your favorite online tool?— Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— I think I made the right decisions for the most part...I wish I’d started my company a little earlier. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Graham to the show 02:10 – Started Fun Fun Fun festival in 2006 with the head of Alamo Drafthouse 02:45 – Cost around $100k to produce and sold around 3000 tickets in the first year 03:15 – Left Emo's to start Transmission Events, a booking and promotions company 03:20 – How did you get 3000 people to an event that had just launched? 03:40 – “A lot of flyering and street-team work” 04:07 – Now a 3-day festival with 20,000 attendees 04:24 – Now costs $4-5 million to produce 05:50 – Currently run by a local manager 05:10 – What’s driven the growth of the festival? 05:40 – “You find your audience and respect that audience” 06:22 – Ticket sales are the bulk of revenue - then sponsorship and bar sales 06:55 – A weekend pass costs a little over $200 07:22 – Around half the total revenue is in ticket sales 08:30 - Sponsors pay more per head because of the opportunity to target an audience 11:00 – The festival feeds into Graham’s year-round business 11:20 – Find Graham at Transmission Events or Fun Fun Fun Fest 12:35 – It’s aimed at licensing information obtained from defunct websites 3 Key Points: Learn all you can - but you need to put that learning into action. Find your audience and respect them. Cater to their needs. Build your niche. Start sooner. Whatever you’re thinking about doing...do it. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/10/2016 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
Phone Cleaner Will Do $5m-$10m This Year, Launched in 2012 at CES, EP 274: Jason Greenspan
Jason Greenspan, the founder and CEO of Whoosh!, a screen-cleaning product that’s on track to make over $5 million in sales this year. Listen as Jason and Nathan talk about creating a start-up with a physical product, what good margins look like, and how to convince people they have a problem. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Purple Cow What CEO do you follow? — Kevin Plank What is your favorite online tool? — Pipedrive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely not If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To start a business then! It’s much easier before you have responsibilities. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:44 – Welcoming Jason to the show 01:54 – Whoosh! is a best-selling screen-cleaning spray and wipe 03:05 – Was on the Canadian version of Dragon’s Den 03:40 – Founded in 2009 03:50 – Pivoted in 2012 from making car-cleaning products 04:05 – Knocked a cleaning product onto his iPad by mistake 04:30 – Filled one-ounce bottles and handed them out at CES - never looked back 04:55 – Entirely self-funded and currently profitable 05:10 – Looking to raise $5 million this spring to fund growth 05:30 – Wiped over 1.5 million screens over the last year 06:30 – Total revenue in 2012 just under $1 million 06:39 – Total revenue in 2016 will be $5-10 million 07:00 – The formula is proprietary - they manage a supply chain 07:40 – The Whoosh! Go sells for $10 - what are the margins on that? 07:55 – Retailer takes a 25-50% gross margin 08:20 – A good gross margin on a physical product is 40-50% 09:02 – A good net margin is around 5% 09:35 – Spending very little on acquisitions 10:00 – We’re building through the wholesale channel - probably 90% of sales 10:24 – 10 full-time employees 10:40 – How do you value a product company? 10:50 – Valuation is on topline revenue and growth 12:30 – Whoosh! is a sticky product once people try it 13:20 – Biggest growth opportunity is convincing the market that there’s a problem 15:40 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Grab opportunities when you see them. Whoosh! was founded by capitalising on an accident. Start your business now. Waiting longer isn’t going to make it easier. If you’re dealing with physical products, you should be making better than 5% margins. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/10/2016 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
This App is Redefining On Demand Apparel Commerce with 3m Downlaods and $3m+ In Sales, EP 273: Ben Williamson
Ben Williamson. Ben went from teaching himself to code, to working with Steve Jobs. After 10 years at Apple, Ben’s building Yoshirt - a custom apparel tool that’s priced at $5 million after just two years. Listen as Ben and Nathan talk through fundraising, insecurities, and building an incredibly successful startup. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Way of the SEAL What CEO do you follow? — Nathan Latka What is your favorite online tool? — Periscope Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Recently, no If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — You don’t need anyone else’s permission. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 02:17 – Welcoming Ben to the show 02:25 – Ben’s second time on the show - he was here in episode 23 02:53 – Yoshirt was founded in 2014 03:00 – “Custom, on-demand apparel from your iOS device” 03:08 – Last year ran an over-subscribed fundraising round that closed at $1.1 million 03:30 – Priced round at a post-money valuation of $5 million 04:10 – 13 full-time employees 04:25 – They make money from the physical product - $36 per shirt 05:30 – Cost of goods is $15-18; gross margin of 50% 06:12 – Unique point: Yoshirt prints image on a single piece of fabric before they cut and sew 07:02 – Running Facebook ads and retargeting current customers 07:30 – Over 3 million people have downloaded the app 07:43 – Over 100k paying customers 08:30 – Focus on delivering fantastic customer experience 08:50 – “We make garments so unique that no one can walk by without saying something” 09:20 – Topline revenue was $3 million in 2015 09:25 – Shooting for $10 million in 2016 09:55 – Working with bands to generate growth - partnered with Fall Out Boy 11:00 – Sold over 1,000 units from the Fall Out Boy activation 11:30 – The goal is to see how far they can push the idea 12:00 – “We really look at ourselves as a technology company” 12:50 – Wouldn’t sell Yoshirt for $10 million in cash today 13:30 – People are looking for attention: we’re building a company around that 14:00 – Connect with Ben through email, Linkedin and Twitter 17:55 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Satisfied customers are your best growth tool. Deliver a fantastic product and people will return and refer. Deal with your own insecurities. You don’t need to seek permission or validation from the people around you. Get the best data you possibly can. Successful entrepreneurs need facts, not stories. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/10/2016 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 321: He's Focused on Social Impact and Still Makes Cash
Laurie Lane-Zucker, founder and CEO of the Impact Entrepreneur Centre. Laurie’s created a network of 10,000 entrepreneurs who are chasing the triple bottom line: making a positive social and environmental impact as well as a profit. Listen in to hear how Laurie funds his dream to make a difference; why you need to expand your bottom-line thinking, and how to get started as an impact entrepreneur. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – The Way of the Wizard What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk Favourite online tool? — Linkedin Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— I wish I knew about entrepreneurship earlier. I wish I had the opportunities that millennials have now to pursue their own goals. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:53 – Welcoming Laurie to the show 02:07 – An ‘Impact Entrepreneur’ is someone who wants to create companies that do good in the world, and to nurture a network and ecosystem that support these values 03:10 – Website is Impact Alchemist 03:40 – A ‘triple bottom line’ that considers social and environmental impact 04:21 – Over 10k members in the network right now 04:40 – Laurie makes money from consulting. He’s recently worked with water purification companies, nutrition research companies, and companies making biofuel from landfill 06:00 – “I gravitate to companies that are working on the UN development goals” 07:15 – Laurie often match-makes between companies and impact investors 08:05 – Takes a ‘success fee’ when they secure funding 09:20 – Currently creating an incubation and acceleration hub in the Berkshires 10:25 – Laurie generates revenue through speaking, consulting, and taking fees on securing funding 11:20 – “Look at the sustainable development goals of the United Nations - and see what strikes a chord with you” 12:20 – Connect with Laurie on Linkedin 13:52 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Chase the triple bottom line. You aren’t really adding value to the world unless you’re looking at your environmental and social impact as well as finances. There’s a lot to do in the world. Look at the UN’s sustainable development goals and see what strikes a chord with you. Make the most of all your opportunities Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/10/2016 • 18 minutes, 49 seconds
He Quit Google To Invent Smart Way to Recruit, Doing Around $50k/mo in Sales, EP 272: Troy Sultan
Troy Sultan, founder and CEO of Resource, a company that’s trying to automate the recruitment process. Troy was the first recruitment officer at Grooveshark, and later left Google to return to his passion: startups. Listen as Troy and Nathan talk about Troy’s career path, managing co-founders, and why you shouldn’t rely on venture capital. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The War of Art What CEO do you follow? — Gary Swart What is your favorite online tool? — Mixmax Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Slow down to speed up. And think about what you’re really good at. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming Troy to the show 01:47 – Troy founded a startup out of college, then joined early Grooveshark 02:10 – Grooveshark got sued for $17 billion 02:40 – Troy went into hiring at Google in 2013 03:00 – Built a startup in the last year of college - “we made every mistake” 04:00 – Decided to work with Grooveshark to learn about startup success 04:30 – Google was the next stage: seeing how a big company worked 05:00 – Lessons from Google? - “A lot of delegation is happening” 05:13 – The quality of your experience at a big company depends on your manager 05:26 – Troy then started Resource 05:54 – Part of the 500 Startups accelerator 06:06 – 5% equity; $125k investment 06:20 – 3 team members 06:33 – Trying to split equity equally, but people came on at different stages 07:00 – If everyone’s going to provide equal value, try to keep it equal 07:30 – “I don’t want to co-found a company with someone who’s not picking up where I’m weak” 08:05 – Charge a monthly flat rate of $5-8.5k for services. Month-by-month opt-in model 08:38 – Doing tens of thousands in revenue per month 09:10 – Customers “in the low double digits” 09:30 – Creating a hiring solution that’s part-human, part-software 09:54 – Most acquisitions are coming through social credibility 10:20 – No spending on marketing at the moment 10:40 – Not a SaaS company - they’re not looking at churn 11:00 – MRR varies depending on when people are hiring 11:50 – “If we do a good job, we get rid of customers...but hopefully they come back” 12:25 – Troy’s trying to hack his way to the next checkpoint 12:50 – In a good month Resource makes $50k in revenue 13:00 – Operating profitably - margins are good 13:30 – “We don’t want to rely on venture capital early on” 13:50 – Connect with Troy on Twitter or through his blog 15:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Slow down to speed up. It can be worth putting your short-term goals on hold to go corporate for a while and learn from the masters Be certain that your business can make a profit on its own terms. If you rely on venture capital early on, you can go a long way with a bad idea. Choose your co-founders carefully. If they’re not going to bring serious value, they’re probably not who you want to start a company with. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/9/2016 • 18 minutes, 48 seconds
He is Killing That Annoying "We Missed You" Sticky Note the UPS Always Puts on Your Door, $3m Raised, 10 Teammates, EP 271: Zander Adell
Zander Adell, co-founder and CEO of Doorman. Zander’s aiming to solve the frustrating problem of finding a note on your door, instead of your Amazon or FedEx package. He left his job as technical director at Pixar to go to business school, and wound up solving one of the stickiest problems in e-commerce. Listen as Zander and Nathan talk logistics, changing a business ecosystem, and dreaming big. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Good to Great What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To focus on the big dream, not the little pieces along the way Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:26 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming Zander to the show 02:20 – Zander left Pixar in his early 30s to go to business school 02:50 – He wanted to understand how to get a business off the ground 03:10 – Fascinated by the logistics element of apps 03:40 – Worked in the gaming industry briefly before starting Doorman 04:10 – Doorman aims to solve the e-commerce problem of getting your stuff delivered 04:40 – It lets customers schedule when a package will come to their house 05:10 – We’re still in a transitional period between shopping in person and online 05:30 – The existing logistics infrastructure isn’t ready to interact with consumers 06:00 – Revenue comes from both retail partnerships and consumer customers 06:40 – Items are delivered to Doorman’s warehouse; customers then choose a delivery time 07:10 – Warehouses in San Francisco, Chicago and New York 07:20 – Working with retailers is currently more profitable 07:50 – Launched in 2014 08:00 – One co-founder and a team of 10 people 08:15 – Raised a little over $3 million through 500 Startups 09:00 – Around 10-20% growth of users per month 10:40 – Delivered over 100,000 packages 11:10 – “We’ll deliver pretty much anything” - anything under 45lb is a normal package 12:00 – Furniture etc. costs a little more 12:40 – Doorman is currently trying to build economies of scale 14:15 – A big win in 2016 would be hooking up with a large retailer 15:00 – Don’t consider themselves a SaaS business - but use SaaS measures 16:00 – Logistics margins are tight - they can get down to 5% in big companies 16:50 – “We can scale without really owning anything” 17:10 – Delivering 15-20 packages on average for top-quartile customers 18:25 – People’s buying doubled when they started using Doorman 21:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Logistics companies can learn from the pared-down model of SaaS. It’s possible to grow without owning bricks-and-mortar infrastructure, or fleets of lorries. Assess whether what you’re doing right now is serving your long-term goals. If it isn’t: change what you’re doing. When you solve a problem in an ecosystem, you change people’s behaviour. Simply providing an effective solution can make a market develop. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/9/2016 • 24 minutes, 30 seconds
28 Year Old Female Entrepreneur Making 100k's Product Images Better for $2 Each, EP 270: Holly Cardew
Holly Cardew, a member of the Forbes 30 under 30 list and the founder of Pixc - an online image optimization service. Holly dropped out of college to grow an image editing empire that’s making just short of $1 million in revenue each year. Listen as Holly and Nathan talk about Pixc’s bootstrapping ethic, the importance of revenue over investment, and how to get the most from an affiliate program. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Lean Startup What CEO do you follow? — Ben Chestnut, though he’s kind of hard to track What is your favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — I wish my parents had told me to go to Silicon Valley. I should have learnt how to code. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:56 – Welcoming Holly to the show 02:03 – Holly took a corporate job in London after university 02:20 – Tried multiple online businesses before Pixc 02:40 – Pixc is an online image optimization service 02:50 – Sells credit image packages 03:05 – Launched a landing page in 2013; started properly in 2014 03:20 – Largely self-funded; raised $150k in capital 03:55 – ‘At the end of the day, you need to have a business - not just capital’ 04:15 – 16 team members 04:30 – Revenue in the range of $200k - $1 million per year 05:10 – What are the running costs? 05:20 – Semi-automated process with some human input 05:35 – Currently breaking even and re-investing in the business 05:50 – Holly is 28; she dropped out of college to start her business 06:20 – Working with over 7,000 clients 06:40 – Acquisitions through referrals, integration, content marketing and affiliates 07:10 – Affiliate program is very effective. One article brought in 70+ customers in 3 weeks 09:20 – Affiliates make 20% commission on referrals 10:40 – What’s the competition? Largely freelancers. 11:03 – What’s Pixc’s growth strategy? 11:40 – Planning to expand the affiliate program and build partnerships 11:50 – Thinking about what other services they can offer in this niche 12:20 – Connect with Holly on Linkedin, Twitter and at her blog 14:58 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on revenue, not on investment. You have to know that your idea can make money. Learn how to code - it’s a basic skill that will pay you back a hundred times over. If you’re looking at expanding, consider what other services fit in your niche. What else do your customers need that you can provide? Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/9/2016 • 20 minutes, 7 seconds
EP 320: With a $150M War Chest, He Gives SaaS Businesses Friendly Loans
Lance Mysyrowicz, the founder of Boost&Co. Lance is an investment fund manager who specialises in European startups. He currently manages over $150 million in assets. Listen in to hear about Lance’s latest investment, the details of early investment in tech startups, and what interest rates you could expect for your startup. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Behind the Cloud What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —I wish I knew what makes me happy today - spending time with people I love, and the things I love doing Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:36 – Welcoming Lance to the show 01:50 – Boost&Co lends money to companies earlier in the process than banks 02:20 – They sit in between VC and banking as an investor 02:55 – Have loaned $120 million to over 100 business 03:43 – Last company was a SaaS firm called Idio that lets people track what’s being read on a web page 04:50 – Have invested around $1.75 million in Idio 05:00 – Make money in three different ways: a 1-2% fee; an 8-12% interest rate on outstanding capital; and a warrant - a right to buy shares at a specific price 05:50 – The warrant includes a negotiated strike price 07:05 – What happens on a $1 million deal? 08:00 – A management fee comes from the investment fund - it’s 2% of the assets they manage 09:12 – Why charge a fee? 10:31 – Interest rates are determined by the revenue and size of a company 11:25 – Interest is paid every month and a small amount of capital is repaid 13:15 – “I would always prefer to do a smaller deal and have a smaller risk exposure” 13:48 – Is this the same as mezzanine finance? 14:06 – Connect with Lance on Linkedin 16:10 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: There are multiple pathways to getting a loan as a startup - through VCs, banks, or a halfway step like Boost&Co Expect to pay a fee, interest, and to offer a warrant to buy shares As an investment fund manager, Lance tries to limit his exposure to risk as much as possible. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/9/2016 • 19 minutes, 34 seconds
He'll Help You Get On Stage With Journey, Power Broker to 3,000 A Listers, Billionaires, And Grammy Winners, EP 269: Steve Sims
Steve Sims, the colorful legend behind The Bluefish. Steve’s the founder of a luxury concierge company that can arrange anything from singing with Journey to getting married in the Vatican. Listen as Steve and Nathan talk about the secrets of engaging people and making impossible things happen. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Cat in the Hat What CEO do you follow? — Tony Hsieh What is your favorite online tool? — I actually use a pad and pen Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No! If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Everything will be all right. Just keep on going, and keep your word. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 02:13 – Welcoming Steve to the show 03:20 – Steve got into the concierge business after being a club doorman 03:50 – “I don’t lie...like me or don’t like me” 04:15 – 99% of Steve’s clients are entrepreneurs 04:50 – “I psychoanalyse the shit out of them” 05:40 – One guy wanted to meet Journey: we got him onstage singing with them 06:20 – I always know someone who’s got a contact 06:50 – A ‘chain of credibility’ 08:20 – “When I went in based on money, I made bad decisions” 09:00 – I always pay people: a favour is expensive in the long run 09:30 – Journey event raised money for Autism Speaks 10:10 – People never want to think they’ve been sold 10:50 – What engages people is stories and emotions 11:20 – The business-entertainment conference that Nathan’s planning 13:00 – Connect with Steve at Ugly Sims 17:11 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Keep your promises. If you say you can get something done, you’d better get it done. Be yourself. People will like you or they won’t - don’t bother trying to bullshit them. Think creatively about what motivates people. Money isn’t always the answer. Stories, emotions, connections, contacts...there are a lot of ways to make things happen. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/8/2016 • 20 minutes, 38 seconds
He's Buildling Billion Dollar Juicing Empire, 16 JuiceLand Locations Already, EP 268: Matt Shook
Matt Shook, founder of Juiceland: an organic juice business that’s taking over Austin. Listen to Matt and Nathan for insight into a bricks-and-mortar startup that’s becoming wildly successful. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Prometheus Rising What CEO do you follow? — Tim League What is your favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Don’t be so afraid of what other people think Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:36 – Welcoming Matt to the show 01:55 – Founded Juiceland in 2011, after making juice for 8 years 02:33 – New location on 4th street sold 2000 drinks in one day 03:30 – Frost Tower downtown store has triple the sales of anywhere else 05:15 – In 2015, 275 employees at 16 locations 05:40 – Net margin of 5% across the company 06:40 – Makes about 40 cents on a $10 drink 08:20 – Business is all bootstrapped 05:25 – Retainer of $50-75k per month 08:30 – First shop was opened for $15k with a friend 08:55 – ‘I’ve never once looked at demographics’ 09:20 – Hoping to have 20 stores by the end of the year 09:50 – Marketing through creating excellent product 11:25 – Connect with Matt on facebook and instagram 12:20 – The Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on creating a fantastic product. It’s the best and most lasting way to get customers. Don’t worry about what other people think. Focus on yourself and what you’re doing. Keep an open mind and connect with the people around you. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/8/2016 • 15 minutes, 29 seconds
Quit 6 Figure Corporate Job With a Kid to Launch SaaS Startup, EP 267: Prem Bhatia
Prem Bhatia, CEO and co-founder of Cooleaf. Cooleaf’s a B2B platform that helps companies organise, coordinate and track their engagement efforts. Listen as Prem and Nathan talk about breaking out of the corporate world, getting startup funding, and acquiring customers at no cost. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Alliance What CEO do you follow? — Dharmesh Shah What is your favorite online tool? — LinkedIn Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —Do it sooner. You’ll learn on the job. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 02:10 – Welcoming Prem to the show 02:40 – Prem left the corporate world aged 35 to begin a startup 03:20 – Gave up a salary supporting his family 04:40 – Cooleaf is a SaaS platform designed to help businesses with engagement efforts 05:30 – Currently has 25 active customers 06:05 – Average annual contract of $25-30k 06:20 – Acquiring customers through inside sales - personal outreach; a blog 07:05 – Not spending any money on acquisitions 07:30 – Have raised about $800k in funding - in part from 500 Startups 08:10 – Funding is largely in equity 08:30 – Founded 4-5 years ago, but pivoted later into B2B 09:05 – Team of 11 10:30 – Annual churn of around 10% - a little unclear right now 11:30 – Average LTV is around $100k 11:45 – Model right now is to ‘nail it and scale it’ - tighten up what they’re doing 12:50 – Made less than $500k in 2015 13:20 – Aiming to make $88k per month this year 13:30 – Connect with Prem on Twitter 15:45 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Startups don’t come with guarantees. To be an entrepreneur, you have to be prepared to give something up. If you’re working with a small number of high-value clients, you shouldn’t have to spend money on acquisitions. Reach out through your networks first. Learn on the job. No one ever feels ready to start something - accept that you aren’t, and jump in anyway. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/8/2016 • 18 minutes, 49 seconds
EP 319: He's 23 And His Asian Parents Don't Like The Non-Traditional Entprenreuer Route He's Taking
Qin En Looi, the CEO and CMO of Glints. Before he turned 20, Qin En had published 20 behavioural science research papers in international journals. He’s put his expertise in psychology and growth hacking to good use...He’s now focused on creating the best possible platform to help graduates find jobs they love. Listen in to hear how Qin En’s growing his talent pool by 15% each month with almost no spending; why word of mouth is the best possible marketing tool, and why you should take care with your first seed capital. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — Google Calendar Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To spend more prudently. Don’t waste your money. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:13 – Nathan’s introduction 02:17 – Glints aims to help young people discover what they love to do 03:00 – “5 years ago I would never have expected to have built a company” 03:28 – Glints makes money through recruitment and development 03:58 – They prepare talent to be ready for jobs: offer training and development 04:34 – Founded in 2013 04:50 – First-year revenue was $7k 05:00 – This year’s revenue was $500k 05:21 – Team of 12 people based in Singapore 05:33 – Raised a seed investment round of $500k in 2014 06:12 – Have placed over 2500 graduates into new jobs - minimum reported number 07:01 – 800 employers have recruited graduates 07:40 – Employers pay Glints for a recruitment plan 08:15 – They charge a flat fee: the average fee is $1000 08:48 – It’s free for students to be listed 09:06 – How are you growing the business? 09:22 – Work directly with students and campuses to bring more students onto the platform 10:04 – Have placed 300 students into jobs in March 2016 10:30 – Talent base is growing by 15% each month and spending less than $1000 each month 11:11 – “Word of mouth has been the most powerful driver for us” 11:40 – Connect with Qin En Looi via email or Twitter [links provided via Skype] 16:28 – Connect to Danielle on Twitter 13:30 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be open to unexpected experiences. Qin En never expected to build his own company - and now he’s making $500k a year. Word of mouth is your best marketing tool. Create a product that makes people refer you. Spend prudently once you’ve raised money. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/8/2016 • 16 minutes, 10 seconds
From Cleaning Company at 26 to $14m Agency By His 42nd Birthday, EP 266: Andrew Howlett
Andrew Howlett, Chief Digital Officer at Rain, and a board member at the Society of Digital Agencies. Andrew started a million-dollar cleaning products business online at 26, before moving into marketing consultancy. Listen as Nathan and Andrew talk marketing, strategy, and how to get out of finance. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People What CEO do you follow? — Maurice Levy What is your favorite online tool? — Pipedrive Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That finance wasn’t the direction I wanted to go - it would have been great to understand computer science more Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Andrew to the show 02:00 – At 26, started a website that sold cleaning supplies 02:35 – At 29, started Rain 02:40 – uClean had total revenues of $200k in its first year; almost $1 million the next year 03:30 – Clear around $200k each year from uClean 04:05 – Rain’s latest client is BeachBody 04:40 – Rain is helping them re-imagine their products 05:00 – Revenue model is generally either a monthly retainer or T&M 05:25 – Retainer of $50-75k per month 05:55 – Works largely with 7 major clients 06:30 – First-ever Superbowl ad this year - Campbells Chunky Soup 06:55 – Wanted to focus on online placement 08:10 – 90% of placement is hustle 08:30 – They use People Pattern as a helpful piece of software 09:10 – Ended up with 3.5 million views in 2 weeks 10:00 – Made 3 videos for the Facebook 10-year anniversary 11:10 – Margin on video can be tricky to handle 11:56 – Total revenue in 2015 was $14 million 12:30 – Vision is to keep strategy, design, development and building in-house 14:20 – Happy with the current size of the company - no plans to grow dramatically 14:30 – Connect with Andrew on Twitter or LinkedIn 16:10 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: The majority of marketing is hustle. Automation helps, but to some extent you need to have real people pushing things along. There are benefits to limiting growth. Having a core team that’s small enough to be in the same room at the start of a project is fantastic. You need to understand how technology works. Even if you’re never going to be a developer, educate yourself in the basics. It will pay off. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/7/2016 • 20 minutes, 25 seconds
He's 31, Doing $700k/mo By Automating The Sales Process WIth $8m Raised, EP 265: Anand Kulkarni
Anand Kulkarni, co-founder of LeadGenius. Anand left his job as a researcher and teacher at Berkeley to develop a tool that uses automation technology to find effective sales leads. Listen as Nathan and Anand talk over starting an SaaS business and exactly how to run an effective fundraising round. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Only The Paranoid Survive What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —I wish I had known how much fun it is to start a company - I would have started sooner! Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan’s introduction 01:54 – Welcoming Anand to the show 02:10 – LeadGenius is AI for sales - ‘top of the funnel automation’ 02:45 – One client is using it to map out every IT director in every Brazilian telecom company, and obtain their contact details 03:30 – Charges between $2k and $1 million a month 03:50 – Started in 2011 03:55 – Total revenue in 2015 was $8 million 04:20 – Worked with 200 customers in February 2015 04:37 – Annual revenue of $40k per user 05:00 – LTV to CAC ratio of about 10 06:00 – Spending about $15k to acquire a customer 06:30 – Some salary costs associated with accessing certain kinds of data 07:30 – Currently have net negative churn 07:40 – That means that growth from existing accounts offsets any loss of customers 08:45 – About to release a new email product 09:05 – Total MRR in February was about $700k 09:30 – 50 team members locally, plus 500 outsourced 10:00 – Raised $8 million total; the last round was a series A of $6 million 11:10 – How do you make the decision about when to raise another round? 12:50 – Pre-money valuation in the last round was in the tens of millions 13:35 – ‘A good partner pays for themselves’ - think about partners, not valuation 15:34 – Connect with Anand on twitter 18:00 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you’re deciding whether to run an investment round, look hard at the milestones for your business. Is investment right now going to make significant progress toward those goals? Don’t just look at valuations when you’re choosing partners. They should bring something significant to the business beyond investment Whatever you’re planning to do, or dreaming you can do: start. It’ll be fun. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/7/2016 • 21 minutes, 50 seconds
Technical Co-Founder Hits $35k in MRR, Won't Sell for $10m Today, EP 264: Gil Allouche
Gil Allouche, the co-founder of Metadata. Gil’s an expert in digital marketing and AI who worked as a marketing consultant for big-name companies before quitting to co-found a startup. Listen as Gil and Nathan talk digital marketing, growth hacking, and how to work with your co-founders. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Enders Game What CEO do you follow? — Brian Halligan What is your favorite online tool? — Hubspot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That everything is achievable, and that I should set my goals much higher Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Gil to the show 02:10 – Before Metadata, Gil was a marketing consultant for B2B companies 03:00 – Gil’s focus in college was on AI and robotics 03:10 – He followed this with an MBA and focused on digital marketing 03:35 – In February 2016, Metadata had MRR of $35k 04:10 – Currently raising around $2 million in equity in a seed round 04:50 – Would be happy with a $5 million pre-money valuation 05:30 – Metadata amplifies the impact of content marketing 06:30 – Takes initial audience and reverse engineers a profile 07:15 – Targets lookalike audiences on multiple platforms 08:10 – Starts at $10k for a 3-month pilot 08:50 – Takes over landing page, enrichment and targeting 09:15 – A startup: still figuring out a pricing model 10:00 – 3 founders; 8 team members 10:35 – How do you talk to co-founders about splitting equity? 11:10 – Just over 12 customers 11:42 – Churn rate: to date, only one customer has left 12:15 – Launched in May 2015 12:40 – Willing to spend $2-3k to acquire a customer 14:00 – Connect with Gil by email 15:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Aim high. Everything is achievable with the right method. Half of content marketing is marketing. The best content in the world won’t help you if no one reads it. If your startup has co-founders, have a serious conversation about splitting equity. It’s too important to not get right. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/7/2016 • 19 minutes, 31 seconds
EP 318: She Threw Away Old Company, Now Doing $3.3 Million/year, $18,000,000 Raised With MatterMark.com
Danielle Morrill, the technology exec who left Twilio to found Mattermark, a SaaS business that’s aiming to make almost $5 million this year. Danielle’s an ambitious CEO who can’t stand to be bored. Listen in to hear why you should never split equity evenly, why focusing on churn rate will make you lose customers, and the one crucial thing you should think about before you sell your business. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Pyramid Principle What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —It was all going to be okay. She should stop angsting and just keep doing what she’s doing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:46 – Mattermark is a SaaS firm that lets customers research private companies 02:20 – Helps people who are looking to sell, buy, or invest in companies 02:41 – Launched in 2013 02:50 – First year revenue was around $200k 03:07 – Left Twilio to start a different startup - an affiliate marketing program 03:43 – Shut down the company completely and started again with the same investors 04:18 – Three co-founders. Danielle is the CEO, her husband codes, and her friend runs sales 05:21 – “We don’t have a 1:1:1 split - because things aren’t ever even.” 06:04 – “I think it’s the CEO’s job to offer equity portions that are fair and make sense” 07:30 – “It’s intellectually lazy to not discuss the equity portions” 08:01 – Topline revenue in 2015 was $2.4 million 08:20 – Monthly recurring revenue is around $260k 08:50 – Around 500 customers 09:07 – Annual customer revenue is around $10k 09:50 – Annual churn is less than 10% 10:11 – “Not everyone has turned over on a year yet - around 80% of customers came on board in the last 11 months” 10:34 – What other metrics measure customer engagement? 10:40 – “By the time they churn, it’s too late” 11:30 – “We think lifetime value will be in the $50k range” 12:10 – Started up an in-house marketing team 8 weeks ago 13:40 – What’s Danielle’s goal with the business? 13:55 – “My goal is to work on interesting things my entire life. If I sold the company for $100 million today, what would I do?” 16:02 – Danielle would be delighted if this year’s revenue hit $4.8 million 16:28 – Connect to Danielle on Twitter 18:08 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Discuss equity portions with your co-founders. All an equal split proves is that you don’t know how to have difficult conversations By the time customers have churned, it’s too late. Look at other engagement metrics to catch them before they leave. Think about your personal goals. Why are you running the business you are? What do you really want out of it? Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/7/2016 • 20 minutes, 58 seconds
Ideally Students Pay $20/mo To Learn From Robots, $1,000,000 In Revenue in 2015, EP 263: Aditya Singhal
Aditya Singhal, an education technology entrepreneur who’s hoping to fully automate tutoring in the next five years. Aditya believes in low-cost, high-quality education for all. Tune in as he and Nathan talk automated education, subscription models, and why Silicon Valley is overrated. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Growth Hacker Marketing What CEO do you follow? — Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — Twitter Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —I wish I knew how to hack growth faster Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Aditya to the show 02:10 – There are 21 million college students in the states, looking for help 02:30 – Created TransTutors - an AI teaching assistant 02:50 – Subscription model: $20 each month, 30k customers 03:10 – Not a typical SaaS business model - uses humans assisted by code 04:05 – Revenue is $60-80k per month 04:20 – Business founded August 2014 04:30 – Revenue is 2015 around $1 million 04:50 – Initially self-funded; now raising investment from 500 Startups 05:00 – Hoping to raise $2.5 million by convertible note 05:30 – Making a trade-off: wants to learn from Silicon Valley 06:10 – Are tech hubs overrated? 06:30 – About 40% of customers (12k) are paying monthly 07:30 – In February 2016 had 3k active paying customers 08:05 – Users typically stay 4-6 months (one semester) 08:40 – Team of 10 people, including 8 in India 09:00 – A young engineer in India earns around $30k per year 10:00 – Aditya’s goal is to have a fully automated teaching system 10:20 – Would be happy to sell once he’s achieved his goal 10:50 – Equity split 50/50 between Aditya and his partner 11:30 – Connect with Aditya by email or twitter 14:50 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Create the solution your market are looking for - even if they don’t know it yet Be clear about your business vision Focus on finding social marketing methods to grow your business explosively Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/6/2016 • 16 minutes, 47 seconds
My Goal is To Put Them Out of Business (Paypal, Venmo). Will He Win? EP 262: John Rampton
John Rampton: a startup guru who was ranked #3 among the world’s top online influencers by Entrepreneur magazine. John’s recently founded the online invoicing company Due, and is aiming to put Paypal out of business. Listen as John and Nathan break down online influence and how to dominate an incredibly competitive market. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Zero to One What CEO do you follow? — Richard Branson What is your favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To take a lot more risks Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:54 – Welcoming John to the show 02:00 – John’s spending the majority of his time working on Due 02:20 – Due is a platform designed to help businesses get paid faster 03:00 – ‘Every person in the world wants to get paid faster’ 03:30 – Do makes money with a 0.5-1% fee on credit card transactions 04:10 – Launched 9 months ago; self-funded 04:30 – Transaction volume in February 2016 was about $4 million 05:10 – Made a little less than $40k that month 05:40 – ‘I like going into hard-to-enter spaces’ 06:30 – John knows how to rapidly increase page rankings 07:25 – 20-30k people have used the site since it launched 07:40 – Goal is to become “Western Union for the modern world” 08:40 – So much competition: How do you beat Venmo, Paypal and Stripe? 09:30 – We’ve already had a multi-million dollar offer to buy 10:00 – We’re not interested in being bought at the moment 10:40 – John has invested close to $500k in this project 12:00 – John’s company Pixloo was acquired rapidly for over $10 million 12:40 – Patented the process of spinning a camera 360 degrees 15:20 – Sole founder of Pixloo; minor founder of Maplenorth 16:00 – Contact John on Twitter or via his blog 17:50 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: If you know exactly what you’re doing, it’s possible to enter spaces with a lot of competition. If you don’t know exactly what you’re doing - don’t try. Take risks when you’re young. Don’t be afraid to put yourself out there. Try things that seem crazy. The worst people can do is say no. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/6/2016 • 21 minutes, 19 seconds
From 0 to 20,000,000 Users and a $150,000,000 Exit to Under Armour, EP 261: Robin Thurston
Robin Thurston, the founder of Map My Fitness and senior VP at Under Armour. Robin built a conversation with cycling buddies into a multi-million dollar app. Listen as Nathan and Robin talk about turning a website into an iPhone app, Map My Fitness’ user base, and the process of exiting a company you’ve founded. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Career Warfare What CEO do you follow? — None What is your favorite online tool? — I travel so much - it’s a car-sharing service Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —You never actually know what’s going to happen Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:25 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Robin to the show 02:10 – The process of founding Map My Fitness 02:40 – Came out of a dinner conversation where someone wanted to map their cycle route 03:10 – Robin wasn’t a developer but had a product background 03:30 – Worked with developers who were also cyclists 04:20 – Bought the ‘Map My Run’ website for $5k 04:50 – Moved to Denver and launched Map My Fitness 05:15 – Had 1 million web users before the iPhone launch 05:40 – 2006-2013, became one of the USA’s top 100 apps 06:00 – Made money from ads and subscriptions early on; added a SaaS business 06:45 – Around $17 million in revenue when they exited in 2013 07:30 – Under Armour was interested in the community and user base 07:40 – Revenue of about $4 per month per user in the US 08:20 – Spent almost nothing on acquisition 09:00 – Early 2013 were advised to ‘go big or go home’ by potential investors 09:40 – Had a call from Kevin Plank in the middle of the raising process - and sold 11:30 – Underarmour were keen to acquire a team experienced in e-commerce 12:40 – Time from call to public announcement was less than 3 months 13:00 – Had 103 employees at time of sale 13:30 – Contact Robin on Twitter 16:10 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Know when it’s the right time to sell or exit your business. Even if it’s not what you’d planned, opportunity may come knocking. Dominate your niche. Robin and his partner bought the ‘Map My Run’ site - a potential competitor - and used it to propel their own site forward. You don’t know where you’ll be in twenty years. Keep an eye out for opportunity and let yourself be surprised. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/6/2016 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
EP 317: New Dad Does $1Million Per Month on Fish Oil and Bernie Sanders?
