Made with Grit: Recent Episodes
Landon Bennett & Kyle Conarro
A show about bootstrapping SaaS businesses. Hosted by Landon Bennett and Kyle Conarro, co-founders of Ad Reform and Zero Mile.
Sponsored by Fetch Truck Rental. Truck rental made easy.
To learn more about AdLib.
Twitter: @HauptmanMichael
- Remote workspaces
- Recent business woes
- Media Math as AdReforms first customer
- Mike's connection to MediaMath
- What happened when MediaMath went down
- Recovery, options
- Repercussions
- Possible next steps
- Ways to stay in the game
- Gaining and keeping Momentum
Sponsored by Fetch Truck Rental.
Goal: precipitate the repeal of 174 changes
But how? Get 1,000+ signatures on the Small Software Business Coalition Letter to Congress by April 10th
- Sign the letter → Small Software Business Owners AllianceSD
- Michele’s Twitter: @mjwhansen
- Michele’s latest Twitter thread about Section 174 changes
- Big Band Software
- how you run multiple businesses and hiring
- How do you structure this from an entity standpoint
- What can founders do to prepare for sale
- What metrics, P&L line items matter
- SaaS acquisition market during these tougher times
- Niches that are doing well
- Sect 174
- Personal updates
- Retreats and Conferences, Kyle at Big Snow, Tiny Conference
- Kicking off 2023 and the year ahead
- Exploring adjacent use case and tailoring products to new needs
- Podcast repurposing
- Tip of the week - high yield savings rates
- Beer vs. Wine vs. Mixed Drinks, all good.
- Camo and OSX iPhone WebCam App, don’t get a fancy webcam, just use your iPhone
- TypeDream.com website builder
- Thnks.com gifting for business
- Claap.io video clip / screen sharing and feedback app
- TLDV.io
- Recast.studio
- Museapp.com - open canvas, white board type idea building, planning, collaboration platform
- Felt.com - MAPS!
- Swarmia.com - Engineering organization app
- Videoask.com - video clip delivery, vid e-mail app
- Switchboard.app - remote collab tool
https://www.sendspark.com/
- Bethany breaks down Sendspark
- The problem of stale content in help center
- Bethany discusses integration into Intercom
- Bethany explains origins of Sendspark, was in marketing at another company when she and co-founder realized the need
- Bethany as a Userfeed customer
- Fundraising for Sendspark, product usage metrics and activation
- Initial product Dev strategies, funding and spending
- Bethany working in NYC
- Energy of NYC and getting sick
- Grind during the week, weekends for sleep
- Landon asks “who is harder to market to - developers or sales people?”
- Struggles of email marketing, the need for more human connection in marketing
- Landon using Notion, problem of lack of context
- Sendspark marketing channels, organic traffic
- How-to-SEO
- Sendspark partnerships
- Landon testing rankings, name changes
- YouTube vid SEO tips from Bethany
- Landon using Intercom for Userfeed
- Bethany using vid email for lead generation on website
Sponsored by Punchlist: Close the loop on creative feedback and get your projects done.
Sign up at punchlist.com and use the promo code GRIT for your first month FREE of Punchlist Team (or 10% off any monthly plan)
Notes:
- Helping people sell more things is the right place to be
- Taplio: 6-figure ARR
- Tweethunter: 7-figure ARR
- Why build two separate products when they could potentially be under one roof?
- Why its important to build a brand on LinkedIn and tips to building an audience
- Why is LinkedIn different from Twitter?
- How much time do you spend on each business?
Sponsored by Punchlist: Close the loop on creative feedback and get your projects done.
Sign up at punchlist.com and use the promo code GRIT for your first month FREE of Punchlist Team (or 10% off any monthly plan)
Notes:
- Growing our candidate pipeline for Hire with Grit
- What we look for in candidate interviews
- Video setups
- Energy/enthusiasm
- Marketing experiments for the podcasts
- Repurposing content for social channels
- Video
- Moving the Hire with Grit site to Typedream
- Crappy accounting software
- Using a services business as hunting ground for software ideas
Episode NotesSponsored by Punchlist: Close the loop on creative feedback and get your projects done.
Sign up at punchlist.com and use the promo code GRIT for your first month FREE of Punchlist Team (or 10% off any monthly plan)
Notes:
- Our first solo pod. Weird? We're also on YouTube now! Weirder? 😜
- Hire with Grit update
- Already placing folks and seeing some good demand from non-friendly customers
- Setting up an internal process and CRM with Notion DB and Tally form
- Figuring out what our value to the market is
- Why an entrepreneur need to do the work first before you can build process and delegate
- Throw everything at the wall to see what sticks then pick a niche
- Why it's more simple than a SaaS business
- "Get paid to learn"
- Start with service before building tech
- Previewads.com free tool for Ad Reform
- Docs Fresh (Intercom app)
- Switching from a simple website builder (Carrd) to Webflow (Using Punchlist.com to help us collab on the changes)
- Trying to figure out what to do first on the marketing side
- You have to get through the failed marketing experiments to get to the ones that work
- Default to action
Sponsored by Punchlist: Close the loop on creative feedback and get your projects done.
