SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders

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

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849: SaaS: Kinvey Acquired for $50m To Help Frontend Devs Be Backend Devs 0

Nov 20, 2017

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

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848: SaaS: Wistia Video King? $10m+ ARR, 10k+ Customers on Just $1m Raised! 0

Nov 19, 2017

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

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847: SaaS: How DaPulse has 3x'ed Revenue YoY 0

Nov 18, 2017

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

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846: SaaS: $50m Raised, $12m+ ARR To Incentivize Reviews and Influencers 0

Nov 17, 2017

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

Download this Episode