Ryan Moran, creator of the Freedom Fast Lane podcast. Ryan’s new venture is Capitalism.com, which will go live in June. He’s making millions from multiple revenue streams and about to run his second conference. Listen in to hear Ryan and Nathan talk creating authority, how to game the Amazon ranking system, and why running conferences is worth the effort. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Ready, Fire, Aim What CEO do you follow? — Glenn Beck What is your favorite online tool? — My journal Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That there were going to be compounding returns on everything he did. I wish I had gone bigger. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:18 – Nathan’s introduction 01:46 – Ryan was interviewed in episode #140 of The Top 02:05 – Why go from Freedom Fastlane to Capitalism.com? 02:45 – “We wanted something more authoritative” 03:45 – Paid $100k for the domain name 04:40 – Ryan’s generating about $1 million in topline revenue per month through Amazon products and his coaching programme The Tribe 05:20 – Access to The Tribe costs $2000 for coaching, conference calls, and physical meetups 06:38 – Revenue breakdown is 25% coaching, 75% physical-product businesses 07:40 – Best-selling product is fish oil, which sells for $20 per unit 08:22 – Product costs $5; Amazon takes around 30% in fees - so $6.50 09:30 - Makes about $7 profit per unit 10:40 - Sells around 150 units per day 11:05 – “It’s still fairly easy to game” the Amazon system 11:30 – The Amazon ranking algorithm is based on volume of sales 12:50 – Ryan also makes money from a yoga business; real estate; and other product sales 13:45 – Why do conferences? 14:05 – “I wanted to create the conference that I wanted to attend” 15:09 – Expecting 750 attendees at the next conference; tickets cost $1497 or earlybird $997 15:16 – At the last conference, spent about $170k on speakers; $70k on AV, and $80k on catering 16:08 – Revenue was around $400k; profit around $50k 16:20 – Expect to spend around $200k on speakers this year 17:00 – “We don’t aim to make money from conferences - it’s a pure branding and networking play” 17:25 – What would Bernie Sanders say about your brand of capitalism? Is it unethical? 17:50 – Subscribe to Ryan’s podcast at Freedom Fast Lane 19:06 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Wealthy people have multiple revenue streams - diversify There are compounding returns on everything you do. Risks and failures go away fast - but successes stay with you Maybe it is unethical that people are paying $1497 to attend a conference while other people are sleeping on the street. Who knows? Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/6/2016 • 24 minutes, 13 seconds
Will This 43 Year Old Win The 3D Printing Industry? EP 260: Drew Taylor
Drew Taylor, founder of AstroPrint - a software and app ecosystem described as “the Android of the 3D printing world”. Listen as Nathan and Drew talk 3D printing, making money, and how to dominate an emerging niche. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Crossing the Chasm What CEO do you follow? — Tony Hsieh What is your favorite online tool? — Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely not If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —I don’t know. I’m a fan of taking life’s lessons as they come. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:11 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming Drew to the show 02:30 – AstroPrint started because Drew saw that 3D printing software needed to improve 03:00 – Two products: software, and cloud-based app store 03:25 – Free for personal use; charge for commercial use 03:50 – 70/30 split on profits from app store 04:10 – Founded in 2015 - with a different idea 04:45 – $150k total revenue in 2015 05:00 – 9 team members 05:10 – Raised $500k in convertible note 05:50 – Fundraising with accelerators including BetaSpring and 500 Startups 06:20 – How do you get enough sales to dominate? 06:45 – Partnering with larger companies 07:30 – Can provide the entire software base for existing printers 09:00 – Adds value to machine by connecting it to an app system 11:00 – Consumer revenue is entirely from app sales 11:50 – Currently almost no revenue from app sales - expected to take off around 2017 14:00 – Would be happy with a pre-money valuation of $10 million 14:30 – Currently in the middle of a fundraising debt round 16:40 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Be creative about making money - what revenue models are working in other areas? How can you generate multiple revenue streams from one product? Accept that your start-up idea will change as you sound out the market. Learn from what doesn’t work. Don’t worry about making mistakes when you’re young - it’s all part of growing. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/5/2016 • 20 minutes, 22 seconds
He Sells Craft Beer On Demand, $250k in 2015, $2m in 2016, EP 259: Charlie Mulligan
Charlie Mulligan , co-founder of BrewPublik - a business that Charlie wants to become “Amazon for beer”. Brewpublik provide a premium catering service delivering craft beer to homes and offices in cities across the States. Listen as Nathan and Charlie talk expansion, investment, and how much to sell a start-up for. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Goal What CEO do you follow? — Jeff Bezos What is your favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —To have more confidence. I can do anything if I set my mind to it. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:22 – Nathan’s introduction 01:40 – Welcoming Charlie to the show 02:00 – Match over 3,000 types of craft beer to a taste profile 02:30 – BrewPublik delivers beers to your office or home 02:50 – $75 for a case of 24 bottles 03:13 – Offers one-off orders, regular subscriptions and monthly memberships 03:40 – Founded in 2014 04:02 – $275k revenue in 2015 04:15 – Delivered around 80k bottles 04:40 – Net margin of 35% 05:00 – Reinvesting capital in expansion 05:40 – Hope for $1.5-2 million revenue in 2016 06:30 – How do you decide which markets to expand into? 07:10 – Look at baseline demographics: age, income, breweries per capita 08:30 – Then look for with B2B clients 09:10 – Bootstrapped for first 6 months then had an angel investment round of $1 million 09:45 – Looking for Series A in the next 12 months 10:03 – Sees the beer industry as ripe for disruption 11:00 – Would sell the business for $100 million 15:19 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Have confidence in yourself. Trust your own abilities and move forward. When you’re thinking about expansion, consider what strategy is going to give you a positive operating balance as quickly as possible. Find a niche to disrupt. Successful start-ups exploit a need that no one else has even considered. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/5/2016 • 18 minutes, 52 seconds
How To Run 4 Businesses, Pay Yourself Dividends, Next Warren Buffet? EP 258: Alex Steele
6/5/2016 • 14 minutes, 28 seconds
EP 316: He's The Secret Financial Consultant to Silicon Valleys Wealthiest
John Bowen - the man who gives financial advice to financial advisors. John’s an expert in the financial world. After founding six multi-million dollar businesses, John moved on to coaching the world’s top financial advisers on ways to better serve their clients. Tune in to hear John’s advice for Nathan on investment, why entrepreneurship is the best way to make millions, and why you need to be playing the long game. Famous 5: Favorite Book? – Bold What CEO do you follow? — David Booth What is your favorite online tool? — SaneBox Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That I wasn’t as smart as I thought I was Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:30 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Welcoming John to the show 02:08 – Key firm is CEG Worldwide 02:55 – Created a firm to do research on the best practice of top financial advisers 04:12 – CEG coaches financial advisors. One product is a year-long coaching program that costs $2000 per month. 05:05 – There’s also a mastermind group that costs $18k per year 06:00 – If you have less than $100k, you can’t afford a good financial adviser 06:57 – “The surest way of creating tremendous wealth is being an entrepreneur” 07:20 – Entrepreneurs often don’t create personal wealth soon enough 08:17 – Do you invest in your own business or other options? 09:30 - We’re not in business just for business - we’re in it for quality of life 10:10 - Think about the long haul 11:15 – Your time is the most valuable asset you have. Focus on a few things. 12:35 – Some financial assets have become commercialized 13:20 – John likes to invest in a team: “Have a personal CFO” 14:45 – What’s John focused on now? 15:05 – John’s just started a site with Dan Sullivan and Joe Polish: Accelerating Entrepreneurial Success 16:00 – Get your free book on the website and learn from the world’s most successful entrepreneurs 18:15 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: 9/10 multi-millionaires are entrepreneurs You don’t have to change the world overnight. Put a long-term plan together and be patient. Your time is your most valuable asset. Focus on what you’re passionate about. Resources Mentioned: Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/5/2016 • 25 minutes, 6 seconds
Is It Possible To Launch a Startup And a Baby At The Same Time? EP 257: Arry Yu
Arry Yu, the CEO and co-founder of GiftStarter - a consumer platform for crowd-sourcing gifts. Arry’s a leader in the space where creativity and technology meet. She worked as a consultant for Microsoft, Google and L’Oreal before launching her own startup. Listen as Nathan and Arry talk fundraising, working with co-founders, and what her mom thinks of her career. Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Jonathan Sposado What is your favorite online tool? — Autopilot Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I just had a baby If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Get away from your insecurities. It’s okay to mess things up - no one else knows what they’re doing either. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:05 – Welcoming Arry to the show 02:10 – Launched GiftStarter in July 2014 02:30 – After 12 years in services industry, Arry wanted a change 03:01 – Won 1st place on Hackathon and decided to launch 04:17 – GiftStarter lets consumers break a product into affordable chunks 04:33 – Contracts range from $2k to $20k each month 05:10 – “Basically crowdsourcing gifts” 05:40 – Makes money on an 8% transaction fee 06:00 – Makes commission on products sold 06:10 – Total revenue in 2015 was $12k 06:30 – Aiming for 50k in 2016 06:40 – Team of 3 full-time, 3 part-time 06:50 – Raised $525k via convertible note 07:10 – Product changed between fundraising round and today 08:00 – Question to Arry’s mom: “What do you think about Arry starting her own business?” 10:00 – Do you ever feel stuck because of angel investors? 10:30 – People expect us to innovate and change 13:29 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don’t be controlled by your insecurities - trust yourself, and let yourself make mistakes Accept that your start-up will change as you grow. It means you’re innovating and responding to your market, and it’s a good thing No one else knows what they’re doing either. Do what you love. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/4/2016 • 17 minutes, 43 seconds
He Quit Six Figure Job To Launch Agency Right As First Kid Was On Way, EP 256: John Lincoln
John Lincoln, the CEO of Ignite Visibility, California’s #1 SEO company in 2015. John’s an expert on online visibility who’s worked with hundreds of high-profile clients. Listen as Nathan and John talk about Ignite Visibility, quitting a six-figure job, and the process of writing John’s new book Digital Influencer. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Unleash the Power Within What CEO do you follow? — Tony Robbins and Neil Patel What is your favorite online tool? — Basecamp, ColorNote, SEMrush Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — You don’t have to have it all figured out. Take your time to see what’s out there. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:15 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming John to the show 01:51 – John started Ignite Visibility at the age of 30 while a director at SEO Inc 02:30 – Gave up a salary of over $100k and a satisfying role 03:04 – “It was literally the scariest thing I’ve done in my life” 03:40 – Invested $10k personally in Ignite Visibility 04:05 – John was well-known in the industry and gained 9 clients in his first 6 months 04:33 – Contracts range from $2k to $20k each month 04:50 – Total revenue in the first year (2013) just under $1 million 05:05 – Aiming for $3 million revenue this year 06:00 – 20-30% net margin on revenue 06:40 – What are they doing with profits? 07:40 – Digital Influencer - John’s book 08:25 – John hopes the book will provide concrete tips for young entrepreneurs 09:20 – Self-published on Amazon and used CreateSpace to make the print copy 10:20 – All proceeds from the book go to charity 10:40 – Aiming to sell 1,000 copies to raise $7k - $10k 11:30 – Sales almost entirely online 12:15 – Book launched February 2016 15:49 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take the plunge and do something that you love. Even if it terrifies you, it’ll be worth it. Building your digital influence is a process - there are concrete steps you can take to achieve it If you’re young, don’t put too much pressure on yourself. Enjoy what’s around you and don’t push too hard. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/4/2016 • 21 minutes, 14 seconds
Will Bernie Sanders Favorite App Kill GoToWebinar? EP 255: Julian Martinez
Julian Martinez, marketing director at Maestro Conference, the webinar platform used by Hilary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Julian’s spent 7 years building marketing programmes from scratch. Listen as Nathan and Julian talk webinars, and the nuts and bolts of building a marketing strategy. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Monkey Business What CEO do you follow? — Eoghan McCabe What is your favorite online tool? — Intercom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Maybe If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To start travelling more, date more girls, and pay more attention in class Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Welcoming Julian to the show 02:00 – Why Julian left Bid On Fusion to join Maestro Conference 02:40 – Choosing between family and work 03:04 – Julian joined Maestro Conference in 2016 03:20 – Hosts interactive webinars and conference calls 03:45 – Obama, Hilary, and Bernie Sanders all use the platform 04:14 – “A sexier version of GoToWebinar” 04:30 – It’s possible to generate breakout groups of 2 from a group of up to 5000 05:05 – Between 1,000 and 2,000 paying customers 06:00 – Julian’s the first marketing hire - most investment has been in the platform 06:20 – Team of 15 full-time people 07:40 – Currently around 30% churn rate 08:30 – Based in Oakland 09:05 – Marketing budget for February was around $3000 09:30 – Julian wants to implement paid social media advertising and SEM 10:00 – Currently around 10% conversion 10:40 – Raised around $2 million total 11:11 – MRR of $90k in February 12:30 – Goal is now to follow up exposure from nominees’ campaigns with paid social 15:13 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Take advantage of all the resources you can find. Do more with what’s around you. Build a marketing strategy around the exposure you already have. If you’ve just joined a company, take time to clean the slate before kicking off your own projects Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
6/4/2016 • 18 minutes, 28 seconds
You Won't Believe How He's Sold 350 Businesses in 6 Years, EP 254: Thomas Smale
Thomas Smale, co-founder of FE International, a company with seven-figure revenues that specialises in brokering the sale of online businesses. Listen as Nathan and Thomas talk about valuing SaaS companies, brokerage models, and the importance of focus. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Tipping Point What CEO do you follow? —Elon Musk What is your favorite online tool? — SEMrush Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Focus. I used to jump from idea to idea - it’s far better to focus on one thing. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:50 – Welcoming Thomas to the show 02:00 – FE International started at university when Thomas was 22 02:30 – Completed just over 300 deals 02:50 – Last deal was a SaaS business 03:20 – Model: FE will value a business, put together a package, and look for buyers 04:10 – How do you value a SaaS business? The amount of time the owner spends on a business: more time = less valuable The growth prospects of a business A multiplier of 4-6 times on annual net revenue 06:10 – Why use net? 06:30 – When valuing smaller businesses, it makes more sense to use net revenue 07:05 – Business in last deal had around $200k net revenue 08:11 – Recent public deal was with PlanScope - around $100k 09:10 – The buyer was a developer looking for a safe investment project 11:00 – 7-12% churn rate is normal for businesses they deal with 11:30 – FE International charges 15% brokerage on each deal 12:00 – Currently have a team of 12 people 12:30 – Made $1.5 million in commissions in 2015 16:00 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Focus on one thing. It’s tempting to jump from plan to plan - but focus leads to success. Small businesses need a different valuation model to large ones. Make sure you’re looking at the right numbers. Always be looking for opportunities - a start-up can expand incredibly fast with the right input Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/3/2016 • 18 minutes, 36 seconds
From $0 to $17,000,000 In 2015 With NYC Based SaaS Company, EP 253: Ryan Urban
Ryan Urban, the founder and CEO at Bounce Exchange, a fast-growing consultancy that increases online conversion rates. Listen as Nathan and Ryan talk about investing in your own start-up, why some analytics aren’t worth it, and the best eateries in Tribeca. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Psychology of Persuasion What CEO do you follow? — None What is your favorite online tool? — Gmail Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — Drop out of college! I should have dropped out instead of going to grad school. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Welcoming Ryan to the show 02:30 – Best eateries in the Tribeca area? 02:54 – Bounce Exchange makes money for e-commerce companies 03:20 – Created a new category of marketing software to increase online conversion rates 04:00 – Why Ryan left Bonobos when he was offered $300k to stay 04:40 – It’s crucial to get the right co-founder for a start-up 06:10 – In 2013 Ryan made a little over $30k: he couldn’t get a loan for a wedding 06:50 – The co-founders of Bounce Exchange are both in business 07:30 – Their developer has equity but doesn’t work for BounceX full-time 08:30 – Ryan didn’t want to follow the model of big software companies 09:10 – Bounce Exchange currently has around 150 employees 09:40 – Bounce Exchange was initially self-funded 10:30 – In August 2015, raised $6.3 million in a VC round 11:30 – 2012 made around $105k in revenue; 2015 made $17 million. 12:00 – Aiming to make $3.3 million in December 2016 12:20 – Currently working with 250-300 clients 13:40 – It’s difficult to come up with average revenue per client 15:30 – MRR January 2016 was between $1.5 and 2 million 16:50 – Net revenue churn is roughly 0% 18:20 – What are Bounce Exchange spending to acquire new customers? 21:30 – CPA of around $2k 23:10 – Why Ryan thinks CAK/LTV isn’t a useful analytic 24:40 – What’s a better measure? Ryan likes to use CPA to acquire a qualified demo 25:10 – Acquiring a customer for 20% of what the contribution margin dollars will be 26:00 – 85% of the team is in New York 26:45 – Bounce Exchange is currently in the black 28:00 – Calculating a PNL 22:30 – Other major costs include security and server infrastructure 3 Key Points: Put your energy into the right start-up. Lots of talented people waste their time making bad ideas work. Everyone feels like they’re underachieving. Decide what goals matter to you. Decide what analytics are relevant to your business. The numbers that everyone else is talking about might not be useful for you. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/3/2016 • 37 minutes, 20 seconds
He’s Taken No Funding, Doing $2,600,000 Per Year With SaaS Business Webinar Ninja, EP 252: Omar Zenhom
Omar Zenhom, co-founder of Webinar Ninja. Omar and his partner Nicole used their years of education experience to develop software and training resources for webinars. Omar also hosts the $100 MBA show, a top-ranked podcast with over 50,000 downloads per day. Listen as Nathan and Omar talk through the process of building up Webinar Ninja - as always, with an eye on the numbers. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Anyone Can Do It What CEO do you follow? — Myself What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — You’ll do better if you rely on your own strengths and skills - don’t look for a path through other people. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 02:20 – Welcoming Omar to the show 02:30 – “Education is a performance” 03:00 – Of Omar’s projects, Webinar Ninja is currently generating the most revenue 03:30 – Over 500 episodes of the $100 MBA show since 2014 04:10 – What you really need to know about getting sponsorship for your podcast 05:05 – Currently use an agent, Midroll, to negotiate sponsorship deals 06:15 – Making around $15-16k in sponsorship per month 07:20 – Discussion of sponsorship models 08:10 – Webinar Ninja: “I was scratching my own itch” 08:50 – Omar and Nicole launched Webinar Ninja in April 2014 09:15 – From $65, $115, or $165 per month 09:40 – “We’re still testing prices and collecting data” 10:20 – Moved away from Google Hangouts to Web RTC 11:00 – Currently working with 2500 customers, 1900 of whom are monthly customers 11:30 – Average customer pays $115 per month 12:20 – MRR $200,000 from Webinar Ninja 12:30 – “We’re really into making everything we release completely stable” 13:15 – Churn rate of around 7% - that means 93% of customers stay on month-to-month 14:20 – Advertise through Facebook ads, public speaking, event sponsorship 15:00 – Paid $15,000 to sponsor Heroic Public Speaking 16:00 – Advertising spend of around $3.20 per customer 17:20 – 8 full-time team members on Webinar Ninja, all remote 18:00 – Total salary cost per month around $9500; all costs around $20,000 a month 19:15 – “I’m happy growing slow - I don’t really want to blow up” 19:30 – Omar says he wouldn’t sell Webinar Ninja right now 20:30 – Right now Omar’s investing profits back into his business 21:15 – How the affiliate program works 22:30 – Other major costs include security and server infrastructure 3 Key Points: Forge your own path. Success comes from relying on your own strengths and skills, not by following other people. It’s okay to grow slowly. You get to decide what you want from your business: stable, slow growth is no better or worse than being explosive. Some of the best business ideas come from solving your own problems. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/3/2016 • 30 minutes, 42 seconds
What if You Could Invest $100k Once, Make $20k/Year Forever? EP 251: Jefferson Lilly
Jefferson Lilly, a millionaire who left his Silicon Valley job to become an expert in Mobile Home Park Investment. Listen as Nathan goes over the nuts and bolts of Mobile Home Park Investing with one of the industry’s leaders. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Snowball What CEO do you follow? — Sam Zell What is your favorite online tool? — Search Tempest Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — How good this niche of real estate is...I would have started raising outside capital sooner. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 02:01 – Welcoming Jefferson to the show 02:15 – Why Jefferson left Silicon Valley to enter mobile home investing 02:40 – “Warren Buffett was right” - Jefferson looked for value investments 03:10 – Mobile home parks yield 300-400 basis points more than apartments 03:30 – Jefferson was 39 with a $100k salary when he got involved with property investing 04:30 – First deal was $450k, with an 80% loan from the bank - put down about $86k 05:17 – Jefferson had almost $1 million saved at this point 06:00 – First property earned about $45k each year 07:00 – 40 filled lots; lot rents $110 per month. 24 vacant lots 08:08 – Jefferson invested in buying and fixing used mobile homes to fill his vacant lots 09:10 – The $20k investment in each used home was repaid by tenants at $600 a month 10:00 – Rental income is about… 12:00 – “If I’ve got $30k, what are the first steps I should take to find a deal?” 12:30 – Get educated: resources at Park Street Partners 13:00 – For $30k, look to buy a 5-space property, say $100k 14:20 – “If you’re not earning 20% on your money, you’re doing something wrong.” 14:50 – Any state that borders the ocean is a good bet 15:30 – Look at places like LoopNet for starting deals 16:30 – How do I value a mobile home park? Jefferson’s advice. 18:00 – Going it alone vs. joining a fund 20:00 – Park Street Partners runs an investment fund 21:40 – They don’t charge management fees - they only make money if the fund does 22:40 – Last year the business made around $5 million 3 Key Points: Do your research. If you’re moving into a new investing field, take at least 100 hours to really learn what you’re doing. Mobile homes have some of the best returns on investment of any property type Consider how much time you want to spend managing a property investment. If you’ve got the time and want more profits, go it alone; otherwise it’s worth looking into funds Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/2/2016 • 31 minutes, 11 seconds
Why Most Podcasters Lie with Rob Walch of Libsyn, EP 249: Rob Walsh
Rob Walsh, the VP for Podcaster relationships for Libsyn, and recently named as the 5th most influential person in podcasting. Rob was in podcasting before iTunes was: listen as he and Nathan talk through the ins and outs of business podcasting, how to make a successful show, and what to look for when sponsoring a podcast. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Art of SEO What CEO do you follow? — Jack Welch What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I have never had 8 hours of sleep If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— The powerball numbers for December 1, 1989 Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:23 – Nathan’s introduction 02:15 – Welcoming Nova to the show 02:45 – What are the trends in business podcasting? 02:50 – Concentrating on ‘new and noteworthy’ is a waste of time 04:02 – The podcast Top 200 list is calculated only by new subscribers 05:10 – New subscribers doesn’t translate to downloads 05:33 – Best resource for investors is the episode list in iTunes 07:20 – Top 5 business podcasts sit at 100s of 1000s of downloads per episode 09:20 – The Top has 250 to 300k downloads per month - how does that compare? 09:58 – Don’t look at figures per month - look at per episode 10:21 – The Top averages around 3000 downloads 30 days after an episode 10:50 – The median number is about 150 11:50 – Most business podcasts don’t reach the median mark 12:20 – An adjusted average is about 2000 12:40 – A show with 5000 downloads per episode is in the top 8% 13:40 – “Everything comes down to word-of-mouth marketing” 14:30 – The best advice on podcasting is free 14:53 – Advice on sponsoring a podcast 16:40 – Starting a new show: put together your own email list and blast your links out 17:46 – Is anyone putting together something like Wistia for podcasts? 18:40 – Apple is committed to keeping podcast traffic on iTunes 19:30 – Overcast is the most promising new podcast player 20:50 – The ‘discoverability issue’ in podcasting is a myth 22:05 – Libsyn’s business model 23:01 – Libsyn has around 30,000 paying customers 21:45 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: The absolute best way to succeed in podcasting is to create fantastic content. Don’t waste your time looking for shortcuts. The quality of advice is usually inversely proportional to how much you pay for it. Podcasting is down to word-of-mouth marketing: if you’re making a great product, then help people to talk about it Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/2/2016 • 29 minutes, 38 seconds
The Inside Scoop On Building $1b+ Unicorn Data Company with Nova at Bottlenose.com, EP 248: Nova Spivack
Nova Spivack, CEO of Bottlenose - a company that uses data mining to predict long-term market trends. Nova’s a notable angel investor, blogger, public speaker, and technological pioneer who’s been involved with everything from the development of Siri to the Daily Dot. Listen as Nathan and Nova talk early-stage investment, big data, and the future of AI. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – Positioning What CEO do you follow? — Myself What is your favorite online tool?— Trello Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— That the first internet bubble was actually going to burst...that would have been a great opportunity to sell up! Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Nova to the show 03:00 – In 2007 Nova was the first investor in Klout - will net about 100x ROI 04:06 – In 2010 started the Venture studio in LA 05:05 – Venture helped incubate The Daily Dot: the internet’s local news website 06:20 – Idea behind Venture is to ‘produce’ companies: linking money to creativity 07:50 – Produced Daily Dot; Klout; Bottlenose, Live Matrix... 08:20 – Took the CEO position at Bottlenose 09:00 – Early-stage companies don’t need CEOs: they need producers 09:50 – The skill set of a producer is very different to that of a late-stage CEO 09:33 – Omelette currently has around 20 big-brand clients 11:20 – What does Nova think of Dose.com and the AI trend? 14:10 – How Bottlenose analytics works 15:00 – Real-time analytics across 100 billion data records per day 15:40 – SAS model: annual subscription with annual contracts of $10,000 - $500,000 16:48 – Discussion of Bottlenose’s current fundraising 19:09 – Tabletop entry for big data analytics is around $40 million 21:45 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Don't let early-stage investors take over your company. The skills they have won't necessarily help you down the track Humans are always going to be needed for creative tasks. Creativity will become more important as automation kicks off Focus on improving yourself and your own performance: don't fret about what anyone else is doing Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives The Top is FOR YOU if you are: A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4) STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7) An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1) The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14). Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries. Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
6/2/2016 • 24 minutes, 50 seconds
EP 300: This Law Student Quit to Build Referral Program Business Doing $2MM+ Per Year
Jeff Epstein is the founder of Ambassador, a SaaS company that helps businesses track and optimise referrals to make their affiliates really work for them. Jeff manages a team of 43 people and made over $3.5 million in revenue in 2015. Listen in as he and Nathan break down Ambassador’s numbers and talk referrals, reaching negative churn, and not sweating the small stuff. Famous 5 Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things What CEO do you follow? — Gary Vaynerchuk What is your favorite online tool? — Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Definitely no If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —That it would be okay. I was really worried about things that didn’t matter. Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Jeff to the show 02:05 – Raised just under $2.5 million in 2015 to grow their team 02:36 – Ambassador helps companies track and manage referrals 03:10 – Currently serving over 300 customers 03:21 – Per-user revenue averages $1500 per month 03:50 – Company started in 2009 and launched in 2010 04:10 – Jeff started an affiliate marketing company in college. He built his own software to support an affiliate idea he had - then realised the software was a better idea 04:50 – Revenue in the first year was almost nothing 07:00 – Funded real estate investments with the revenue from selling his first business 07:28 – Revenue in 2015 was $3.5 million 08:11 – Ambassador is a SaaS business 08:40 – Churn decreased as Ambassador moved up-market 09:16 – “We now require onboarding for every customer” 09:55 – Around 10% annual customer churn 10:40 - Measure both gross churn and net churn 12:15 - Net dollar churn is currently negative 13:00 - “Customer acquisition cost isn’t our biggest concern at the moment” 13:55 - “On our own referral programme we pay $525 per customers” 14:30 - Advertising in paid channels was around $25-50k in February 2016 15:33 - On average customers are paying $15-30k per year, and acquisitions cost $2-7k 16:15 - Most of the team are based in Detroit; some are in Colorado and some are remote 17:05 – Connect with Jeff on Twitter 19:20 – Famous Five 3 Key Points: Everything will be okay. Don’t get worked up over small things. High-value customers are often more committed. They’ve invested more in you and so churn is likely to be lower. Don’t worry if revenues are low when you start out. All businesses start somewhere. Resources Mentioned: Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
5/20/2016 • 22 minutes, 5 seconds
She Has 5 Kids and Is Making THIS MUCH Per Month? With Kim Ades EP 250
Kim Ades, president of Frame Of Mind coaching. Kim’s a
performance coaching expert who helps people to examine and shift
their thinking using a unique system of journaling. Listen to Kim
and Nathan talk performance coaching, the details of Kim’s business
success, and how to be an entrepreneur with kids.
Famous 5
Favorite Book? – Scaling Up
What CEO do you follow? — Richard Branson
What is your favorite online tool?— Dropbox
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely not
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would
it be?— That everything would be fine
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:10 – Nathan’s introduction
01:40 – Welcoming Kim to the show
01:55 – Kim now licenses out journaling software developed in her
company
02:15 – Licensed for $69 per month to around 400 subscribers
02:31 – Main revenue stream is from coaching at Frame of Mind
03:17 – Prices range from $3600-$10,000 for 10 weeks of
coaching
04:24 – Total coaching revenue $600,000 in 2015
05:03 – Business employs 18 coaches
05:50 – Main expenses are phone lines, internet and support
staff
06:29 – Overhead around $18,000 per month
07:02 – Revenues split between Kim and the coaches
08:01 – How Kim runs her business with 5 kids
08:30 – “Be where you are” - focus on home at home, and work at
work
09:15 – Are you raising your kids to think like
entrepreneurs?
09:40 – How Kim’s kids are running their own businesses
11:00 – Managing allowances and jobs
14:50 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:
Don’t panic. Even when times are incredibly challenging, you’ll get
through them.
Changing your mindset is the most important step to improving your
performance. Take time to reflect on how you’re thinking.
If you have kids, teach them that they have to work for their
success.
Resources Mentioned:
Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and
accounts.
Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and
hosting for cheapest price possible.
Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create
his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+
Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San
Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under
24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo
side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly
RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL
(episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow
to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur
who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person
team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes
Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+
different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to
then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15
minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat
Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/25/2016 • 16 minutes, 40 seconds
EP 247: He's 27, You Won't Believe What He's Doing for Redbull with Ty Stafford of Omelet Agency
Ty Stafford, a video strategist and advertising innovator who featured in this year’s Forbes 300 under 30 list. Ty’s won awards at the Webbies and Streamies, and has worked with the likes of Walmart, Red Bull and Ubisoft. Listen as Nathan and Ty drill down into content marketing, social media, and the future of brand management.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Orbiting the Giant HairballWhat CEO do you follow? — Stefan KozakWhat is your favorite online tool?— Youtube AnalyticsDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not a chanceIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Nothing! I hope my 20 year old self could stay as optimistic and naive as I did - otherwise I wouldn’t have had a chance.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:20 – Nathan’s introduction02:00 – Welcoming Ti to the show02:17 – What Ti’s doing right now 02:35 – Currently helping Red Bull translate social media campaign into sales04:00 – Red Bull is focusing on Facebook for their content marketing05:30 – The challenge of measuring sales impact06:20 – 100,000 views a day is the goal for a piece of content07:20 – Aiming to keep costs of each video beneath $1,00007:50 – Paid a yearly retainer for the project08:30 – Pay range in the high 6 figures09:33 – Omelette currently has around 20 big-brand clients10:20 – Why Ti loves working for Omelette12:30 – How social media content is breaking the traditional model for TV and film15:50 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:Stay optimistic. If you don’t know what you can’t do...you’ll do it. Surround yourself with creative people. Top-notch content marketing has to translate into sales if it’s going to pay off.Resources Mentioned:Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/25/2016 • 20 minutes, 2 seconds
EP 246: Will She Replace Lori Grenier on Shark Tank? Her Designs Have Sold Brought In Over $1,000,000,000 In Revenue with Tracy Hazzard of HazzDesign
Tracy Hazzard, CEO of Hazz Design. Tracy is the co-designer of over 250 products, generating over $1 billion at retail. She also co-hosts the WTFFF?! Podcast, and writes for Inc magazine. Listen as Nathan and Tracy talk about her wildly successful design business, the ins and outs of starting a podcast, and just how the profits from an office chair are broken down.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Rembrandts in the AtticWhat CEO do you follow? — Ken CourtrightWhat is your favorite online tool?— Get PocketDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely not! I got two copies of Thrive for ChristmasIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Recognise the power of not having to do everything yourself. Team up with experts.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:44 – Welcoming Tracy to the show01:46 – What came first?02:00 – Tracy worked for two of the world’s largest design companies from ‘9202.50 – Having a great CV helped her to strike out on her own03:20 – Won an IP battle... but lost money03:58 – Created Hazz Design as a design consulting business04:45 – Tracy has helped launch over 253 retail products04:50 – Those products generated $758,457,260 of client sales04:55 – Tracy and her team have racked up over 98,688 design hours05.30 – ‘Platinum record’ product is the Metrex office chair at Costco06.00 – Received a royalty of 2-3% on chair sales06:30 – Charge a monthly retainer to a client - $10-20,000 per month08:30 – Breaking down the Metrex chair, which retails for around $9908:55 – Chair costs: $50 to build; $10 to transport; $2 design royalty; $8 sales royalty 09:56 – From Costco’s perspective: profit per chair around $29 gross 11:22 – Metrex sales from 2010 to date - around 1 million units; $1 million profit12:20 – Their business model: fees cover costs; royalties on a product line generate profits13:16 – “Ghost design” - why Tracy designs for known brands14:00 – 86% of their designs have sold successfully in the last 10 years14:55 – Tracy and her husband run the business together15.15 – Total 2015 revenue: $500,00015:30 – Currently investing in brand building: WTFFF?! is a podcast on 3D printing16:24 – 30,000 total downloads per month16:40 – Costs around $200 per episode to produce17:40 – Landed first sponsor for $4,000 per month20:40 – Just started writing for Inc in January - recent article hit 15,000 views23:50 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:You don’t have to do everything yourself. Team up with consultants, experts and mentors to be more effective.Invest in brand building by educating people about your area of expertise.Working for a recognised company gives you a pedigree and contacts to strike out on your own.
Resources Mentioned:Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/25/2016 • 26 minutes, 20 seconds
This Teacher is Right About Education and You're Crazy if You Disagree with Joe Sual Sehy of Stacking Benjamins Podcast EP 245
4/20/2016 • 28 minutes, 14 seconds
This Mom of 3 Does Clever Thing Each Morning, Has Made $76 Million with Jana Francis of Steals.com EP 244
Jana Francis, founder and president of Steals, and a mother of three. Listen as Jana shares how she started Steals in her basement and grew the company to the point where it generates nearly $10M dollars.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Purple CowWhat CEO do you follow?— Marissa MayerWhat is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Stop stressing so hard being so poor because one day, you won’t be
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:35 – Welcome Jana to the show01:40 – How Steals make money03:10 – Holding inventory07:50 – 17% net margin09:43 – Jana started her business in their basement09:56 – $680,000 in 200810:15 – $8M revenues in 201511:56 – 22 employees in total13:07 – Total emails at 375,00016:20 – Snapchat Jana_Steals18:05 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Buying products at a deep discount and reselling at a markup is easy money—IF you’re willing to be patient.Most ecommerce businesses are splitting pennies—that’s their downfall.Iron out a net-margin and hold onto it.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/20/2016 • 21 minutes, 38 seconds
"I Don't Know How Much I Made in 2015, It's Too Compliated" with Jason Hartman of JasonHartman.com EP 243
Jason Hartman is a self-made millionaire, serial entrepreneur, and host of a killer podcast with more than 3,000 episodes. Listen as Nathan quizzes Jason about his real estate investments, both personal and profession, and finds out what podcasts Jason thinks are the best in the business.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – 7 Habits of Highly Effective PeopleWhat CEO do you follow?— Seth GodinWhat is your favorite online tool?— BoxerDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— I wish I held on to some of the properties I soldTime Stamped Show Notes:01:02 – Nathan’s introduction01:33 – Welcoming Jason to the show01:47 – Real estate has always been Jason’s top revenue source04:09 – Jason’s personal real estate investing08:12 – Return comes from a lot more things than just cash flow11:06 – Real estate appreciation and 2008 recession12:27 – Jason’s Ten Commandments of Successful Investing14:31 – Jason on podcasts14:57 – www.jasonhartman.com16:03 – The Creating Wealth Show17:10 – 60,000 downloads per month17:53 – Marketing real estate on the podcast19:17 – www.hartmanmedia.com20:55 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Look into rent value ratio vs appreciation.Your cash-flow is largely determined by the amount of leverage you have over a property.Income property is a multi-dimensional asset class.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.Ten Commandments of Successful Investing – Jason’s 10 Commandments
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/20/2016 • 24 minutes, 9 seconds
Veteran and CEO Says Business, Not Bullets, Key To Winning Afghan War with Matt Griffin of CombatFlipFlops EP 242
Matt Griffin, a former US Army Ranger and current HMFIC at CombatFlipFlops. Listen as Nathan talks to Matt about how the origins of CombatFlipFlops and what social cause they are supporting with the sales of their footwear.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Drive by Daniel PinkWhat CEO do you follow?— John SercuWhat is your favorite online tool?— ShopifyDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Take care of your body and slow down
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:03 – Nathan’s introduction01:19 – Nathan introduces Matt01:58 – What CombatFlipFlops do02:23 – 2015 sales came up to $300,00004:55 – The social cause behind the business06:35 – If Matt was the president…09:03 – Started off with their own money for capital10:58 – “We contacted every media we knew to drive people in our website”13:23 – Goal for 2016 is at $1.4M15:55 – Instagram @CFF.GRIFF17:12 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Educate women and families to fight radicalism.Kept rolling initial profits back into the company. Get sources to drive people to your site
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/18/2016 • 21 minutes, 45 seconds
He 3D Prints Body Parts And Will Do $4m in 2016 with Erik Gatenholm of CellInk EP 241
Erik Gatenholm, founder and president of Cellink, the world’s first bio-ink company. Erik started his own biotech business at age 18, and at 25 exited with $250k. Listen as Erik and Nathan talk biotech, getting investors on board, and why Erik went back to college after his first business.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – No LogoWhat CEO do you follow?— Peter ThielWhat is your favorite online tool?— StrikinglyDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— Absolutely notIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Things don’t really work the way people think they do. Keep your vision strong and trust your gut.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:38 – Welcoming Erik to the show01:40 – Erik’s first biotech company, started at age 1803:05 – How to successful exit a company you founded04.20 – Erik sold his shares for over $250k—a boatload of cash for a 25 year old05:02 – Why Erik went for a Masters degree despite having enjoyed entrepreneurial success07.05 – Talking about the origins of Cellink08.20 – Started based on a product developed by Erik’s father08:36 – They pay a monthly licensing fee of several thousand $10:08 – Currently raising around $200k for trials via convertible note10.30 – Discussion of convertible notes11.55 – How bio-printing works12.22 – Hope to print organs for medical patients13:58 – Ink for printing is a patented hydrogel that mimics human tissue14:50 – dream is to have a ‘A bioprinter in every lab’15:00 – Each unit sells for around $500016:00 – Total 2016 revenue: $4 million17:50 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:Trust your gut and don’t be afraid to do your own thing.If you’re working with specialists, it’s worth going back to study.Find a partner whose skills complement your own.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/18/2016 • 20 minutes, 38 seconds
Turning Humans Into Robots For 50 Million Monthly Unique Wesbite Views with Emerson Spartz of Dose.com Ep 240
Leading expert in internet virility, a New York Times bestselling author, and CEO of Dose and OMG Facts, Emerson Spartz. Listen as how Emerson explains how he started as a 12-year-old and dropped out of middle school to become the CEO of a leading virility content website today.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – 80 20 Sales and MarketingWhat CEO do you follow?— Tony HsiehWhat is your favorite online tool?— IntentlyDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Spend way more time developing the skill set
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:01 – Nathan’s introduction01:43 – Welcoming Emerson to the show01:59 – The story behind MuggleNet’s 50 Million viewsLink SwapsLooked for ideasRecruiting04:29 – Negotiating with writers before Dose05:25 – 50 content pieces per day for Dose05:53 – Raised $35M07:56 – Team size of 5008:37 – Start of A-B TestingUse FacebookHeadlines and Thumbnails09:57 – Keppler Technology11:05 – 1 hour to 1 day execution to distribution11:47 - $5-10 for testing headlines and thumbnails14:30 – Behind the article seeding process15:52 – How Dose makes $$$17:26 – 15M unique website views17:38 – www.emersonspartz.com19:05 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:You have to be good at recognizing top talent.When you find talented talent, find a way to add it to your organization. First obtain a compelling vision, then obtain a compelling pitch.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.MuggleNet’s – The Top Harry Potter fan website on the planet
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/18/2016 • 21 minutes, 45 seconds
This 30 Year Old Bought a $6.2m Apartment Complex And Makes How Much Cash Flow? With Joe Fairless Episode 239
Joe Fairless, the youngest Vice President of an NYC ad agency, and host of the Best Real Estate Advice Ever Podcast. Listen as Joe shares how he left his executive position to open a website, only to fail and later discover his true knack for real estate.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Crucial ConversationsWhat CEO do you follow?— Gary Keller and Jay PapasanWhat is your favorite online tool?— QuotifulDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— It’s okay that things aren’t going exactly how you want them to go
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:05 – Nathan’s introduction01:34 – Nathan welcomes Joe01:47 – Vice president at 29 years old03:00 – “I decided to launch a product without clients and it flopped”04:18 – Knowing when you fail04:52 – Joe on real estate05:57 – Followed blogs like Bigger Pockets, read books like The Complete Guide in Buying and Selling Apartment Building, Commercial Real Estate for Dummies06:42 – Joe’s first deal11:16 – Joe got a business partner after the first deal13:51 – Best Real Estate Advice Ever Podcast14:22 – 120,000 monthly podcast downloads in February 201615:35 – Production costs $25,00016:39 – www.joefairless.com 18:14 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Do not launch a product without clients.When you don’t have any clients, you don’t have a business—never lose sight of that.Follow blogs and read books to guide you—learn from others.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.Best Real Estate Advice Ever Podcast – Joe’s podcastBigger Pockets – blog Joe Recommends
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/15/2016 • 21 minutes, 51 seconds
This Entrepreneur Served 10 Years in The Army, You Won't Believe What Happened Next with Michael Slavin EP 237
Michael Slavin, author of One Million in The Bank, a CEO and founder, and former commander of two army aviation units. Listen as Michael shares how he ended up losing everything after his service to the military and how he got back on his feet 7 years later to build a business and how he banked his 1st million dollars.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Accidental GeniusWhat CEO do you follow?— Paul GrahamWhat is your favorite online tool?— DropboxDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Pay attention on learning technnology
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:28 – Welcoming Michael to the show01:39 – 10 years of service in the army01:55 – Writing One Million in the Bank02:09 – “I struggled badly for 7 years. I lost everything.”03:26 – US Emerald Energy06:55 – Biggest loss of $1.2M in a well07:12 – More details on the book07:48 – Frank Nunez10:33 – 1500 books sold in 5 months13:51 – Audio book15:23 – “I spend most of my time taking care of my wife (who has Parkinson’s)”16:38 – www.onemillioninthebank.com19:03 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:You don’t need a new and innovative idea to be successful.You don’t need your own money to be successful.There’s lots of FREE help—you just have to ask.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/15/2016 • 23 minutes, 34 seconds
The Clever Way This 26 Year Old Is Making $128k/mo PROFIT with Regan Hillyer Episode 236
Regan Hillyer, a personal development coach, wellness educator, and founder of Regan International. Listen as Regan walks The Top audience through the nuances of her all-online coaching program, and explains what she does to ensure the programs stay tailored to her clients’ needs.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – E-MythWhat CEO do you follow?— Gary VWhat is your favorite online tool?— ClickfunnelsDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Just jump straight to a personal brand
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:46 – Welcoming Regan to the show02:04 – How Regan generates revenue02:16 – An all-online coaching and education Success MindsetPersonal Branding05:19 – 3 one-on-one clients summed up to $50K07:45 – Walking away with your own personal brand09:25 – Robin Nikora Scott—certified change specialist10:43 – 200 clients in the low-end membership site11:59 – Tailored programs basing on clients’ needs12:31 – You need to compound your success on focus on one thing13:09 – www.reganhillyer.com16:15 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:You grow out of each other sometimes when you’re working very closely.A coaching business isn’t about having a good product, it’s about having good access. Compound your success and focus on the one thing you do better than ANYONE.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.Robin Nikora Scott—certified change specialist Regan recommends
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/15/2016 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
Why Is He Scared to Share Revenue Numbers? EP 235 with Randy Rayess
Randy Rayess, co-founder of VenturePact, a Saas platform that helps businesses manage software development teams. Listen as Nathan quizzes Randy on his professional history, and the disparity between revenue models, particularly the difference between a SaaS versus retainer model.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – High Output Management by Andy GroveWhat CEO do you follow?— David Sacks and Scott CookWhat is your favorite online tool?—f.luxDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Stop stressing and worrying about things that are (ultimately) not really relevant to your success.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:23 – Welcoming Randy to the show01:27 – Talking about machine learning02:15 – How Randy makes $$$03:15 – Currently working with a hundred clients05:50 – SaaS vs Retainer Model06:50 – Revenue in 201513:58 – Competitors15:24 – Connect at randy@venturepact.com and @randyrayess17:15 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Life is too short to constantly worry about things that don’t really matter.Machine learning is the way of the future—get on board the train or get left behind.Don’t hate or envy your competitors—study them to find out what they do better than you and adapt.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/13/2016 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
Here's a Creative Artist Who Knows How to Make $1m with Molly Marie EP 234
Molly Marie Keyser, a photographer and insanely creative entrepreneur who found her niche in boudoir photography. Listen as Nathan asks Molly to share her keys to entrepreneurial growth, and explain how she went from the depression of debt to a million dollar business.