Sign up at punchlist.com and use the promo code GRIT for your first month FREE of Punchlist Team (or 10% off any monthly plan)
Notes:
- Starting multiple new ventures
- Zeromile.io
- HirewithGrit.com
- Zeromile.io#docsfresh
- Hillchart.app
- Why are we starting more businesses, especially as the macro-economy crumbles
- Things we're doing different this time around
- How to set up operations to run multiple businesses and why it's important to separate all revenue and accounting accounts
- Relay Finance
- Wave
- Why we're building Hire with Grit, a headhunting business out of the Philippines
- Getting our first few deals under our belt and figuring out our lane
- Building Docsfresh and why we're starting on Intercom
- Why working on multiple things gives you energy and learnings you can't get through one business
- Starting sponsorships for the pod
- Landon starts continuous glucose monitoring with Levels
- Snapchat drone cam: Pixie
Links
- Bonjoro.com
- Matt Barnett
Notes
- Landon tells Matt about his funny Bonjoro story
- Landon talks about Docs Fresh, a new Intercom app their about to launch
- How Matt stair-stepped to Bonjoro through a video insights agency
- SaaS Virality (Bonjoro videos)
- How they've grown to multiple millions in revenue without an outbound sales team
- Workday schedule with kids
- How they scale support with 60k users
- Finding talent overseas (ie. Hire with Grit)
- Bootstrapping vs funding
Notes:
- Daniel Zarick (Founder of Arrows.to)
- Why it's hard to do a podcast about your business when you're growing a company in a competitive category
- Learning about the compounding of SaaS with Daniel's Twilio experience (23rd employee)
- Some markets are a lot bigger than you think
- Daniel talks about going from bootstrapper to VC-funded with Arrows.to
- How did you meet all of the high profile angel investors that joined your seed round?
- Operators as investors
- The current funding market with valuations dropping
- What were the first things Daniel spent the money on?
- Pivoting Arrows to an integration-based product (currently focusing on Hubspot)
- Narrowing focus for the product and how that allows you to improve your marketing content
- Marketing assets: Templates and guides (Arrows guide to customer onboarding on Hubspot)
Links
- Punchlist.com: Close the loop on creative feedback and get your projects done
- Techstars Atlanta
- Overline VC
Notes
- Why raise money vs. continuing to bootstrap?
- How to get the most out of an accelerator?
- What were the most interesting startups to come out of Techstars?
- How to find a co-founder?
- How did you raise $2mm?
- "Team, team, team, product"
- How are you finding great people to hire remotely?
- Quantifying success by time spent in the product vs. revenue (early on)
- What are the weirdest use cases you've seen with Punchlist users?
- How do you sell to agencies?
- Paying over $20k for the .com and why it's a no-brainer
Notes:
- What it was like to start our business (the hard times)
- Building out our new home offices
- A new product: recurring website screenshots
- Building landing pages before building the product
- How important is SEO
- Userfeed/Bump being sold again for a big return in only one year from the initial sale
- Are SaaS businesses being flipped or used as cashflow entities?
- If you buy a SaaS what's the optimal length of time before you sell it?
- Hard to maintain the tech/security overtime
- Platform risk on things like Intercom or Shopify
Links:
- Hillchart.app (Hillcharts for Notion, Clickup, Github, Trello, Gitlab)
- Intercom <> Jira App
- Highways.io (Intercom integration for A bunch of CRM apps)
Notes/Links
- Ad Reform's first sales without the founders!
- How soon should a company hire a sales rep?
- Is the product management role shrinking in a remote-first world?
- Peter Levels tweet
- Profit-first as a service
- Matt Wensing tweet
- Is Facebook crumbling? And is that going to kill small businesses that rely on that growth channel (e.g. DTC brands)?
- Startup valuations declining alongside public tech company valuations
- What does this mean for companies that raised at crazy valuations over the past two years? Will they all die?
- Why Kyle is a weirdo for not watching the Super Bowl
Notes
- Typefully: Twitter threads & analytics
- Matter: a better reader
- Calendly Twitter drama
- Stripe/YC mob drama
- Marvel: productized content service
- Purchasing a $1k course
- Project work vs. sales work and the feeling of momentum
Kyle and Landon discuss 2022 planning, talking to as many prospects as possible in the early days, why some entrepreneurs are afraid of rejection, the wave of competition in SaaS, and the different levels of authentic demand.
