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SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders

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 business. SaaS Founders range from bootstrapped to funded, MVP to 10,000 customers, pre revenue to pre IPO.
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Now displaying: January, 2017
Jan 31, 2017

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 SLSwhich 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
Jan 30, 2017

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
Jan 29, 2017

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
Jan 28, 2017

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
Jan 27, 2017

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 listssimilar 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
Jan 25, 2017

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
Jan 24, 2017

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
Jan 23, 2017

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
Jan 22, 2017

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
Jan 21, 2017

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
Jan 20, 2017

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
Jan 19, 2017

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 termthat 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
Jan 18, 2017

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
Jan 17, 2017

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
Jan 16, 2017

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
Jan 15, 2017

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
Jan 14, 2017

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
Jan 13, 2017

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
Jan 12, 2017

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 customersturning 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
Jan 11, 2017

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 spacethey 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
Jan 10, 2017

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
Jan 9, 2017

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
Jan 8, 2017

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
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