Famous 5Favorite Book? –Breakthrough AdvertisingWhat CEO do you follow?—Cameron LunaWhat is your favorite online tool?—OBS Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Get started on your business as soon as you know what it’s going to be—it doesn’t matter if you’re in college.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:10 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming Molly to the show01:36 – Molly’s 1st business?—photography01:50 – How Molly Made $$$02:25 – Multiple 6-figures with the portrait studio02:59 – Molly’s lines of business03:49 – www.BootyShorts.com 04:22 – www.ventureshorts.com 05:55 – Info product pricing08:05 – How Molly uses her money08:30 – Annual expenses are under $100K09:22 – Most of the money goes into Molly’s retirement account and her business savings account09:55 – When it comes to working in ART—people quit way to early10:28 – You gotta do what you don’t love at first so you can get some cash to start playing11:44 – When you establish your first business, diversify!12:05 – www.VentureShorts.com 13:42 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:You CAN turn art into a career.At the beginning—you can’t necessarily do what you love, you have to do what makes cash.Have multiple revenue streams.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.www.BootyShorts.com – One of Molly’s companieswww.ventureshorts.com -- Another one of Molly’s companies and the best place to contact her.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/13/2016 • 17 minutes, 11 seconds
He Hustled in His Attic for 5 Years Before Hitting $1m, Now Over $4.8m Annually with Robert Moore of RJ Metrics EP 233
Robert Moore, CEO of RJMetrics, a Business Intelligence organization that specializes in helping small businesses obtain the data they need to thrive. Listen as Nathan and Robert talk fundraising, life in venture capital, and what it takes to grow a business from $0 to $4M is less than 5 years.
Famous 5Favorite Book? –Winners DreamWhat CEO do you follow?—N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?—SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?—NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Everything is going to be OK.Time Stamped Show Notes:01:20 – Nathan’s introduction 01:41 – Welcoming Robert to the show01:50 – A history rooted in Online Poker04:35 – Getting in on Google AdWords early05:12 – 2004-2006 almost $100K in revenue06:21 – RJMetrics coming to be08:12 – Worked at a VC firm after college09:41 – 100-200 touches to get 1 or 2 conversations12:15 – Thus far, RJMetrics has raised $22M13:10 – Being on the sales side of money sucks14:20 – Average revenue per client per year15:11 – User acquisition is done through both inbound and outbound efforts16:14 – All-in customer acquisition cost is between $5K and $50K17:00 – Churn rate is 3 to 4 years18:15 – RJMetrics went from $0 to $4M in revenue over 4 years20:30 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Economies and industries can collapse overnight, have an idea or exit strategy in your back pocket.The money-selling business is a GRIND. Keep grinding…it’s the only way to get from A to B.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/13/2016 • 25 minutes, 16 seconds
YEC Lands Forbes Partnership, 1000's of Paying Members Early EP 232
Ryan Paugh, a man who builds kick-ass communities for entrepreneurs and Gen Y dreamers. Listen as Nathan asks Ryan about what inspired him to get into community building, how he does it so effectively, and what enticed Forbes to become one of his partners.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Lessons in AffluenceWhat CEO do you follow?—NoneWhat is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Create early on—don’t wait until you’re in your late 20s
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming Ryan to the show02:00 – Ryan’s main focus 04:31 – You’ve got to have real people behind the scenes04:53 – How Ryan drives revenue06:05 – What it costs to join Founders Society07:22 –Roughly 500 members09:15 – Total membership of the Forbes Partnership—it’s in the thousands09:44 – Forbes gets a cut—that’s why they take the time to support the community10:55 – These communities are both an online and offline venture11:53 -- @RyanPaugh13:49 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:At the end of the day, you need real people to run your company.You have access to more communities than you realize—get out there and take advantage of them.If you’re willing to offer them a monetary cut, you can secure BIG, name-brand partners.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Founders Society – One of the communities operated by RyanMallard Creatives – Provider of Show Notes
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/12/2016 • 16 minutes, 44 seconds
2 Moms, 6 Kids Get Deal on Shark Tank, Take us Behind the Scenes EP 231
Jenny Greer and Erin Bickley of Hold Your Haunches, a women’s wear company that makes products designed to show a more shapely you. Listen as Nathan, Erin, and Jenny banter back and forth about the challenges of growing a business from scratch and what going on the hit TV show Shark Tank was really like.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Shark TalesWhat CEO do you follow?— Mark ZuckerbergWhat is your favorite online tool?— WunderListDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—You’re not always going to have this body
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:49 – Welcoming Erin and Jenny to the show01:53 – The idea for Hold Your Haunches02:32 – Started in 201003:15 – Why go on Shark Tank?03:37 – Free Publicity04:38 – Re-negotiation05:24 – What going on Shark Tank was like08:12 – More than $1.5M in 201408:25 -- $500K in product sold within 72 hours of airing on Shark Tank09:40 – Average cart checkout is worth $200 ($100 an item)10:12 – The number of customers varies per month10:30 – Went from 800 email subscribers to 16K subscribers thanks to Shark Tank12:00 – Most valuable piece of off-air advice?—you don’t have to get it right, just get it going14:20 – www.ShopHYH.com 15:50 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:You can always convert negatives into positives if you’re willing to be creative. Get into the public eye and watch your business BOOM.Find friends in high places. Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Hold Your Haunches – Women’s shapewear companyShark Tank – TV show Erin and Jenny went on
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/12/2016 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
From Apple to Raising $250k on Kickstarter For His New Hardware Company with Nils Mattison EP 230
Nils Mattisson, CEO of Minut, a company that designs tools to help homeowners monitor their homes. Listen as Nathan grills Nils on the basis of Minut’s product pricing, their investment sources, and the likelihood of Minut taking off in the consumer hardware market.
Famous 5Favorite Book? –The Innovator’s DilemmaWhat CEO do you follow?— None What is your favorite online tool?—SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Always take the leap, no matter the fear.Time Stamped Show Notes:01:03 – Nathan’s introduction 01:09 – Welcoming Nils to the show01:25 – Nils role at Apple02:05 – Working on the original iPhone 03:53 – What Minut does05:43 – How the Minut algorithm works07:19 – Finding success on Kickstarter08:20 – The costs of production for Minut08:45 – In consumer hardware, prices drop rapidly as products take off—sell for 4x production cost10:31 – How are new buyers finding the product10:44 – Pre-sold 4K products, now delivering11:21 – Eight team members11:30 – Backed by a variety of investors13:27 – Raised nearly $500K thus far14:53 – Nils@Minut.com 16:14 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Be courageous—make the leap of faith.Just because you work for a kick-ass company (like Apple), doesn’t mean you need to stay there.If you want to get into consumer goods, Kickstarter is GREAT way to test the market.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Minut – Nils’ company
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/12/2016 • 20 minutes, 7 seconds
$172k in Debt to $2/5m/Year Painting Company with Father of 2, Matt Shoup EP 229
Matt Shoup, a man who took himself from nearly $200K in debt to life as a millionaire before the age of 30. Now Matt is making a major career pivot to speaking, coaching, and motivation. Listen as Matt shares his rags to riches story, and why he decided to change careers in spite of a THRIVING operation.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Total Money MakeoverWhat CEO do you follow?— Curt RichardsonWhat is your favorite online tool?— InfusionsoftDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Bring others up the mountain with you.Time Stamped Show Notes:01:03 – Nathan’s introduction 01:29 – Welcoming Matt to the show02:12 – Matt’s main income stream in 2015 03:15 – Why not stay in painting?03:30 – Being told you’re not good enough04:58 – Why Matt doesn’t sell the painting company—because why shed a recurring revenue stream?05:40 – Earning money through coaching06:35 – Matt’s Mastermind is the main revenue generator on the coaching side09:45 – Why not kick back and let the money roll in?—because there’s no way to help people10:27 – Matt’s two-cents: “I exist to help others live with excellence”12:55 – www.MattShoup.com 14:15 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Live with excellence.Find a way to help people.Don’t stay in a business just because the money is good—if your heart isn’t in it, move on.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.M and E Painting – Matt’s painting company
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/6/2016 • 16 minutes, 35 seconds
0 to 80m Monthly Unique Website Views and Millions in Revenue by 31 with Gerard Adams of Elite Daily EP 228
Gerard Adams, Millennial thought-leader and founder of Elite Daily—an online publication that caters to the interests and needs of the Millennial Generation. Listen as Nathan quizzes Gerard on the revenue model of Elite Daily, their acquisition by Daily Mail, and the key to keeping content creators happy.
Bio:No Bio Available
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Nothing to Lose, Everything to GainWhat CEO do you follow?— Elon MuskWhat is your favorite online tool?— Fifteen FiveDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Build the right team.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:03 – Nathan’s introduction 01:33 – Welcoming Gerard to the show 01:45 – 31 Years old02:00 – First million made through establishing a PR and Marketing company for small businesses02:32 – 10M a year in revenue across a team of 5 people03:00 – www.EliteDaily.com03:48 – Roughly $20M in revenue in 201504:40 – One of Elite Daily’s 1st native ads06:25 – Partnering with T-Mobile07:21 – Elite Daily was at $80M unique visitors when they were acquired by Daily Mail10:15 – Writer compensation and incentives11:25 – Reach out to people who have native following already…offer them small cash amounts, swag, etc. but the KEY is helping them BUILD their profile13:33 – Seeding the initial topics—driving the foundational traffic15:27 – www.GerardAdams.com
3 Key Points:Keep the people that create your content HAPPY and ENGAGED.A great TEAM is indispensable.You don’t need cash to incentivize your employees. Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.www.GerardAdams.com – Gerard’s Websitewww.EliteDaily.com – Gerard’s latest venture…recently acquired by Daily Mail
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/6/2016 • 20 minutes, 35 seconds
Italian Fashion Brand Doing $12m/Year In Transaction Volume EP 227
Diego Abba, president of Italist, an eCommerce site that sells luxury Italian items. Listen as Diego shares his experience working with consumer giants like Proctor & Gamble and Activision, as well as his inspiration to abandon the security of the corporate world to venture out into the uncertain plain of entrepreneurship.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Ultimate QuestionWhat CEO do you follow?— N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?—Skype Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Stay more zen
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:57 – Nathan welcomes Diego02:10 – Diego’s experiences in Bain, Proctor & Gamble, Activision and Global Bank03:45 – Speaking on Activision05:00 – Italist05:50 – 2015’s transaction volume $10M06:39 – How Italist makes money07:00 – The idea of Italist revolves around creating the look and feel of an Italian Luxury Store within the confines of the digital space07:36 – Percentage income is 20-30% of retail value09:23 – Farfetch11:20 – There are 2 seasons in luxury goods –spring/summer and winter13:03 – Gross margin of $250,00014:17 – Affiliates17:23 – Who would you love to sell to one day? –Ebay or Amazon21:12 – www.fab.com comparison21:34 – The key is to stay focused, do the best you can, and keep the rest simple22:40 – Diego’s LinkedIn
3 Key Points:You company website has to have a look and feel that is reflective of your product or service.If you’re going to get into the consumer luxury goods market, be ready for a dogfight.The key to success has three teeth—focus, effort, and simplicity.
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Italist – company founded by Diego that sells Italian luxury items across 85 countriesFarfetch – a competitor of Italistwww.fab.com -- another rival of ItalistActivision – An American video game publisher
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/6/2016 • 28 minutes
Cirrus Insight Is Doing $640k in MRR (Dec 2015) With Much Bigger Plans EP 226
Brandon Bruce is the co-founder and CEO of Cirrus Insight, a plug-in app for Gmail and Outlook that tracks emails, schedules meetings, and updates sales figures automatically. Listen as Brandon takes The Top audience into the intricacies of his business, and shares how he “worked-backwards” from the perspective of the end-user to build a winning brand.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Good Strategy, Bad StrategyWhat CEO do you follow?— N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?— Assistant.toDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Start a company as soon as possible
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:33 – Nathan welcomes Brandon01:57 – Cirrus Insight’s revenues for 2015 - $6.5M ARR (Annual Recurring Revenue)02:28 – What Cirrus Insight does02:57 – It was really built for ourselves – we found ourselves constantly switching between Gmail and Salesforce 03:55 – The secret of ranking so well in the Salesforce app exchange? Positioning and designing the brand as an end-user based application04:48 – Huge benefits can be drawn from the volume of users as well as the volume of reviews07:30 – MRR was $640,00009:39 – Net negative churn11:39 – Best spend was on events and partner marketing14:07 – We try our best to stay really close to the customer and make sure we’re providing value everyday16:16 – Focus on the Google market16:45 - @CirrusInsight and www.cirrusinsight.com/blog
3 Key Points:Your company, product, etc. needs to be engineered from the perspective of the end-user.Stay close to your customers—provide value EVERY day.Events and partner marketing are a great way to spend your marketing dollars.Resources Mentioned:Gmail – google-owned web-based email serviceOutlook – a free personal email service from MicrosoftSalesforce – an enterprise cloud that provides CRM software solutionsHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/4/2016 • 25 minutes, 41 seconds
PRIVATE: Text "nathan" to 33444 to get access to this episode EP 225
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/4/2016 • 59 seconds
He Got 17m YouTube Subscribers and 1b+ Views EP 224
Nathan interviews Mickey Meyer, a digital media producer and the co-founder of JashNetwork, a multi-tiered digital media studio. Listen as Nathan quizzes Mickey on his role as a producer, and how he makes money as a digital media producer.
Famous 5Favorite Creative/Production Book? – The book he’s currently writing which is The TelevisionWhat CEO do you follow?— Ted SarandosWhat is your favorite online tool?—Final CutDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Have fun
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:20 – Nathan’s introduction02:10 – Nathan welcomes Mickey03:05 – Mickey walks us through Epic Rap Battle04:28 – 13M-17M Youtube subscribers with billion views per video05:21 – Mickey talks about his job in production05:27 – Think first and foremost, about consistency06:33 – If you can build those long standing relationship with your audience, it gives them something to look forward to07:42 – The Top production secret08:53 – Content is king09:35 – Look for something that will stand out, something that people can latch on to10:06 – You want to make sure that you do have vibrant colors10:40 – Production for Jash’s12:10 – Getting users to longer session times14:04 – Start focusing more on narrative, long-form content14:59 – Doing what people are searching all the time and not just trends15:37 – Our strategy is more in line with the overall entertainment industry16:50 – Make money in a lot of different ways21:45 – Paying someone to distribute a video (on a Youtube channel)22:00 – It is a very intimate relationship on that channel with that audience26:52 – Mickey’s instagram
3 Key Points:Consistency is king in the world of content.For years, the emphasis has been on short-form content—that trend is reversing.Speaking of trends—do not pigeonhole yourself by keeping your content trend-centric—find a way to engage with people’s interests long-term.Resources Mentioned:Epic Rap Battle – An online media platform Mickey helps to produceHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/4/2016 • 28 minutes, 49 seconds
How to Get Event Organizers To Tell You Speaker Budget With Shari Alexander EP 223
Shari Alexander persuasive coach and entrepreneur . Listen as Shari highlights how her coaching services, how she earns money through speaking, and her exciting plans for growth in 2016.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Creativity IncWhat CEO do you follow?— NoWhat is your favorite online tool?—CalendlyDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Do it your way—don’t get distracted by ever shiny object that comes across your path
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:12 – Nathan’s introduction01:46 – Nathan welcomes Shari02:00 – How Shari makes money02:32 – 2015’s revenue -$150,00003:12 – One-on-one coaching packages04:05 – Getting paid to speak and how negotiation works09:16 – Plans for 201609:48 – Reach out to people that are familiar or inside of your target market—everything else is a waste of time10:07 – If you’re just getting started in Lead Gen, start by reaching out to people you know10:35 – Building an email list and doing webinars 11:33 – How many are in your list? – I don’t have a big list, only about 3500, but it is engaging12:45 – www.observeconnectinfluence.com12:57 –shari@observeconnectinfluence.com
3 Key Points:Getting paid to speak isn’t as easy as it seems.When you’re first getting started with outreach, begin with people you know. KNOW YOUR TARGET MARKET.Resources Mentioned:Influence HQ – Shari’s group mentorship programHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.www.observeconnectinfluence.com – one of the best ways to reach Shari
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/3/2016 • 19 minutes, 1 second
LTV, CAC, ARPU Numbers from SaaS CEO Michael Perry of Kitcrm.com EP 222
Michael Perry, owner of Kit, an online marketing software that lets people connect eCommerce sites to different social media platforms. Listen as Nathan and Michael talk about how they started their respective businesses, how they’re using Facebook to target clients today, and why Kit should be so attractive to entrepreneurs.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Search Inside YourselfWhat CEO do you follow?— Mark ZuckerburgWhat is your favorite online tool?— ClaraDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Nothing f****** matters
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:15 – Nathan’s introduction01:43 – Welcoming Michael to the show01:47 – Defining small business survivalist 02:20 – How Michael currently makes money02:23 – The idea for Kit03:37 – How Kit started and how many clients currently working with it04:32 – No one wants to invest in technology for SMB—But they should!05:20 – “We didn’t want to be an agency, we wanted to become a software company and create a digital person that can work for SMB owners 24/7”06:16 – Right now, Kit has about 2000 paying customers08:22 – People have this misguided notion that everything on the internet should be free—this is simply not the case09:03 – Acquisition cost per customer is at $21 via Facebook11:26 – Kit is not a non-profit—it’s all about revenue11:48 – What revenue number would you love to hit in 2016? -$150,000-$200,000 MRR12:19 – Hitting those metrics is not an option13:26 – 99% of the time it’s the people behind the business that make the business GREAT13:34 – It’s better to have a good team than a good idea15:05 – @MichaelPerry Michael@kitcrm.com
3 Key Points:SMB business owners would be wise to invest in technology early—the long-term gains outweigh the upfront expense.Just because something is on the internet, doesn’t mean that it should be free.It’s your team—not your ideas, not your products—that make your business great. Resources Mentioned:Kit –an online marketing assistanceHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/3/2016 • 20 minutes, 40 seconds
Magic Words That Make People Buy with Ray Edwards EP 221
Ray Edwards, a best-selling author and a copywriting coach. Listen as Nathan asks Ray about books, the mechanics of publishing, how he was able to sell a thousand copies before getting promoted, and how affiliation works.
Famous 5Favorite Business Book? –The Biography of John AdamsWhat CEO do you follow?— Peter DiamandisWhat is your favorite online tool?—EvernoteDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Don’t do credit cards, invest your money, spend less than you earn, take better care of your body…most of the stuff you worry about in your 20s you won’t even remember so lighten up.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:17 – Nathan’s introduction01:54 – Nathan welcomes Ray02:07 – Writing Riches02:42 – Ray’s revenue stream03:00 – How to Write Copy that Sells05:30 – It’s relatively easy to get published compared to how hard it is to write06:03 – Mechanics of publishing Ray’s book with Morgan James07:50 – Business books should be positioning pieces to win clients08:27 – As a result of having written the book, I can attribute directly or indirectly at least $.5M in revenue 09:07 – The goal with this one (How to Write Copy that Sells) is to sell a lot more books10:02 – We’re looking for list placement in the book list10:36 – How did you get the first thousand sales? – Just from my email list11:11 – How big is your email list? –It was about 37,000 people11:28 – We went through this whole campaign, for about 2 weeks, basically driving people off the list. Now we are about 17 to 18,00011:55 – Lining up affiliates for the book12:45 – How did you do the $400,000 in one month? –We sold to our own list and we had affiliates to promote the course on their list13:42 – I am the most expensive direct response copy writer in the internet14:17 – Sometimes people forget that they need to pay you royalties and you start chasing them14:45 – Making the Call to Action effective15:08 – What would you headline this podcast to maximize downloads? –Magic Words that Make You Rich15:25 – www.rayedwards.com
3 Key Points:Writing something that people want to ready is a lot harder than getting published. If you’re working on a royalties payment scheme find a way to automate it so you’re not chasing down payments. Life is short—lighten up.
Resources Mentioned:Writing Riches – book authored by RayHow to Write Copy that Sells –the updated version of Writing RichesMorgan James –the publisher that published Ray’s two booksHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/3/2016 • 20 minutes, 28 seconds
$70m Loaned in One Click Mortgage Lending Business with Jason van den Brand of Lenda.com EP 220
Jason van den Brand, owner of Lenda, to the podcast. Lenda is a financial services company that lets people refinance their mortgages with greater ease. Listen as Jason shares his company’s astounding start and explains how Lenda is removing the financial middlemen to give their clients more value.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Traction: Get a Grip on Your BusinessWhat CEO do you follow?— Elon MuskWhat is your favorite online tool?—Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? —At the end of the day, it’s all about the network so don’t worry so much about your GPA. Go and meet more people.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:20 – Nathan’s introduction01:30 – Nathan welcomes Jason van den Brand02:20 – Jason’s take on the Quicken Loans Controversy03:34 – About Lenda03:45 – If you go online today, your mortgage is going to end up looking like a big giant stack of paperwork05:10 – “We are an automated underwriting process so we’re predicting what kind of documentation you’re going to need to qualify for the home loan.”06:28 – Loan servicers07:04 – Wells Fargo07:34 – Loans split up after they transmit it09:27 – We are moving toward servicing our own loans10:28 – Currently raised about $3.8M11:02 – Warehouse Line of Credit11:20 – We hold our loans for 6-7 days before they get sold off to the final investor who will actually service the loan11:56 – $25M pipeline13:36 – Almost $70M loans passed from October 2013 to January 201613:50 – How much money Lenda made in 2015 and how did you do it? -$500,000 – we make a margin on the loan amount15:39 – Because we’re building technology, we don’t have loan officers in our model16:50 – Continuously practice vertical integration19:50 – This business model is going to work because it eliminates middle men, and when you do that, you eliminate costs21:05 –@vandenTweet
3 Key Points:The mortgage industry as it exists today is a dinosaur. When you use technology to replace middlemen or redundant people you cut costs dramatically—that savings can be passed back the consumer.We can make this business model and completely remove all the middle men in the transactionResources Mentioned:Lenda – Jason’s companyWells Fargo – a loan servicer Jason mentionedWarehouse Line of Credit – the credit line Lenda is usingHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/2/2016 • 26 minutes, 46 seconds
26 and Managing $8.4m In Adspend with Fehzan Ali of Adscendmedia.com EP 219
Fehzan Ali, Co-Founder & CEO at Adscend Media LLC, home of award-winning offer walls, and advertising solutions for mobile app and web publishers. Listen as Nathan quizzes Fehzan on the Adscend revenue model, and inquires about the future of the adwall business.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard ThingsWhat CEO do you follow?— NoWhat is your favorite online tool?— Google DocsDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Sales is critical and I wish I knew more about it early on
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Fehzan to the show02:12 – Focusing on the user increases profitability02:25 – Measuring interest from publishers and advertisers02:45 – Doing $100K a month in advert spend03:12 – Only paid for app installs or actions04:05 – How Adscend makes money?—Take 30% of the spend received04:52 – Breaking down the spend07:20 – Founded company in 2009, been in rewarding space for 10 years07:39 – Fehzan is ONLY 26!09:50 – Keeping 30% of $13M10:25 – User engagement with the offer wall11:18 – 95% of revenue is mobile11:31 – Based in Austin, TX12:25 – bootstrapped with $10K12:35 – Most profits have been reinvested13:08 – Fehzan@AdscendMedia.com 13:30 – Ashu’s Twitter Handle
3 Key Points:Reinvest your profits if you want to grow.Practice and refine your sales pitch.Don’t balk at bootstrapping a business just because you don’t have a lot startup capital.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/2/2016 • 17 minutes, 59 seconds
Sold 5 Companies Before Age of 30, Now Side Stream Income is $500k/Year with Lane Campbell EP 218
Listen as Lane Campbell shares his insight on the importance of partnerships for rapid growth, the challenges of finding quality technical talent, and his plans for the future.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard ThingsWhat CEO do you follow?— Mark ZuckerbergWhat is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Leave college early.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:28 – Welcoming Lane to the show01:33 – The 5 companies Lane sold before he was 3002:20 – Lifetime value of exits was south of $10M02:45 – Lane’s current projects03:51 – His #1 focus right now is TBD04:44 – Lane’s #1 income stream is Create.ly05:39 -- $20-$40K is Lane’s consulting fee07:25 – Use partnerships and incentives to grow rapidly08:18 – Even if you’re a name brand you can still decline in revenue year of year09:05 – Create.ly did roughly $500K in 201509:52 – The challenge of attracting top technical talent11:26 – The cost of hiring an $80K salaried employee in the U.S. is $26K13:43 – www.LaneCambell.com
3 Key Points:Take advantage of partnerships and incentivize your offerings to grow quickly. Just because you’re a household name/brand doesn’t mean you’re infallible. Top technical talent is hard to find and harder to lock up—if you find it put a vice on it.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Create.Ly – Lane’s current income generator
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/2/2016 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
His Action Marketing Agency did $2.5m Last Year with Fritz Heffinger of OutCold.com EP 217
Fritz Heffinger, President at OutCold, an action media company that specializes in creating unforgettable brand experiences in the most unexpected ways. Listen as Fritz outlines the origins of his company’s unique name, and why action media exposure is changing how businesses approach branding and outreach.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – NoneWhat CEO do you follow?— Steve DimeWhat is your favorite online tool?— AsanaDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Don’t take life so seriously.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:11 – Nathan’s introduction 01:27 – Welcoming Fritz to the show01:36 – Named after the movie “OutCold”02:12 – How OutCold makes money04:18 – Dive right into unique forms of marketing and communication05:29 – Depending on the variety of experience, they charge between $300-600K06:35 – Revenue in 2015 was $2.5M07:34 – 11 Full-time and 400 Part-time employees08:03 – Take advantage of local people and resources09:14 – Nathan talks about future plans—Public or Bust!10:05 – The technical aspects of converting a shipping container into livable spaces11:03 – Making the leap from $2M a year to $10M a year11:30 – Media space isn’t a personal connection—the tide is turning12:19 – Fritz@OutCold.com
3 Key Points:Employ local resources—people, businesses, etc.Start building real relationships with your customers.Life is for living, not sweating—stop taking it so seriously. Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.OutCold – The 2001 movie Fritz named his company after
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/1/2016 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
Quit $100k+ Private Equity to Move to South America, Does $1m Tax Business Now with Vincenzo Villamena of Online Tax Man EP 216
Vincenzo Villamena, the founder of OnlineTaxman.com, the best resources for U.S. Expats looking to stay on the good side of the IRS. Listen as Nathan and Vincenzo discuss Private Equity in-depth, moving to South America, and starting OnlineTaxman from scratch.
Bio:No Bio Available
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The 4-Hour Work WeekWhat CEO do you follow?— Elon MuskWhat is your favorite online tool?— Solve 360Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Don’t get a job, just pursue your dreams and ideas
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:52 – Welcoming Vincenzo to the show02:00 – Making money selling candy03:30 – Talking PwC and the Big 4 in general04:45 – Got into Private Equity for the money05:28 – Getting paid in Private Equity06:00 – Bonuses were highly discretionary06:30 – Talking about “Carry”08:15 – It’s all about networking09:00 – Describing a private equity deck09:43 – The balance between hardcore numbers and noise11:00 – Describing IRR (investment rate of return)11:28 – Generally in Private Equity you can expect to lock up your money for 5 years13:55 – Moving to South America14:39 – Living in Argentina and discovering the tax opportunity for Ex-Pats16:05 – Clients around the world16:24 – In January 2016, did $40K in revenue and close to $1M for the year17:00 – 7 employees, all virtual17:25 – Vincenzo@OnlineTaxMan.com
3 Key Points:Go for your dreams—not a “job”—from day 1.Do NOT make a decision purely for the money.You can have a company that is completely virtual.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Carry – Share of profits paid to investment managerPwC – Pricewaterhouse Coopers
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/1/2016 • 22 minutes, 48 seconds
$16m Just Raised and 1 Billion Monthly Active Views with Ashish Patel of NowThis EP 215
Ashish Patel, the VP of Social Media at NowThis & Executive-in-Residence at Lerer Hippeau Ventures. Listen as Nathan and Ashish discuss entrepreneurial life within the media space, and how NowThis is changing the way people approach mobile video.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Art of WarWhat CEO do you follow?— Richard BransonWhat is your favorite online tool?— TweetDeckDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Know that life is a marathon, not a sprint—take your time and stop stressing
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:36 – Welcoming Ashish to the show02:55 – Working with Shell Oil04:12 – Like to produce content that’s about 4 Mins long05:08 – Lots of businesses are trying to find a way to make content for Snapchat and Instagram08:00 – Working with Joe Biden08:19 – Custom pricing for working with Shell Oil—a campaign based model, generally more than $100K09:18 – How do you transform 10 minutes of footage into dozens of different assets?09:53 – You have to know the KPIs of your business11:05 – Most videography is happening on mobile today11:33 – Text on screen is to make the videos “Agnostic”12:53 – Facebook film is where the platform is getting the most traction13:23 – Trying to optimize for retention14:03 – Hook users with compelling visuals EARLY15:40 – Around 1 billion views a month across all channels16:18 – Connect via any of the NowThis social channels
3 Key Points:Know your KPIs.Hook your site visitors EARLY with compelling visuals. Life is a marathon, not a sprit—slow down and smell the flowers people!
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Sidekick – The online tool Ashu can’t live withoutPitch Anything – Ashu’s favorite business bookJack Dorsey – The CEO Ashu follows
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
4/1/2016 • 21 minutes, 26 seconds
She's Sold 20m Stickers and Will Do $100m By 2018 with Andrea Lake Ep 214
Andrea Lake - As owner of six successful businesses, Andrea has a unique insight into what it takes to not only start a business, but turn it into a winner. Listen as she shares her trade secrets for aspiring entrepreneurs.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Do Cool ShitWhat CEO do you follow?— Jeff WalkerWhat is your favorite online tool?— 15-5Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Worrying is unnecessary, it’s a waste of time.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:32 – Welcoming Andrea to the show01:57 – StickerJunkie started before YogaJunkie02:25 – Build and hold kinda girl02:40 – Currently owns 6 companies03:17 – Lessons.Biz and StickerJunkie are the most profitable businesses05:12 – All sticker companies do well and have solid recurring revenue05:48 – Andrea would exit StickerJunkie for a number just north of $5M09:11 – Licensing versus Sales11:00 – Talking Lessons.biz 12:55 – Have 2400 email addresses on list via BF ads—spent $.50 a name13:25 – Course pricing models14:30 – Build a T-shirt Empire—NOT on Amazon yet, but it will be16:35 – The 1st day you launch your website is the worst day of its life17:23 – Measuring success for Lessons.Biz17:47 – www.AndreaLake.com
3 Key Points:Don’t obsess over online metrics.Keep your fingers in lots of different pots.You don’t have to sell a business to WIN—you can keep and hold.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.YogaJunkie – One of Andrea’s companiesStickerJunkie – The heart and soul of Andrea’s successLessons.Biz – Andrea’s next big venture
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/31/2016 • 22 minutes, 18 seconds
Female Led SaaS Company $3m ARR Goal By EOY 2016 with Ishveen Anand of OpenSponsorship EP 213
Nathan speaks with Ishveen Anand, the CEO of Open Sponsorship, a membership-based platform that connects brands with athletes looking for sponsors. Listen as Nathan asks Ishveen about the origins of the company, their latest round of funding, and life as one of Forbes 30 Under 30.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – NoneWhat CEO do you follow?— Indra NooyiWhat is your favorite online tool?— ReBumpDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Ignorance is bliss
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:48 – Welcoming Ishveen to the show01:59 – Talking Forbes 30 Under 3002:24 – How Open Sponsorship makes money03:12 – Money is made on the brand wanting to find the athlete side--$400/month so not a huge barrier to entry—and %5 on the athlete side04:15 – The cash deals are not necessarily the most popular05:15 – Started in August 201405:39 – 400 brands have already signed up06:19 -- $120K annual revenue in 201506:48 – Trying to be at $3M at end of year07:39 – Customer Acquisition Cost is at $3008:41 – Lifetime value of a customer is between $1200 and $2K10:28 – Subscription minimum is 3 months12:12 – The value proposition14:50 -- Ishveen Anand LinkedIn
3 Key Points:If your customer acquisition cost is lower than lifetime value, why are you hesitating on spending?Don’t let age hold you back, get started young!Know your value proposition like the back of your hand.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/31/2016 • 20 minutes, 6 seconds
No Way This Fitness App Worth $8m With No Revenue with Ashu Dubey of GetApplause EP 212
Ashu Dubey, Co-Founder of Get Applause, an app designed to help people lose weight and get back in shape. Listen as Nathan grills Ashu about the valuation of his business, how he was able to court Marc Benioff, and why an $8M offer wouldn’t be enough for him to sell right now.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Pitch AnythingWhat CEO do you follow?— Jack DorseyWhat is your favorite online tool?— SideKick by HubspotDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Start one more company.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:06 – Nathan’s introduction 01:32 – Welcoming Ashu to the show01:48 – How Ashu makes money02:40 – Volume, downloads, and how they’re making money03:03 – Active users are defined as someone who takes an action with a month03:29 – Nathan quizzes Ashu on the meaning of “Retention”04:55 – Raising money, and keeping the lights on via a priced round06:25 – The leadership team at Applause07:50 – Why Ashu feels an $8M valuation is small08:40 – Optimize for the long term09:50 – Execution risk11:03 – The data points used for valuation12:53 – Courting Marc Benioff13:30 – Ashu’s Twitter Handle
3 Key Points:Understand how you’re going to make money—if you don’t, you’re done before you get started.Optimize your businesses for the long-term.Clearly understand your execution risk.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Sidekick – The online tool Ashu can’t live withoutPitch Anything – Ashu’s favorite business bookJack Dorsey – The CEO Ashu follows
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/31/2016 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
This Media Agency Does $6m in Revenue with 32 Employees With Matt Weinberg of Vector Media Group EP 211
Matt Weinberg, CEO of Vector Media Group a company that specializes in web design, content management, and general media consulting. Listen in as Matt shares the history of his 15 year old company, how it went from a small pet project to genuine giant, and what he sees for the future of media.
Bio:Matt cofounded Vector Media Group in high school, and is now its President of Development and Technology. Vector is now 32 people and has been on the Inc 5000 list of America's fastest growingcompanies for 3 years in a row. We're fully bootstrapped: we've never taken outside funding or debt and have been profitable every single month since our start.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Getting to YesWhat CEO do you follow?— Travis KalanickWhat is your favorite online tool?— WorkFlowyDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Know how much harder it is to take a risk at 30 than 20.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:17 – Nathan’s introduction 01:48 – Welcoming Matt to the show02:19 – Matt has one partner (Lee)02:36 – Company founded in 200003:02 – Started ramping up to a media company in 200503:40 – They are effectively a consulting company04:48 – Web design and consulting is the biggest aspect of Vector’s business05:45 – Vector loves to get in with companies as early as possible06:44 – www.GreenTechMedia.com 07:55 – Vector bills at roughly $180/HR10:03 – Walking through the negotiation/fleshing out process11:12 – Catch problems EARLY11:28 – Vector can work on almost any budget12:00 – Ideas change DRAMATICALLY post launch12:50 – Working with the Associated Press13:41 -- @MRW
3 Key Points:Take risks before your 30…it gets harder after that birthday.Mentally and financially budget for the changes you’ll want post launch—there will be many.Don’t be afraid to price yourself as a premium product if you know you’re worth it.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.WorkFlowy – The online tool Matt can’t live withoutTravis Kalanick – The CEO Matt followsGetting to Yes – Matt’s favorite business bookwww.GreenTechMedia.com – One of Vector’s clients
3/30/2016 • 19 minutes, 18 seconds
$700k Raised For App That Connects Brands to High School Athletes With Brian Verne of Phantom EP 210
Brian Verne, CEO of Phenom, former college baseball player, and native of Cleveland, Ohio. Listen as Nathan and Brian chat about life as a college athlete, and why big time athletic brands are starting to sponsor high school athletes when they once only cared about the pros.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Art of FeelingWhat CEO do you follow?— N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Understand how difficult it is to build a business.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:17 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Brian to the show01:45 – What Phenom is03:35 – How Phenom makes money04:01 – Phenom gives young athletes the ability to connect with large brands04:38 – Currently connected with Wilson05:18 – The payment model between Phenom and Wilson06:04 – Currently have 60K users 06:50 – defining an “active” user08:49 – There’s a massive psychological connection between gear and performance11:15 – Brian talks about supporting himself in lieu of revenue12:32 – Right now, Brian is taking down $30K per year13:28 – Maxing out credit cards, getting down the last penny—but it’s worth it15:18 – Brian is 2816:00 – Instagram is the basis of Phenom’s business
3 Key Points:Building a business is a bitch—never forget it.Don’t quit just because the money isn’t “there”—make whatever personal cuts you need to keep the momentum going.Parlay life lessons into your business.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Slack – The online tool Brian can’t live withoutThe Art of Feeling – Brian’s favorite business bookWilson – Large sporting goods company that Phenom partners withPhenom – Brian’s company
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/30/2016 • 22 minutes, 50 seconds
From $10m+ Hedge Fund Details to $2.4m Travel Company To FinTech Startup with Derek Capo of eFin EP 209
Derek Capo, a former hedge fund guy, and Miami native who witnessed the 2007 real estate collapse first hand. Listen as Nathan asks Derek about his life in a hedge fund, his several entrepreneurial ventures, and what it’s like saying “See-ya” to South Beach to set up a business ½ a world away in China.