Back after a lengthy break, Landon and Kyle discuss Atlanta sports (and the World Series champs), collections, valuations & more.
Today’s Topics:
- The Atlanta Braves are World Series champs!?
- Iterating on and improving new hire onboarding
- Bookkeeping mania: adding granularity, cleaning things up
- Micro-acquisitions, Micro PE, and wild valuations
- Building vs. buying
- Landon reviews his fancy new espresso machine (and Kyle confuses semi-automatic with Semisonic)
Links & Resources:
- MicroAcquire
- Terra Kaffe
- Nespresso
- Bottomless Coffee (← Kyle's referral link)
- Trade Coffee
In part two of the conversation, Landon and Kyle discuss experimenting with approaches to building businesses, how much is "enough", and reward and incentive structures as companies grow. They also touch on the current moment: the end of the 20-year American occupation of Afghanistan.
Today’s Topics:* Experimenting with new markets and approaches to building businesses * Doubling down vs. autopilot vs. freedom to build other stuff * Thinking critically about the end goal to maintain optionality * How much is "enough"? * How do we build an asset that affords our team a comfortable life + enables us the freedom to work on anything we want to work on * Profit-sharing as a simple, shared incentive structure * Acknowledging the moment: the difficult and tragic end of the 20-year American occupation of Afghanistan * Where do these events fall in the arc of history? (local vs. global optima) * Podcast chats as historical markers
Links & Resources:* fatFIRE subreddit (Wealth and Financial Independence/Retire Early) * MwG episode 36 with Tyler Williams of Motion Array * Income vs. Happiness curve * Local vs. global optima
Landon and Kyle chat about parenting, productivity, and new business ideas.
Today's Topics:
- A new Ad Reformer! Landon had a baby boy 👶
- Parenting through a pandemic
- What could (and would) you do with more time?
- Deliberately setting aside time for thinking & strategy
- Productivity, output, efficiency, and leverage
- The luxury of owning your schedule
- Experimenting with founder-friendly funding options
- Micro-acquisitions and the surrounding ecosystem
- Landon's list of ideas (featuring "something for AWS" 🤣)
- Exploring new businesses (within constraints)
Links & Resources:
- MicroAcquire
- Userfeed
- After bootstrapping Median, why go venture-backed with Workshop?
- Derek talks about their $3mm seed
- Easier to raise after some wins
- What has been different about having capital from the start?
- Derek talks about some of the marketing strategies that are helping them build up a large following in the HR space
- Acquired a newsletter for $6k
- Running ads that point to templates accessed by filling out an email form
- Hubspot form
Links:
- Workshop
- Workshop Raises $3mm
- Previous episode with Derek
- @dhomann
Notes:
- First post-covid vacations
- New hire running customer operations and freeing Landon up to sell
- The struggles of handing-off tasks you've owned for years
- Force testing how the business runs without you
- What is a customer ops manager?
- What Landon has been doing on the outbound sales side and how it's going
- A new product direction/use case that's brought on $100k in ARR in the past few months
- How to find these opportunities
- How we're feeling about the Userfeed acquisition six months later
- Outbound sales email
- Copy pointers
- Industry-based sequences
- Tactics
- When email works and when it doesn't
- How we approached outbound at Rigor (selling to enterprise in a highly competitive incumbent market)
- Personalization do's and don'ts
- Why making assumptions in emails work
- Landon's first seed investment (Grayscale). See episode 15 where we talked to the CEO of Grayscale (Ty) about his business. By the way, they're hiring.
Links:
- MixMax
- Hubspot
- Rigor
Landon and Kyle discuss growth, hiring, and selling business ideas.
Today's Topics:
- Getting back in the office
- Growing revenue by following leads, expanding offerings
- Hiring for help with customer operations
- Differentiation vectors: usability, functionality, design, etc.
- A storefront for business ideas?
- Coming soon: Made with Grit swag
Notes:
- Why did we sell?
- How did we sell the business?
- MicroAcquire
- Managing leads and sharing information with potential buyers
- How long did it take?
- What were the terms?
- What went well and what would we do differently?
- Why focus is important
Today's Topics:
- Clubhouse takes...what is it good for?
- Update on Landon's stock trading "hobby"
- What we're drinking
- New Webflow marketing site launched
- It's tax time - R&D tax credits & filing services
- Update on what we're buying: Cocofloss, coffee delivery
- Landon got a new Apple watch
- Changing the default music app on iOS
- We're getting M1 Macbooks
Links & Resources:
- Clubhouse (no, not this Clubhouse)
- Capiche.fm - Talk to the internet
- Uncle Nearest Whiskey
- Agora - Realtime video and voice engagement
- New Ad Reform website on Webflow
- Endorsal - Customer testimonials, automated
- Checkly - Delightful active monitoring for developers
- Mainstreet
- Taxfyle
- Coco Floss
- Bottomless Coffee (Kyle's referral link)
Episode SummaryTyler Williams on bootstrapping and selling Motion Array for $65 Million.