Famous 5:
Favorite Book? – N/AWhat CEO do you follow?— Hoby DarlingWhat is your favorite online tool?— AsanaDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Focus on more profitable businesses
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:16 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Derek to the show01:48 – Life in a hedge fund and in Fin Tech02:22 – The biggest win?—Jet Blue—made $3-4 million in a few weeks04:27 – Luck versus Skill in the hedge fund game07:35 – Compensation in a hedge fund08:50 – Not many 21 year olds get started in a hedge fund09:50 – It’s ALL about the hustle10:50 – Heading to China from Miami11:18 – Seeing the financial crisis LIVE in Miami12:16 – In the “shorting” game you have to be patient and willing to wait years to see your positions pay off12:44 – Why Derek went to China14:30 – The lifestyle in China is cheap, but not as cheap as you might think14:58 – www.efin.com 16:25 – Derek has two partners from China17:17 – How Derek will eventually make revenue with EFin17:38 – So far have put $50K into the business20:30 – Derek@Efin.com
3 Key Points:Engage prospects with content before making an offer.Get facetime with people, build intimacy.Test different things to see what works well…when you find it, hit it hard and fast.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Google Keep – The online tool Ezra can’t live withoutwww.EFin.com – Derek’s new businessDerek@Efin.com – Derek’s email address
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/30/2016 • 26 minutes, 56 seconds
The Art of a Profitable Book Launch with Born For This Author Chris Guillebeau EP 208
Chris Guillebeau, a world traveler and writer who helps people get the kick start they need in life. Listen as Nathan asks Chris about the publishing industry’s trade secrets, and how he built a booming career in writing.
Famous 5:Favorite Book? – Mountains Beyond MountainsWhat CEO do you follow?— N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?— OmniFocusDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—You don’t need to have everything figured out, don’t be afraid.\
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:17 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – How Chris makes money02:30 – Chris is 3702:38 – An entrepreneur is someone who will work 24 hours a day to avoid working 1 hour a day for someone else03:15 – So many people are out there making a great living for themselves OUTSIDE of silicon valley04:15 – The #1 thing you can do is create something of value05:55 – Relationships are the key to success07:12 – Make sure your book kills in the first few week07:51 – Chris is published through Random House09:24 – If you don’t love books, if you don’t love to read and if you don’t love to WRITE—do not become a writer10:18 – Books account for 50% of Chris’ revenue10:58 – Multiple six figures in royalty income via Chris’ books12:34 – Converting email and social followers into sales16:35 – Optimizing book orders depends on the stage of the publication process17:50 – Cracking the Amazon Top 25 means selling a copy in a day19:03 – www.ChrisGuillebeau.com
3 Key Points:Don’t be afraid of making a move, just go for it.If you’re going to become a writer, you had better LOVE writing.Relationships are the key to success.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Born for This – Chris’ latest book
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/29/2016 • 24 minutes, 6 seconds
How Male Marketer Does $1.5m Per Month In Womens Cosmetics with Ezra Firestone of Boom! By Cindy Joseph EP 207
Ezra Firestone, the Smart Marketer and Co-Founder of BOOM! By Cindy Joseph. Listen as Nathan and Ezra discuss the intricacies of intelligent digital marketing, why a universal sales funnel can work extremely well, and how the relationships you make are often your best tools for success.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:17 – Nathan’s introduction 01:49 – Welcoming Ezra to the show02:11 – Talking about BOOM!02:27 – Fundamentally—they’re selling an idea03:00 – http://www.boombycindyjoseph.com/04:23 – The best-selling item of 201304:43 – Ezra uses a universal sales funnel05:12 – Engage with content and then make an offer 06:00 – No long-form sales page, just the product list07:24 – Different content sells to different people08:04 – Get facetime, build intimacy10:00 – the lifetime value of a customer—historically $12011:00 – Ad purchasing is done manually11:25 – Buying traffic is wide to narrow---work wide to narrow12:00 – See what works, then hit it hard and fast13:00 – eCommerce business doesn’t do as well as information marketing business14:05 – eCommerce businesses fuel information businesses
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Extreme Revenue GrowthWhat CEO do you follow?— N/AWhat is your favorite online tool?— Google KeepDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Have less attention on yourself and be interested in other people, rather than trying to be interesting to other people.
3 Key Points:Engage prospects with content before making an offer.Get facetime with people, build intimacy.Test different things to see what works well…when you find it, hit it hard and fast.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Google Keep – The online tool Ezra can’t live withoutExtreme Revenue Growth – Ezra’s favorite business bookBOOM! – One of Ezra’s best businesses
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/29/2016 • 20 minutes, 13 seconds
How to Bet On Poker Players and Make Money with Scott Hansbury of YouStake EP 206
Scott Hansbury, CEO of YouStake, a company that gives poker fans the ability to stake their favorite players in real, fully-licensed tournaments. As a 53 year-old entrepreneur and former Sun Microsystems executive, Scott is a goldmine of business insight—listen as he shares those insights with us on today’s show.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:18 – Nathan’s introduction 01:45 – Welcoming Scott to the show02:00 – Giving up the corporate world02:46 – Talking successful exits03:32 – Mezzanine round of funding04:00 – ARR was $15M when they sold to Sun Microsystems at $400M—during the silly days of the internet ‘99 05:31 – Staying motivated when you’re “Set for life”07:15 – Staking in the poker industry08:19 – Person to Person sponsorship—IRS approved!08:44 – Bootstrapped to launch10:25 – How the betting/staking works11:08 – So far, YouStake has garnered $2.8M stakes and $1.4M pledges12:30 – There are a shitload of poker fans worldwide14:24 – The average stake is $34015:13 -- %5 goes to YouStake and 2.9% goes to fee processors15:53 – Registered and Active Users are the two metrics that matter most to YouStake16:41 – User acquisition is done through social media17:53 – Scott@YouStake.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Innovator’s DilemmaWhat CEO do you follow?— Jeff BezosWhat is your favorite online tool?— WunderlistDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Spend more time conducting 24-sponges, filter, and then apply.
3 Key Points:Think about building a business overseas—America isn’t always the best place.Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Wunderlist – The online tool Scott can’t live withoutThe Innovator’s Dilemma – Scott’s favorite business bookJeff Bezos – The CEO Scott closely follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/29/2016 • 22 minutes, 28 seconds
No One Is Talking About This Multi-Million Dollar Tech Company in Barecelona with Gina Tost of GeneApp Episode 238
Gina Tost, a journalist, author of the book Vida Extra, cofounder for Gin App—one on the Top 100 Start Ups of 2015. Listen as Gina shares insights surrounding her marketplace app and how her company creates organic reach in Barcelona.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Who by Geoff Smart and Randy StreetWhat CEO do you follow?— NoneWhat is your favorite online tool?— Twitter & TweetDeckDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Focus on learning everything because you’ll never know when you can use itTime Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction01:48 – Welcoming Gina to the show02:02 – All about Gin App04:20 – Currently working with 350 advertisers and 700 sources06:35 – Annual revenue for 2015 - $750K07:40 – Monthly subscription10:45 – Average invoicing of $1000 monthly11:29 – “We don’t track cost per signup because, nowadays, everything is organic”13:25 – More than 10,000 bloggers made money from the app13:53 – Twitter @Ginapp15:24 – Famous 5
3 Key Points:Bloggers are app promoters, not advertisers—never lose sight of that.When you’re trying to market your business—try and make as much organic as you can. Keep making money! If you’re making money, you’re making progress!
Resources Mentioned:Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/25/2016 • 18 minutes, 36 seconds
She's Built a $500k/year Company in Bali Looking for $8m Pre-Money Valuation with Andrea Loubier of MailBird EP 205
Andrea Loubier, the CEO of Mailbird, a company that is revolutionizing the way online communication is conducted through email reform. Tune-in to hear Andrea talk about abandoning her humdrum corporate life for her exciting entrepreneurial venture based in Silicon Bali.
Andrea Loubier is a travel addict, who is obsessed with spicy food, third culture kid who is crazy passionate about improving the unification of online communication...starting with email. As the CEO of Mailbird and one of Southeast Asia leading female thought leaders, Andrea is taking on Outlook from Silicon Bali.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:12 – Nathan’s introduction 01:39 – Welcoming Andrea to the show01:54 – Building the business in Bali02:03 – Mailbird is a Swiss-Army knife for email02:50 – Just hit 1M mailboxes managed03:14 – Close to $500K in AR03:44 – They’ve hit on a solid model05:09 – The Flash-sale pricing structure05:55 – After the banner—20% conversion06:45 – Before the banner—10% conversion07:15 – Mailbird has been around since 201207:39 – Breakdown between one-time payers and subscribers?—50/5008:53 – Does the lifetime subscription leave money on the table?10:00 – Looking at retention numbers10:24 – Monthly retention is the most important figure11:07 – Very, very high churn w/ Mailbird, as a result, they need a high-acquisition model12:04 – Ideally in SaaS, you want churn at 5%13:00 – The 1st $100K was bootstrapped—now looking for $10M in Series A13:58 – Putting a $10M valuation on a company that’s cranking $500K in ARR15:35 – AngelList has an awesome valuation tool16:00 – Team of 12 people, full-time17:36 – AL@GetMailBird.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard ThingsWhat CEO do you follow?— Ryan HooverWhat is your favorite online tool?— Mailbird Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Find what makes you happy, find a way to help the world, and find something that you want to leave behind.
3 Key Points:Don’t necessarily be afraid of high churn.Understand what you want your legacy to be and make sure it benefits the world.Think about building a business overseas—America isn’t always the best place.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Mailbird – The online tool Andrea can’t live withoutThe Hard Thing About Hard Things – Andrea’s favorite business bookRyan Hoover – The CEO Andrea closely follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/14/2016 • 23 minutes, 49 seconds
From 0 to 1 Billion Impressions With Imoji Founders Daniel and Jason EP 204:
Nathan speaks with Daniel Brusilovsky and Jason Stein, the co-founders of i-Moji.Daniel Brusilovsky and Jason Stein are two of the cofounders at imoji, the largest sticker library in the world.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:33 – Welcoming Daniel and Jason to the show01:45 – Six founders of i-Moji02:48 – Do what you’re passionate about03:30 – Jason originally operated at Hotel Tonight03:54 – How they’re making money?—They’re not04:48 – Give users as fast and relevant experience no matter what05:48 – A b2c product06:05 – Left Shark example07:01 – Proactively try to curate categories and put them in trending lists so people don’t have to search for them07:36 – Where to experience i-moji09:47 – The team is 7 people full time and they’ve raised $2M of seed in equity10:27 – Advice on raising capital in the B2C space11:01 – Understand how it becomes a massive business12:35 – In the b2c space, you’ve got to have a following13:08 – Impression goal is in the billions per month13:75 – i-moji doesn’t track users14:22 – Have a ROCK SOLID vision15:56 – Jason@imojiapp.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Delivering HappinessWhat CEO do you follow?— Elon MuskWhat is your favorite online tool?— EvernoteDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Do what you love. Take Risk. Always trust your gut.
3 Key Points:Life and success are rooted in passion—do what you love.Have a ROCK SOLID vision if you want to your business to appeal to people, especially investors.If you want to make it in the consumer space, you need massive following.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Evernote – The online tool Daniel and Jason can’t live withoutDelivering Happiness – Daniel and Jason’s favorite business bookElon Musk – The CEO Daniel and Jason closely follow
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/14/2016 • 21 minutes, 19 seconds
Getting Your First $10k/mo In Revenue with Ben Fisher of CartHook.com EP 203
Ben Fisher, the co-founder of Lean Startup Machine, and Alchemy. Listen in as Ben talks about his growth process with both Lean Startup Machine and Alchemy, what he learned, and what lessons can be applied universally.
Ben, a New York Citybased designer + hacker, cofounded Lean Startup Machine and Alchemy (acquired by Red Rover in 2013).
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:35 – Welcoming Ben to the show01:50 – Talking Lean Startup Machine02:00 – You will fail, you will focus on the wrong stuff.03:23 – Lean Startup Machine started as a weekend-long experiment04:25 – The ascension of Alchemy Labs06:14 – Collaboration software—Google Group meets LinkedIN07:30 – WeWork was one of the earliest customers…bottom line at $100/mo08:50 – By the time they raised $60K in funding, they realized they didn’t have the energy to build the company—they therefore jumped on an acquisition offer11:38 – Ben was drawn to Jordan because he’s a fantastic marketer12:27 – People pay a ton of money on user-acquisition, but it’s highly inefficient14:00 – 100 paying customers right now—not profitable, but close!15:05 – Currently have raised $300K (originally wanted to boostrap)15:58 – SkinnyAndBald
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Thinking in SystemsWhat CEO do you follow?— Brian FentyWhat is your favorite online tool?—Duet DisplayDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Collaborate more.
3 Key Points:Don’t try and do it all yourself. Being profitable isn’t important at the onset.If you don’t have the energy to do something right, don’t do it at all.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Duet Display – The online tool Matthew can’t live withoutThinking in Systems – Ben’s favorite business bookBrian Fenty – The CEO Ben closely follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/10/2016 • 21 minutes, 27 seconds
Growing to $50k/mo with Roost CEO Jon Gillon Ep 202
Jon Gillon, 7x startup founder, 4x failer, general Silicon Valley Hustler, and free-style rapper. Listen in as Jon shares his story of early failure, how he remained persistent, and how his latest startup Roost came to be.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 01:30 – Welcoming Jon to the show01:53 – The 4 failures were Jon’s most important lessons02:40 – Did the friends and family round02:53 – Hiring an engineer is the hardest part of getting a business off the ground04:05 – Just in the failed businesses Jon’s raised $35K05:20 – Jon’s biggest competitors06:00 – 15% transaction fee on all Roost transactions06:29 – AirBNB for inanimate objects08:22 – How to look for a lead investor—it’s not a willy nilly process09:45 – Zipcar and Enterprise are big partners of Roost10:16 – Finding a technical co-founder at the start of Roost12:20 – http://www.medium.com/@jongillon
Famous 5Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence PeopleWhat CEO do you follow?— Jack Dorsey What is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Nobody really knows what they’re doing…they’re learning as they go along. Just try it and be confident.
3 Key Points:You’re not looking for a lead investor, you’re hiring one—this person will be a part of your company for a long time.Bringing a GREAT engineer on-board early is key to the life of your business.Nobody knows what they’re doing until they’re actually doing it—just give something a try!
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Slack – The online tool Matthew can’t live withoutHow to Win Friends and Influence People – Jon’s favorite business bookJack Dorsey – The CEO Jon closely follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/10/2016 • 17 minutes, 32 seconds
How To Get Your First 100 Customers with Matthew Bernman EP 201
Matthew Bernman of Sonar, a business that makes is super convenient for customers to chat with the companies they buy from. Listen as Nathan asks Matthew about his journey into the startup game, Sonar’s financial backing, and their long-term development goals.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:09 – Nathan’s introduction 01:39 – Welcoming Matthew to the show01:52 – Why he left 500 Startups02:08 – Matthew always wanted to jump back into the startup game03:09 – Used to work with Teamly—a company that folded04:10 – Convertible note versus equity05:03 – Lead Cap negotiation05:34 – How Sonar makes money06:00 – 120 paying customers, on average contributing $2K per month07:30 – Customer acquisition is primarily through word of mouth08:05 – Month over month revenue increase is 35%09:20 – Inbound leads tend to convert at a much higher rate09:48 – 3rd party integration will also be a growth driver10:22 – Want to hit $1M ARR in 201611:49 – The interest is in taking a lasting vestment in the company
Famous 5Favorite Book? – NoneWhat CEO do you follow?— None What is your favorite online tool?— TrelloDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—It’s all about who you know and forming good relationships—you can’t do it yourself.
2 Key Points:You need help so involve other people in your life.Understand the differences between a convertible note and an equity round.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Trello – The online tool Matthew can’t live without
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/10/2016 • 16 minutes, 45 seconds
Would You Sell for $6m Today? No. With Olivier Pailhes of Aircall.io EP 200
Olivier Pailhes, the CEO of Aircall.io, an app that lets you buy one or several phone numbers across the world, add teammates to your dashboard, and place & receive calls on existing devices. Listen as Nathan and Olivier discuss the importance of clearly outlining equity splits, and the importance of starting a business at young rather than old age.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:01 – Nathan’s introduction 01:23 – Welcoming Olivier to the show01:29 – Based in Paris01:42 – Worked for years in Strategy Consulting03:03 – What Aircall does04:57 – The conversation surrounding splitting equity06:19 – How much of the business Olivier still owns06:35 – Aircall charges per month and per seat07:08 – 2015 revenue08:08 – Finding new customers09:10 – The average customer pays $100 per month09:27 – Talking gross retention10:40 – Negative churn11:12 – Customer acquisition cost 13:01 – Sales Call Center is only 6 people15:00 – Aircall’s main goal is to secure a few HUGE customers15:40 – Want to grow revenue number by 5x per year16:05 – www.Aircall.io
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Predictable RevenueWhat CEO do you follow?— Jorn Lyseggen What is your favorite online tool?— SlackDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Just start building your company—don’t waste time, don’t take the “classical path”
3 Key Points:Start building your dream TODAY.Have clear conversations when it comes to splitting equity.Don’t worry about 8 hours of sleep—you can adapt.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Predictable Revenue – Olivier’s favorite bookJorn Lyseggen – The CEO Olivier adoresSlack – The online tool Olivier can’t live without
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/9/2016 • 20 minutes, 39 seconds
Freelance Marketplace AwesomeWeb Hits 1100 Active Freelancers With Nick Tart Episode 198
Nicholas Tart, one of the founders of AwesomeWeb, a freelance marketplace for people who do and need awesome work. Listen as Nathan and Nick talk about the journey to a viable product, the challenge freelancers face, and why AwesomeWeb is so different compared to Elance or Upwork.
Nicholas Tart is the cofounder and product manager for AwesomeWeb, a professional freelance marketplace for people who do and need awesome work. He's focused on building a perfect SaaS web app that'll help other founders make their sites more awesome.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:01 – Nathan’s introduction 01:18 – Nathan welcomes Nick to the show 01:50 – Nick likes the show because Nathan asks good questions02:15 – AwesomeWeb is a great bootsrapped website02:45 – Spend $30K to get from idea to minimum viable product03:00 – Charge $17-$27 to participate on the business—the only people that pay are the freelancers04:08 – Walking through the growth of AwesomeWeb05:37 – More focused on creating a great experience than maxing out revenue06:07 – AwesomeWeb’s goal is to help freelancers earn $100K per year07:43 – Processing 36 jobs per month with a worth of $2-5K08:33 – The long-term goals of AwesomeWeb08:51 – Finding great clients is insanely difficult as a freelancer09:39 – Always be willing to sell09:54 – Attracting new customers10:00 – Income Diary
Famous 5Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence PeopleWhat CEO do you follow?— Neal PatelWhat is your favorite online tool?— N/ADo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Learn how to ask good questions and tell good stories
3 Key Points:If you’re a freelancer when you find a good client, hold onto them for dear life.Ask good questions and tell better stories.Get to a minimum viable product as cheaply as possible.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.How to Win Friends and Influence People – Nick’s favorite bookNeal Patel – The CEO Nick followsIncome Diary – A fantastic blog Nick follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/9/2016 • 15 minutes, 46 seconds
Inventor of Hyper-Convergence Sitting On $150m+ Valuation and $77m Raised with Mohit Aron of Cohesity EP 199
Mohit Aron, CEO of Cohesity, a company that caters exclusively to the secondary data storage market. Listen as Nathan ask Mohit about his journey up and through Google (including his decision to leave), his trial and error experiment in entrepreneurship, and how he came to create Cohesity.
Cohesity was founded in June 2013 by CEO Mohit Aron, who is regarded as the pioneer of hyperconvergence, the first architecture to converge compute and storage to simplify virtualization. Aron founded the infrastructure company Nutanix to bring hyperconvergence to market and served as its CTO before leaving to build Cohesity. Aron worked as a Staff Engineer at Google from 2003 to 2007, where he helped design the company’s innovative Google File System. He also served as Architect at AsterData, a leading big data analytics company that was later acquired by Teradata. Mohit holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Rice University.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:08 – Nathan’s introduction 02:00 – Nathan welcomes Mohit to the show 02:22 – Why Mohit left Google?—life was too comfortable03:30 – What Mohit gave up to leave Google—north of $500K04:09 – You can’t make a big difference when you’re working inside a juggernaut05:27 – Don’t make a decision purely on the money—look at all the elements in the equation07:00 – “The Cliff”07:40 – AsterData sold to Teradata for nearly $323 million08:40 – Founding Nutanix and hyper-convergence10:04 – Network speeds have only grown by 10K in the last 15 years, whereas disk speeds have grown by 1000x11:02 – Once Mohit leaves a company, he cuts ALL ties11:59 – Crossing the chasm13:40 – Talking about Cohesity13:55 – Mohit originally bootstrapped but ended up being funded by Sequoia16:28 – Alpha phase v. Beta phase17:45 -- Aron@cohesity.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Crossing the ChasmWhat CEO do you follow?— Steve JobsWhat is your favorite online tool?— EvernoteDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Trust your gut
3 Key Points:Don’t get too comfortable—ever.Trust your instincts.Once you’ve “crossed the chasm” it’s time to find a new challenge.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Crossing the Chasm – Mohit’s favorite bookSteve Jobs – The CEO Mohit adoresEvernote – The online tool Mohit can’t live withoutAsterData – One of the companies Mohit worked with after Google
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/9/2016 • 23 minutes, 46 seconds
How To Make $500k/year Podcasting With Best Selling Author Jay Baer EP 197
Ep 197 Jay Baer, the world's most retweeted person among digital marketers. Jay is a renowned business strategist, keynote speaker and the New York Times bestselling author of five books. Listen as Nathan and Jay talk about the difference between a workshop and keynote speaker, the importance of having a “bad cop” on your team, and why being patient is grossly undervalued.
Jay Baer is the world's most retweeted person among digital marketers. He is a renowned business strategist, keynote speaker and the New York Times bestselling author of five books who travels the world helping businesspeople get and keep more customers. Jay has advised more than 700 companies since 1994, including Caterpillar, Nike, Allstate, The United Nations and 32 of the FORTUNE 500. He is the founder of Convince & Convert, a strategy consulting firm that helps prominent companies gain and keep more customers through the smart intersection of technology, social media, and customer service. His Convince & Convert Media division owns the world's #1 content marketing blog, the world's top marketing podcast, and many other education resources for business owners and executives. The creator of five multimillion dollar companies, Jay is an active venture capitalist and technology advisor, as well as an avid tequila collector, and certified barbecue judge.
Time Stamped Show Notes:02:07 – Nathan’s welcomes Jay to the show02:28 – Jay’s #1 channel03:55 – Until your scheduled release date…don’t sell your book on Amazon05:25 – HugYourHaters.com05:49 – The advantage of partnering with corporate sponsors for generating marquee revenue 07:28 – Valuing sponsorships08:45 – Jay has 6 podcasts and advertisements are normally recorded LIVE in the show09:41 -- $500K per year on the podcasts alone10:12 – The only 3 people Jay will do FREE gigs for10:40 – Reward the people that help you build your career11:10 – MC-ing something is HARD—way harder than doing a keynote11:35 – If you’re a speaker, you do NOT negotiate your own rate—get yourself a “bad cop” biz dev person12:40 – Jay’s 1st paid speaking gig13:08 – The more you speak, the more you speak13:40 – Start playing for free, then start playing for beer, then start playing for favors, then start playing for money—you have to be PATIENT14:35 – Workshop Speakers versus Keynote Speakers15:30 – Jay does $1M a year in speaking--$20-25K per event16:34 – www.JayBaer.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – DifferentWhat CEO do you follow?— Gary VaynerchukWhat is your favorite online tool?— SigstrDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Understand the real rhythms of business and be patient.
3 Key Points:The more you speak, the more you speak.If you’re not patient, you’re not successful.Reward the people that help you build your career.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Sigstr – Jay’s favorite online toolDifferent – Jay’s favorite bookGary Vaynerchuk – The CEO Jay follows
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/8/2016 • 22 minutes, 32 seconds
30,000 Pounds Per Day, Efficiency Machine Did $7m Last Year on Industrial Planks with Brian Adams of Rumber.com EP 196
Brian Adams, CEO of Rumber Materials Inc, a company that manufactures composite material boards, sheets and molded products from 100% recycled tire rubber and plastics.
Time Stamped Show Notes:00:57 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show01:39 – Brian defines what Rumber does04:35 – How Brian came into Rumber04:49 – Know what you love to do and do it05:09 – Bought Rumber in 2012 for $5 million05:55 – Rumber turns about 30% of gross income into profit06:35 – The biggest challenge Rumber faces07:37 – Controlling the manufacturing process in the United States08:53 – This is a high-abrasion, industrial good09:19 – Pounds per hour is how the measure their performance—1,250 lbs per hour is a GREAT day10:43 – Find Brian on LinkedIn
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Think and Grow RichWhat CEO do you follow?— NoneWhat is your favorite online tool?— Strategic CoachDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Don’t do it by yourself—partner with someone else, someone who’s been there before
3 Key Points:Know what you love and do it.Learn from someone else’s mistakes.Get 8 hours of sleep!
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Strategic Coach – Brian’s favorite online toolThink and Grow Rich – Brian’s favorite book
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/8/2016 • 15 minutes, 22 seconds
$120k, Hustle, and a Hugely Successful Digital Magazine with Margaret Brown or Podster EP 195
Ep 195 Margaret Brown, the owner and publisher of Shelf Media a company that holds and manages a variety of free digital publications. Listen as Nathan and Margaret talk about the art of driving revenue from publishing, what it takes to turn a profit, and how digital publishing works.
Famous 5
Favorite Book? – The Four Hour Work Week
What CEO do you follow?— Alex Blumberg
What is your favorite online tool?— BlinkPlan
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Embrace who you are and what you were meant to do.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:10 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:45 – Margaret breaks down Shelf Media
02:40 – Invested less than 10K to get started
03:45 – Acquiring the 1st 1,000 readers
04:24 – The primary thing that got them on the map was media coverage
04:54 – Throw a lot of spaghetti at the wall and something will stick
05:38 – Press Rush
07:09 – Subscriptions to all Shelf content is FREE
07:39 – You have to believe in your product
08:38 – The revenue model of Shelf Media
09:43 – $4k a month in to be profitable
10:17 – It takes a lot of failure to lead to success
12:55 – The rates for advertising with Shelf Unbound
13:50 -- $20K per issue of Shelf Unbound (125K readership) in top-line revenue
15:19 – ShelfMediaGroup.com Margaret@ShelfMediaGroup.com
3 Key Points:
Learn how to fail. Then learn how to fail faster.
You don’t always need a ton of money per month to be profitable…just keep your overhead low.
Embrace who you are—don’t fight it.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.
Press Rush – A media tool Margaret loves
Alex Blumberg – CEO of Gimlet Media
BlinkPlan – Margaret’s favorite online tool
The Four Hour Work Week – Time Ferris’ book
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/8/2016 • 22 minutes, 6 seconds
How To Grow a $10 Million Annual Recurring Revenue SaaS Business Jared Fuller Episode 193
Ep 193 Jared Fuller (Recovering) CEO of PandaDoc, a company that’s focused on making the digitization of documents a simply smooth process. Listen as Nathan and Jared talk about venture debt, the hidden value of recurring revenue, and Jared’s famous title of “Recovering CEO”.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:05 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show01:28 – Living as a “Recovering CEO”01:55 – Recurring revenue is the way to go02:09 – Screwed up lots of stuff, but that’s OK02:23 – MRR before everything crashed02:50 – Fought over stupid stuff that had nothing to do with getting customers03:20 – Make sure you start a company with someone who’s done it before04:12 – Get focused on getting shit done05:55 – Talking about PandaDoc—going after the document as a whole06:50 – How PandaDoc makes money06:55 – Panda could be profitable tomorrow if it wanted to be07:50 – Talking venture debt (Square1 and Silicon Valley Bank)08:12 – The revenue and books on PandaDoc are SO good venture debt made sense09:35 – 4% interest rate11:00 – People raise money in a short-sighted way—huge mistake11:45 – 25 team members in Belarus and 40 people in San Francisco13:20 – The library of free templates is the secret sauce of PandaDoc’s SEO success14:35 – The big deals are in outbound client acquisition15:40 – Jared@PandaDoc.com
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Leadership and Self-DeceptionWhat CEO do you follow?— NoWhat is your favorite online tool?— YesWareDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Understand the value of recurring revenue—stop relying on project based fees
3 Key Points:Recurring revenue is the key to happiness and success.Start a business with people you can REALLY trust and (ideally) people that have done it before.Do NOT raise money in a short-sighted way.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Leadership and Self-Deception – Jared’s favorite bookYesWare -- The tool Jared couldn't live withoutSquare1 and Silicon Valley Bank – The big players in venture debt
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/7/2016 • 21 minutes, 26 seconds
How to Sell 10,000 Units of a Physical Product Fast with Cathryn and Allen Episode 192
Ep 192 Nathan speaks with Cathryn and Allen, the founders of The Best Self Co., a business dedicated to helping entrepreneurs think big, stay focused, and get more done. Listen as Nathan and the duo talk about using Shopify to grow their business and promoting on Kickstarter.The BestSelf Co. started as a project between two entrepreneurs, Cathryn and Allen, who were on a journey to creating a life they loved, through building their respective businesses and being able to quit their day jobs.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show01:28 – Cathryn and Allen join the show. 01:40 – Bestself.co is a company dedicated to people to help them become the best version of themselves. 03:40 – Cathryn and Allen got the idea for the company when they started applying the principles of successful time management in their work lives and started seeing results. 04:20 – They did a Kickstarter to fund their first big batch of products. 05:44 – BestSelf Co. makes about 70% profit margins per product. 07:04 – Go to Bestself.co and use code “NATHAN” to get a 10% discount. 08:06 – The business uses Shopify because they have experience using it along being entered in a competition.09:59 – BestSelf Co. creates their products with a framework in mind – so users can reach milestones day-to-day. 12:00 – Dear Top Tribe, tweet to @NathanLatka on Twitter about how you organize your daily notes. 13:16 – In the first couple weeks, BestSelf Co.’s generated roughly 16K in revenue. 15:03 – BestSelf’s concept started in May – since then they’ve gotten 19K email subscribers. 17:15 – BestSelf’s products are designed with principles of psychology and aesthetics to create a pleasant user experience. 18:26 – Host Gator: Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable19:07 – Famous Five21:46 – What’s Nathan doing after selling his business Heyo? Find out at Nathanlatka.com/whatsnext.
Famous 5Favorite Book? – The Four Hour Work WeekWhat CEO do you follow?— Tim FerrissWhat is your favorite online tool?— Slack Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— YesIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Get started as soon as you can doing what you want to do.
3 Key Points:You can use Shopify to help you sell things in your online store. BestSelf’s products combine aesthetics, productivity psychology, and various useful tools to increase the value of their planners and other products.Kickstarter is a great way to gauge interest in a business/product and to raise money. You can set milestones to further interact with your potential audience.Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Bestself.co – Cathryn and Allen’s business. Use promo code ‘NATHAN’ to get 10% off.
@bestselfco – TwitterHost Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Slack – Web tool used by Cathryn and AllenThe Four Hour Work Week – Favorite book by the duo.Tim Ferriss – CEO the duo follows.
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/7/2016 • 22 minutes, 18 seconds
The Right Way to Do Real Estate with Engelo Rumora Episode 194
Ep 194 Engelo Rumora a property developer who also owns Ohio Cash Flow a multi-million dollar Turnkey Real Estate Investment company based in Toledo, Ohio that specializes in providing turnkey properties in the Toledo, Dayton, Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio markets. Listen as Nathan and Engelo talk about establishing a secure property portfolio, the art of the hustle, and why you need to keep throwing the “mud.”
Time Stamped Show Notes:02:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show01:28 – Living as a “Recovering CEO”02:40 – Building a $1M portfolio at a young age03:45 – Engelo was losing money on his mortgage payments04:50 – Optimizing real estate investments for cash flow05:09 – Establish an end-goal? How much money do you need per month to live on your own terms?05:39 – Every piece of property you buy needs to bring you closer to your goal06:38 – Engelo was 23 when he started doing the real estate investment work07:05 – Making $80K per year as a laborer08:40 – Hope is not a strategy—it’s for people with terminal illnesses09:30 – Talking about Engelo’s plans for his portfolio10:13 – At this time, Engelo only has 3, residential properties11:25 – Goal for this year is to close 250+ deals11:45 – How Engelo finds his deals?—any means necessary12:53 – Life is about the hustle—keep throwing mud, eventually it will stick13:50 – Profits derived from property investors with a penchant for rentals14:39 – It’s not about leaving a legacy, it’s about helping people16:24 – Google Engelo Romero
Famous 5Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence PeopleWhat CEO do you follow?— Nido QubeinWhat is your favorite online tool?— HipChatDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— NoIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be more patient
3 Key Points:Be patient.Beware the dangers of refinancing on your property.Hustle your ass off.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable.Nido Qubein – The CEO Engelo adoresHipChat -- The tool Engleo couldn't live withoutSquare1 and Silicon Valley Bank – The big players in venture debt
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/7/2016 • 20 minutes, 56 seconds
Jack Dorsey's Last Boss Tells True Story in Episode 191 with Tony Stubblebine
EP 191 Tony Stubblebine, the CEO and co-founder at Coach.me. Listen as Nathan and Tony talk about different branches of coaching and the latter’s claim to fame as Jack Dorsey’s last boss.
Bio Tony Stubblebine co-founded Coach.Me (formerly knows as Lift) on the idea that positive reinforcement and community support could be deployed universally to help people achieve their goals. Prior to Coach.Me, he was the founder and CEO of CrowdVine Event Social Networks, which builds simple and powerful social software to help people connect and meet. He was part of the Wesabe launch team, Director of Engineering at Odeo.com and Engineering Lead for O’Reilly Media. He is the author of Regular Expression Pocket Reference (O’Reilly).
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:54 – Tony joins the show. * 02:27 – Tony refused to be interviewed for the book Hatching Twitter so that he could write his own book one day. His claim to fame is ‘the last boss of Jack Dorsey.’
05:01 – Tony talks about Coach.me which hit 1 million users.
07:16 – Mechanically Coach.me was a success because it was successful in revenue, conversion, and results from the service.
09:10 – Coach.me takes a 50% cut of coaching fees as a revenue source.
10:03 – Digital coaching is when the coaching happens on a messaging based relationship. Coaches can pay a smaller cut to use the tools from Coach.me.
11:18 – In 2014, they grossed 82K$, 2015 they grossed 650K$. They project 2 million dollars in 2016.
12:22 – There are roughly 5K coaches in the database, of which there are varying degrees of commitment by the coaches.
13:49 – Rolling notes can be open or closed based on a business’s scaling.
14:34 – Tony talks about LTV (lifetime value) and how his business interacts with the metric.
16:12 – Many people tend to hire more than one coach. Unlike other branches of coaching, Coach.me has enough information to know what’s working and what isn’t.
16:47 – Jack Dorsey was a good employee while he worked under Tony. * 17:42 – Host Gator: Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable
18:20 – Famous Five
Famous 5 * Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things * What CEO do you follow?— Evan Williams * What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Sometimes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Have faith in yourself to work on a life mission instead of thinking about salary and location of a job.
3 Key Points:
1. Digital coaching is a branch of coaching when the client maintains constant communication through digital media.
2. Rolling notes is a way of raising funds that can be open or closed depending on business scalability. Burned money is cash that is leaving the bank account while running a business.
3. Many people tend to hire more than one coach. Unlike other branches of coaching, Coach.me has enough information to know what’s working and what isn’t.
Resources Mentioned: * Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. * Host Gator - Powerful web hosting made easy and affordable * Coach.me – Tony’s business * LinkedIn – Tony’s LinkedIn * The Hard Thing About Hard Things – Tony’s favorite business book * Evan Williams - CEO Tony follows * Evernote – Tony’s favorite online tool
Credits Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/6/2016 • 22 minutes, 48 seconds
How Latergram.me Grew to $50k/mo, 500,000 users, $1.2m Raised in Episode 190 with Matt Smith
Ep 190 Matt Smith, the founder of Latergramme and Thinkific. Listen as Nathan and Matt talk about how the latter left a 10K MRR business to work on a marketing platform for Instagram.
BioMatt previously started 2 profitable self-funded startups. Most recently he co-founded Latergramme, a visual content marketing platform that makes visual marketing a snap. The app one to aggregate, curate, schedule and optimize visual marketing campaigns across all visual social media networks.
Time Stamped Show Notes:01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show01:29 – Matt joins the show.02:30 – Thinkific is a platform that allows one to create, market, and sell online courses.03:53 – Matt created Latergramme at a hackathon while he was also work on Thinkific.04:20 – Latergramme allows one to create a publishing schedule for Instagram that automates marketing. 05:17 – Matt was making about 10K MRR (monthly recurring revenue) when he left Thinkific for Latergramme. His brother is still CEO. 07:00 – Matt believes his company Latergramme is well on its way to over 100K MRR by the end of 2016. 07:35 – The app was created in 2013, but wasn’t launched until May 2014. They did a beta list launch. 08:40 – Leading up to the May release, Matt built an audience of 20K through bloggers, article writers, and other online influencers. 09:30 – Matt built a VIP program as a marketing tactic and spent most of his evenings up to the release writing to potential users personally. 10:54 – Latergramme is currently free, but the business has 50K MRR soon to be 88K MRR. (1 million ARR).11:30 – The business is focusing on expanding user-base as its priority right now. 11:56 – The government covers a huge portion of salary for the people working at Latergramme. There are grants for SAAS based businesses in Vancouver. 12:37 – Latergramme has about 40K active users. 13:25 – 5% churn. 14:16 – Latergramme does no paid acquisition. Maybe in the future.15:31 – 25-30% month over month growth goal for 2016.16:42 - Rocketship.vc is an investment group that’s been giving Latergramme a hand. 18:42 – As the founder of the company, Matt pays himself south of 100K.21:25 – Find out what Nathan’s doing after selling his business Heyo at nathanlatka.com/whatsnext on February 4th. 22:08 – Famous Five
Famous 5Favorite Book? – Thinking Fast and Slow What CEO do you follow?— Hiton ShahWhat is your favorite online tool?— FitbitDo you get 8 hours of sleep?— Trying toIf you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— You don’t need a job.
3 Key Points:The government grants money to SAAS based businesses in the city of Vancouver. Latergramme does no paid acquisition but nevertheless projects to grow 25-30% per month. Matt hyped up the business by writing emails to influencers in the field who would write articles about the service.A convertible note is a short-term debt that converts into equity. Read more about it at Tech Crunch.
Resources Mentioned:Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. @symana – Matt’s TwitterLinkedIn – Matt’s LinkedInLatergramme – Matt’s businessThinkific – Create, market, sell online coursesThinking Fast and Slow – Matt’s favorite bookFitbit – Online tool Matt usesRocketshipVC – Venture capital group backing MattConvertible Note – What is it?
CreditsShow Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/6/2016 • 24 minutes, 47 seconds
He Made $750k in November, 2015 From Tee Shirt Quilts in Episode 189 with Nathan Rothstein
Ep 189 Nathan Rothstein, the co-founder at Project Repat, a custom quilt blanket design shop. Listen as Nathan and Nathan talk about not only the latter’s business numbers but also how they’re affecting American manufacturing.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribe
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Without the help of a big company like Groupon it’s a mystery whether Project Repat would have nearly as much success as they do today. They were able to be featured for less cost because they were a social good company.
The market for repurposed t-shirts as quilt already existed, but Project Repat excels because they have affordable pricing and has more ad spend.
Nathan uses the online tool Klaviyo to more effectively use his email list to reach new customers.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:39 – Rothstein joins the show.
03:01 – Rothstein’s business partner was in Nairobi where Project Repat was inspired.
04:09 – Project Repat makes money by repurposing old t-shirts into keepsake quilt blankets. 04:38 – Depending on the size, each quilt costs from 75 to 250$.
05:25 – After expenses, Project Repat clears about 35-45% margin on each quilt.
06:05 – They’ve made about 1,000 quilts per week in 2016.
07:10 – Project Repat’s goal is 7.5 million in topline revenue.
08:22 – Project Repat was part of a social good accelerator called Better Ventures in 2012 – they’ve contributed to the revival of the textile industry in the U.S..
09:33 – It was difficult to get investment money for a quilt business. Rothstein and his partner had to sleep in the office at times.
10:21 – They ran into a big boon when they Groupon featured them without taking a percentage because they were a social good business.
12:02 – In 2012-2013, Project Repat acquired a lot of customers through flash sales.
13:17 – Project Repat spent about 750K on Facebook advertising last year.
14:00 – Repurposing t-shirts into quilts isn’t a new idea, but Project Repat expanded the market by making their products more affordable and visible through advertisements.
15:00 – Rothstein spends from 5-7$ to get a new email. Last year they got about 50K emails and 7.5K customers from their list.
15:32 – Project Repat uses Klaviyo to expand their email marketing list.
17:36 – Find out what Nathan’s doing after selling his business Heyo at nathanlatka.com/whatsnext on February 4th.
18:37 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book? – Do the Kind Thing
What CEO do you follow?— Howard Schultz and Hamdi Ulukaya
What is your favorite online tool?— Klaviyo
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Be more open to different stages of life – everyone’s going through their own thing. Throughout the course of your life you’ll be doing different things.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Project Repat – Nathan’s business
Howard Schultz and Hamdi Ulukaya – CEO’s Nathan follows
Do the Kind Thing – Nathan’s favorite book
Klaviyo – Build your email list, Nathan’s favorite online tool.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/6/2016 • 22 minutes, 46 seconds
He's 32 and raised $136m in Funding But It's About More Than That with Josh Reeves EP 186:
EP 186 Josh Reeves CEO of Gusto
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/5/2016 • 20 minutes, 45 seconds
How Lifehacker Went from 1m to 10m Monthly Uniques Fast with Whitson Gordon EP 187
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/5/2016 • 19 minutes, 36 seconds
They hit $100k/mo in revenue in 2015, now raising $2.5m round of funding with Eran Eyal episode 188
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/5/2016 • 17 minutes, 33 seconds
My Company Was Just Acquired, Here's Whats Next with Nathan Latka
Ep 184 Heyo gets acquired, Nathan continues to tell-all about the selling of Heyo. In this part, he focuses on ‘due diligence’ and the business post-acquisition.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
00:00 – Nathan’s talks with Jim Risner, a co-CEO of Votigo.
01:30 – Nathan signed the LOI offered by Votigo.
01:53 – Jim talks about Votigo, a social marketing promotions platform.
03:22 – Nathan kept leverage and created a safety net by keeping Letters of Intent from other companies in case the signed deal with Votigo fell through during ‘due diligence.’
04:37 – Sue Zimmerman joins the show, one of Nathan’s first customers at Heyo.
06:41 – Nathan does The Top Podcast because he loves being out in front of people, not for the money.
07:38 – Joe Snider weighs in on what he thinks Nathan should do with his podcast now that Heyo is being sold.
08:56 – Autumn Beam of the Write Your Own Story podcast calls in.
10:05 – Nathan talks to Jim Risner about Heyo’s future post-acquisition – there are none to few changes planned.
11:09 – Nathan and Jim discuss red flags when it comes to business acquisition and due diligence.
12:40 – DJ Stephan, a highly accomplished entrepreneur and podcast listener calls in to advise Nathan.
15:03 – Nathan docu-signs the acquisition deal and sells Heyo.
18:29 – Get your mind in something, build it, hustle hard, ignore haters, and ride momentum to winning.
19:07 – What’s next for Nathan? Find out live on February 4th in his webinar.
3 Key Points:
While waiting on due diligence, Nathan kept leverage and created a safety net by keeping Letters of Intent from other companies in case the signed deal with Votigo fell through.
Entrepreneurs often have strong intuition or ‘gut feeling.’ Sometimes it’s wise to trust your instincts or to find out why you’re feeling a certain way.
Nathan’s signed the deal to sell Heyo! What’s next for him? Find out on his webinar launching on Feb. 4th.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Heyo – Contests, sweepstakes, and campaign landing pages.
Votigo – Social Marketing platform that acquired Heyo.
Write Your Own Story – Podcast by caller Autumn Beam
SkySlope – Caller D.J. Stephan’s business
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe athttp://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 20 minutes, 14 seconds
Blab goal is 7% week over week growth. Here's how the Founder will do it with Shaan Puri CEO of Blab Episode 185
Ep 185 Shaan Puri, a co-founder of Blab, a media platform that lets you listen in on conversations between experts in just about any field. Listen as Nathan and Shaan talk about how the latter plans to monetize his growing business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets
Bio Shawn Puril is the co-founder of Blab – previously he opened a sushi restaurant, bio-tech startup, and ran an idea lab in San Francisco.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:21 – Sean joins the show.
02:53 – Blab is in beta. It’s like Skype, but it has a public forum feature that allows users to listen in on an interview or call-in.
03:45 – The average daily active user is watching for a little over an hour a day.
05:04 – People can tune into the conversation of CEO’s or other topics or people they care about.
06:28 – Blab covers a lot of niche audiences such as RV’s and old book collecting.
07:28 – Blab has a feature that allows more audience and broadcaster interaction.
08:22 – Anyone can use the platform – from at-home hobbyists to professionals from big name companies.
09:13 – Blab is privately funded – their business model is similar to that of TV, they plan to monetize with sponsors in the future.
10:30 – The Blab team is aiming to grow big enough so that users can make a living off of broadcasting on the site.
11:17 – Blab’s current goal is an increase of 7% of viewers every week.
12:13 – Blab’s team consists of 15 members.
14:31 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- Rework by Fried and Hansson
What CEO do you follow?— Conor McGregor
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Forget the classes, forget the grades. Build about 5 really great connections that’ll last you a lifetime at University.
3 Key Points:
Blab is a media platform on which users can listen in on calls conducted by just about anyone (hobbyist to professional) on any variety of topics. There are also features that allow listener/broadcaster interaction.
Blab is privately funded – in the future once they have enough viewers, they plan on running ads to monetize traffic.
Blab is unlike Netflix and YouTube in that it’s a live stream and covers any variety of topics by any type of profession.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
@shaanvp – Shaan’s Twitter
Blab – Shaan’s business
Rework by Fried and Hansson– Shaan’s favorite business book
Conor McGregor– CEO Shaan follows
Slack – Shaan’s favorite online tool
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
Startup COO Leaves after 500 Accelerator, Left with 1% Equity with Jules Hill Episode 183
Ep 183 Jules Hill, the analytics manager of the startup Windsor Circle . Listen as Nathan and Jules talk about the latter’s previous experiences as the COO of Cellbreaker.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
BioJules Hill was born in England, grew up in Mexico, and went to the U.S. for college. After graduating early from Kenan-Flagler business school he dedicated two years to the venture backed startup CellBreaker as COO.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:34 – Jules joins the show.
01:51 – CellBreaker had raised about 50K when Jules joined it full time.
02:38 – When he started, he got equity and pay, but it wasn’t much.
03:47 – He was paid 20K a year at the startup when he first started and he’d just bought a house.
05:02 – One of the milestones CellBreaker reached was getting accepted to the 500 startups programs in California which granted the business 100K.
06:19 – Jules gets paid as a reserve in the marine corp., rents out a room in his house, and does freelance jobs occasionally to make ends meet where he can.
07:00 – Nathan and Jules breaks down the money he’s made through each means.
08:31 – Jules left CellBreaker when the startup didn’t meet the milestones he thought they would. However, it was a valuable learning experience.
09:48 – Jules talks about the legal ramifications that slowed down CellBreaker’s progress.
10:55 – Jules possesses 1% equity in CellBreaker.
11:45 – Currently Jules works at a new startup called Windsor Circle. It helps retailers increase their customer lifetime value and customer retention.
12:23 – Jules is the analytics manager at the new startup.
13:25 – Jules is making significantly more than 20K
15:26 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Tufte
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Google’s Ngram viewer
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— You’re always going to be able to make it work. Don’t be afraid to take risks. Ask yourself ‘what’s the worst that could happen?’
3 Key Points:
Being involved in extraneous legal matters will really bog down a business.
It can be a dilemma deciding between going to work for a well-established business or a startup straight out of school.
Making ends meet can be an eclectic task because there are a variety of ways to make money here and there.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
LinkedIn – Jules’s LinkedIn
Windsor Circle – Jules’s current business
CellBreaker – Jules’s previous business
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information – Jules’s favorite business book
Elon Musk – CEO Jules follows
Google’s Ngram viewer – Jules’s favorite online tool
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 18 minutes, 25 seconds
19 years old, in college, has sales, will she drop out with Lila Zimmerman Episode 182
Ep 182 Lila Zimmerman, the founder of Fresh Fit, and Fearless, dedicated to the promotion of healthy lifestyles. Listen as Nathan and Lila talk about
Bio Lila Zimmerman is a 19 year old college student from Boston, MA and is currently a sophomore at the University of Maryland. Her passion for health and fitness moved her to create an Instagram account to share her lifestyle.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:46 – Kristi joins the show.
02:13 – Kristi uses Instagram to market partner products and promote her e-book on healthy living.
02:46 – Kristi launched her Instagram account summer 2014. She got to a thousand followers in a year. And now she has 15K followers.
03:11 – Instagram pictures are popular through consistency, quality, good hashtags, and interacting/networking with other accounts.
03:42 – Lila talks about using Share for Share to grow her Instagram account.
04:54 – Traffic is directed from Lila’s Instagram bio to her website.
05:15 – Nathan talks about a useful bitly tip to track clicks from url’s.
06:31 – Writing her e-book took about 2 months and it costs 14.99$ to download. It’s sold 900$ worth of copies.
07:40 – Lila talks about what’s next for her as an entrepreneur – creating a new e-book.
09:00 – Lila would pursue her business full time if it generated 9K a month.
10:56 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk
What CEO do you follow?— Suja Juice
What is your favorite online tool?—IconoSquare
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 15 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Eventually you’ll find something you’re passionate about.
3 Key Points:
Popular Instagram posts possess consistency, high quality, good hashtags, and interact/network with other accounts.
Share for share is a good way to grow your social media account. Accounts with a similar target audience can both grow their audiences by mutually sharing a post.
You can track the number of clicks a bitly link has generated by adding a plus notation after the link.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Instagram – Lila’s Instagram
Fresh Fit Fearless – Lila’s website
Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook – Lila’s favorite business book
Suja Juice – Business Lila follows
IconoSquare – Lila’s favorite online tool
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 16 minutes, 50 seconds
How to Quit Corporate for a Startup with Kristi Zulkhe Episode 181
Ep 181 Kristi Zulkhe, the CEO and co-founder of KnowledgeHound. Listen as Nathan and Kristi talk about how the latter’s company turns a profit curing corporate amnesia.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio
Kristi Zulkhe is an entrepreneur idea generator and global consumer insights and strategy expert with six years of proven strategic leadership and experience at Procter and Gamble and three years of being CEO at her startup KnowledgeHound. In the summer of 2011, she founded a new consumer solution to pursue her own passion for innovation and impacting lives.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
02:07 – Kristi joins the show.
02:36 – KnowledgeHound is a business dedicated to curing corporate amnesia.
03:09 – Many businesses forget the research they’ve done in the past. They end up wasting a lot of money and time.
04:17 – They’re a software service email subscription business model. They load a business’s data onto a database and apply a search engine to it.
05:04 – Pricing is all custom based on the enterprise level and it’s dependent on how many studies they have. Companies pay on an annual subscription basis.
06:03 – KnowledgeHound has been growing in double digits since they’ve started. Their key metric is number of clients, monthly recurring revenue, and adoption rate.
07:03 – The business is aiming for 5 million in revenue for 2016.
08:47 – Kristi gave up a six figure salary to work on KnowledgeHound.
09:31 – As an entrepreneur, Kristi’s ventures are not about the money.
10:56 – Kristi’s biggest investment in her business was her time. She spent 12-14 hour workdays 6 days a week.
12:38 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- The Hard Thing About Hard Things
What CEO do you follow?— Michelle Hayward and Amanda Lannert
What is your favorite online tool?— Droplr
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Remember that your work is all about your journey and your present impact, not necessarily the end result.
3 Key Points:
Many businesses have a problem recalling research they conducted in previous years. Services like KnowledgeHound seek to fix the problem by importing business data and applying a search engine.
For some entrepreneurs, the venture is not about the money – it’s natural drive that pushes them towards their goals.
For KnowledgeHound, pricing is dependent on the number of studies that need to be stored in their database.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
@zulk10 – Kristi’s Twitter
KnowledgeHound – Kristi’s business
LinkedIn – Kristi’s LinkedIn
The Hard Thing About Hard Things – Kristi’s favorite business book
Michelle Hayward and Amanda Lannert – CEO’s Kristi keeps up with.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 16 minutes, 30 seconds
She Focuses on Energy and Did $1.2m Last Year with Sheevaun Moran Ep 180
Ep 180 Sheevaun Moran, the founder and creator of the Energetic Solutions, Inc ® Success Systems. Listen as Nathan and Sheevaun talk about her conference Epic Life and building a reliable list.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Often having people on your list from previous ventures will bring them back in present ventures. Sheevaun still gets responses from people on her list who know her from older projects like her podcast.
Audio visual equipment and services often costs a big portion of expenses when holding an event such as a conference.
Social media platforms are efficient customer acquisition channels.
Sheevaun is the founder and creator of the Energetic Solutions, Inc.® Success Systems. - Devoted to teaching the world’s entrepreneurs and leaders the authentic and audacious Energetic Principles with practical step-by-step ‘How-To’s’, to fulfill their legacy or dream. Sheevaun has helped over 15,000 people to achieve their dream, trained thousands to have clarity, calm and vibrant health while building their businesses.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:37 – Sheevaun joins the show.
01:45 – Sheevaun helps people achieve their dreams by helping them to unlock their potential.
02:49 – In 2015, Sheevaun’s largest revenue stream was through coaching.
03:08 – The entry level coaching costs 997$ and is called Epic Life. It focuses on breaking through perceived limits we put on ourselves.
04:53 – The last Epic Life conference was in California in early December. 150 people signed up for the conference, but only 120 showed up.
06:02 – The expenses totaled up to about 50K for the conference (room/food) and from participation sales the conference brought in about 2-3K per member.
07:05 – For the last conference, Sheevaun paid 25K for the Audio Visual services.
08:34 – People on Sheevaun’s list come from a wide variety of sources such as her inactive podcast. (150 Episodes in 2011).
09:05 – Sheevaun has 50K efficient emails on her list.
09:58 – Sheevaun relies on Facebook ads and Twitter for advertising channels. She spent about 12-15K for the last conference.
10:33 – Webinars are the new things Sheevaun hopes to utilize efficiently. She has about 10 people on her team. 1.2 million dollar revenue in 2015.
13:21 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- Double Double and As a Man Thinketh
What CEO do you follow?— Mark Cuban
What is your favorite online tool?— Trello
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Sometimes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Think bigger and make sure you keep your health intact for the long play.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Epic Life – Entry level coaching created by Sheevaun.
com – Sheevaun’s website
LinkedIn – Sheevaun’s LinkedIn
Trello – Sheevaun’s favorite online tool
Mark Cuban – Website Sheevaun keeps up with.
Double Double and As a Man Thinketh – Sheevaun’s favorite business books
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/4/2016 • 15 minutes, 24 seconds
How to Sell an Expensive Course FAST with Sue Zimmerman Episode 24
Sue Zimmerman Episode 24 Instagram
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/3/2016 • 17 minutes, 52 seconds
The Confident Way to Quit Your Corporate Job with Greg Hickman
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/3/2016 • 23 minutes, 3 seconds
The Art of Building Something From Scratch with Shahar Gilad
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/3/2016 • 17 minutes, 21 seconds
How YoShirt App Went from $0-$1m Fast with Ben Williamson of YoShirt Episode 23
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/1/2016 • 26 minutes, 5 seconds
Genius Way to Go From Freelance to $100k/Year with Jamie Turner of Sixty Marketer Episode 22
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/1/2016 • 18 minutes, 46 seconds
Afghan War Fighter Now Makes $500k/mo in Weird Market with John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur On Fire Episode 21
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
3/1/2016 • 20 minutes, 51 seconds
Getting 20,000 Buyers for Your InfoProduct with Sean Malarkey of LinkedInfluence Ep 17
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/29/2016 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
You Won't Believe How He Makes $64k Per WEEK with Jordan Harbinger of Art of Charm Episode 20
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/29/2016 • 21 minutes, 42 seconds
His Underwear Story Was Secret Until Now with Franklin Cole
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/29/2016 • 18 minutes, 27 seconds
Creative Way to Get Customers From Instagram with Daniel Vitiello of HandGround
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
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Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/28/2016 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
Convincing Affiliates To Market For You with Sean Wycliff of DealFlicks Ep 14
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
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Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/28/2016 • 21 minutes, 9 seconds
He Crowdfuned $1m. You Won't Believe Why with Christian Smith of Trackr Ep 13
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/28/2016 • 17 minutes, 47 seconds
Mom of 4 Teaches How To Land First Paid Speaking Gig with Carrie Wilkerson of The Barefoot Executive
Carrie Wilkerson Episode 12
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/27/2016 • 20 minutes, 40 seconds
Ethical Way To Build Membership Site with Tracy Matthews
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/27/2016 • 15 minutes, 32 seconds
This Creative Thinker Makes Bank on Real Estate In Weird Way With Ben Uyeda of Homemade Modern
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/27/2016 • 21 minutes, 3 seconds
Does This Ford Dealership Sell The Most Cars Ever? with Cameron Johnson Ep 9
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/26/2016 • 16 minutes, 9 seconds
How GoPro Went from $300k to $600M In Sales in Weird Way with Ron Lynch Ep 8
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/26/2016 • 18 minutes, 31 seconds
The Smart Way To Quit Your Corporate Job with Kevin Lavelle Ep 7
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
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2/26/2016 • 15 minutes, 35 seconds
How to Sell 1.5 Million Books Bob Burg Ep 7
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/25/2016 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
He Got 5000 Customers In Weird Way with Kevin Wilke Ep 5
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/25/2016 • 17 minutes, 13 seconds
From Student to $10m Entrepreneur with Nick Kneuper of Electric Threads Ep 4
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/25/2016 • 20 minutes, 3 seconds
Under 30, Made $5m, Tells Me He Loves Me Dane Maxwell Ep 2
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/24/2016 • 24 minutes, 6 seconds
How To Build App Worth $10m With 3 Million Users with Ida Tin of Clue EP 154
Ep 154 features Ida Tin , who’s the co-founder and CEO of Clue, the world’s fastest growing period tracking and fertility application.
Ida Tin is the co-founder and CEO of Clue, a digital female health company based in Berlin, Germany whose Clue app is acclaimed as the most streamlined, user-friendly menstrual cycle tracking app available. Born in Copenhagen, Ida graduated from Denmark’s prestigious creative business school, KaosPilots. A lifelong entrepreneur, she previously led motorcycle tours around the world and published a book about her experience, “Direktøs” which became a Danish bestseller.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Working in several different fields fosters unexpected skills that become useful in other occupations and ventures.
Clue was made because nobody had come up with a modern and data-driven innovation to help women manage their reproductive health.
Don’t let your age be an obstacle to your plans. Every age has unique strengths that can be utilized immediately.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:41 – Ida joins the show
01:41 – Clue doesn’t generate revenue right now, the company is focused on growth.
02:24 – Clue’s raised about 10 million from Union Square Ventures and other investors.
03:09 – Before working on Clue, Ida had a jewelry startup in London and also ran a motorcycle touring company.
03:45 – Despite working in seemingly unrelated fields, Ida’s found that her eclectic experiences help her with current ventures.
04:42 – Clue was made because nobody had come up with a modern and data-driven innovation to help women manage their reproductive health.
05:48 – The company was founded by five people – they were funded 50K euros by investors in the beginning.
08:59 – Clue is approaching 3 million active users (using the app at least once a month).
11:20 – Luckily since Clue has several investors, they’re able to put off creating a revenue channel, while growing their user base.
12:24 – Clue currently has 24 employees.
13:42 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Clue – Ida’s period tracking and fertility app.
@idatin – Ida’s twitter.
LinkedIn – Ida’s LinkedIn.
CrunchBase – Ida’s CrunchBase
Hard Things About Hard Things – Book Ida stands by
Slack – Online tool Ida likes
Pocket – another online tool
Trello – Another online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Hard Things About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz
What CEO do you follow?— Vanessa Lee Bush
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack, Pocket, Trello
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— More or less
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Each age has their unique strengths, go full force with your creative energy regardless of how old you are.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/23/2016 • 17 minutes, 41 seconds
How do You Sell for $90m with NO REVENUE?! EP 167
Ep 167 Eran Eyal, the CEO and founder at Springleap, a marketplace of 180K advertising agency experts. Listen as Nathan and Eran talk about the latter’s extensive experiences as an entrepreneur and the valuation of SAAS businesses.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
The valuation of a SAAS model business may not necessarily be only evaluated on a multiplier. There are a variety of factors that can influence its value.
It can be prudent to start small as an inexperienced entrepreneur – E-Squared, Eran’s clothing and coffee based retail business was a labor of love and learning.
By building and integrating a successful marketplace into his crowdsourcing drag-and-drop business, Eran was able to increase its value.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show.
01:34 – Eran joins the show.
02:20 – Eran describes his time with E-Squared, an apparel and coffee based retail business.
03:51 – E-Squared started in 2006 and was sold in 2008.
04:34 – The business had two locations and didn’t produce a massive exit. 3-4X in topline revenue.
05:31 – Eran describes his second business which relied on crowdsourcing.
09:00 – Initially the drag-and-drop crowdsourcing software wasn’t SAAS based. But it quickly switched because clients preferred paying a SAAS model.
10:11 – At its peak, the crowdsourcing business had about 37 large customers and several small ones.
10:36 – The highest MR (marginal revenue) for the crowdsourcing business was about 250K a month.
11:45 – One of Eran’s strengths is building a successful marketplace, a skill that helped him strengthen his drag-and-drop crowdsourcing business.
12:29 – Nathan and Eran discuss tying the valuation of a SAAS business to annual recurring revenue.
13:37 – Eran gives an example of why a MRR SAAS based business shouldn’t be valuated with only a multiplier.
14:35 – 7X to 10X is a good multiplier on ARR (annual recurring revenue) for a SAAS based business being sold, but it hinges on a variety of factors.
15:43 – While Nathan believes that anything other than the multiplier is only speculation, Eran believes that the speculation affects valuation significantly.
16:01 – Eran explains/defends his stance on speculation’s impact on valuation.
18:05 – Eran will be back on the show to talk more about Springleap. No Famous Five for this episode.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Edgar – A tool Nathan uses to add pieces of content to a library and automate content distribution on media platforms.
Springleap – Eran’s business
@EranEyal – Eran’s twitter
Clarity – Eran’s Clarity
eran@springleap.com – Eran’s email
LinkedIn – Frank’s LinkedIn
Crunchbase – Springleap, Eran’s current business
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/23/2016 • 21 minutes, 27 seconds
Why We Turned Down a $35 Milllion Acquisition Offer With Russell Brunson of ClickFunnels
Ep 137 Russell Brunson joins Nathan.
Russell Brunson is a trail blazer in the world of internet marketing, becoming most famous for his sophisticated use of split testing. Russell started his first business while studying at University, selling over a million dollars’ worth of his own products and services from his own basement by the time he graduated. Since then, he has started and built diverse businesses including software company ClickFunnels and coaching company DotComSecrets.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
You can create an astoundingly profitable consulting business by providing a bridge between software and the concept behind the software
When you go the VC route, your board members become your customers and the REAL customers are the ones who lose out.
If the goose is laying the golden egg—don’t tinker.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:35 – Russell joins the show
01:46 – Russell talks about what he was selling in college—POTATO GUNS
02:15 – Russell is 35 years old
02:35 – Dot Com Secrets is Russell’s coaching company—ClickFunnelsis the result
03:39 – Dot Com Secrets is also a book now
04:04 – The company (DCS not CF) will do between $6-7 million by the end of the year
04:20 – Most ClickFunnels members ultimately become consulting clients in one way or another
04:55 – Bridging the gap between the software and the concept
06:13 – The call-to-action in Russell’s book
07:20 – 18% of ClickFunnel customers pay $300 a month—everyone else pays $100
08:08 – Defying the venture capital route
09:13 – Defining the ultimate goal with ClickFunnels
11:16 – Ironing out the equity split
11:29 – Russell sank over $1,000,000 to get Click Funnels off the ground
13:10 – It’s not always about what your partner’s bring—it’s about how much you respect them
14:20 – Customer acquisition cost
15:05 – 80% of new clients are organic, 20% are from affiliates
18:30 – Click Funnels list is ½ million people
18:45 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?—Rework
What CEO do you follow?— None
What is your favorite online tool?—Tomorrow.do
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Understand the power of working for people for FREE
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
ClickFunnels – Russell’s newest company
Dot Com Secrets – Russell’s consulting company
Dot Com Secrets – Russell’s book
Rework – Russell’s favorite business book
Tomorrow.do – THE digital tool Russell could not live without
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe athttp://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/17/2016 • 21 minutes, 32 seconds
This is The Worlds Most Influential, Powerful Investor with Tim Draper of DFJ Venture (Timothy Draper)
Ep 129 Tim Draper of DFJ Venture (Timothy Draper) joins Nathan.
Tim Draper was a founding partner of Draper Associates and DFJ. He has raised ten core funds totaling more than $10 BILLION, hired and led a team of partners, invested in hundreds of earlystage private companies, including Baidu, Tesla, Hotmail, Skype, Parametric Technology, Digidesign, TwitchTV, Theranos and Overture. He has extended his reach through the building of the Draper Venture Network with 14 funds covering 30 cities around the world, through the creation of Draper University, a school and ecosystem dedicated to preparing entrepreneurs, and through building a high-profile brand to generate deal flow.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Entrepreneurs need to be comfortable with changing rules
California is falling behind in business, education. Division of the state would improve results.
Viral marketing is a good thing.
Episode Notes:
00:58 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:43 – Skype investment – Tim was in the first Skype video call, his username is ‘Tim’
02:52 – Skype investment less than $10 million. Sold for $4 billion to ebay
04:08 – Size of funds usually around $400 million. Network is in 36 cities around the world
06:10 – ABC reality show Startup U
07:25 – Changing volleyball rules on Startup U / encouraging freedom at Draper University
10:18 – Invested in Tesla early prior to Elon Musk’s involvement
10:59 – Tim’s different processes for finding new investment opportunities
12:10 – Elon was an investor in Tesla prior to taking control
13:19 – Tim’s ties
13:43 – Six California’s – the rationale
16:50 – Doesn’t believe he would be a good political candidate
17:13 – ‘Get your free email at Hotmail’ – first viral marketing
19:37 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects.
Draper Associates
DFJ
Startup U
Draper University
Draper Venture Network
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Startup Game by William Draper
What CEO do you follow? — All of them. Elon Musk, Robin Li (Baidu), Elizabeth Holmes (Theranos).
Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No
If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? – Stick to your intuition.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/9/2016 • 23 minutes, 19 seconds
People Hire Him Behind The Scenes to Launch Their Crowdfunding Campaigns, $40m Raised with Zach Smith of Funded Today
Ep 178 Zach Smith, the cofounder and CEO of Funded Today, the world’s leading crowdfunding agency. Listen as Nathan and Zach talk about how to grow a list and what makes a crowdfunding project successful.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
In order to back campaigns that will a nearly guarantee a return, Funded Today utilizes its massive email list to gauge interest and calculate projections for project candidates.
Ubiquitous products that are used widely with an interesting backing story are qualities of a project that would perform well in crowdsourcing.
Social media customer acquisition channels are invaluable for growing a list. Zach believes that Instagram in particular is the next big thing.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:24 – Zach joins the show.
02:43 – Funded Today built a big list months in advance before launch.
03:31 – RooSport 2, attachable magnetic running wallet.
04:41 – Funded Today built its list for about 10 to 65 cents a click. With about a 30% opt-in rate.
05:33 – Zach’s favorite customer acquisition channels are Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest.
06:36 – RooSport 2 spent about 10-15K to build their list through various means. They raised 50K for the product in the first ten days of launch.
08:22 – Funded Today makes money by taking a percentage of all the money raised.
11:49 – They take about 35% of total sales as commission.
13:21 – In order to know which campaigns to back safely, the Funded Today runs a testing period during which they find statistical significance from their list and project growth.
14:09 – Another advantage of using Funded Today’s services is they’re well connected in the crowdsourcing industry.
14:29 – Funded Today has 31 employees and a list of over one million emails.
14:57 – The business made about 8 million in 2015, aiming for 16 million in 2016.
15:32 – Zach’s ideal client is someone who understands the factors that go into running a successful crowdsourcing campaign.
15:54 – Some factors for a successful campaign are: ubiquity, techie-cool, story-exciting.
17:10 – Genuine stories behind crowdsourcing campaigns seem to have greater success.
20:34 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Funded Today – Zach’s business
@tweetzachsmith – Zach’s Twitter
Google Drive and Skype – Zach’s favorite online tools
David and Goliath by Malcom Gladwell – Zach’s favorite business books
Elon Musk – CEO Zach follows
Bio Zach Smith is the cofounder and CEO of Funded Today, the world’s leading crowdfunding agency. The business has raised over 40 million dollars and counting for over 300 campaigns for Kickstarter and Indiegogo.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- David and Goliath by Malcom Gladwell
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Google Drive and Skype
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— You can learn much on your own, find a mentor and try to learn as much as possible from them.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/8/2016 • 24 minutes, 8 seconds
Is He The Worlds Youngest, And Smartest Investor with Aaron Fifield
Ep 179 Aaron Fifield, the host of the podcast Chat with Traders. Listen as Nathan and Aaron talk about trading and what makes a podcast attractive to listeners.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio Aaron Fifield is the host of Chat with Traders a podcast focusing on weekly interviews with profitable traders. He also runs his own graphics and web design company.
3 Key Points:
Before monetizing a product or service, often times it’s beneficial to grow your list and become better known.
Qualities that attract listeners to a podcast are the inclusion of well-known guests, consistency, and being active on social media platforms.
If you want to be something, spend your time around people who already are. To be an engineer, spend time with engineers.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:22 – Aaron joins the show.
02:05 – Aaron made his first thousand dollars when he started his graphics and web design company.
03:32 – Chat with Traders began with Aaron’s desire to spend more time with traders.
05:30 – Movies make trading look more glamorous than it really is.
06:35 – Aaron’s main revenue stream comes from his podcast Chat with Traders which hasn’t been monetized - only publicized.
07:20 – Chat with Traders started about a year ago and releases once a week. They reached about 90K downloads in a recent month and have about 627K cumulative downloads.
07:57 – Featuring prolific or famous guests attract listeners to the podcast, but convincing them to come on air requires perseverance.
08:26 – Being active on a couple social media platforms and being consistent with publishing schedule are also important to getting listeners.
10:08 – Aaron gives an example pitch to direct listeners to his podcast.
10:33 – Chat with Traders has 5,800 subscribers, Aaron’s focus is growing the list through 2016.
10:58 – Aaron makes some revenue from graphics and web design. He makes a couple hundred bucks from his podcast per month.
13:31 – Famous Five
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- Rich Dad Poor Dad and The 48 Laws of Power
What CEO do you follow?— com
What is your favorite online tool?— Trello and Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No, but he keeps in mind that ‘the morning starts the night before.’
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Start trading early. Don’t start a purely service based business. Get into the habit of outsourcing more.
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
@chatwithtraders – Aaron’s Twitter
LinkedIn – Aaron Fifield
Chat With Traders – Aaron’s podcast
Trello and Slack – Aaron’s favorite online tools
com – Website Aaron keeps up with.
Rich Dad Poor Dad and The 48 Laws of Power – Aaron’s favorite business books
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/8/2016 • 17 minutes, 31 seconds
Nathan Records Negotiation With Seller, Should He Sell Heyo or Not?
Ep 177, Nathan talks more about selling his business Heyo and brings on Jim Risner of Votigo to talk about what makes Heyo desirable. Listen as Nathan comes to a decision regarding a dream he’s had since college – selling a business before the age of 30.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Offers to buy a business may be a ploy to gain information by competitors. Often it’s prudent to hold off on any announcements before seeing a contract.
LOI’s aren’t created equally. Some of them are offers of pure cash while others include other things like stock in a publicly traded company.
Even after a signed LOI, many deals fall through. Due diligence is required for the actual exchange of money for a company.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – If you haven’t caught up already, one of Nathan’s biggest competitors has offered to buy Heyo.
01:26 – One concern is that the offer may not be serious, only a ploy for information.
01:51 – Ken Armijo calls in to offer advice: before taking the buyers seriously, wait until they produce a contract.
03:02 – Nathan plans to obtain LOI’s (Letter of Intent) from companies that might be interested in buying Heyo and leveraging competition to raise its price.
03:17 – Another Top Tribe listener weighs in on what Nathan should do with the company.
04:36 – Nathan called CEO’s to talk about Heyo’s desirability so he could better understand its selling points.
05:06 – Nathan talks with Jim Risner of Votigo, one of Heyo’s main competitors in the SMB space (Small Business Space) about obtaining a LOI (Letter of Intent).
05:51 – With one LOI in hand from Jim, Nathan began emailing other CEO’s to gauge other interest in Heyo. He obtained four LOI’s from interested companies.
06:30 – The LOI’s weren’t created equally – some of them are pure cash and others include stock in a publicly traded company.
07:27 – Jim Risner talks about Votigo and why they would want to acquire Heyo.
09:10 – Votigo’s been thinking about entering Heyo’s space for a while, expanding into the SMB market. Buying the company would be a big head start into the space.
10:21 – Bethany London calls in to express her thoughts that selling Heyo, a long-time dream of Nathan’s, might not be all that it’s cracked up to be.
11:34 – One of Nathan’s friends from Virginia Tech’s Pamplin School of Business offers his thoughts that Nathan may have outgrown Heyo.
13:58 – Nathan signed the LOI - he’s selling Heyo.
14:22 – Many deals fall through even after a signed LOI.
15:21 – Tune in next Monday to find out what happens. And also, call in to express your thoughts @ com/talk
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe athttp://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/8/2016 • 15 minutes, 40 seconds
His company has lended $400m via unique canadian model with Jeff Goldenberg
Ep 176 Jeff Goldenberg, the head of growth at Borrowell a leading Canadian online marketplace lender. Listen as Nathan and Jeff talk about the concept of Engineering as Marketing and the trickiness of growing a loan related business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Engineering as Marketing is a concept in which a service or product is provided for free and in turn is used as a lead generator.
Borrowell keeps the loans it processes off its books as it’s only a marketplace for buying and selling loans – not processing the loans themselves.
Like in the case of Borrowell, growing a business is never straightforward – Burrowell has to examine all its loans carefully so they don’t pay the price.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:40 – Jeff joins the show.
01:50 – Borrowell is a marketplace lender. They offer online loans to high credit Canadians.
03:37 – Customer acquisition cost is Burrowell’s key metric when measuring their progress.
04:42 – Borrowell isn’t bootstrapped – they’ve raised 5.4 million by the end of last year.
05:31 – Jeff talks about loan capital and equity in Borrowell.
06:22 – Borrowell is only a marketplace in which people buy and sell loans. Investors such as banks provide loan capital.
08:46 – Growth is tricky because Borrowell doesn’t want to process unreliable loans quickly that might sink them in the future.
09:36 – Jeff is available on Twitter: @jeff_goldenberg.
10:05 – Borrowell is closing in on half a billion loan applications in Canada.
11:04 – Jeff’s favorite growth tool is known as Engineering as Marketing. Which is when a service or product is made free and used as a lead generator. (Dropbox, Hubspot)
13:00 – Borrowell takes a percentage of each loan between 1-5%.
14:51 – They are raising below 20 million in a Series A.
16:53 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Growth Hacker’s Guide to The Galaxy – Growth hacks for the Digital Marketer
@jeff_goldenberg – Jeff’s Twitter
LinkedIn – Jeff’s LinkedIn
Zapier – Jeff’s favorite online tool
Traction and Choose Yourself – Jeff’s favorite business books
Elon Musk – CEO Jeff follows
Bio Jeff Goldenberg is the Head of Growth at Borrowell, a leading Canadian online marketplace lender. He is a sought after expert and speaker in the areas of digital marketing, growth hacking and business development for innovative, high-growth companies. He is an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at MaRS Discovery District as well as a mentor at the TechStars/Startup Next accelerator.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?- Traction and Choose Yourself
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Zapier
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— You don’t have to jump on a concept with two feet – you can test the waters first.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/7/2016 • 21 minutes, 5 seconds
He did $900m in sales last year on something you touch every day with Allon Bloch of Vroom
Ep 175 Allon Bloch, the CEO of Vroom, the largest online car retailer in the U.S. Listen as Nathan and Allon talk about how Vroom grew to an almost billion dollar business in a span of only three years.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Vroom acquired a business (Tiger Direct Auto) that had a lot of technological and software related innovations in the field that allowed them to be even more efficient.
Being an entrepreneur is an exciting challenge – one has to be able to think on their feet, make important decisions, and surround oneself with forward thinking peers.
Vroom’s model relies on flipping low-mileage used cars for a fast profit – in order to do so they needed to hire professionals who knew cars very well.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:37 – Allon joins the show.
01:46 – Vroom made about 900 million in revenue in 2015.
02:01 – Vroom is an online car retailer. They sell, buy, and appraise cars in a haggle-free environment.
04:06 – In December, Vroom sold about 5K vehicles. Often they sell low-mileage, well-kept vehicles, which brings their average price point to 30K per automobile. (150,000,000$ total)
05:11 – Allon talks about the acquisition of Texas Auto Direct by Vroom which allowed the company to more effectively refurbish cars at the top level.
07:31 – Vroom was founded only 3 years ago. It has about 500 employees.
08:50 – Allon attributes Vroom’s success to being able to hire people who understand cars very well so they can be fixed and turned quickly.
09:26 – They also grew by acquiring a company that’d been in the same field since 2003.
10:30 – Allon wanted to get into Wix as an investor – it went public about 7 years after being founded. He left the board before the company went public.
12:11 – Being an entrepreneur is challenging as one has to be able to think on their feet, make decisions, and surround oneself with forward-thinking peers.
13:42 – Vroom relied on its high volume model in order to be a viable business like Amazon or Walmart.
14:27 – Allon talks about equity and relying on your board.
15:30 – Allon invested his own personal money to build Vroom’s capital when it first started.
18:21 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Vroom – Allon’s business
@allonbloch – Allon’s Twitter
CrunchBase – Allon’s CrunchBase
LinkedIn – Allon’s LinkedIn
Spotify – Allon’s favorite online tool
Graham and Dodd Investing – Allon’s favorite business book
Mark Zuckerberg – CEO Allon follows
Bio Allon Bloch is CEO of Vroom, the largest online car retailer in the U.S. He previously served as Co-CEO of Wix, the world’s leading website publishing platform, and CEO of mySupermarket, a digital platform that empowers consumers to find the best prices for their groceries. Allon is also a former venture capitalist, serving as a Venture Partner with Greylock's Europe/Israel fund and a General Partner at JVP. He holds an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School and is based in New York.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Graham and Dodd Investing
What CEO do you follow?— Mark Zuckerberg
What is your favorite online tool?— Spotify
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— .Be more daring early on. Get into the entrepreneurial game earlier.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/7/2016 • 23 minutes, 40 seconds
How to Make $500k Teaching Someone Elses Software with Joseph Michael
Ep 174 Joseph Michael, a top-notch Scrivener coach who helps people become world class writers. Listen as Nathan and Joseph talk about how they keep up with lists and the market’s demand for learning how to use a particular piece of software.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
One can build a product and then use it to gain targeted subscribers which allows one to more effectively find joint ventures.
Often times the service that teaches how to use a particular software has the same or greater demand than the software itself.
One can grow their list by doing webinars in joint ventures and increasing demand for their services.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:57 – Joseph joins the show.
02:28 – Scrivener is a super powered version of Microsoft Word.
03:39 – Joseph teaches his clients through an Evernote course – the software itself is 45$. Joseph’s highest tier of teaching how to use software is about 290$.
04:12 – In 2015, Joseph’s services have raked in 500K in sales. (42K a month)
05:17 – Traffic is directed to Joseph’s service through JV partners.