Episode NotesToday's Topics:
- After selling your company for $65mm what was your first purchase?
- The story on how they sold the business
- Why they bootstrapped the business
- What is Motion Array and how did Tyler come up with the idea
- What move really made the business take off
- The importance of SEO and why bootstrapped businesses need to find free/cheap distribution channels
- Venture Studio model
- Failure.inc
- Some ideas he's cooking up for his next venture
Links & Resources:
- Motion Array
- Artlist acquisition of Motion Array
- Failure.inc
- Tyler Williams on Twitter
Today's Topics:
- A lot of momentum for alt-funding options like Pipe
- Money is cheaper, with less "baggage" than ever before
- Marketplace for selling a smaller SaaS is growing
- Best time ever to be a bootstrapped founder
- Comparing our march to $1mm ARR vs what it was like getting there in our previous company 5 years ago
- What we're drinking
- Recent fancy DTC purchases we've made
- Made with Grit T-shirt design in the works
- Regulation changes for crowdfunding
Links & Resources:
- Pipe
- Haus
- MiniMeis
- Casper glow lights
- Exposure
- Coco Floss
- Fatherly
Today's Topics:
- Deleting Twitter from phone and using Mailbrew
- What are we drinking
- How we performed our first profit share
- Why invoice collections are a huge pain for a small team
- Bootstrapped business ideas
- Made with Grit t-shirts
Links & Resources:
- Mailbrew
- Tip Top canned cocktails
- Nathan Barry: Profit-sharing for bootstrappers
Landon and Kyle discuss the idea of avoiding popular SaaS markets and give their thoughts on building in public (while sipping on some bourbon & eggnog). They also give their thoughts on some of the recent SaaS acquisitions.
Today's Topics Include:
- Their podcast drinks of choice
- Acquisitions of Kustomer (Facebook) & Slack (Salesforce)
- New product: Bump
- Building in public? Pros and cons
- Learnings are helpful
- Leads to more competitors
- More interested in klout instead of business
- Spending more time showing you're building in public than actually building
- Many 'open startups' move away from that as they grow
- Giving a business more time to mature
- 90% of companies still aren't using cloud-based software
- These are the unsexy niches
Links & Resources:
- Salesforce, Slack, and the future of work
- Bump
Landon and Kyle discuss their business bouncing back from the dip they experienced during the beginning of the pandemic. They also discuss their previous company getting acquired by Splunk.
Today's Topics Include:
- Kyle's long absence from the podcast
- Ad Reform's revenue bouncing back strong after the pandemic dip
- Userfeed launch of a new Intercom app: Bump
- Kyle and Landon's previous employer, Rigor, selling to Splunk for 8-figures
- US election craziness
- Kyle and Landon getting new houses and dealing with the moves
Links & Resources:
- Rigor
- Rigor acquired by Splunk
- Bump
Landon and TJ discuss what it's like transitioning from services to products, bootstrapping, selling to NGOs/healthcare, and being motivated by the impact their products have on the world. TJ also talks about how his global health data SaaS is having quite a moment in the year of COVID, sparked by a free tool that tracks Coronavirus data.
Today’s Topics:* ATL ties * Bootstrap or raise? * Services to products * Building for impact * When to cut your losses and move to the next idea or product * "Luck is the residue of design" * Building a fully remote team * Global health data and how COVID has shined a light on the space * Covid Mapping Project * Selling, contracts, and collections pains in the healthcare industry * Profit-sharing and owner distributions
Links & Resources:* Secure Data Kit * NTDeliver * Covid Mapping Project * Switchyards * Atlanta Tech Village * Nathan Barry on profit-sharing * @TJMule
Landon and Baird discuss what it's like starting and running multiple SaaS businesses. Baird's businesses include Wavve, Zubtitles, Duplikit, and Churnkey and are doing over $2mm ARR combined.
Today’s Topics:* Should you build more than one SaaS? * One company or multiple? * Dealing with support/churn across multiple businesses * What's more important: growth or retention? * Moneyball approach to prioritization * Low effort, high impact * Async communication and decision-making
Links & Resources:* Wavve * Zubtitles * Duplikit * Churnkey * @BairdHall
Jeff Gardner of Graphy joins Landon and Kyle to discuss his 8-year journey at Intercom. He chats about the early days of the product (he was employee #4), growing a support team from 1 to 100, launching a developer platform, and more.