05:53 – Joseph describes his first JV partner and webinar that helped him convert to customers.
06:55 – Joseph’s webinars are teaching based – he walks watchers through a process in using Scrivener. His conversion rates are very good in his field.
08:31 – For letting him use their list, JV partners split the profits with Joseph 50/50. JV partners are usually strapped for time and need expertise on software like Scrivener.
09:43 – Joseph hired a researcher to compile a list of 200 possible names of interested influencers who’d be interested in a Scrivener teaching service in the writer community.
11:50 – Learn Scrivener Fast is hoping to double revenue for 2016. The demand for the service remains high and Joseph’s current list has 60K emails.
12:15 – One can build a product and then use the product to gain targeted subscribers which lets one partner more efficiently with other JV’s.
12:42 – Nathan plans on asking for Scrivener’s revenue on a future episode to compare to Joseph’s. He’s willing to bet the teaching service makes more than the software itself.
14:12 – Customers who buy Joseph’s services don’t necessarily own Scrivener, but it’s usually a big selling point that the software can be confusing to use.
15:00 – Scrivener is behind Learn Scrivener Fast, but they haven’t done a JV together.
15:42 – The CEO of Scrivener is scheduled to be on The Top on February 18th – Nathan is thinking about trying to buy the company.
16:55 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
@scrivenercoach – Joseph’s twitter
Joseph Michael – Joseph Michael’s personal site.
Nathan Latka – CEO Joseph follows
ScreenFloat – Joseph’s favorite online tool
The 80/20 Principle – Joseph’s favorite business book– Game Matthew plays
Bio
Joseph Michael is a top-notch Scrivener coach who helps people become world-class writers by mastering Scrivener. His online course, Learn Scrivener Fast, has helped even best-selling authors and full-time writers like Michael Hyatt and Joanna Penn create their best work. The course reveals Scrivener's untapped powers and hidden benefits, which is why writers like to say that he's their secret weapon.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch
What CEO do you follow?— Nathan Latka
What is your favorite online tool?— ScreenFloat
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Spend 80% of your time on 20% of your gifts. Find the things in which you’re the most effective.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/7/2016 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
He plans to be #1 Wordpress Membership Plugin by 2017 with Jason Coleman of Paid Memberships Pro
Ep 173 Jason Coleman, founder and lead developer of Paid Memberships Pro. Listen as Nathan and Jason talk about his e-commerce membership plug-in and the numbers for his business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Despite expecting to rake in 360K+ in 2016, Jason’s business doesn’t rely on paid acquisition or a sizeable number of employees. Paid Memberships Pro is quite independent.
Because of the type of service they provide, Paid Memberships Pro has a hard-to-measure churn rate. (Churn is dependent of the type of service or product being sold.)
Without many employees or expenses to run his business, Jason and his wife bring in almost all of the revenue from the business as profit.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:32 – Jason joins the show.
02:09 – Paid Memberships Pro is an e-commerce membership plug-in for WordPress.
02:31 – Jason’s business has about 3-5K paying customers.
03:15 – The membership for the service is 200$ a year for premium service. They project about 360K+ in revenue for 2016.
04:25 – Because of the kind of service that Paid Membership Pro provides, churn rate is difficult to measure.
06:08 – The business has a few contractors but not many employees.
06:54 – About 40K sites use the service and 4K are paying customers.
08:05 – Jason doesn’t do paid acquisition – the business’s biggest expense is the developers working on the service.
08:26 – They make about 10-20K a month. Jason and his wife take in about 15K a month from it.
09:12 – Paid Membership Pros’ competitors include Restrict Content Pro and Easy Digital Downloads.
10:27 – Jason beatboxes.
11:32 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar
Paid Memberships Pro – Jason’s WordPress business
Biography – Jason’s personal description on his website
The Singularity is Near – Jason’s favorite business book
Slack – Jason’s favorite online tool
Bryan Johnson – CEO Jason follows
Bio
Jason Coleman is the founder and lead developer of Paid Memberships Pro. The membership plug-in for WordPress that over 40,000 entrepreneurs and organizations use to get paid.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Singularity is Near – by Ray Kurzweil
What CEO do you follow?— Bryan Johnson
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Sometimes.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Focus on one thing at a time and fail fast.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/5/2016 • 14 minutes, 42 seconds
Yesware Aims for $30m in 2016 with Matthew Bellows of Yesware
Ep 172 Matthew Bellows, the founder and CEO of Yesware which serves more than 750,000 salespeople. Listen as Nathan and Matthew talk about the field of software sales effectiveness and when to hire a salesperson.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
To be able to hire engineers to work on the projects they wanted, Yesware had to raise millions in capital instead of being bootstrapped.
Sales effectiveness is a field in which companies offer the service of using software to market more effectively.
Business is sometimes stereotyped as dry and boring. Matthew found that it could be creative and fun in contrary to his belief at 20.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
02:03 – Matthew joins the show.
03:18 – Matthew just raised a total of 33 million in capital for his company.
03:40 – They needed to go the venture capital route for Yesware in order to hire the engineers they wanted.
03:57 – The company has 80 employees. Of which 30 are developers. About 25 people in the sales department.
06:04 – Yesware has about 750K registered users. They are well above 10 million in annual topline revenue.
07:02 – Yesware’s target customer is a company with 1K-2K employees and 200-300 salespeople.
08:51 – The business’s average deal size is 500$ per month.
10:08 – Hiring a salesperson depends widely on the product being sold.
13:05 – Matthew generally wants customers to install Yesware because they try to provide value as fast and much as possible.
15:27 – Matthew gives some advice on usage data .
16:15 – Yesware is in the field of sales effectiveness or sales consideration. Their competitors are InsideSales or ClearSlide.
17:24 – Matthew would like to end the year with a 30 million dollar run rate.
18:37 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Yesware – Matthew’s business.
LinkedIn – Matthew’s LinkedIn
Reed Hastings – CEO Matthew follows
The Alliance – Matthew’s favorite business book
Hearthstone – Game Matthew plays
NY Times – Article featuring Matthew Bellows
Bio
Matthew Bellows is Founder and CEO of Yesware. Yesware serves more than 750,000 salespeople at companies like Acquia, Adroll, Groupon, Salesforce, Twilio, Yelp and Zendesk. Prior to Yesware, Matthew was the Vice President of Sales at Vivox. Before that, he served as General Manager at Floodgate (acquired by Zynga), as Founder/CEO of WGR Media (acquired by CNET Networks), and as VP Sales and Marketing of Interstep (acquired by Flycast/CMGI). Matthew earned his B.A from Naropa University and his M.B.A. magna cum laude from The Olin School for Business at Babson College.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Alliance by Reed Hoffman
What CEO do you follow?— Reed Hastings
What is your favorite online tool?— Not a tool, but Hearthstone
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Business is a lot more fun and creative than you think it is.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/5/2016 • 21 minutes, 55 seconds
We got an offer to sell Heyo with Nathan Latka
Ep 171 Nathan breaks some big news regarding his business Heyo – he got an offer to sell it. Listen as Nathan discusses with his team the process and ramifications of selling their business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Transparency has the advantage of keeping everyone on Heyo’s team informed and learning. The downside is that they may feel anxious about what the future holds.
A big part of selling a business is considering its future profitability and potential.
When selling a business, it’s important to be sensitive to the feelings of the people who are invested in it. (Employees, investors, customers, etc.)
Time Stamped Show Notes:
00:00 – Nathan talks about when he first started his business with his mom.
02:02 – Early on building Heyo, Nathan resolved to be transparent about how offers were negotiated so that everyone on the team could learn from it.
04:28 – Nathan’s team got an offer to sell their five year old business Heyo by their competitor.
05:56 – In line with the founding philosophy, Nathan’s decided to be fully transparent about the process to his Heyo team.
07:22 – Chris Rieger, the head of operations at Heyo expresses his thoughts.
08:04 – Heyo has sentimental value to the team and still possesses long-term value in its future opportunities.
09:20 – Nathan’s concern with transparency is losing talented employees due to the potential acquisition.
10:10 – Nathan is also concerned that the business might become too comfortable and miss out on bigger opportunities.
10:30 – A big part of deciding whether to sell Heyo is its future potential.
11:18 – Nathan doesn’t like the offer – he plans to reach out to other potential buyers get LOI’s (letters of intent) to leverage Heyo’s value.
13:37 – Christina, Heyo’s head of branch strategy joins the show.
16:01 – Nathan thinks that Heyo’s brand wouldn’t be shut down if acquired by their competitor, only reused.
18:01 – Nathan and Christina have faith in their team to find a new project if Heyo were acquired.
19:01 – Christina thinks that as long as they properly manage the communication to their customer base, the transition will be smooth for users.
21:48 – There are numerous people tied to the business – Nathan sees his business partners as life-long, not business long.
22:19 – The investors in Heyo is an important factor to consider in the acquisition decision.
22:44 – What do you guys think - should Nathan sell Heyo?
Sponsor:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe athttp://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/5/2016 • 24 minutes, 1 second
This is How Much Revenue Ontraport Does with Landon Ray
Ep 170 Landon Ray, the founder and CEO of Ontraport, an award winning web-based sales, marketing, and business automation software platform. Listen as Nathan and Landon talk about how the latter went from selling flowers, to Wall Street, to running his own wildly successful business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Ontraport stays true to its mission by lowering the cost of their services after they became well established to aid small business owners.
Landon pivoted his old assets in the SEO business to create Ontraport – he also used some of his personal savings to keep the business going before it blew up.
It’s hard to pull yourself out of career mode once you’ve settled into it. Whenever possible, it’s beneficial to expand your horizons by traveling.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
02:05 – Landon joins the show.
03:25 – When he was 25, Landon wanted to find something meaningful to do and was attracted to the technological renaissance in Silicon Valley at the time.
03:20 – The main reason businesses in the info-marketing space don’t go into software is that the development side can be intimidating.
04:22 – Landon bought and sold stock for himself on Wall Street – he stopped after 2001.
05:30 – Being in the SEO business was a bad move because Google would eventually take away all the search results.
07:19 – Before Ontraport gained traction, hundreds of thousands of dollars went into the company from Landon’s own pocket. He didn’t take a salary either because he had savings.
08:04 – The business has about 10K clients and made about 500K four years in a row.
10:36 – Ontraport’s mission is to remove the burden of technology for entrepreneurs so they can focus on building the business they love.
11:21 – Ontraport’s services have gotten cheaper because they can afford to do it.
12:07 – The average customer pays 400$ a month, but the current value is now offset by a free service the company offers.
13:09 – Ontraport has about 6K customers paying about 200-300$ and 100 employees.
13:50 – Between 14-20 million dollars in annual returning revenue.
16:40 – If Oracle offered to buy Ontraport for 100 million, Landon would decline. Though the money would guarantee stability, the business is in a very favorable position right now.
18:17 – Landon would consider 50 million for a portion of Ontraport.
19:00 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Ontraport – Landon’s business.
LinkedIn – Landon’s LinkedIn
The Obstacle Is the Way – Landon’s favorite book.
Gary Vaynerchuk – CEO Landon follows
Google Keep – Landon’s favorite online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Obstacle Is the way by Ryan Holiday
What CEO do you follow?— Gary Vaynerchuk
What is your favorite online tool?— Google Keep
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Once you get into career mode, it’s hard to pull yourself out of it. Remember to travel and expand your horizons.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/4/2016 • 23 minutes, 56 seconds
Edgar Social Posting Tool Does $2.2m in Annual Revenue with Laura Roeder of Edgar
Ep 169 Laura Roeder, the creator of the social media scheduling software Edgar. Listen as Nathan and Laura talk about the importance of online marketing and getting connected to influencers in a particular market.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Software developers need the services of online marketing experts as much as marketers need the services of software developers.
It’s important for new businesses to get connected with influencers in their specific market. This can be achieved through social media among other means.
Edgar is a social media scheduling tool that automatically publishes content from libraries at set times in the day to maximize audience interaction.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:32 – Laura joins the show.
02:19 – Edgar is an automated way to showcase a library of content on social media sites.
03:20 – The main reason businesses in the info-marketing space don’t go into software is that the development side can be intimidating.
04:25 – Laura is married to a Ruby on Rails developer so she got lucky being able to make Edgar. However, those with online marketing expertise have much to offer in a partnership with a software developer.
05:22 – Developers need marketers in the same way marketers need developers.
07:10 – Before Edgar, Laura had already built a list, but she also went around getting connected to influencers in the market. Twitter was useful for this particular reason.
08:25 – Edgar was launched in the middle of 2014 and her list was about 80K from her previous business.
09:11 – If you want to learn how to build a list, go listen to episode 35 of The Top.
09:21 – Edgar was intentionally priced higher than its competitors for two reasons
It was bootstrapped and couldn’t support loads of customers using the service for free.
They wanted to differentiate that Edgar was a business tool, not just a social media tool.
11:24 – The business currently has just under 4K customers, making a topline revenue of about 180K a month. Most customers pay about 49$ a month.
11:58 – Edgar spends money on content marketing and paid acquisition (mostly Facebook ads.) They spend about 30K a month on Facebook ads.
12:40 – Edgar’s retention rate is about 95% month to month.
13:26 – Laura talks about why a bootstrap company has to be careful calculating lifetime values.
15:06 – Edgar’s biggest concern is helping customers utilize its services in an easy-to-use manner.
16:42 – Using Edgar for the past 6 months, Nathan’s gotten 3,286 clicks from Twitter updates that were published through Edgar.
19:00 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for Twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar
LKR Social Media – Laura’s personal website
@lkr – Laura’s Twitter
Scaling Up – Laura’s favorite business book
Slack – Laura’s favorite online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Scaling Up by Verne Harnish
What CEO do you follow?— Laura likes chatting to business owners and entrepreneurs.
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Even the most successful business owners are human – you can do what they do.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/4/2016 • 21 minutes, 56 seconds
Use $200 To Make $15m With ECommerce Tricks of Scott Hutchison of Ashley Bridget
Ep 168 Scott Hutchison, a serial entrepreneur who helped build an e-commerce jewelry brand to 15 million in sales in just three years. Listen as Nathan and Scott talk about the pros and cons of e-commerce and Ashley Bridget’s immense growth.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
If you’re thinking about advertising through Instagram, keep in mind that accounts that list an email address in or below their bio are likely willing to do business.
Ashley Bridget ran an immensely successful advertising campaign in which they gave away free bracelets – the average cart value during the campaign was 25$ from other products being purchased alongside the bracelets and the business got about 25K new customers.
One of e-commerce’s advantages is not needing many employees. Ashley Bridget later sought professionals to enhance their business and increase the quality of their product.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:24 – Scott joins the show.
01:41 – Scott Hutchison helped build Ashley Bridget which sells women’s jewelry almost exclusively on the website.
03:45 – In 2013, Ashley Bridget made 1.5 million in revenue, 4.5 million in 2014, and 8.2 million in 2015.
04:37 – To generate its first sales, the business advertised on Instagram. Accounts that list an email address below their bio are likely willing to do business.
05:16 – The business had a successful campaign starting out giving out free bracelets that got very popular. The shipping fee covered the cost of making the bracelet and so they broke even on the campaign.
05:58 – They got about 25K customers in 1.5 months just from the free bracelet promotion.
06:43 – When customers got the bracelet for free, they usually added other things to their cart.
06:59 – Ashley Bridget advertises with a combination of Google AdWords, Pinterest, Instagram and Facebook.
07:09 – The company’s started focusing on retention instead of advertising by increasing product quality.
07:54 – 20% of 2015’s revenue went into advertising (roughly 160K.)
08:45 – Initially the business relished e-commerce because it didn’t require a lot of employees, but now that they’ve expanded they’re focusing on hiring professionals.
09:23 – Scott talks about why the referral system is successful for his business.
10:43 – The business averages about 25K orders per month.
11:14 – In 2014, the business bought a warehouse, but it was difficult to manage.
12:36 – The business is lucky to have an experienced senior advisor who affords them a good network of Venture capital investors.
13:43 – The name Ashley Bridget came from what the founders thought would be an ‘ideal girl.’
17:16 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Edgar – Nathan uses Edgar instead of other scheduling tools for twitter because Edgar cycles through content over and over (buffer/others you have to re-input content over and over – time consuming). In the last several months, Edgar has driven Nathan over 3728 clicks that he didn’t have to work or pay for. Here isNathan’s Edgar Content Calendar:
Ashley Bridget – Scott’s business
LinkedIn – Scott’s LinkedIn
Gary Vaynerchuk – CEO Scott follows
Evernote – Tool Scott uses
The 4-Hour Workweek – Scott’s favorite business book
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferris
What CEO do you follow?— Gary Vaynerchuk
What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—To keep doing what he’s doing and to enjoy himself while doing it.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/4/2016 • 18 minutes, 59 seconds
How To Hit $600k Revenue Goal Fast
Ep 165 Nehal Kazim, the CEO of Amplifii Corporation, a Toronto based paid advertising agency specializing in Facebook and Google advertising. Listen as Nathan and Nehal discuss the importance of asking for the right amount of money for one’s services and having faith in one’s abilities to that end.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
If you think your services might be worth more than what you charge, don’t be afraid to ask for more money.
You can improve your negotiating skills by going on Craigslist and bargaining with buyers and sellers.
Most businesses don’t know the first thing about spending its money on Facebook ads effectively. Applying marketing concepts is essential to advertising success. (Also Nehal sells courses on how to market effectively.)
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:41 – Nehal joins the show – he’s 25 and founded Amplifii when he was 22.
02:06 – Amplifii isn’t Nehal’s first business – he started out teaching people how to play basketball and worked in other ventures.
03:29 – When he was selling websites he made, Nehal was afraid of asking for too much money, which he regrets.
04:03 – The only difference between Nehal’s ability to charge 500$ vs 5000$ was his belief as well as his skillset to show that he was able to get his client the results they were paying for.
04:22 – Nathan recommends learning how to negotiate for prices on Craigslist.
05:45 – Amplifii makes money by charging a monthly retainer or a percentage of ad spend.
06:05 – Revenue is 30-60K a month.
07:15 – Nehal’s didn’t hit his revenue goal for 2015 which was 600K a month, Amplifii made 300K.
08:11 – Think your services might be worth more than what you’re charging? Bite the bullet and just ask for more.
08:37 – Amplifii’s staff includes one project manager, a few virtual assistants overseas, and copywriters on contract.
09:33 – Nehal is offering a teaching service on how to spend a business’s first 100$ on Facebook ads most effectively.
10:48 – Amplifii is a cash flow business for Nehal to be able to accomplish what he wants in life through other businesses. (It’s like a launching pad for him.)
12:03 – Nehal doesn’t take much money out of the business – he considers the most important return from his business is his personal development. (Attending masterminds, traveling.)
13:57 – Nehal spends a lot of money on his education – he gets online certifications and signs up for courses and conferences.
14:55 – Nehal aims to learn from those who are better, faster, and stronger than him so he can catch up.
16:08 – Nehal can be reached personally over his Facebook page/profile.
17:16 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Amplifii – Nehal’s business
Facebook – Nehal’s Facebook
LinkedIn – Nehal’s LinkedIn
10X Rule – Nehal’s favorite book
Peter Diamandis – Author Nehal follows
Asana – Online tool Nehal uses.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— 10X Rule by Grant blah.
What CEO do you follow?— Not a CEO, but Peter Diamandis
What is your favorite online tool?— Asana
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Stop being so hard on yourself.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/2/2016 • 20 minutes, 5 seconds
He Sits on Spotify Board
Ep 166 Frank Meehan, the co-founder of Spark Lab Global Ventures a global early stage ventures capital firm. Listen as Nathan and Frank talk about how to effectively run a board meeting and the numbers of Spark Lab Global Ventures.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: bit.ly/1SynoAg
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Don’t be afraid of managing your board strongly. Get every member up-to-date on what’ll be discussed clearly before a board meeting.
SAAS companies can thrive in Asia, getting up to 30-40X on annual recurring revenue compared to being based in America.
Core strengths of Spark Lab Global Ventures include being well connected and scouting to the U.S. from Asia and vice versa.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show.
01:42 – Frank joins the show.
01:52 – Frank left Horizons Ventures because he wanted to be more independent.
02:48 – Frank was involved in Spotify’s development team.
03:27 – Countries like Sweden, Israel, and Korea work hard but have to go global because the local market is limited.
04:35 – When it comes to boards, generally an entrepreneur doesn’t want to start with too many people on them.
05:17 – Frank gives general advice on managing a board.
06:50 – Talk to your board members individually before a board meeting and ensure it’s clear what’ll be discussed during the board meeting.
07:03 – Because of good planning by his partner, Frank’s never been surprised at a Spotify board meeting.
08:40 – Don’t be afraid to manage your board strongly. But do it before the board meeting.
09:03 – Spark Labs Global Ventures ran a fund of 30 million in 2014.
09:57 – A core strength of Spark Lab Global Ventures is scouting to the U.S. from Asia and vice versa.
10:56 – There’s a lot of investing going into Asia.
11:22 – SAAS companies transferred to Asia can get up to 30-40X on annual recurring revenue.
12:30 – Of the 30 million Sparks Labs Global Ventures raised, the company’s deployed about half of it.
13:43 – One of Frank’s businesses’ main pull is that it’s incredibly well connected – it can identify hot businesses quickly.
17:02 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Edgar – A tool Nathan uses to add pieces of content to a library and automate content distribution on media platforms.
Spark Labs Global – Frank’s business
@frank_meehan – Frank’s Twitter
LinkedIn – Frank’s LinkedIn
Mark Zuckerberg – CEO Frank follows
Slack – Frank’s favorite online tool.
Only the Paranoid Survive – Frank’s favorite business book.
frank@smartup.io – Frank’s email.
frank@smartlabsglobal.com – Frank’s email
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Only the Paranoid Survive by Andrew S. Grove
What CEO do you follow?— Mark Zuckerberg
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Be more ruthless.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/2/2016 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
King of Podcasts Tells Us How He Launched 5, Made Millions, with Alex Blumberg of Gimlet Media
Ep 164 Alex Blumberg, the host of StartUp and CEO and co-founder of Gimlet Media. Listen as Nathan and Alex talk about the Freedom Journal, a notebook designed for users to set and accomplish their goals effectively.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
As podcasts grow as a medium, expect to see an increase in production value and overall quality.
Advertising on podcasts is extremely straightforward because sponsors can clearly evaluate how many people they’re reaching.
For even seasoned veterans like Alex, creating a quality podcast can take a lot of time, money, and manpower (6 months, 100K, varied staff).
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:37 – Alex joins the show
01:49 – Gimlet is a digital media company that focuses primarily on audio.
02:27 – Alex and his team at Gimlet has raised 6 million for the business.
04:08 – His podcast StartUp generates revenue through ads.
06:05 – Alex estimates that his CPM on this podcast is higher than the average radio station.
06:28 – As podcasts as a medium mature, Alex expects them to grow in production value.
07:05 – Alex describes his 6-month process when creating a new podcast.
07:55 – It takes roughly 100K from start to finish when making the first episode.
09:18 – Alex’s old colleagues from his career in public radio have come to work at Gimlet.
10:40 – Each individual show produced by Gimlet Media generally has its own team.
13:22 – Alex uses SoundCloud to keep track of listeners for a particular audio.
14:39 – Advertising on podcasts is very straightforward and works well for Alex’s sponsors.
15:49 – Sponsors advertise in accordance to a contract with Alex’s podcasts.
17:09 – Alex makes over 1 million dollars per podcast.
19:16 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Gimlet Media – Alex’s business
@abexlumberg – Alex’s twitter
LinkedIn – Alex’s LinkedIn
Creativity Inc. – Alex’s favorite book
Mark Zuckerberg – CEO Alex follows
Steve Jobs – CEO Alex follows
Google Docs – Online tool John uses.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Creativity Inc. – by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace
What CEO do you follow?— Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg
What is your favorite online tool?— Google Docs
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be more patient.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/1/2016 • 22 minutes, 28 seconds
Numbers Behind Freedom Journal Launch with John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur On Fire
Ep 163 John Lee Dumas, the founder and host of EOFire, an award winning podcast where he interviews today’s most inspiring entrepreneurs seven days a week. Listen as Nathan and John talk about the Freedom Journal, a notebook designed for users to set and accomplish their goals effectively.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Goals should be specific and contain aspects that make it a ‘smart goal.’ (Specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound.)
It’s important to ‘shoot for the moon’ when trying to achieve a goal, because one might ‘land among the stars.’ (As corny as that sounds, John insists it’s true.)
The Freedom Journal is a tool designed to help users set and accomplish their goals. It’s not just a revenue model; the product is intended to make a lasting impact on the world.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:58 – John joins the show
02:23 – The Freedom Journal was created to help people set and accomplish their goals.
05:02 – John believes that a constant notebook should be a staple of entrepreneurs. But often times they’re missing an organizational outline. (Something The Freedom Journal features.)
06:28 – For some people, the one obstacle to success is similar to a big heavy domino that, once knocked over, initiates a chain reaction.
07:02 – For this reason, the first page of The Freedom Journal is teaching a user how to set a smart goal.
07:45 – John talks about what makes a goal a ‘smart goal.’
08:37 – It’s important to be realistic, but being ambitious with a goal often ensures that the effort produces something significant.
09:54 – John talks having 10 micro goals within a 100 day project.
10:27 – It takes 6.50$ to produce a Freedom Journal and it retails for 35$.
11:47 – One of The Freedom Journal’s purposes is to make a lasting impact on the world.
12:33 – John’s partnered up with Pencils of Promise, an organization that builds schools in developing countries.
14:40 – The Freedom Journal comes with a software component that further increases accountability for a user.
17:32 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
EOFire – John’s Podcast and personal website
@johnleedumas – John’s twitter
LinkedIn – John’s LinkedIn
The Chimp Paradox – John’s favorite book
Elon Musk – CEO John follows
Focus@Will – Online tool John uses.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Chimp Paradox – Dr. Steve Peters
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Focus@Will
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Chill out and enjoy the journey.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/1/2016 • 22 minutes, 23 seconds
Is This Uber's Next Acquisition?
Episode 162 Harry Campbell, the owner and founder of The Rideshare Guy Blog and Podcast. Listen as Nathan and Harry talk about recent developments in the rideshare industry for companies such as Uber and Lyft.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
The most successful billion dollar businesses are almost always the ones that build the community in a new industry the fastest. (PayPal, Airbnb, etc)
Rideshare companies like Uber have steadily been driving prices down for their services, but also paying their drivers less.
Harry Campbell made 25K in his most recent month as a blogger simply through driver referrals and direct ad buys.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:29 – Harry joins the show
03:08 – Harry began as an aerospace engineer making 80K a year. His wife attends med school in Southern California.
04:10 – Alongside engineering, Harry did some freelance writing and worked as an Uber driver on the side.
05:04 – Harry makes money with his blog through driver referrals.
06:28 – Using Lyft and Uber at the same time isn’t a bad idea as it’ll enable you to get a driver sooner.
07:58 – Uber has been driving prices steadily down since they’ve begun, but their drivers are now paid less than when the company started.
08:22 – One of the ways the company does this is by carpooling rides to halve passenger fees, but keep the driver’s earning the same.
09:13 – A rideshare driver can make about 15-20 bucks an hour.
10:30 – In his most recent month, Harry’s made 25K through driver referrals and direct ad buys.
12:27 – The most successful billion dollar businesses are almost always the ones that build the community in a new industry the fastest. (PayPal, Airbnb, etc)
13:29 – Harry’s list consists of about 10K email subscribers and his podcast has been getting about 12K downloads per month.
15:09 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
The Ride Share Guy – Harry’s Podcast
@TheRideShareGuy – Harry’s twitter
The E-Myth Revisited – Harry’s favorite book
Brian Kelly – CEO Harry follows
Asana – Online tool Harry uses.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The E-Myth Revisited – by Michael E. Gerber
What CEO do you follow?— Brian Kelly
What is your favorite online tool?— Asana
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Sometimes you have to be willing to do the work others aren’t willing to do.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
2/1/2016 • 17 minutes, 29 seconds
How To Be A Mom And Do $10k/mo From Home with Jenn Scalia
Ep 160 Jenn Scalia, a single mom who started from rock bottom to creating a six-figure business. Listen as Nathan and Jenn talk about how she runs her business coaching entrepreneurs in marketing strategy.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio
Jenn Scalia is a visibility strategist for entrepreneurs who want to make an impact. A self-professed introvert, and single mom, she went from rock bottom to creating a multi six-figure business. She’s known for her tough-love, no-BS style and helping business owners overcome their fears and share their message with the world.
3 Key Points:
A useful online tool known as a “Welcome Mat” can increase the number of website opt-ins from visitors.
Despite running a successful business, Jenn invests heavily into her education – a prudent practice.
It’s important to get smart about money (not just in the traditional sense) - play around with the mindset of finance and what it means to you personally.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:20 – Jenn joins the show
01:27 – Jenn sells business strategy and coaching for entrepreneurs through a paid membership and also in one-on-one sessions.
01:52 – She makes about 50K in revenue per month – sometimes hitting 100K.
02:54 – Most of her revenue comes from one-on-one coaching and mentorship. She also has a membership site that rakes in about 5-6K a month.
03:55 – The sit-down mentorship involves marketing strategy, funnels, email marketing, and social media strategy. Jenn is all about visibility and getting a message out.
05:01 – Jenn has two secrets. She works hard and is relatable.
05:47 – Membership currently costs 30$ a month and it’s going up to 47$ in a year. Every month, members get two master-classes from Jenn and a guest expert.
06:22 – Membership perks also include a monthly Q&A and a private community (online forum on Facebook).
06:52 – Users stay an average of three months – Jenn offers a trial membership for people who’d like to try it.
07:42 – Jenn’s one-on-one mentorship costs 10K for four months. The price is increasing in January to 15K.
08:20 – Jenn finds her clients through her followers (tribe) and funnel.
09:12 – Jenn and Nathan talk about the usefulness of website ‘welcome mats’ that can increase website opt-ins.
10:22 – Jenn’s biggest expenses are the salaries for her online business manager and virtual assistant for 2K a month (combined) and 4K a month on advertising.
11:40 – Jenn’s spent about 6 figures on her education this year.
12:10 – Nathan and Jenn talk about Todd Herman.
14:14 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Jenn Scalia – Jenn’s Website
Digital Welcome Mats – Increase opt-ins with this online tool
Facebook – Jenn’s Facebook
LinkedIn – Jenn’s LinkedIn
@jennscalia – Jenn’s Twitter
Todd Herman – CEO Jenn follows
30/30 – Jenn’s favorite online tool
Profit First – Book Jenn stands by
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Profit First – by Mike Mikalowisk
What CEO do you follow?— Todd Herman
What is your favorite online tool?— 30/30
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Get smart about money – play around with the mindset of finance and what it means to you personally.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/31/2016 • 16 minutes, 26 seconds
How To Acquire $1m+ Company For $2 Dollars with Eric Siu CEO of Single Grain
Ep 159 Eric Siu, the CEO of the digital marketing agency Single Grain, which has helped companies such as Salesforce, Yahoo, and Intuit scale their revenues online. Listen as Nathan and Eric talk about how Single Grain went from having negative cash flow to profiting 30K a month.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio
Eric Siu has worked with various startups, non-profit organizations, and co-founded an online marketing agency. He was formerly the Growth lead at Treehouse, an online coding education business and is currently the CEO of Single Grain, a digital marketing agency. Eric has a podcast based on growth hacking at http://growtheverywhere.com/.
3 Key Points:
Often it’s beneficial for a business to expand its main money making channel instead of investing in new ones.
Previous expertise shouldn’t be underestimated as it can lend itself to current ventures.
Watching the numbers of one’s business’s rise and fall is a more involved process and can be more insightful than reading a report.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:12 – Eric joins the show
01:22 – Single Grain is a marketing agency that helps with search engine optimization and paid advertising.
02:08 – Single Grain made 30K in monthly revenue from making nothing eight months ago.
02:29 – Eric was first brought on to help the agency for a 10% stake. Later he bought the other 90% for only two dollars.
03:25 – The company was struggling when Eric bought it out – losing money at negative 27K in net profit despite generating 1.5 million dollars in annual revenue.
04:32 – Eric sat down with the original founder and was able to negotiate owning the entire company by leveraging his expertise.
05:42 – Single Grain also generates money by referring to other agencies for services the company no longer fulfills. (Such as search engine optimization)
06:28 – Eric’s previous expertise hiring marketers allows him to vet agencies and determine their quality of work.
06:53 – Nathan and Eric discuss the latter’s earnings from Single Grain.
07:42 – For his newer business Care Sprout, Eric is delving into the senior living industry.
08:33 – Care Sprout has whittled its lead cost to 60-70$ per individual signing up for services.
10:05 – Nathan and Eric break down how Care Sprout makes money.
11:09 – A lot of businesses tend to neglect their main money making channel in favor of creating new ones.
11:27 – Eric talks about Care Sprout’s current money making channel, phone calls.
12:17 – Care Sprout spends about 30K a month for lead acquisition channels. (420 new leads per month.)
13:02 – Eric likes to look at his company’s numbers personally, but also uses a dashboard tool called Cyfe.
15:27 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Single Grain – Eric’s current business
Care Sprout – Eric’s newer business
Cyfe – Dashboard software Eric uses
GrowthEverywhere – Eric’s Podcast
@ericosiu – Eric’s Twitter
LinkedIn – Eric’s LinkedIn
Bill Gates – CEO Eric follows
Emerson Spartz – CEO Eric follows
Nathan Latka – CEO Eric follows
TextExpander – Eric’s favorite online tool
The Billionaire Who Wasn’t – Book Eric stands by
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Billionaire Who Wasn’t – by Conor O’Clery
What CEO do you follow?— Bill Gates, Emerson Spartz, Nathan Latka
What is your favorite online tool?— Text Expander
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Keep going; those who persist will eventually succeed.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/31/2016 • 18 minutes, 11 seconds
His Boss Won't Believe How He's Selling Mens Leggings with Tom Hunt of Virtual Valley
Ep 161 Tom Hunt, a location independent founder of online marketplace Virtual Valley. Listen as Nathan and Tom talk about the latter’s experience selling men’s leggings and hiring offshore employees.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio
Tom Hunt is a TEDx Speaker, Dragons Den “Failure” and Location Independent Founder of Online Marketplace: Virtual Valley (Launching Jan 2016) That Connects Entrepreneurs & Rockstar Virtual Assistants (www.blog.virtualvalley.io).
3 Key Points:
Publicity from shows such as Dragon’s Den usually won’t benefit a company directly but can raise publicity for an area of products.
Getting press is much easier for a business if it jumps on top of an existing trend.
According to Tom, often times it’s more worthwhile to focus on the journey than the result.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:27 – Tom joins the show
01:51 – Tom tells the story of how he started selling men’s leggings.
03:18 – As a part time project, Tom and his partners started selling them online and was able to sell 150 pairs in the first year.
03:50 – Eventually, Tom’s efforts were chronicled in an online article that was shared about 66K times.
04:46 – Tom talks about how he got onto Dragon’s Den, UK’s equivalent of the show Shark Tank.
06:10 – Tom’s revenue since selling men’s leggings was roughly 160K.
07:01 – Tom’s online store saw a big spike in traffic the day after Dragon’s Den. 100 -> 1000.
07:28 – The store got more traffic from the daily mail article because there was a direct link to the site.
08:00 – The online store is still operational and doesn’t spend any money on paid acquisition. All the advertising is done through social media outlets.
10:10 – Virtual Valley is a service in which people looking to build a team can acquire its members virtually.
11:30 – There’s a 20% service charge for using the platform – Virtual Valley provides advantages such as employer/employee insurance and an online time tracking program that it believes is covered by the fee.
13:14 – Virtual Valley’s services are based in the Philippines.
15:04 – The company’s goal is to have 7K monthly recurring revenue by February. By the end of 2016, 15K per month in recurring revenue.
15:53 – Getting press is much easier if a business can jump on an existing trend.
17:51 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Daily Mail – Article about men’s leggings
@tomhuntio – Tom’s twitter
Tom Hunt – Tom’s personal website
Meggings – Tom’s e-commerce business
Virtual Valley – Tom’s online marketplace
The Icarus Deception – Book Tom stands by
Sniply – Tom’s favorite online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Icarus Deception – by Seth Godin
What CEO do you follow?— Nathan Latka
What is your favorite online tool?— sniply
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Focus more on the journey instead of the result.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/31/2016 • 21 minutes, 39 seconds
How To Quickly Build Million Dollar SaaS Company with Jonathon Ende of Seamless Docs
Episode 156
Ep 156 features Jonathon Ende, the founder and CEO of Seamless Docs, a next generation e-signature platform that specializes in working with businesses and governments to digitize and automate their pdf and form processes. Listen as Nathan and Jonathon talk about how local governments are using Seamless Doc’s services to modernize cumbersome forms.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
It’s important for new startups to find their “perfect customer” AKA a target consumer who is in consistent need of a particular service or product.
One of the hardest things for an entrepreneur to do is to change people’s existing routines.
Account management is an effective way to promote the growth of businesses.
Bio Jonathon is an experienced CEO passionate about government innovation. He is dedicated to bringing his diverse skill set and applying all his resources to truly changing the way that government works. He has been honored by the GREAT Tech Awards winning a grant from the British Government and even receiving the award from Prince William and Mayor DeBlasio of NYC. He has also been appointed a NYC Venture Fellow by the NYEDC and the 92Y and won the prestigious NextCity Vanguard Award, the Grand Prize Winner of $100K at TechWeek NYC and winner of Code for America Technology Award for Government Innovation. He also was a member of the prestigious Entrepreneur Roundtable Accelerator and Code for America Accelerator Program and is a member of the Urban.Us, 1776, and Govtech Fund portfolio and networks. Jonathon is excited to continue being a trailblazer within the Govtech community. He believes that interacting with your government can be a beautiful experience.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:50 – Jonathon joins the show
01:58 – Seamless Docs takes any existing PDF and turns it into an online ‘smart’ version.
02:40 – The idea is to make cumbersome forms easier to access by converting it from a PDF to a format that can be filled through various digital means.
03:34 – Government agencies and businesses are billed annually using Seamless Docs.
04:14 – Jonathon’s company is gaining clients at a rate of about 1 per day, and over 300 clients use the service right now.
04:39 – Most customers are local governments that pay between 5K to 100K a year for Seamless Doc’s services.
05:56 – Before Seamless Docs, Jonathon found that PDF’s came with various inconveniences.
06:03 – “One of the hardest things for an entrepreneur to do is to change people’s existing processes (routines).”
06:58 – Finding the “perfect customer” is crucial for an entrepreneur.
07:09 – The company struggled when it was first started in 2013.
07:55 – Nathan and Jonathon talk about convertible notes for Seamless Docs.
08:42 – Because Seamless Docs is primarily used by the government, it has a low churn rate. (less than 1%).
09:28 – The average customer pays an average of 17K annually.
10:05 – Seamless docs has been focusing on account management to foster growth.
12:40 – Forms in government are clunky and inconvenient. Jonathon’s services ensure that they’ll be digitalized and a more modern experience.
13:42 – Seamless Docs is predicting 10x growth by next year. 2 million -> 20 million.
15:14 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
LinkedIn – Jonathon’s LinkedIn
CrunchBase – Jonathon’s Crunch Base
Seamless Docs – Jonathon’s company.
Elon Musk – CEO Jonathon is mildly obsessed with
Intercom – Jonathon’s favorite online tool
The Lean Startup – Book Jonathon stands by
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Lean Startup by Eric Ries.
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Intercom
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No, he’d be lucky to get 6.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Focus.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/30/2016 • 18 minutes, 55 seconds
Genius Way to Stop Selling Your Time For Money with Allison Schaaf of Prepdish.com
Ep 157 Allison Schaaf, the founder of prepdish.com, an online meal planning service that sends weekly downloadable real food, gluten free, and paleo meal plans. Listen as Nathan and Allison talk about how Prep Dish uses Facebook ads and influencers to acquire customers.
3 Key Points:
A great way to acquire new customers is to reach out in places where current customers spend their time. (Blogs, social media, events)
Prep Dish has had the most success gaining customers through influencers such as 100 Days of Real Food.
For a meal plan service such as Prep Dish, the churn rate varies depending on the time of the year. This can apply to other seasonally dependent services.
Bio
Allison Schaaf is a chef and nutritionist who is also the founder of Prep Dish. She holds a masters in Nutrition Communications from Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:27 – Allison joins the show
02:08 – Prep Dish started as a personal chef company (that still exists) where customers would personally consult Allison for their meal plans.
03:00 – Prep Dish is a monthly prescription service for 14.99$ a month or 99$ a year.
03:26 – As of November, the service has around 1,100 paying customers.
04:48 – The churn rate for Prep Dish depends on the seasons, with January and August being the busiest months of the year.
07:19 – Some customers switch to a yearly plan to save money. Allison’s company sends out emails to ask if they want to switch.
07:50 – Screenshot
08:40 – Allison spent about 5K a month on Facebook ads for four months which generated about 40K in revenue.
10:14 – Nathan talks about Jamie Tardy, a coach Allison worked with.
10:53 – The average monthly subscriber yields 43$.
11:47 – Allison’s found that the best tactic for her business is working with influencers.
12:32 – Allison talks about working with 100 Days of Real Food.
13:35 – Another way Prep Foods reaches people is by surveying their customers where they spend their time online and acquiring new customers from those places.
14:09 – Prep Foods makes about 10K a month.
15:39 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Prep Dish – Allison’s business
Twitter – Prep Dish Twitter
Instagram – Prep Dish Instagram
Facebook – Prep Dish Facebook
Periscope – Prep Dish Periscope
Automatic Customer – Allison’s favorite book
Infusionsoft – Allison’s favorite online tools
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Automatic Customer by John Warrillow
What CEO do you follow?— Her Husband
What is your favorite online tool?— Infusionsoft
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Take it from a nutrition expert, avoid gluten!
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/30/2016 • 17 minutes, 57 seconds
Weird Way To Capture 25m Leads Free with Taylor Peck of iSideWith.com
Episode 156
Ep 158 Taylor Peck, the co-founder and editor of isidewith.com, the most popular political information platform in the world. Listen as Nathan and Taylor talk about how iSideWith generates revenue and reaches out to unique visitors.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Bio
Taylor Peck is a political analyst and tech marketing consultant. He manages the data, research, and marketing aspects of iSideWith. Having a lifelong interest in politics, he was searching for a way to engage more voters.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:26 – Taylor joins the show
01:39 – iSideWith was created when Taylor and his roommate in college wanted an online outlet to discuss political issues.
03:10 – A lot of political affiliation quizzes are powered by iSideWith.
04:08 – Almost 25 million people have taken the quiz online.
04:47 – During the political season, the website is averaging 3 to 5 million unique visitors a month.
05:59 – The website gets more than 30% of visitors to participate in the quiz which is rare for a software based company.
06:15 – iSideWith makes money through Google AdSense (10K a month).
07:30 – Taylor lives on about 2,250$ a month.
08:59 – The company’s email list is about 3 million people – they’ve made it very easy to sign up by not asking for a lot of personal information.
10:22 – Political candidates will run sponsored ads on the site to collect emails.
11:39 – The campaigns pay to advertise on a CPA basis (cost per action).
12:46 – Taylor’s website generated 10K in revenue in November.
14:10 – iSideWith is starting to reach out to other countries. Many expenses go to translation services and research.
15:14 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:
Successful CEO’s like Warren Buffet don’t just make a lot of money, they’re just as good at keeping their expenses low and investing intelligently.
iSideWith focuses on growth by developing interactive tools for political candidates instead of generating ad revenue.
“Independence isn’t missed until it’s gone.”
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
LinkedIn – Taylor’s LinkedIn
iSideWith – Taylor’s business
David Heinemeier Hansson – CEO Taylor follows
Jumpcut – Taylor’s favorite online tool
Storming the Magic Kingdom – Book Taylor stands by
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Storming the Magic Kingdom by John Taylor
What CEO do you follow?— David Heinemeier Hansson
What is your favorite online tool?— JumpCut
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Independence isn’t missed until it’s gone.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/30/2016 • 20 minutes, 8 seconds
The Genius Who Runs Ad Budgets of Politicians You Know with Vincent Harris of Harris Media
Ep 155 features Vincent Harris, the CEO of Harris Media and Chief Digital Strategist for Senator Rand Paul. Listen as Nathan and Vincent discuss the Harris Media’s online services and how it relates to political strategy.
3 Key Points:
As media choices become more and more fragmented, it’s become important to observe which online platforms can maximize a politician’s voice. (Reddit, Snapchat, Facebook)
Most online funding for political campaigns come through online email solicitations.
It pays to have more patience in one’s professional and personal life – and also to stress less about the little things.
BioVincent Harris is CEO of Harris Media and Chief Digital Strategist for Senator Rand Paul. Previously he has worked on the digital side of three Presidential races, having run all online operations for Texas Governor Rick Perry and Speaker Newt Gingrich’s 2012 campaigns. In 2014 Vincent was hired by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to oversee the digital operations for his Likud party’s successful campaign.
Vincent spent over three years working with Ted Cruz, whom many have credited his successful use of the web as part of his incredible underdog win. Under Vincent’s watch, the nationally acclaimed firm, Harris Media, has grown into a successful company with over 20 employees proudly headquartered in Austin, Texas.
Vincent is a strong believer in the power of the internet as a tool to influence the public arena, and his firm’s successes have been noted in numerous publications and news outlets. His expertise stretches from practical application into academia where he is working towards a PhD at the University of Texas and is blessed to be guest faculty at Baylor University.
He was named the youngest “Rising Star” in Politics by Campaigns & Elections Magazine and was recently profiled in Bloomberg, where he was dubbed “The Man Who Invented the Republican Internet.”
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:38 – Vincent joins the show
01:48 – Vincent’s been working in politics since the age of 14, volunteering locally and building websites.
02:50 – At Harris Media, Vincent’s team manages digital communication for his clients by building websites, maintaining social media, and creating videos.
03:45 – As media platforms increase every day, reaching an audience is now dependent on new online trends and websites such as Snapchat and Reddit. Vincent watches these trends to most effectively reach audience members for his clients.
05:19 – Vincent’s firm has found that applications like Heyo are useful for getting emails.
06:13 – Roughly ten percent of Rand Paul’s online fundraising came from his online store which Harris Media maintains.
06:32 – In order to increase sales, Vincent’s firm allowed customers of Rand Paul’s online store to vote on which products they wanted on sale.
07:43 – According to Vincent, most political campaigns raise their money through online email solicitations.
08:30 – Rand Paul’s raised a little south of 10 million dollars through online means in the past 12 months for his campaigns.
09:27 – Harris Media makes money through online services for clients who usually pay them a monthly retainer. The company was started in Vincent’s dorm room in college and currently has about 35 employees.
10:37 – Vincent’s clients pay a range from 4K to 15K a month. The firm has about 15 clients. 11:22 – Although Harris Media is a conservative/libertarian agency – their clients are not necessarily politically affiliated.
12:50 – Vincent talks about a full day live stream for Rand Paul.
15:06 – Vincent believes that Trump is too brash with his political statements.
16:58 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Too Conservative – Blog Vincent started in High School
Harris Media – Vincent’s Website mobile app
Wikipedia – More information on Vincent
Mark Zuckerberg – CEO Vincent keeps up with
Love Works – Book Vincent stands by
Over App – One of Vincent’s favorite tools
Perfect Video – Another of Vincent’s online tools
Famous 5
Favorite Book?—Love Works by Joel Manby
What CEO do you follow?— Mark Zuckerberg
What is your favorite online tool?— OverApp and Perfect Video
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Most nights, yes.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be more trusting of God, stress less about the little things. And also to have more patience in his professional and personal life.
Credits
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/29/2016 • 20 minutes, 34 seconds
Use Friends Money to Make $500k Ethically with Mark Gagner of Bridge Equity Group
Ep 153 features Mark Gagner, the president of Bridge Equity Group, a company specializing in single family fix and flip project in Northern California. Listen as Nathan and Mark talk about how the latter’s company remodels properties and flips them for profit.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
Properties that come with challenges such as foundational issues are good targets for remodeling purposes, because they have less competition on the market.
Fix and flippers often get their deals through wholesale, but it’s also possible to sustain business through skilled agents.
One can fund their business like Mark through various means such as hard money loans, private money loans, and personal savings.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:43 – Mark joins the show
01:52 – Gagner-Toomey Assoc. is a family run business Mark’s been running since 1999.
02:28 – The company trades about 2-4 million in electronic components every month and collects about 2-5% commission.
03:36 – Most of Mark’s resources are applied to his real estate business, Bridge Equity Group.
04:54 – For Mark’s most recent fix-up, his company bought a property for 400K and sold it for around 700K. The deal made roughly 100K after remodeling costs.
05:38 – Bridge Equity Group remodels kitchens, bathrooms, floors, and windows. They remake the house.
06:30 – The house was found off the MLS (multiple listing service).
07:21 – Mark targets properties that have challenges such as foundation issues. They have less competition and are more easily purchased.
07:41 – The majority of Mark’s deals are found through agents and sometime through wholesale.
08:42 – Bridge Equity Group plans on using direct mail to find buyers and sellers – one of the challenges is finding the right recipients.
09:28 – Many fix and flippers in the Bay area rely on wholesale, but Mark’s found agents who are very efficient at finding opportunities.
10:30 – His agents get bonuses after each project.
11:18 – Mark finances Bridge Equity group through hard money loans, private money loans, and personal savings.
12:16 – For the last deal with the 400K house, Mark puts a portion of his savings into remodeling the house, but not acquiring it.
13:30 – Mark is personally liable for things that don’t get sold, but luckily for him, in Northern California everything gets sold.
16:49 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Bridge Equity Group – Mark’s company.
mgagner@bridgeequitygroup.com – Mark’s email.
Gagner-Toomey Assoc. – Mark’s family business
Rich Dad Poor Dad – Book Mark stands by
Book by Rock Thomas – CEO Mark follows
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki
What CEO do you follow?— Rock Thomas, author of The Power of Your Identity
What is your favorite online tool?— No, not really.
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— To have more of a mindset as an entrepreneur instead of staying in corporate.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/29/2016 • 20 minutes, 7 seconds
He Pushed Button, $1 Trillion Transferred with Nick Sonnenbergof CalvinApp
Episode 152
Summary:
In Episode #152, Nathan speaks with Nick Sonnenberg, the founder of CalvinApp, a productivity mobile app designed to cut back on the amount of emails and texts sent back and forth when making plans. Listen as Nathan and Nick discuss the latter’s transition from making a seven figure salary to building his new startup.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:47 – Nick joins the show
01:54 – For eight years, Nick used mathematical models and programs on Wall Street to trade stocks in milliseconds.
03:50 – There were many parallels with business and finance with automation that Nick observed as a high frequency trader.
04:50 – Nick was making seven figures before he decided to do his startup.
05:29 – Like many people, Nick values the ability to work on what he wants whenever he wants.
05:52 – Calvin App is funded by 200K of Nick’s own money and another 200K raised by family and connections.
06:21 – The company is looking to raise around 750K.
07:27 – CalvinApp stores the plans of a user and can compare it to those of another user to efficiently find a time both users are free.
09:33 – Instead of making money, the app’s current focus is to improve and get users.
09:45 – Moving forward, CalvinApp plans to make money through affiliate partnerships with services such as OpenTable and Fandango.
10:08 – Nick discusses a second interesting method with CalvinApp that is further down the road. (integrating into brands)
10:56 – CalvinApp has had about 400-500 downloads since coming out very recently on the app store.
11:35 – Who is Calvin?
13:07 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:
As a high frequency trader, Nick observed the benefits of automation not only in finance but also in everyday life.
CalvinApp allows a user to store plans and compare it to those of another user to efficiently find a time both users are free.
Soft skills such as marketing and web development can be just as important as hard skills such as engineering and math.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
LinkedIn – Nick Sonnenberg’s LinkedIn
CalvinApp – Nick’s mobile app
Jack Dorsey – CEO Nick keeps up with
Less Doing, More Living – Book Nick stands by
Slack – One of Nick’s online tools
Trello – One of Nick’s online tools
Evernote – One of Nick’s online tools
Famous 5
Favorite Book?—Less Doing, More Living by Ari Meisel
What CEO do you follow?— Jack Dorsey
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack, Trello, Evernote
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—To get involved with web development and marketing instead of focusing too much on Engineering and Math.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/28/2016 • 16 minutes, 59 seconds
How To Sell a $150/Yr iPhone App with Evi Meyer of uMake
In Episode #151, Nathan speaks with Evi Meyer, the co-founder and CEO of uMake. In the past, he led design and product management at AutoDesk’s Autocad mobile project. Listen as Jay and Evi talk about how the latter left his job as a project manager in Israel to develop uMake, a 3-D sketching app for mobile platforms.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:26 – Evi joins the show
01:54 – Evi worked on Autocad mobile which is one of the most successful apps available today.
02:10 – uMake is based in both Tel Aviv for engineering and San Francisco for marketing and business.
03:04 – Evi’s team left Autodesk in order to dive into the 3D design market.
03:33 – uMake is the first 3-D sketching app on mobile platform.
04:11 – Founded in April 2014.
04:25 – The founders invested not only their savings in the project but also less palpable resources.
05:50 – On day one, the business had 80K, which converts to 240K Israeli sheqels.
07:11 – Evi made roughly 97K a year as a project manager in Israel.
08:13 – uMake raised 5.2 million in funding (equity) just recently.
08:32 – uMake was part of an Israeli startup accelerator, and Brian McClendon was one of the first to invest in it.
09:35 – Good investors are interested in what you’re doing and can support you.
11:50 – There are currently hundreds of people using uMake.
12:50 – To create a sustainable business on the app store, the product has to generate value for a user every day.
14:50 – The churn rate is difficult to determine because the app’s been on the store for only about a month.
15:40 – Average revenue per user per month is roughly 13-14$.
16:59 – Famous Five
3 Key Points:
One of the first of its kind, uMake is a 3D sketch tool for mobile devices used by professionals and hobbyists alike.
Good investors not only fund your project but care about the work you do and can support you in other ways like connections and relevant experience.
In order to create a sustainable business based on an app, a product has to generate value for a user every day.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
LinkedIn – Evie Meyer’s LinkedIn
CrunchBase – Evie Meyer’s Crunch Base
uMake – Evie’s 3-D sketching tool for mobile devices.
Aaron Levie – CEO Jay keeps up with
Trello – Evi’s favorite online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— N/A Evi learns from his life.
What CEO do you follow?— Aaron Levie
What is your favorite online tool?— Trello
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be confident. Be who you are and do what you want to do.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/28/2016 • 19 minutes, 39 seconds
Getting 1m Users Fast with Kelvin Lockwood
Episode 151
Summary:
In Episode #151, Nathan speaks with Kelvin Lockwood, the leader of the team behind Bundle, which is a mobile application that collects local news based on a user’s location. Listen as Nathan and Kelvin talk about how Bundle plans to reach users and generate revenue through mobile ads.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
3 Key Points:
There aren’t many mobile apps that can tell you the local news based on user-location. Facebook can’t because content doesn’t change when traveling.
Getting traction for a user base as a mobile app, the bar is set very high.
Boosting productivity can be as simple as spending less time on things that are not super meaningful in your life
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:24 – Kelvin joins the show
01:38 – Bundle is a location driven mobile app, as a user moves around the app collects data and news from the surrounding area.
02:18 – Kelvin jumped ship from his account management job for his startup due to pursue his ideas
02:53 – Kelvin made roughly 50-60K a year in his old job.
03:24 – Bundle addresses a problem that isn’t often talked about – where people get their local news.
04:05 – Websites like Facebook generate local news but when traveling it’s not much use.
04:43 – Kelvin describes what a news feed would look like on Bundle in Austin, Texas.
06:32 – Bundle is currently testing in the UK and US. Anyone who wants to try the app, can request for access.
07:03 – Bundle makes money through mobile advertising.
07:47 – Kelvin’s team thinks there are 8 million prospective users in the UK and 24 million in the US.
08:44 – CPM(cost per mille) of 7$.
11:00 – Getting traction for use of mobile app is very high.
12:38 – By around December 2016, Kelvin hopes that the app will have around a million users.
14:04 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Kelvin Lockwood – LinkedIn
Bundle – Kelvin’s mobile news application
Bundle – LinkedIn
@kelvinlockwood – Kelvin’s Twitter
Breeze– Kelvin’s favorite online tool
How Google Works – Book Kelvin stands by
Bridget Dunlap – CEO Kelvin follows
Andrew Strauss’s Books
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— How Google Works by Eric Schmidt and Andrew Strauss’ books
What CEO do you follow?— Bridget Dunlap
What is your favorite online tool?— Breeze
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Block out the distractions and non-meaningful things in your life.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/28/2016 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
How To Mathematically Figure Out Amazon Sales Potential With Michael Devlin
Episode 149.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/27/2016 • 20 minutes, 29 seconds
How to Build SaaS Company in Small Biz Space, Sell for $30m With Jay Bean
Episode 148.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/27/2016 • 26 minutes, 21 seconds
Would You Sell Your Business to WP Engine for $1m With Troy Dean
Episode 147
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/27/2016 • 17 minutes, 55 seconds
How Moms Can Quit Corporate For Their Own Startup with Liz Picarazzi of CheckListHomeServices.com
Episode 146 Liz Picarazzi personifies her company’s target customer. She’s spent the last decade juggling a corporate job, motherhood, and marriage, barely having enough time to maintain and improve her family’s biggest investment – their home. Inspired by a book that reminded her how much she loved shop class in middle school, Liz took a leap of faith and started Checklist Homes Services in 2011.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Running a handyman service has a lot of hidden costs like licensing, insurance, and worker’s compensation.
Juggling a corporate job, motherhood, and marriage is hard, but doable.
It’s important to explore what makes you happy and to have a good understanding of how to frequently feel good.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:38 – Liz joins the show
02:10 – Liz started the business because she was disappointed in outside contractors for home services.
03:50 – Most customers find Checklist through Google search and they can customize their to-do list room by room.
05:00 – Checklist completed 65 jobs in October – the business is run by a local team of dedicated craftsmen.
05:41 – Checklist’s numerous services include TV mounting, AC installations, furniture assembly, painting, and caulking/grouting.
06:55 – The most common service purchased is the “Handyman for a Day” which is between 595 and 725$.
07:41 – Checklist’s craftsmen are benchmarked against those in the same field – they’re paid between 15-35$ an hour depending on their experience.
08:50 – There are a lot of unexpected costs running a handyman service –it needs to be licensed, insured, and take into account worker compensation which is 20% of a craftsman’s payroll.
10:51 – Per 400$ job, Checklist will make a net profit of about 60-75$.
11:21 – Liz has launched a second business related to Checklist – City Bin.
12:23 – Liz was making 6 figures at Bank of America before she started Checklist. (to get an idea of what she was doing before.)
14:39 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Boss Life, Surviving my Own Small Business – Paul Downs
What CEO do you follow?— Managed by Q with Saman and Dan
What is your favorite online tool?— Mindfulness Daily
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Explore what made her happy and have an understanding of it so it can be recreated.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Checklist NYC – Liz’s business
Facebook – Checklist NYC’s Facebook
Boss Life, Surviving my Own Small Business – Book Liz stands by
Managed by Q with Saman and Dan – Business Liz keeps up with
Mindfulness Daily – Liz’s favorite online tool
Think and Grow Rich – By Napoleon Hill
Audible.com
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/25/2016 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
How to Profit Big and Give Back At Same Time with Yanik Silver
Ep 144 Yanik Silver redefines how businesses is played in the 21st century as the intersection of more profits, more fun and more impact. Starting with his first million-dollar idea at 3 o’clock in the morning, he has bootstrapped 7 other products and services to the 7-figure mark from scratch without funding, taking on debt or even having a real business plan. Yanik’s story and businesses have been featured in WIRED, TIME.com, USA Today, SmartMoney.com, MSN Money, Entrepreneur, Fox Business News, WORTH.com and the Wall Street Journal among others.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
A business shouldn’t be just about earnings – it should have an aim that affects the world positively.
Self-publishing a book has some upsides like more flexibility and freedom.
Follow your heart when making a choice – it may not be an easy one, but you’ll likely make the right decision.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:33 – Yanik joins the show
02:18 – Frequently, customers want the fish handed to them, not to be taught how to fish.
03:04 – Yanik got a very early start in entrepreneurship, he was a cold-caller at 16.
03:47 – Printed Salesmanship by Robert Rucksten My first 65 years in advertising by
05:16 – Yanik respects the value of books especially since some authors put their expertise of about a decade in them.
06:42 – About 100K people have read Yanik’s books.
07:26 – Self-publishing gives the author more flexibility with timeline and control.
09:51 – Yanik sometimes disagrees with the use of the words “give back” because it implies guilt, that something should be returned.
10:34 – Yanik talks about Maverick 1000 and its impact fund.
11:23 – One of the topics the group talked about was the decline of bee populations and how entrepreneurship could positively impact the problem.
12:18 – The membership cost for Maverick 1000 is about 1,500$ a month and 10% of it goes into the impact fund, which goes into projects.
13:32 – Maverick 1000 is currently around 125 members – there’s another entrepreneurial group called Maverick Next which is all 25 years and under.
13:55 – The organization has used about 2 million to create some sort of impact on the world.
14:34 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Great Work of Your Life by Stephen Cope
What CEO do you follow?— Sir Richard Branson
What is your favorite online tool?— Trello
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Continue following your heart. It might not make an easy decision but it’ll make the right one.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Maverick1000.com – Yanik’s Entrepreneur group
Yaniksilver.com – Yanick’s website
@yaniksilver – Yanik’s Twitter
Facebook – Yanik’s Facebook
The Great Work of Your Life by Stephen Cope
Trello – Yanik’s favorite online tool
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/25/2016 • 20 minutes, 15 seconds
How Students Can Sell First $6k with Elijah Montecelli of Montecelli Band & Satchel
Episode 145 Elijah Montecelli was in debt before he started his business selling hand-tailored Apple watch bands. Nowadays he spends his time honing his craft and developing new products for his company, Montecelli Band & Satchel.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
There are a variety of online stores that a vender can utilize such as Ebay, Etsy, and Shopify.
There are two approaches to building a creative product business from the ground up – offering a constant product for a while or making tiers of a variety of products early on.
Getting started earlier is better – don’t wait.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:26 – Elijah joins the show
02:04 – Elijah sells hand-tailored cuff bands for Apple watches.
02:52 – They’re sold on Montecelli.us
03:47 – At the beginning of August the bands were sold.
05:08 – Elijah sold his first product with Shopify, an online store builder – you can have it up two weeks for free.
06:40 – Elijah chose several different outlets like Ebay and Etsy to see which would bring in the most customers.
07:50 – 70% of Montecelli sales are on Etsy alone – also customers can request specific things through the website.
08:29 – Elijah is currently interested in expanding and creating more types of products.
08:43 – Also he wants his store to have different tiers of products for affordability
09:51 – Elijah’s become so used to making the same thing over and over that he wants to go back into the developmental cycle for a new product.
11:00 – Nathan believes as more jobs become automated that the creative job market will stay resilient because creativity and empathy can’t be emulated by machines.
11:27 – Nathan talks about Ben Uyeda from The Top episode 10, another creative type.
12:02 – Elijah is content making 20-30 sales a month as long as he’s able to develop new products.
14:04 – Five years from now, Elijah hopes that his store will become a more rounded out store.
14:30 – Nathan is a believer in first letting one or two products flourish before branching out.
16:01 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Luck Factor by Bryan Tracy
What CEO do you follow?— Gary Vaynerchuk
What is your favorite online tool?— Facebook Ads/Pixel
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— It depends.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Elijah wishes he’d gotten started sooner selling his bands.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Facebook – Montecelli Band & Satchel Co.’s Facebook
Instagram – Montecelli’s Instagram
Etsy – Elijah’s hand-tailored bands
The Luck Factor by Bryan Tracy – book that Elijah stands by
Gary Vaynerchuk – CEO that Elijah follows
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Top Entrepreneurs join Nathan Latka daily inspired by, Art of Charm, Pat Flynn, John Dumas, Entrepreneur on Fire, Chalene Johnson, Lewis Howes, School of Greatness, HBR Podcast, the StartUp podcast, Mixergy, Andrew Warner, AskGaryVee, and the great hosts of BiggerPockets!
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/25/2016 • 18 minutes, 16 seconds
How To Get 10,000 Customers for Your SaaS Business with Pam OHara of BatchBook
Ep 143 Pam OHara of BatchBook joins Nathan.
Pam O’Hara is the CEO of Batchbook social CRM, which she co-founded in 2006. She is responsible for setting the overall direction and product strategy for the company. As a businesswoman and mother, she is committed to running a company that can adapt to the unique needs of both its employees and its customers in order to foster better organization, increased productivity and more balanced lifestyles.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
As a business grows, it gains more sophisticated channels for customer acquisition.
It’s important for small businesses to be able to easily add employees and partners to their online communication networks – and Batchbook does just that.
Learning is a lifelong process, fail hard and fail fast instead of concentrating on getting every little thing right.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:42 – Pam joins the show
02:31– Small businesses needed an online tool to keep up with their advertisers, customers, and speakers
03:20 – Pam met her lead developer for Batchbook on the playground where their children played
05:20 – Batchbook, an online service offers two pricings, 33$ or 46$ per month billed annually
05:30 – They are a 9-year-old company that is self-funded and has around 20 team members
05:50 – Batchbook is used by tens of thousands of clients – free and paid
06:36 – Batchbook was the first online organizational and sharing service to offer an unlimited user plan
08:19 – They charge by successful relationships that translate into contacts
09:36 – The average business using Batchbook pays 42$ a month
09:51 – Pam looked at things in terms of 10K increments while Batchbook grew
11:00 – For the first 10K in revenue, Pam’s priority was getting Batchbook’s name out through word of mouth and telephone (this was before Facebook was popular)
11:51 – As a business grows, it gains more sophisticated channels for customer acquisition
13:01 – Batchbook uses channels like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn for customer acquisition -Targeting a very specific type of customer is usually more successful
13:31 – A big part of Batchbook is its integration with other software products
14:28 – Batchbook’s churn rate is private, but the majority of customer’s will stay into the second month (mostly because of the free 30 day trial)
15:45 – After the second month, Batchbook has over a 95% retention rate
16:13 – Currently Batchbook isn’t seeking outside funding
16:30 – Pam’s team is launching a new standalone product in the first quarter of next year
17:25 – Currently Batchbook is not at break-even due to marketing spend investments
20:07 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5:
Favorite Book?— The Upside of Down by Megan McArdle and The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz
What CEO do you follow?— Chris Schroeder
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Pam gets 1 to 24 hours of sleep every night – highly dependent on her three kids.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Continue to learn and make mistakes instead of concentrating on doing everything right.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Batchbook – Pam’s business
The Upside of Down by Megan McArdle – A book Pam stands by
The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz – another book Pam stands by
Slack – Pam’s favorite online tool
Chris Schroeder – CEO Pam follows
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/24/2016 • 23 minutes, 57 seconds
Art of Your First Six Figure Launch with Kimra Luna
Ep 142 Kimra Luna joins Nathan.
Kimra Luna is a personal branding and online business strategist who helps freedom-seeking entrepreneurs to stand out, captivate their audiences’ attention and monetize their authentic brands online.
In 2014 and after being on government welfare for over 4½ years, Kimra defied the odds grew her business from zero to $880k in sales in the less than a year.You can find Kimra on YouTube, Twitter, Pinterest and of course Facebook where she consistently provides advice and guidance to her group The Freedom Hacker’s Mastermind.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Demand for sales on the internet usually grows exponentially right before closing hours.
Growing a community based on Facebook ads and other means can be achieved for less than 2$ per conversion.
For those just starting out, remember to go for it! Don’t hold back.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:44 – Kimra joins the show
01:54– Kimra sells a signature program called Be True, Brand You
02:03 – In her first year of business, she made 880K in sales from the program
02:42 – Before the program, Kimra was a health and wellness food blogger
03:31 – Sales page for program not up currently – the program runs for short periods per year
04:00 – Kimra’s website was designed by Diane and Peach – it’s hand drawn
05:17 – Kimra goes over all her expenses for her program (facebook ads, team, copywriting, sales page, brand video, photoshoot)
07:23 – At first, Kimra’s ad revenue was used for previously familiar audiences
08:45 – In February, Kimra’s list was 10K-11K, by end of launch, 12K.
09:19 – Advertising for her webinar is kept below 2 dollars per conversion (people who saw it)
10:48 – Audience members usually purchased a product after watching 4 webinars
11:16 – 1500-2000 members register for each webinar, about half of them show up
11:30 – The webinars are about 90 minutes long and cover a wide variety of topics
12:03 – Kimra doesn’t do sales on the webinar event, but usually the demand is much more massive last minute
13:07 – Luckily because most of Kimra’s list is in her Facebook community, she doesn’t have to email much
14:03 – The 2K digital course buys into a membership site with videos covering the ins and outs of online marketing – Kimra also answers individual questions from members
16:00 – Kimra grew her group and list simultaneously
18:13 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Don’t have one
What CEO do you follow?— Nope, don’t have one
What is your favorite online tool?— Leadpages
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No, she’s got three children. (Whew!)
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Go for it! Don’t hold back. Just go for it.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Kimraluna.com – Kimra’s website
Diane and Peach – People who designed Kimra’s website
LeadPages – Kimra’s favorite online tool
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/24/2016 • 20 minutes, 59 seconds
Case For Quitting Your $100k Corporate Job with Stig Brodersen of We Study Billionaires
Ep141 Stig Brodersen holds a master’s degree in Finance, has studied Business Analysis at Harvard University, and he’s the co-founder of the BuffettsBooks.com educational site. During graduate school Stig co-founded a consultancy firm, providing clients with legal and financial advice relating to personal finance. Upon graduation Stig sold his shares in the firm to become a commodities trader in one of Europe’s leading energy trading companies. Now, Stig works as a college professor teaching a variety of courses including financial accounting, investment and economics. Stig also owns the investment company Stig Brodersen Holding.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
“If you can’t be the person that you really are [in a workplace], you should leave for the sake of everyone.”
“Success is probably the simplest thing in the world. You just have to do the same thing as successful people and then stop doing the same thing that unsuccessful people are doing.”
Being a commodities trader is a strenuous, long hour job that pays a lot of money.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
02:00 – Stig joins the show
02:27 – “Always be good to other people.” – Easy to say, hard to practice
03:56 – Million monkeys flipping coins, one should be lucky – a Warren Buffet metaphor
04:40 – Stig quit his job as a commodities trader to teach and run a podcast
05:23 – Being a commodities trader involves working very long hours
06:08 – A trader gets a base salary and a bonus which is usually more appealing than the base salary
06:49 – Stig made between 200K and 400K on his base salary as trader
07:25 – As a trader, Stig dealt in energy like stocks. He started in 2011 and quit in 18 months
08:43 – “If you can’t be the person that you really are, you should leave for the sake of everyone.”
09:09 – Luckily, Stig didn’t struggle with paying rent or food in his off period
09:47 – His living expenses per month was a few thousand dollars
10:25 – Something that stuck with Stig: “Success is probably the simplest thing in the world. You just have to do the same thing as successful people and then stop doing the same thing that unsuccessful people are doing.”
11:31 – Nathan and Stig discuss audio equipment
12:46 – Stig makes money in Denmark teaching making 6-7K a month
13:51 – Stig discusses his podcast and having a co-host
16:41 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Snowball – by Warren Buffet
What CEO do you follow?— Warren Buffet
What is your favorite online tool?— Boomerang
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Often, but less on the weekends.
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Don’t worry Stig, you won’t be single for the rest of your life.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
The Investor’s Podcast – Stig Brodersen’s podcast
The Snowball: Warren Buffet and the Business of Life – Book Stig stands by
Tap Dancing to Work – Another book Stig stands by
Eddy Communications – Nathan’s audio/studio team
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/24/2016 • 20 minutes, 3 seconds
How To Launch Your First Conference with Ryan Moran of Freedom Fast Lane: Financial Freedom, Personal Growth, and Extraordinary Living
Ep140 Ryan Moran of Freedom Fast Lane: Financial Freedom, Personal Growth, and Extraordinary Living
Ryan Daniel Moran is one of the most sought after and well respected leaders on entrepreneurship in the marketplace. He is best known for helping businesses develop their million-dollar plan, getting rapid results, and investing the profits for passive income. Ryan is recognized for cutting out the fluff and creating the “fast lane” to results without compromising your lifestyle or being a slave to your business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
‘Real companies’ that have potential for growth offer products and services that are independently sought by customers. Not just from websites like Amazon.
If you want to have an exit with a cash flow business, you need to build it like to acquire customers and influence the marketplace.
For the younger viewers, you don’t have to do something the way everybody says you should, you can blaze your own path.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:30 – Ryan joins the show
02:40 – To sell on Amazon, one should focus on ranking high on search keywords
03:25 – ‘Real companies’ offer products and services that are independently sought out by consumers – not just on Amazon
03:41 – Ryan’s team’s total topline revenue in October: 500K
04:06 – Primary expense of being in a products business is usually cost of goods sold (COGS)
04:45 – For Ryan and his team of 6, COGS is around 30% (in the ballpark)
05:40 – Costs include salary, sales, and advertising
07:08 – For publicity, Ryan’s team often sponsors athletes or bloggers
07:54 – Ryan’s primary focus is to scale into new areas and to find new ways to capture customers once they purchase through Amazon
08:42 – Ryan’s team will put things in their packaging in order to direct attention to some of their other products
09:05 – Some examples of what are put in their product shipments
10:18 – Ryan’s team nets just under 50% of their topline revenue of 500K
11:03 – Ryan and how he sold his yoga products business
13:14 – Selling a cash flow business is possible but not easy
14:30 – If you want to have an exit with a cash flow business, you need to build it like to acquire customers and influence the marketplace.
16:00 – Details on Ryan’s next conference
17:55 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Straight-Line Leadership by Dusan Djukich
What CEO do you follow?— Glen Beck and Tai Lopez
What is your favorite online tool?— Ryan prefers a physical journal (probably black moleskin)
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Most of the time (unless the baby’s having a particular night)
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Realize that you don’t have to do something the way everybody says it should be done. Blaze your own path.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
freedomfastlane.com – Ryan’s website
Glen Beck – Businessperson Ryan follows
Tai Lopez – CEO Ryan follows.
Straight-Line Leadership – Book that Ryan stands by
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 23 minutes, 6 seconds
How To Build an 8 Figure Business Fast with James Marks of WhipLash
Ep139 James Marks of WhipLash joins Nathan.
James Marks is the Co-Founder and CEO of Whiplash, a shipping department for e-commerce. He negotiated his first commercial lease when he was 17 and has been building companies ever since.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Whiplash’s success is attributed to being flexible in order to suit their clients’ needs.
There is a balance between profitability and growth that affects your company’s stability and direction.
For those younger starting out, remember to enjoy the journey because the road is long.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:17 – James joins the show
01:20 – Whiplash is order fulfillment for e-commerce
01:59 – Shipping might seem like a simple industry but it’s surprisingly difficult
02:26 – 330K in revenue in October from carrier fees, handling fees and monthly storage fees
03:26 – About 600 dollars per client per month. 157 clients equate to roughly 100K per month
04:19 – Whiplash’s warehouses rely on an organizational app
05:41 – The company is currently hiring for the sales and engineering departments
06:07 – James attributes his company’s success to being flexible to customer needs
07:11 – James is more concerned about who is investing in his company than the amount of money they are investing
08:36 – Whiplash is content with slower growth if it means stability and being on track
09:02 – The company launched in 2010 as a part time endeavor – became full time in 2013
10:42 – How Whiplash’s development affected equity distribution among its three cofounders
12:30 – Follow James on twitter and check out his website below
13:48 – Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Small Giants by Bo Burningham
What CEO do you follow?— Richard Branson
What is your favorite online tool?— Voodoo Pad
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— It’s going to be a long road, enjoy the process.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Whiplash – James Marks’ company.
dynamidynamics – James’ twitter account
Small Giants by Bo Burningham – One of James’ favorite books
Voodoo Pad – James’ favorite online tool
Richard Branson – CEO James follows.
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 16 minutes, 18 seconds
Smart Way to Buy Profitable Land with Mark Podolsky of Landgeek
Ep138 Mark J. Podolsky (AKA The Land Geek) is widely considered the Country’s most trusted and foremost authority on buying and selling raw, undeveloped land within the United States. He has been actively investing in Real Estate and Raw Land since 2001, and has completed over 5,000 unique transactions. Mark’s company, Frontier Equity Properties, LLC, is an A+ rated BBB real estate company. Mark has achieved this level of success largely due to his core business philosophy – “Happy Customers Guaranteed.” Mark is the host of one of the top rated podcast in the Investing Category on iTunes aptly title The Best Passive Income Model. He is also the host of the Land Geek Podcast- Work Smart. Earn More. Learn How.
3 Key Points:
The raw undeveloped land market is an untapped real estate niche that if bought and sold correctly, can generate considerable passive income.
Selling raw undeveloped land doesn’t require rehab, renters, renovations, or rodent control. It can be done from a computer anywhere.
Life is a numbers game. Don’t be fearful and take risks when you can.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:53 – Mark joins the show
02:39 – Bought 160 acres of raw undeveloped land for 6,200$. Sold for 54,000$
03:14 – Mark’s company sends direct offers to land holders that are accepted at a 3-5% rate
04:21 – Why selling raw land is an ultimate passive income model
04:50 – Specifics on how Mark’s company turns a profit
06:15 – Land investing is an untapped real estate niche that isn’t intuitively profitable (at first!)
07:15 – The business is still dependent on the market
07:37 – 12% consistent annual returns
09:13 – Mark’s total topline revenue in 2014 was over 1 million dollars
09:21 – Mark’s company’s passive income exceeds its fixed expenses – generating over 20K a month
10:26 – Mark’s company’s average ROI is over 1000% on owner financing and 300% on flips
11:21 – Nathan’s post-podcast experiment
11:51 – Buying correctly, the undeveloped land market is a reliable source of income
12:05 – Amazingly most of the work is automated with software for Mark’s company
13:51 – The Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Give and Take by Adam Grant
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Voxer
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Don’t be fearful, be your authentic self, and understand that life is a numbers game. Take risks when you can.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
The Best Passive Income Model Podcast – Mark Podolsky’s podcast.
Thelandgeek.com – Resource for learning more about the raw undeveloped land market.
Voxer – Mark’s favorite communication tool.
Elon Musk – CEO Mark follows.
Give and Take by Adam Grant – Mark’s recommended business book.
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
How to Make $250k In Health and Fitness Industry with Matt Gallant Episode 132
Ep 132 Matt Gallant joins Nathan.
Matt Gallant is a serial entrepreneur who’s collected over 7 million leads, scientifically tested well over 10,000 different marketing ideas, generate tens of millions of dollars online and built his dream international lifestyle. Matt currently resides in Panama with his beautiful wife.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Product quality should be a priority
Your product has to be unique and stick out
Look at what’s wrong with what you’re doing
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:40 – Source of the 7 million leads
02:15 – Matt’s strongest revenue is his supplement company
02:45 – Breakdown of Matt’s company production costs
03:56 – Restocking the supplement company
04:38 – Custom funnels for every affiliate
06:02 – Matt talks about his products’ nature – enzymes and probiotics
06:46 – Matt discusses his expertise in the field of health and supplements
07:57 – Your product has to be unique and stick out
09:09 – Look at what’s wrong with what you’re doing and doing it right
09:38 – www.masszymes.com
11:56 – Revenues per e-mail address
12:02 – Gold Lantern Lead Tracking Software – Infinite Profit Solutions
14:08 – Matt talks about investments outside his online market (real estate)
16:23 — Famous Five
16:25 – Breakthrough Advertising
17:08 – Richard Branson
17:15 – Gold Lantern
17:21 – A big sleeper
17:39 – Learn how to invest right now
Resources Mentioned:
www.masszymes.com
Gold Lantern Lead Tracking Software – Infinite Profit Solutions
Breakthrough Advertising
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Breakthrough Advertising (I’m reading/listening to an underground book all the billionaires recommend called Business Adventures. I got it for free. Click here to get your free audiobook and listen to it during the holidays.)