Today’s Topics:* Intercom pricing (and potential IPO?) * Growing support in lockstep with customer growth * The evolution of hiring needs as a company scales * Being remote in a majority in-person company * Going from "we have an API" to "we are a developer platform" * Advice for indie developers building on a platform * Back to the beginning: moving to Graphy * What is customer success? * Customers as collaborators on the product journey * Thinking in trade-offs
Links & Resources:* Jeff on Twitter: @erskingardner * Graphy: Data collaboration in a visual, fun and flexible way * Finite and Infinite Games by James P. Carse
Landon chats with Derek Homann, co-founder of Median and Workshop, about bootstrapping, working on multiple SaaS products, taking money off the table, and more.
Today’s Topics:* Building SaaS outside Silicon Valley (in Omaha, in Derek's case) * Running multiple SaaS products as a small, bootstrapped team * Derek's career journey: technical recruiter > customer support > director > founder * Latest project: Workshop: Collaborative & Actionable Meetings * Jumpstarting a business by building on a platform * Taking money off the table with perpetual licensing
Links & Resources:* Derek on Twitter: @dhomann * Median: Simple CoBrowsing for Support Teams * Workshop: Collaborative & Actionable Meetings
Kyle and Landon share a company update, then chat about the Facebook ad boycott, stocks, and HEY.
Today’s Topics:* How the pandemic has impacted revenue and growth * Paused customers are returning...will that continue? * The pain of getting a home loan as a bootstrapper * The Facebook ad boycott: meaningful, or just posturing? * Investing a little money for fun (and maybe profit) * HEY, Basecamp, and DHH's Twitter mastery
Links & Resources:* Razer Kiyo webcam + light * Squadcast * HEY.com
Kyle and Landon discuss recent changes to their product development and marketing processes.
Today’s Topics:* The psychological impact of slow growth * Objective improvements vs. psychological tricks * Balancing commitment and responsiveness * Prioritization and execution: Serial process, or concurrent threads? * Shipping cadence: Minimizing work-in-progress, maximizing throughput * Marketing: one-month-at-a-time, one thing per week * Finding rhythm and a sustainable pace
Links & Resources:* Intercom's 6 week product cycles * Userfeed video: 3 ways to collect feedback * RescueTime (Kyle's referral link) * Userfeed + GitHub integration
Kyle chats with Andy O'Hara, a finance guy turned healthcare entrepreneur (and now a self-taught developer). Listen as they discuss Andy's experience growing an on-demand pediatrics business.
Today’s Topics: The acquisition of Andy’s recent company * Learning to code on the job at Chiron Health * Building an app simply for an easier dev - and user - experience * Andy’s journey building a telemedicine business * Deciding against the brick-and-mortar route and building an on-demand pediatrics service * What Andy is doing differently with the new company * VC-backed and* profitable * Modern Pediatrics’ roadmap in light of COVID-19 * Using code and no-code tools together * No-code debt
Links & Resources:* Andy on LinkedIn * Modern Pediatrics - Let the pediatrician come to you * Chiron Health - See your patients over HIPAA-compliant video with full reimbursement * Elixir - A dynamic, functional language designed for building scalable and maintainable applications. * Ruby On Rails - A web-application framework that includes everything needed to create database-backed web applications according to the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern. * Zapier - Connect your apps and automate workflows
Landon chats with Brandon Cummings about his journey from finance, to tech, to starting a non-profit in Atlanta that feeds 6,000 people per week.
Today’s Topics:* Brandon’s journey from finance, to biz dev, to engineering * The demise of Voxa * Bootstrapped vs “going big” * A detour into data science * Going full-time on a side project * Taking a new job after COVID-19 shuts down the business * Building an open source platform for COVID-19 testing * Starting a non-profit to feed hospitality workers during the pandemic * Building software and systems to support feeding 6,000 people a week * $20 provides 4 family meals. Donate here.
Links & Resources:* ATL Family Meal - Feeding 6000 hospitality workers per week * ATL Family Meal on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook * Kevy - The best marketing platform for growing sales * Rigor - Digital Experience Monitoring and Optimization * Terminus - Full Funnel Account-Based Marketing * Rails Tutorial - Michael Hartl * Capgemini - A global leader in consulting, technology services and digital transformation * FlowPath - Facilities management simplified * Twilio - Engage customers on any channel, any time * Tighten - Software for strength & focus * Matt Stauffer * Lyft - Get a ride from a friendly driver within minutes
Landon & Kyle have a heated discussion about B2B customer support.