What CEO do you follow?— Richard Branson
What is your favorite online tool?— Gold Lantern
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—I’m a big sleeper
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Learn how to invest right now
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
How Experts Do $1m On Their InfoProduct Launches with Amy Porterfield of AmyPorterfield.com Episode 133
Ep 133 Amy Porterfield of AmyPorterfield.com joins Nathan.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Always take opportunities when they come
Don’t put all your eggs (affiliates) in one basket
Communicate with your audience
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:37 – Amy Porterfield’s Podcast #64
01:55 – Amy launched her Profit Lab program
02:47 – Closing the cart
04:03 – A combination of affiliates and cold traffic
04:24 – Picking affiliates
05:48 – The urge of the leader boards
06:46 – Don’t put all your eggs (affiliates) in one basket
07:49 – Amy talks about cold traffic and ads
08:44 – Amy talks about her webinars
10:55 – Communicating with your audience about price increase
12:57 – The power of retargeting
14:43 – Amy Porterfield’s Podcast #64 and Podcast #62
16:16 — Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Rework
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— I do, that’s why I’m so healthy
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Every single thing works out how it’s supposed to work out
Resources Mentioned:
Amy Porterfield’s Podcast #64 and Podcast #62
Rework
Slack
Nathan uses Growth Geeks (my friend Mike’s company) to keep this blog and podcast at the top of the charts. Nathan hires growth hackers to do anything he wants for an hourly or monthly price to avoid bringing on full time employees/fixed costs. Mike and Nathan have hooked you up with a free growth hacker: Click here and get your first job done free.
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 19 minutes, 7 seconds
How To Make Money Off Events with Gilbert Welsford of Sparks Entertainment Episode 134
Ep 134 Gilbert Welsford of Sparks Entertainment joins Nathan.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Create authentic relationships.
Rent capital equipment at 10% of the purchase price.
Don’t shy away from businesses with large, up-front capital expenses—they payoff is there if you’re patient.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:28 – Sparks Entertainment
01:53 – A creative lighting company for events, tours, etc.
03:50 – Fees range from $2k to $150K
04:05 — $100K worth of business in September ‘15
04:35 – Spark also does Audio/Visual engineering, and staging
04:54 – Spark does a LOT of corporate events
05:30 – The client acquisition process
06:22 – Costs involved in the business—very capital intensive
06:39 – Profit margins for 1-off events are roughly 70 to 80% but that does not account for capital expenses
07:28 – Spark is still in high-growth mode
07:55 – Rent equipment out at 10% of the purchase price—so items are paid off depending upon how quickly they are rented
08:35 – Growth—what it looks like
10:14 — @GilWelsford
11:23 — Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Think and Grow Rich
What CEO do you follow?— Steve Jobs
What is your favorite online tool?— Google Docs
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Slow down and enjoy college…you’re going to be able to do “it” (whatever that “it” may be) eventually
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Think and Grow Rich – Gil’s favorite business book
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/23/2016 • 13 minutes, 51 seconds
He Sue's Cell Phone Companies that Pray on You with Jon Colgan of Cellbreaker
Ep 131 Jon Colgan of CellBreaker.com joins Nathan.
Jon Colgan is founder of www.CellBreaker.com , an NC IDEA grant recipient (2013) and 500 Startups accelerant (2015). Fun fact: To talk about CellBreaker, Jon was the last scheduled interviewee with Diane Sawyer before she retired as ABC World News nightly anchor in 2014. Funner fact: Jon hasn’t brushed his hair since the 7th grade. As a lifelong entrepreneur and former UNC ethics debate captain, Jon’s mission is simple: give consumers confidence to veto bills they don’t owe.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Play the strength of your hand, not your bank account.
Large companies can’t keep up with the changes they make to their own contracts.
Justice as a Service businesses are growing and growing rapidly.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:39 – Jon Colgan joins the podcast
02:20 – What CellBreaker means
02:40 – Helps people OUT of cell phone contracts they don’t want
03:15 – The Cell Breaker revenue model
03:40 – A real-life sample of how Cell Breaker works
04:40 – Cell Breaker is a REALLY efficient way to enforce the contract as written
05:50 – In August of 2015, Cell Breaker say 13,000 customers pass through
07:00 – Determinants for fulfillment
07:20 – The fall rate for Cell Breaker
07:45 – Cell Breaker’s success rate is 100%–They’ve never lost a case
08:15 – The highest density of hatred for any carrier is tied between Verizon and Sprint
09:15 – Prior to 2011, state consumer protection laws allowed people to band together and forge class action lawsuits against consumer goods providers
10:45 – As a business, Cell Breaker is all about efficiency
11:16 – Cell Breaker’s competition?—“Justice as a Service” businesses
12:40 — @JonColgan or FredoParedo.com
13:00 – The Cell Breaker Team
14:08 – Cell Breaker is hoping to raise $1.5M in equity
15:38 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
@JonColgan – Jon Colgan’s Twitter handle
Fredo Pareto – Jon’s blog
Zero to One – Jon’s favorite business book
Gyazo – Jon’s favorite online tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Zero to One
What CEO do you follow?— Sylvain Dufour
What is your favorite online tool?— Gyazo
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Play the strength of your hand, not the strength of your bank account.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/22/2016 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
Amy Tells Nathan he's Wrong on Membership Sites with Amy Schmittauer of SavvySexySocial.com
Ep 130 Amy Schmittauer of SavvySexySocial.com joins Nathan.
Amy Schmittauer is Founder of SavvySexySocial.com, a video blog empowering brands to embrace their amazing personality and share it with the world. Leading the charge in video blogging for business, Amy has grown a community of advocates who’ve helped the brand amass more than 2 million views in turn growing her social business coaching and speaking career.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Say NO more!!!
Advice Doesn’t Matter if you don’t take action.
Unless you’re a content guru, membership sites are HARD.
Episode Notes:
01:03 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:30 – Amy Schmittauer joins the show
02:15 – YouTube is still the big dog on the block
02:34 – How Amy makes money
03:50 – Why she walked away from her consulting business
04:52 – Membership launched in May of 2015 and it costs $59/Month
05:12 – www.SocialAuthorityMembership.com
06:00 – October 2015, the membership site brought in $5K
06:45 – How Amy drives new clients
07:32 – The annual premium price is the “best-deal” for Amy’s clients
09:00 – Why set up a membership sites which require SO much work month-to-month
10:20 – Don’t join Amy’s group if you’re not going to do shit
10:40 – Keeping people in the group is more difficult than acquisition
11:00 – Members stay in her group for 3 months on average
12:12 – Getting paid for speakership–$5K per opportunity
14:05 – Say NO more
15:57 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Social Authority – Amy Schmittauer’s membership site
Savvy, Sexy, Social – Amy Schmittauer’s original video blog business
Aaron Levie – CEO of Box
Never Eat Alone – Amy’s favorite book
ToDoist – Amy’s favorite Tool
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Never Eat Alone
What CEO do you follow?— Aaron Levie
What is your favorite online tool?— ToDoist
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— The Marine was not a good guy, and there are a LOT of amazing things to look forward too
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/22/2016 • 18 minutes, 57 seconds
Secret Art of Getting Your Product Into Walmart with Vincent van de Poll of GROM
Ep 136 Vincent van de Poll of GROM joins Nathan.
Vincent van de Poll, co-founder of GROM: Make Things Personal @500 Startups Batch 13, an entrepreneur with 12 years’ experience in retail & ECommerce, and 3D Printing. Vincent van de Poll has lived and worked in 4 continents. Specialties: Gettingshitdone, Deal Closer, Growth Hacker, Sales, Marketing, Business Development, putting a smile on your face.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Don’t be afraid to split equity 50/50, but know that it doesn’t come without consequences.
Growing revenue by more than 20X isn’t impossible, but it takes WORK.
Fail fast and often.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:29 – Vincent joins the show
02:00 – Grom did $20K in topline revenue during October 2015
03:40 – Search for “’Minion’ or ‘Inside Out’ phone case” onWalMart.com to see some of GROM’s products
04:55 – What GROM does that’s different from other 3D printing companies
06:15 – GROM’s revenue percentages ranges per deal
07:15 – Net margins typically range between 40-60%
07:39 – Founded in 2012
08:28 – Splitting equity
09:00 – GROM consists of 7 team members at the moment
09:15 – Have raised $180K thus far
10:38 – Total revenue in 2015 is $85K
10:48 – Going from $85K in 2015 to $2.2 million in 2016
13:00 – The Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Four Hour Work Week
What CEO do you follow?— No
What is your favorite online tool?— Asana
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Fail often, fail fast. Don’t be afraid to fail.
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
@MrVandePoll – Vincent’s Twitter
The Four Hour Work Week – Vincent’s favorite book
Asana – Vincent’s favorite software tool
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/21/2016 • 15 minutes, 30 seconds
How to Sell For $100m+
Ep 135 Hampus Jackobsson joins Nathan Latka.
Hampus Jakobsson, the founder of Brisk sales process acceleration tool (customers such as Hootsuite, Intercom, Evernote). Angel investor in 45 startups. Previously 2010-2012 M&A director for Blackberry and 2002-2010 Founder of TAT (acquired by Blackberry for $150 in 2010), customers such as Google, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Find a place to work where you don’t know stuff—it’ll keep you interested.
If you’re an entrepreneur, always UPSELL next year’s revenue number.
Embrace your weaknesses, because they’re actually your strengths.
Episode Notes:
01:00 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:28 – Hampus joins the show
02:28 – The exit for TAT—The Astonishing Tribe
03:40 – Motorola, Sony, Samsung, Nokia
04:00 – 18 month sales cycles, for $1.5 million dollar contracts plus $3-4 million in implementation services
04:55 – Blackberry Acquiring TAT
05:26 – The Blackberry Playbook
07:20 – Getting acquired by Blackberry
07:54 – Acquisition price
08:25 – If you’re an entrepreneur—NEVER—low-ball next year’s revenue number
09:04 — $150 million in cash from Blackberry and then a cash-based retention to sign-on with Blackberry
09:45 – Why Hampus left Blackberry
12:30 – Know everything about your clients
13:00 – Hampus has put $2.5 million into startups
14:15 – Brisk’s revenue for October 2015
11:23 — Famous Five
14:30 – B2C to B strategy
15:35 – Brisk’s product pricing
16:15 – The headache of professional services
18:20 – How Brisk broke into Hootsuite
18:52 – @HAJAK
19:50 – The Famous Five
Related: Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Made to Stick and Switch (two different books)
What CEO do you follow?— No
What is your favorite online tool?— Tab Snooze
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?— Your weaknesses are your strengths and your strengths are you weaknesses
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
Mike Lazaridis – The Blackberry genius who brought Hampus to the BB team
Made to Stick and Switch – Hampus’ two favorite business books
Tab Snooze – Turns open tabs into to-do lists
Want to learn how to go from $0-$10k/mo in revenue fast? Join Nathan live on the Starter Tribe Beta free workshop.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/21/2016 • 24 minutes, 27 seconds
Why You Should Always Promote Women with Neylan McBaine
Ep 127 Neylan McBaine joins. She had a front row seat to the earliest days of digital marketing in Silicon Valley, and she’s brought that experience to several top retailers’ marketing efforts in the years since. Neylan has served as both an in house marketer and as an agency account planner, giving her unique insight into the challenges and benefits of each. She currently is the CMO of Brain Chase, an educational technology tool for kids that disguises online learning with premiere curriculum providers as a massive global treasure hunt for a reallife buried treasure.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Avoid seasonality by expanding range of services provided.
Expand curriculum to appeal to a wider audience.
Prizes as incentive.
Episode Notes:
00:59 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:44 – Witnessing 1999 – 2001 Silicon Valley dot.com boom/bust
03:40 – Brain Chase curates online curriculum for Grades 2-8
05:13 – Pricing
06:42 – Summer 2014 – 500 subscribers; 2015 – 2000 subscribers
07:21 – Price 2014 $199 down to $149 in 2015
08:22 – Seasonality – introducing new Spring and Fall semesters in Feb 2016
09:44 – Hoping to break $1 million in 2016
10:15 – Teachers and parents were targeted for marketing
11:53 – Expanded elective curriculum in 2016 to appeal to a wider audience
12:54 – Partnered with Junior Explorers (see Episode 110)
13:28 – Buried Treasure prize incentive
14:45 – Follow @NeylanMcBaine
16:23 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects.
Brain Chase
Junior Explorers
ReWork
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Re-Work
What CEO do you follow?— Jason Fried
What is your favorite online tool?— Kickstarter
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No
If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? How flexible I would need to be with my career.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/21/2016 • 19 minutes, 37 seconds
The Trick to Finally Write Your First Book And Sell 15,000 Copies with Bryan Kramer
Ep 126 with Bryan Kramer, one of the world’s foremost leaders in the art and science of sharing, and has been credited with instigating the #H2H human business movement in marketing and social. With over 300,000 social fans and followers, and an intimate understanding of the intricacies and interworking of both social technologies and social behaviors, Bryan is both a practitioner and authority on the subject. In January 2014, Bryan’s first book There is no B2B and B2C. Human to Human: #H2H rose to the #1 top selling spot in Business Books on Amazon in its first week. In January 2015, #H2H was named as the number 1 buzzword for 2015 by The Writer.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Self-publishing is effective for new authors.
Strike while an idea is hot.
Retain ownership of content.
Episode Notes:
00:57 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:28 – Bryan’s recent book Shareology has sold 30,000 copies
02:28 – Ensure you have the time and passion before attempting writing
03:33 – There is no B2B and B2C. Human to Human: #H2H and Shareology
04:42 – Getting published vs self-publishing
06:35 – #H2H e-book published 4 days after the hashtag went viral
08:15 – Sold 15,000 copies
9:24 – Shareology published by Morgan James, retained ownership of content
10:32 – Lower advance with higher royalty structure
11:44 – BryanKramer.com
12:52 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects.
There is no B2B and B2C. Human to Human: #H2H
Shareology
Morgan James publishers
com
Orbiting the Giant Hairball
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Orbiting the Giant Hairball
What CEO do you follow?— Brene Brown
What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes
If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? You’re going to be fine, just chill dude.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/21/2016 • 16 minutes, 21 seconds
How to Make a Fortune Selling on Amazon with Scott Voelker of The Amazing Seller Podcast
Ep 128 Scott Voelker joins Nathan.
Scott Voelker is an Amazon FBA Seller and Podcaster helping others start their own Amazon business.
YOUR $100: Remember to subscribe to the show on itunes then text the word "nathan" to 33444 to confirm that you've done it to enter to win $100 every Monday on the show. Do this now. Stop reading this and do it!
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Private labeling is more sustainable than retail arbitrage
Calculate competitors’ daily turnover via their BSR
Sell like-products in order to build a brand around a market
Episode Notes:
01:05 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:34 – Selling private labeling items vs retail arbitrage on Amazon
03:40 – Process of working out the daily turnover of competitors via their Amazon BSR
05:49 – How BSRs work across different categories
06:58 – Gross revenue $307,000, 38% margin
07:32 – Cross-promotion of like-products – building a brand around a market
8:50 – Cashing out of your Amazon business
10:38 – Diversification – 25% of Scott’s income now comes from selling on Amazon, 75% from teaching
12:00 – Podcast launched in Feb 2015, classes didn’t start until after 50 podcast episodes
13:04 – Scott’s introduction to Amazon (downloadable templates)
14:13 – Podcast @ theamazingseller.com
15:15 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects.
theamazingseller.com
Crush It!
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Crush It!
What CEO do you follow?— Pat Flynn
What is your favorite online tool?— Google docs
Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — No
If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? – To trust my gut, and that fear is an indicator that you should do something.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/21/2016 • 17 minutes, 54 seconds
How to Sell $300k Of Your Physical Product with Trisha Roy from Barn and Willow
Ep 123 Trisha Roy of Barn and Willow is a product manager turned entrepreneur. She is a design enthusiast and believes technology will continue solving problems! Traveled across almost all continents (except for Antarctica).
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Quality, make sure quality is obvious to customers.
Social media is a unparallel marketing tool
Manage marketing resources and know exactly what you are spending on them
Episode Notes:
01:15 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s Show with Trisha Roy
01:34 – Barn and Willow
02:00 – Founded December 2014
02:14 – How do you make money?
02:30 – Online store
02:50 – Vertically integrated brand
03:30– Who gets the money?
04:00 – 85% product mark up
04:28– What are your costs?
05:04– Funding
05:31 – Cash flow positive
05:58 – Story of the name
06:44– Total transaction volume
07:06 – $20,000- $25,000 revenue per month
08:55 – How to grow transaction volume
09:19 – Customer acquisition channels
10:08 – About $70 to acquire one customer
10:50—Business deals
11:30—One big influencer per month
11:50—Offline deals
13:39 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Barn and Willow —Trisha’s new online venture that is making $20-$25k per month.
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects without hiring full time employees.
Poorly Made In China—By Paul Midler
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Poorly Made In China by Paul Midler
What CEO do you follow?— Steve Jobs
What is your favorite online tool?— Whats App and Google Keep
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Sometimes yes, sometimes no
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be open to take more risks. Never negotiate with yourself and always ask.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/20/2016 • 17 minutes, 53 seconds
Why You Should Turn Down a $14m Acquisition Offer with Derek Bluford of QuickLegal
Ep 124 Derek Bluford of QuickLegal joins Nathan. Derek Bluford is the founder of Quicklegal, Inc., A new company that provides attorneys on demand via Facetime, voice call and instant messaging. Mr.Bluford has a history of entrepreneurial success in the legal service markets, and has won business awards such as California TechWeek, Entrepreneur Magazine Growth Conference, Legal Innovator and more. Mr.Bluford has a degree in legal studies and graduated Cum Laude. Mr.Bluford’s companies have been seen on publications such as Business Journal, California Lawyer, Landlord, Daily Journal and Porsche’s “The Drifter”.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Due diligence is key to decision making
Create a stellar team and build upon partnerships
There are lots of contributing factors in the decision to sell
Episode Notes:
01:15 –Nathan’s introduction to today’s Show with Derek Bluford
01:34 – QuickLegal
02:00 – Founded January 2014
02:14 – Why did you start Quick Legal?
03:10 – Sold last company for $424,000 when he was 26 years old
03:41 – Funding came from last company
04:10– Launched February 215 after one year of beta testing
05:00 – What does QuickLegal provide?
04:13– How do you make money?
06:04– Bootstrapped company up to 600,000 and raised about 750,000
06:31 – Evaluation hopes of $12 million
06:58 – 65k per month, 800k annual rate
07:44– Offers to purchase
08:31 – Growth before selling
09:30 – Use offers for credibility for evaluation
10:00 – Will not sell for $14 million
10:08 – Why won’t you sell?
11:30—Shark Tank
12:09—Biggest concern
14:12 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
QuickLegal, Derek’s new company that provides on demand legal service
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects without hiring full time employees.
The Success Principles—By Jack Canfield
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Success Principles by Jack Canfield
What CEO do you follow?— Jack at Cleo
What is your favorite online tool?— Google Analytics
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Absolutely not, probably closer to 8 hours per week
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Always be humble and realistic. Follow the data.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/20/2016 • 18 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 125: Will He Take Down Udemy? $100k/mo Already with Gautam Tambay
Ep 125 Gautam Tambay of SlideRule joins Nathan.
Gautam Tambay is the cofounder and CEO of SlideRule, an educational institution that teaches design and technology online, with oneonone mentorship from industry experts. He’s passionate about helping people achieve their full potential.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Offer free content for lead generation.
Offer greater value than competitors.
Convertible S.A.F.E for funding.
Episode Notes:
01:02 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:30 – Gautam joins the show
01:38 – How SlideRule works – an online school with one-on-one expert mentorship
02:23 – SlideRule was created in 2013
02:29 – Course costs and payment system
03:00 – www.mysliderule.com
03:26 – Enrolment numbers and revenue to date
04:45 – Finding customers through content marketing
05:26 – SlideRule offers a free UX design course for lead generation
06:01 – Mailing list +80,000, 2-3% conversion rate per month
06:38 – Funding – backed by Angel investors, raised just under $1 million
07:01 – Investment via Convertible S.A.F.E. (Simple Agreement for Equity)
08:00 – Cap on investment
09:00 – Gautam is 32, his first start-up.
09:08 – Mark Suster Is it time for you to earn or to learn?
09:35 – Find Gautam on Twitter @Gautambay
10:57 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects.
SlideRule
Is it time for you to earn or to learn?
@Gautambay
Getting to Leadership
Steve Jobs
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Getting to Leadership, Steve Jobs biography
What CEO do you follow?— Steve Jobs
What is your favorite online tool?— Evernote
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—No (catches up on weekends)
If you could let your 20-year-old self know one thing, what would it be? Take more risks, dive into entrepreneurship
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/20/2016 • 13 minutes, 57 seconds
Stress Free Way to Launch Startup In Red Tape Industries with Jarie Bolander of Lab Sensor Solutions
Ep 122 Jarie Bolander of LabSensor Solutions is an engineer by training, entrepreneur by nature and leader by endurance. Presently, he is the founder and COO of Lab Sensor Solutions, a company bringing sensor technology to healthcare to prevent medical errors.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Know your industry.
Quality, quality, quality.
Start slow and do a LOT of research.
Episode Notes:
01:15 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s Show with Jarie Bolander
01:25 – Lab Sensor Solutions
02:27 – Five founders discovered a need for their product
03:14 – How equity is split
04:10 – 4 year vesting period
04:22 – Sales process
05:09 – 85% margins
06:08 – Raised $420k seed money from friends and family
06:24– Who are the customers?
07:31– Break down of membership and service
07:33 – Business was launched in January after working on the sales platform for 2 years
07:47 – Current monthly earnings
08:30 – High touch sales process
08:45 – Growth hacking methods
09:25 – Average sale per customer after trial period
11:25 – $3k/month revenue
11:48 – Effect of affordable care act on Lab Sensor Solutions
12:44 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Lab Sensor Solutions—Jarie’s new venture, a B2B medical company that ensures blood sample integrity in transit.
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects without hiring full time employees.
The Pumpkin Plan—By Mike Michalowicz
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— The Pumpkin Plan By Mike Michalowicz
What CEO do you follow?— Brian Clark
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Trying
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Be confident that you can be your own boss. The people who tell you that you can’t are probably just jealous that you’re doing it.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/19/2016 • 16 minutes, 1 second
Quick Way to Sell Your First Company For More Than $1m
Ep 121 Chad Wittman joins Nathan Latka. Chad sold EdgeRankChecker for about $3m and then founded Dolly, an app built to bring moving into the 21st century. Listen as Chad talks about abandoning the “security” of a job, bootstrapping a start-up, and managing a business with partners.
Click here to join the top tribe and instantly learn how Nathan made his first $10k at 19 years old: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
If you want to reap 100% of the rewards, you need to bootstrap your business.
The sharing economy has touched a variety of markets, but not every market—find your niche.
Valuations are insanely high right now.
Episode Notes:
01:02 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show with Chad Wittman
01:25 – Edge Rank Checker
02:19 – Making $50-60K in the agency
03:00 – How Edge Rank Checker made money
03:30 – Launched in 2012 with a $30/month price point
04:22 – Two co-founders
05:40 – Within 2 months they were making $20K per month
08:20 — $60K a month at its peak before selling to Social Bakers
08:44 – Selling the technology but not the team
09:10 – Negotiating Sale Price
11:30 – 6 month earnout
11:55 – 75-25 cash-equity split
12:50 – Chad was paid out 100% b/c they were 100% bootstrapped
13:20 – MRR x $60k x 12 x 4
13:44 – The moving business digitized—Dolly
14:15 – The financial model of Dolly
15:00 – Valuations are high right now…some as high as $25X
16:05 – The sharing economy has touched a lot of form factors, but not the pack-up truck market
17:48 – The Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects without hiring full time employees.
Edge Rank Checker – Chad Wittman’s original foray into entrepreneurship
Dolly—Chad’s new venture, an app for moving your stuff intelligently
Famous 5
Favorite Book?— Getting Real (I’m listening to How to Win Friends and Influence People for free using Audible while I travel for the holidays)
What CEO do you follow?— Elon Musk
What is your favorite online tool?— Slack
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Do not overvalue an idea
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/19/2016 • 21 minutes, 21 seconds
How to Do Your First Profitable Real Estate Deal
Episode 120 Justin Williams and Tara Williams, 8 Minute Millionaire,
Click here to join the top tribe and talk to Nathan live: http://nathanlatka.com/startertribelive
3 Key Points:
Life is about passive income—passive income is where you win.
Don’t worry about the 1st return—dedicate yourself to the waterfall.
Avoid the “this is gonna be easy” pitfall—nothing worth having is ever easy.
Episode Notes:
00:55 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:47 – Justin and Tara join the show
01:57 – Why 8 minute millionaire is working so well
02:43 – The FIRST flip
03:15 – Whole Selling
04:02 – The struggle of 2011—being broke…all the money of the past had gone to debt
05:40 – 60 houses in 2011, and 100+ houses ever since
06:05 – Net profit in 2014 was roughly $1M
08:14 – Where do you invest your money?
09:04 – Fix and flip is the backbone of the business today
09:25 – Automate the business and crush passive income
10:00 – Don’t focus on the 1st return, focus on the waterfall
12:15 – The plan is to have the online education surpass real estate revenues
14:16 – Don’t fall into the pitfalls of “this will be easy”
14:50 – Managing the coaching lifestyle
18:55 – Famous Five
Resources Mentioned:
Growth Geeks – The way Nathan hires growth hackers on a per project basis for things like info graphics, blog posts, and other growth projects
8 minute millionaire – A program about developing the MINDSET of a millionaire
House Flipping HQ – Learn how to flip houses for free with house flipper Justin Williams
Outwitting the Devil—A great business book from Napoleon Hill
Famous 5
Favorite Book?—Outwitting the Devil
What CEO do you follow?—Nathan Latka
What is your favorite online tool?—Google Calendar
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?—Yes
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be?—Life is going to be OK.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/18/2016 • 21 minutes, 50 seconds
Get Your Own Realty Show
Belgray, Episode 83
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/15/2016 • 16 minutes, 41 seconds
Write a Best Selling Book
Dorie Clark, Episode 82
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/15/2016 • 17 minutes, 24 seconds
Capture Emails From Instagram
Billy Murphy, Episode 81
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/15/2016 • 16 minutes, 3 seconds
Get 75,000 Users Fast
Episode 80 Murray Newlands
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/14/2016 • 16 minutes, 2 seconds
Use Events to Sell Software
Brad Martineau, Infusionsoft Episode 79
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/13/2016 • 23 minutes
He Sold HARO to Vocus. Here's How.
Peter Shankman, HARO, Episode 78
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/13/2016 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
Business Behind YEC with Scott Gerber
Episode 37 Scott Gerber, YEC
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/13/2016 • 16 minutes, 35 seconds
How to Convince People To Work For You Without Hiring Them
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/10/2016 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
Is This the Smartest Copy Writer Alive Today?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/10/2016 • 18 minutes, 40 seconds
How to Sell A Lot of Books
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/10/2016 • 13 minutes, 52 seconds
Get a Deal With Walmart Using These Strategies
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/9/2016 • 20 minutes, 19 seconds
How To Get Big Money On Your Book Deal
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/9/2016 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
Quick Way to Get Anyone To Write About You
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/4/2016 • 13 minutes, 13 seconds
SaaS $0 to $37k/mo Fast with Peter Shallard of CommitAction Ep 3
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/4/2016 • 19 minutes, 58 seconds
Get Book Deal Without Being Big Name
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/3/2016 • 18 minutes, 53 seconds
Predictable Way to Launch Successful Podcast
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/3/2016 • 14 minutes, 54 seconds
Safe Way to Quit Job - With Kids - for a Startup
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/3/2016 • 21 minutes, 58 seconds
Yes, I Get Business Savvy From My Mom
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/2/2016 • 22 minutes, 29 seconds
Intern Escapes Corporate Hell, Does $3m
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/1/2016 • 14 minutes, 12 seconds
He has 2 kids. Guess what he did to make $500k?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/1/2016 • 19 minutes, 33 seconds
If you like show, tell friend at lunch?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
1/1/2016 • 16 minutes, 12 seconds
Does Tai Lopez Actually Own That Lambo?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/31/2015 • 22 minutes, 32 seconds
How to Raise Millions
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/31/2015 • 21 minutes, 28 seconds
From Student to Successful Entrepreneur Fast
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/31/2015 • 17 minutes, 31 seconds
Why You Should Still Buy Magazine Ads
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/30/2015 • 13 minutes, 35 seconds
She Makes More Money Than You. Won't Believe How.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/30/2015 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
The Art of Selling Your Company
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/30/2015 • 21 minutes, 30 seconds
Get Accepted Into TechStars
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/29/2015 • 16 minutes, 10 seconds
Quick Way to Make Money Blogging
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/28/2015 • 15 minutes, 42 seconds
Ethical Way to Build a Mastermind
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/28/2015 • 17 minutes, 56 seconds
How to Sell on a Webinar
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/27/2015 • 18 minutes, 30 seconds
Get Free Users to Finally Pay
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/27/2015 • 14 minutes, 43 seconds
He wanted freedom and $5k/mo. Here's how he did it.
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/27/2015 • 14 minutes, 37 seconds
It's SILLY How Much He Makes on Instagram
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/26/2015 • 14 minutes, 43 seconds
3 Secrets To Making Money at Events
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/26/2015 • 21 minutes, 42 seconds
Quick Agency Model to $90k In Cash
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/26/2015 • 17 minutes, 48 seconds
His Event Is Most Expensive, Always Sells Out
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/25/2015 • 19 minutes, 6 seconds
How to Be A Parent And Make $1,000,000+
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/25/2015 • 17 minutes, 22 seconds
2 Ways to Make Extra $5k Per Month
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/25/2015 • 20 minutes, 23 seconds
The Surprising Way This 30 yo Got Rich
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/24/2015 • 21 minutes, 23 seconds
How to Sell Your Company
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/24/2015 • 16 minutes, 5 seconds
How Defending Patents Can Make Bank
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/24/2015 • 16 minutes, 34 seconds
Quick Way to Sell Expensive Event Tickets
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/23/2015 • 18 minutes, 35 seconds
He's Sold The Most Mastermind Tickets
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/23/2015 • 17 minutes, 26 seconds
Smart Way to Get Press to Write About You
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/23/2015 • 16 minutes, 20 seconds
He's Sold The Most iPhone $3 Apps
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/22/2015 • 17 minutes, 26 seconds
How to Raise Investor Money
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/22/2015 • 20 minutes, 43 seconds
Artists, You Don't Have to Be Broke!
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/22/2015 • 19 minutes, 39 seconds
How to Sell Out Your Event
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/21/2015 • 20 minutes, 21 seconds
You Probably Saw His Self-Produced $250k Movie
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/21/2015 • 19 minutes, 57 seconds
The Art of a $75k/mo Marketing Funnel
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/21/2015 • 17 minutes, 36 seconds
We Need More Female Founders Like $170k/mo Crystal Huang
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/20/2015 • 16 minutes, 4 seconds
He Filed Bankrupt Then Made Millions
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/20/2015 • 17 minutes, 30 seconds
The New Way to IPO With Just $40k/mo in Revenue
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
12/20/2015 • 21 minutes, 8 seconds
EP 68: 4% churn, $1500 LTV, and $700k+ per month in revenue with Contactually Founder Zvi Band
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/23/2015 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 119: Fat to $14k/mo With the 30 Day Challenge and James Swanwick
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/20/2015 • 18 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 118: 12 Kids, Took Salesforce to $100m ARR, 50,000 Books Sold
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/19/2015 • 25 minutes, 37 seconds
EP 117: He made $2m at 18 then quit for Teachable, worth $30m?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/18/2015 • 23 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 116: Get $25k First Book Advance and Sell 500,000 Copies with Michael Port
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/17/2015 • 19 minutes, 25 seconds
EP 115: $1.3m Per Year with 950,000 Person List with ProBlogger's Darren Rowse
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/16/2015 • 20 minutes, 1 second
EP 112: He Quit Google Now Serial Entrepreneur
3 Key Points:
Understand your customer pain points and alleviate them—it’s the quickest way to success.
Know your growth story and paint the vision.
Don’t waste a moment in a day—once time ticks past, it’s gone forever.
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:01 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:55 – Ethan loves product because it’s all about understanding what the customer needs to make their life easier
02:28 – What it’s like working at Google and why Ethan left
03:55 – The Google video team was floored when YouTube was bought
04:55 – The story behind Red Beacon
07:00 – Red Beacon made money by taking a percentage of service provide bids
08:15 – The problem with Red Beacon was an absence of usage frequency
10:15 – Companies don’t get sold, they get bought
11:30 – The original concept of MyTime was to become the Amazon of local services
12:45 – MyTime Marketplace gets 1M visitors per month
13:50 – 2/3 business still use pen and paper
15:20 – Time is precious—once it’s gone, it’s gone
16:10 – MyTime is a multimillion dollar business with the potential to become a billion dollar business
17:00 – MyTime rolls with a churn rate that’s less than 10% per month
18:24 – Be able to tell the growth story and paint the vision to investors
19:30 – www.MyTime.com @Ethan_Anderson
20:24 – Famous Five
11/16/2015 • 22 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 114: $70k/mo Business Building 1,500 Online Businesses with Corbett Barr
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/15/2015 • 18 minutes, 58 seconds
EP 113: 0 to 6% Market Share in 3 Months with Former Microsoft Bing Director
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/14/2015 • 18 minutes, 44 seconds
EP 111: Adding 3000 Emails Per Week Buildling Ziglar Empire with Tom Ziglar
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/12/2015 • 20 minutes, 4 seconds
EP 110: He gave up a $1m wall street salary for nature with Anurag Agarwal
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/11/2015 • 23 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 109: How BiggerPockets Grew to 10,000+ paying $9/mo with Joshua Dorkin
In this episode you learn how Josh Dorkin and his partner build a membership site around real estate. They have well over 10,000 paying customers paying a minimum of $9/mo (doing over $1.2m annually).
01:03 – Nathan’s introduction to today’s show
01:38 – Welcoming Josh to the show
01:50 – Why become a web designer before a realtor?
03:12 – Josh started buying real estate at the age of 22
05:45 – Building an organic community
06:24 – You don’t need to know what you’re doing—just get started
07:40 – Building something credible means requiring real names
08:32 – The price-point to join bigger pockets
09:05 – Bigger Pockets was built to get Josh answers he needed himself.
10:58 – Give your users what they want
12:29 – A summary of Josh’s stats
13:50 – What do you do with the cash you make?—Real estate
15:52 — @JRDorkin
17:33 – Famous Five
17:50 – Delivering Happiness
18:20 – Tony Hseih
18:33 – None
18:55 – No
19:24 – Being an entrepreneur is hard and lonely so start building your network early on
3 Key Points:
Find creative ways to make money.
Have cash?—Find a way to put it in real estate.
Be credible to yourself and to others—it’s the easiest way to be successful.
Join The Top community at http://nathanlatka.com/thetop
11/11/2015 • 20 minutes, 46 seconds
EP 108: How FinCon Sells 900 tickets at $240 Each wtih Philip Taylor
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/9/2015 • 18 minutes, 8 seconds
Ep38: Capture 1000 Emails Per Day Fast Neil Patel
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/9/2015 • 16 minutes, 48 seconds
EP 107: Did going through 3 dads make you more creative? With Jason Zook
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/8/2015 • 21 minutes, 1 second
EP 106: He's 28, In Poland, and wants a $20m Valuation!
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/8/2015 • 18 minutes, 10 seconds
EP 105: He did $35k in October and is building to sell with David Abrams
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/6/2015 • 16 minutes, 59 seconds
EP 104: How'd you invest $1.5m in 40 different companies?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/5/2015 • 19 minutes, 44 seconds
EP 103: How MadMimi Does $500k/mo in Revenue and Sold to GoDaddy with Dean Levitt
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/4/2015 • 19 minutes, 30 seconds
EP 102: Pro Surfer to $2m in 12 months with this product?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/3/2015 • 19 minutes, 13 seconds
EP 101: 7 Kids and $500k In Revenue With Wes Schaeffer
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/2/2015 • 20 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 100: Couldn't Afford Groceries '08, Now Mom Makes $200k/year
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
11/1/2015 • 20 minutes, 21 seconds
EP 99: Will Pinterest IPO in 2016 w/ $4b VC
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/31/2015 • 20 minutes, 11 seconds
EP 98: "Did ABC Reality Show Kill Your Startup?" w/ John Frye
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/30/2015 • 19 minutes, 9 seconds
Charlie Houpert: How To Make $12,500 While on Vacation
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/30/2015 • 17 minutes, 39 seconds
AdEspresso: How They Make $1.8 Million Per Year
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/30/2015 • 19 minutes, 3 seconds
Hollis Carter: How To Charge $3k For Mastermind
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/30/2015 • 16 minutes, 42 seconds
EP 97: Spent $8000 in fb ads for $2,500,000 in revenue
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/29/2015 • 16 minutes, 58 seconds
EP 95: Topless lady tanks billionare and $250k contract
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/28/2015 • 17 minutes, 43 seconds
EP 96: He makes $100k/mo from "Revenge Porn"
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/28/2015 • 14 minutes
EP 94: 24 year old invents music through teeth with Rob Burke
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/27/2015 • 16 minutes, 38 seconds
EP 93: I offered him $2m for his business on the podcast
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/25/2015 • 21 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 92: $300k in 9 days from small Iceland hut
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/24/2015 • 18 minutes
EP 91: Do you make alot of money producing reality shows?
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/23/2015 • 21 minutes, 36 seconds
EP 90: Quitting Corporate and Going all In With Her Own $50k with Sonya
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/22/2015 • 16 minutes, 53 seconds
EP 89: From Poker Player to Magician to $5m Advertisements
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/21/2015 • 18 minutes, 19 seconds
EP 88: How a NYC Piano Street Performer Makes $100k/ Year
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/20/2015 • 19 minutes, 27 seconds
EP 87: Making $80k/mo After being $90k in Debt with Elliott Hulse
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/19/2015 • 19 minutes, 55 seconds
How to Run Profitable Event And Become Rich With Joe Pulizzi
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/19/2015 • 18 minutes, 5 seconds
EP 86: How a Gay Fashion Brand Does $500k/Year in Revenue With a Membership
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/18/2015 • 21 minutes, 17 seconds
EP 85: Going from 1 To 17 Restaurants and Landing a Bravo TV Show with Jeffrey Zurofsky
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/17/2015 • 20 minutes, 57 seconds
EP 84: How to Spend $.05 Per Click and Make $2 On that Same Click with Bazi Hassan
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at http://NathanLatka.com/TheTop
10/16/2015 • 19 minutes, 2 seconds
33: How to Build a $100m SaaS Company
Listen to The Top if you want to hear from the worlds TOP entrepreneurs on how much they sold last month, how they are selling it, and what they are selling - 7 days a week in 20 minute interviews! Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
The Top is FOR YOU if you are:
A STUDENT who wants to become the CEO of a $10m company in under 24 months (episode #4)
STUCK in the CORPORATE grind and looking to create a $10k/mo side business so you can quit (episode #7)
An influencer or BLOGGER who wants to make $27k/mo in monthly RECURRING revenue to have the life you want and full CONTROL (episode #1)
The Software as a Service (SaaS) entrepreneur who wants to grow to a $100m+ valuation (episode #14).
Your host, Nathan Latka is a 25 year old software entrepreneur who has driven over $4.5 million in revenue and built a 25 person team as he dropped out of school, raised $2.5million from a Forbes Billionaire, and attracted over 10,000 paying customers from 160+ different countries.
Oprah gets 60 minutes or more to make her guests comfortable to then ask tough questions. Nathan does it all in less than 15 minutes in this daily podcast that's like an audio version of Pat Flynn's monthly income report. Join the Top Tribe at NathanLatka.com/TheTop