Today’s Topics:* We got the PPP loan! * Decided not to run for president * What we’ve learned about B2B SaaS support * Stop calling them support “tickets” * Live chat isn’t the problem * Choosing to be opinionated about customer feedback management * Don’t make your customers do all the work * Why you should be collecting customer feedback from the beginning
Links & Resources:* Business Casual Podcast episide with Ray Dalio (Part 1 and Part 2) * Remote Team - Automated Payrolls, Time Off, HR Tools, and Compliance for Remote Teams * Calendly - Super easy online appointment scheduling software * Userfeed.io - Customer feedback designed for Intercom
Today’s Topics:* Kept up all night by…the dog * What we’re working on * New podcast idea * Handling subscription pause requests due to COVID-19 * Automating payroll * Virtual coffee with the founder of a new SaaS * Looking back at the inflection points for Ad Reform * Trying to monetize free software * What we would have done differently if we started the business today * Iterative billing strategies * Joe Rogan and UFOs
Links & Resources:* Remote Team - Automated Payrolls, Time Off, HR Tools, and Compliance for Remote Teams * Ads.txt Pro - Monitor ads.txt files, find errors before files go live, and get notified in Slack * Ad Reform - Your intelligent ad ops assistant * Userfeed - Customer feedback designed for Intercom
Kyle ventures back to the office to water the plants, Landon has been researching note-taking apps, and the governor of Georgia is reopening bowling alleys.
Today’s Topics:* An update on the COVID-19 life and distant socializing * Georgia ignoring the stats to reopen gyms, restaurants, massage parlors * Bowling alley conspiracies * Note taking apps for the iPad * Ad Reform’s cash situation and the hot new trend in SaaS: Subscription pausing * How the businesses have been impacted
Links & Resources:* Landon’s tweet about governor of Georgia's announcement * Notability - Fall in love with Note taking * GoodNotes - GoodNotes transforms your iPad into digital paper * Nebo - Your notes at work * Notion - All-in-one workspace * Sidecar - Use your iPad as a second display for additional screen space * Build your SaaS episode with Josh Pigford of Baremetrics * Getting To Ramen Podcast
Landon and Kyle talk about the strategies and (many, many) tools they use (and have tried out) to collaborate remotely on work.
Today’s Topics:* COVID-19 drinking game (the new normal) * All we can do is keep moving forward * Blood-sucking sales reps * How our team collaborates remotely from all over the world * Using Slack only for what it's good for * Our async-first workflow and why it's better than the alternative * Knowing what communication goes where * Using Loom and Soapbox for async video communication
Links & Resources:* Guru - Knowledge management solution that delivers everything you need * Rework (book) - The playbook for anyone who’s ever dreamed of doing it on their own * Remote (book) - Shows both employers and employees how they can work together, remotely * Notion - Write, plan, collaborate, and get organized * Userfeed.io - Customer feedback for Intercom * Art of Product Podcast * Tuple - The best remote pair programming app on macOS * Screen.so - Work together like you're in the same room * Tandem - A virtual office for remote teams * Yac - Voice messaging for remote teams * Loom - Easy and free screen recorder for Mac, Windows, and Chromebooks * Soapbox - The easiest way to create a great video by yourself * Around - Quick, high-impact video calls for a new era of work * Matt Stauffer blog post on setting Up Your Webcam, Lights, and Audio for Remote Work
Kyle and Landon reflect on how fast things have changed, how COVID-19 has affected the team so far, and how running the companies conservatively has ultimately paid off.
Today’s Topics:* A break from podcasting because of "you know what" * The emotional phases of a pandemic * How our remote team has been affected * Building a no-code app to keep track of COVID-19 cases where our different team members live * Globally united for better or for worse * Where the business stands from a cash standpoint * Providing extra financial support to our team * Shifting gears from growth to sustainability * Cutting tech costs by requesting deferred payments and or discounts * Applying for government loans * How running a business conservatively has paid off * In a twitter battle with a journalist
Links & Resources:* AdReform - Your intelligent ad ops assistant * Userfeed.io - Customer feedback for Intercom
Landon and Kyle talk about the struggles of hiring a remote international team while still building a product and moving bigger deals forward.
Today’s Topics:* Kyle and Landon chat about what they’ve been doing lately * Challenges that come with hiring remote international staff * Discovering unnoticed fees when paying internationally with Bank of America * R&D tax credit * Feeling overwhelmed when day to day work takes a back seat * What kind of things you need to know about and ask when it comes to making bigger deals
Links & Resources:* Upwork - Connects businesses of all sizes with freelancers. * TransferWise - Transfer money abroad quickly with low costs money transfers. * Stripe - The best software platform for running an internet business. * Gusto - Payroll, benefits, time tracking tools, and more. * Wave - Award-winning financial software designed for entrepreneurs. * Payoneer - Get paid online by international clients. * Basecamp - Get it together and manage projects the right way.
Kyle talks to Pete Bernardo about leaving agency life and starting Punchlist
Today’s Topics:* Our second guest Pete Bernardo * What is Punchlist * The problem that Punchlist is solving for agencies and businesses * Naming Punchlist * Starting as a solo-founder and bring people in later * Past businesses & co-founder fallouts * Rolling out new pricing through in-person conversations to get feedback * The technical implications of a pricing change toward teams * Focusing on annual deals
Links & Resources:* Punchli.st - Knockout what's left. A todo list for your website * Product Of One Podcast * MicroConf - The world’s most popular community for non-venture track startup founders * Tuple - The best remote pair programming app on macOS * Startups For the Rest of Us - 480+ episodes to help you launch and grow your startup
It’s that time of year again: Tax season. Landon & Kyle talk about what they’ve learned (or haven't) about accounting for startups over the years.
Today’s Topics:* Doing the boring stuff (taxes, bookkeeping, booking flights, etc.) * Stuff you should leave until you’re actually making money * Got ourselves a bookkeeper * Using a product-ized service for filing taxes * Another benefit to being apart of an incubator like TinySeed * Our new accounting membership business * Ramping up the new head of product for Userfeed
Links & Resources:* MicroConf - The World’s Most Popular Community for Independent Startups * TaxFyle - On-demand tax work * Wave - Award-winning financial software designed for entrepreneurs * Bench - America’s largest bookkeeping service for small businesses * TurboTax - The #1 best-selling tax preparation software to file taxes online * TinySeed - The first startup accelerator designed for bootstrappers. * Gusto - Payroll, benefits, time tracking tools, and more. * High Alpha - We create and fund B2B SaaS companies. * Atlanta Ventures - We empower entrepreneurs to achieve their potential. * ATDC - Georgia’s technology incubator
Landon sits down with Ty Abernethy, Co-Founder and CEO of Grayscale to discuss getting to $60K ARR with an MVP, getting blacklisted for sending too many outbound sales emails, and VC vs Bootstrapping.
Today’s Topics:* How Landon and Ty met at a strangely-named entreprenuer meetup * Grayscale’s 30-second elevator pitch * Accidentally naming Ty’s company after a disease * Coming up with the initial idea * Getting to $60K ARR with an MVP * Finding a co-founder * Burned by too much funding too early in a recent business * Outbound sales and partnerships * How to get your domain blacklisted (and then fix it) * The hardest part about running a business * Taking the team out for drinks * Digital detox
Links & Resources:* Grayscale - Conversational Recruiting Platform * Marcel - Steakhouse and bar
Landon and Kyle discuss the hard questions they've had to ask about the fate of Userfeed. As well as the conclusion they've finally come to.
Today’s Topics:* Struggle to run two businesses without neglecting one * Weighing the options for Userfeed * The decision we’ve landed on * What’s next * The loss of a hero
Links & Resources:* Basecamp * Wildbit
Landon and Kyle prepare for an Atlanta Hawks game while chatting about dev emergencies, content marketing, and tricks for LinkedIn outreach.
Today’s Topics:* Our first remote episode! * A small emergency on the engineering side * Even accountants don’t like accounting * Using StoryChief for content marketing using keyword research and SEO * Repurposing blog posts * Should we use Webflow? * How we do LinkedIn outreach
Links & Resources:* Tuple - Pair Programming for MacOS * Podmelon - Podcast editing * StoryChief - All-in-one Content Marketing Workspace * Webflow - Build better business websites, faster. Without coding. * Landen - The Website Builder for Startups * Landon’s tweet about Webflow templates * Landon’s tweet about using Intercom bots for tracking where customers are coming from
As Ad Reform continues to grow, Kyle and Landon talk about the tools and tactics they are using to stay focused on the priorities.
Today’s Topics:* Our most popular episode yet * We’re killing it! Or so it seems? * Can’t get back into a groove after the holidays * Learning to balance a growing list of priorities * Tools for staying productive * When should the founders stop providing full-time support?
Links & Resources:* Rescue Time - Automatically tracks & categorizes the websites you visit and time spent * HeyFocus - Website and application blocker for MacOS * StatusHero - Automated Stand-ups, Reports, and Insights for Software Teams
Kyle and Landon reflect back on a funding offer from their dream accelerator and wrestle with whether or not they made the right decision...
Today’s Topics:* An offer from our dream accelerator * Sudden influx in cash * At what point does it no longer make sense to take funding? * Things to factor in when considering funding (VC or otherwise)
Links & Resources:* TinySeed * MicroConf * Techstars * Tweet by Kristen Anderson about who should/shouldn't take VC funding * Kyle's retweet and comments on notes/SAFEs * Podmelon
NotesAfter a few weeks off, Kyle and Landon return to chat about what they've been up to: hiring, funding, benefits, projections, and more...
Today’s Topics:* An opportunistic hire appears (and then disappears) * Funding offers on the table * Projecting profit and burn * The power of the annual prepay (free working capital!)
Links & Resources:* Startup Runway * Profitwell * Take Command Health * Gusto (get a $200 Amazon gift card with this referral link)
Landon and Kyle chat about the human side of a remote team, keeping people connected, and adding a monthly "investor" letter into the mix.
Today’s Topics:* Kyle working on back-end upgrades (i.e. Rails) * Staying connected as a remote team * Monthly "investor" letters * Landon going vegetarian (for now)
Links & Resources:* Standups.io - async video standups * Standuply * Remote HQ * Grayscale Labs - conversation recruiting platform * yac.chat
Kyle and Landon discuss Ad Reform growth, sales, tick-tock development, and more.
Today’s Topics:* Finding time to work (and record, and sleep) * Ads still working (driving leads, trials, and revenue) * Landon getting back in sales mode (custom deals, procurement, and more) * Tick-tocking between 2 products * Moving to a hosted website provider to make it easier to experiment (with messaging, pricing, etc.)
Links & Resources:* Podhunt maker podcast collection * Landen.co * Webflow
Kyle and Landon try to keep things in perspective after a down week.
Today’s Topics:
- Restricting feature access: Hard limits vs. soft limits
- Userfeed challenges: Churn, slow activation, messaging
- Revamping a marketing site: Wholesale vs. step-wise
- Reinvesting in growth
Links & Resources:
- Userfeed's marketing site
- Made with Grit on Twitter
- Landon on Twitter
- Kyle on Twitter
After missing a week, Kyle and Landon return to chat about babies, family, and the personal side of bootstrapping.
Today’s Topics:
- Kyle is a two-time dad! What's it like so far with two daughters under two?
- Landon holdin' it down while Kyle's out. What's different this time around?
- An update on the advertising efforts: it's paying off so far!
- Kyle ditches a contract development opportunity
Links & Resources:
- Getting To Ramen podcast: episode 14 with Landon and Kyle
- Made with Grit on Twitter
- Kyle on Twitter
- Landon on Twitter
Kyle and Landon discuss the idea of making their onboarding process more manual. Could a concierge onboarding service improve activation?
Today’s Topics:
- Atlanta sports sidebar
- Manual vs. self-serve onboarding
- Concierge onboarding to improve activation
- Qualification steps for prospective customers
- Kyle is (almost) a two-time dad
Links & Resources:
- Fullstory
- Superhuman's onboarding process (via growth.design)
- Don't Build Growth Teams blog post (found via Rogue Startups podcast)
- Eletype
So it's time to roll out a new feature. What's the process? Kyle and Landon share how they do it: from identifying beta testers to closing the loop with stakeholders.
Today’s Topics:
- Landon played golf (badly)
- What's typical for SaaS product announcements
- Feature flags for testing in production
- Identifying candidates for beta
- Personalizing your product updates
Links & Resources:
- Using Intercom tags to manage feature flags
- Product feedback as a lead nurture strategy
- Segment product tours based on feedback
- Intercom templates
In this episode, Kyle and Landon discuss their foray into advertising. They also discuss "how much is enough?", the much-discussed topic recently on bootstrapped Twitter (is that a thing?).
Today’s Topics:
- Landon's bourbon blunder
- Userfeed ops fun
- Notion, Basecamp, and hill charts
- Ad Reform's new advertising channels
- How much is enough? (Here's some of the convo on Twitter)
Links & Resources:
- Hillchart.app
- AdLib Media
- Intercom templates
In this episode, Kyle and Landon discuss the importance of talking to customers.
Today’s Topics:
- Increasing prices
- Shape Up (everybody's doin' it)
- "Talk to your customers" buzzwords
- Kyle gripes about a poor support experience (as a customer)
- Platform risk (for Userfeed)
- Is live chat a distraction?
- Support as a differentiator
Links & Resources:
- Shape Up book by Basecamp
- Intercom
- Made with Grit website - give us feedback!
Welcome to Made with Grit, a show about bootstrapping SaaS businesses. The show is hosted by Kyle Conarro and Landon Bennett, co-founders of Ad Reform and Userfeed.
In this episode, Kyle and Landon chat about their recent revenue milestone and what things they've done to get to this point.
Today’s Topics:
- A bit of background on Ad Reform and Userfeed
- Why bootstrap?
- Focusing on profitability from day one
- Customer acquisition: free(ish) channels are great!
- Pricing (hint: increase it!)
- Experimentation and codeless features
- Customer retention
Links & Resources:
- Ad Reform
- Userfeed
- Intercom
- Profitwell
- Landon's blog about hitting $250k
- Made with Grit website - give us feedback!