Startups For the Rest of Us

In episode 655, Rob Walling answers listener questions on enterprise pricing frameworks, validating a business idea, and if it is possible for your churn rate to be too low. Topics we cover:  2:17 - How to avoid login abuse on individual plans 8:12 - How to validate a business idea before committing to it 15:26 - Enterprise pricing frameworks 19:34 - What Rob learned in the early days as a consultant and building early products pre-Drip 26:22 - Finding role fit in a SaaS 32:21 - Is it possible to have a churn rate that is too low? 33:41 - How much should you pay yourself vs. investing back into the business? Links from the Show: The SaaS Playbook  Validate Your SaaS Idea Fast  State of Independent SaaS Report The Stair Step Method of Bootstrapping Episode 628 I The 5 P.M. Idea Validation Framework  MicroConf Youtube Channel If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit y

In episode 654, Rob Walling chats with Tom Merritt, who is the host of multiple shows, including Daily Tech News, Know A Little More, Sword & Laser, Cordkillers, and more. Tom has more podcasts than anyone I know, and this episode will be a little different since Tom is not a SaaS founder or someone who wrote a book for founders. Instead, you’ll learn about the systems, processes, and discipline that Tom has set up so that he can be such a prolific creator. You’ll also learn more about his innate ability to summarize complex situations and then talk about both sides in a fair and balanced way. Topics we cover:  3:13 - Tom’s decision to go into business for himself in 2013 7:10 - Being an early adopter of Patreon 9:29 - Dealing with the emotional aspect in the early days 10:40 - The hardest parts of launching a daily show in the early days 13:01 - Tom’s approach to dealing with public criticism 19:07 - Tom’s process for shipping new content every day for 10 years 24:00 - Ha

In episode 653, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he talks through three topics, including the story of an Armageddon beer, developing taste, and an important question that all entrepreneurs should ask themselves. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers who can get started in as early as a week

In episode 652, Rob Walling answers more listener questions with Derrick Reimer, the founder of SavvyCal. They cover topics from the most important superpower for developers to the best resources for learning how to code and should you ever mix no-code with code. Topics we cover:  2:03 - The most important superpower for developers 11:39 - Combining no-code with code 20:31- Should you take a $5k angel investment? 25:30 - How to do outreach for initial idea validation calls 29:09 - How should bootstrapped founders handle the Section 174 changes 33:50 - Best resources to learn how to code Links from the Show: Derrick Reimer (@derrickreimer) I Twitter Derrickreimer.com  SavvyCal  Episode 642 I The Pros and Cons of Building a No-Code MVP  MicroConf Remote 6.0  TinySeed If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear fr

In episode 651, Rob Walling catches up with fan favorite Mike Taber, who co-hosted the first 448 episodes of Startups For the Rest of Us. The last time he was on the podcast, Bluetick was still a side hustle. Now, 15 months later, he shares that the app is now profitable, supporting him full-time, and gives an update on some key parts of his entrepreneurial journey. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemo

In episode 650, Rob Walling answers more listener questions. We cover topics like how to get more customers while working a full-time job, talking to users when there is a language barrier, and whether to buy vs. build a SaaS product. Topics we cover:  1:59 - Buying a small SaaS for $10,000 vs. getting financing and buying a SaaS for 6-figures 8:00 - How to get more customers while working full-time 13:33 - Can you hire someone to find an established SaaS business for you to buy? 16:40 - Diverse entrepreneurship podcast recommendations 20:08 - Talking to users when there is a language barrier Links from the Show: MicroConf Remote 6.0  SaaS Playbook  Zen Founder Software Social  Indie Hackers  In Demand: How To Grow Your SaaS to $100k MRR  They Got Acquired  Afford Anything Deploy Empathy: A Practical Guide To Interviewing Customers  The Jobs-To-Be-Done Handbook If you have questions about starting or scaling a so

In episode 649, Rob Walling chats with Pete Kazanjy about his book Founding Sales, which is designed to help SaaS founders learn how to sell as well as how to hire and scale sales. We cover a lot, including objection handling, how to ask for the sale, and mindset shifts you need to make when learning how to sell. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by t

In episode 648, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he answers a bunch of listener questions. Some topics covered include competing against a nonprofit, validating step 1 app marketplace businesses, and driving traffic to idea validation landing pages. Topics we cover:  2:02 - Competing against a nonprofit as a startup 4:11 - The trend of bigger companies building more projects in adjacent verticals 8:03 - Incorporating as a Delaware C Corp 9:57 - Bootstrapping a spinoff startup from a dev agency 14:27 - How to go to market when solving a latent pain 19:09 - How to validate step 1 app marketplace businesses 22:19 - Driving traffic to an idea validation landing page Links from the Show: SaaS Playbook  The Elephant in the Room: The Myth of Exponential Hypergrowth Episode 442 I Corporate Structures and How The Choice You Make Now Can Impact You Years Down The Line  Stripe Atlas  How to Get Your First Hundred Customers for Your SaaS Product&

In this bonus episode, we are playing back the audio from yesterday’s TinySeed Application Q&A livestream. The TinySeed team (Rob Walling, Tracy Osborn, and Alex McQuade) answers questions from the audience about the application process. TinySeed is a year-long, remote accelerator designed for early-stage SaaS founders. Our program is designed to help founders with a revenue-generating SaaS optimize product-market fit and grow faster.  Spring 2023 applications are open until from February 6th to February 19th, 2023. For more information about the program and application process, check out https://tinyseed.com/program Links from the Pod Watch this Q&A on YouTube Apply for TinySeed Tracy Osborn I Twitter Alex McQuade I Twitter

In episode 647, Rob Walling chats with Whitney Deterding about product marketing and how to equip sales, support, and your entire team with critical product knowledge as you grow. We dive into how to communicate all aspects of your product, from individual features to benefits and use cases. When you're one or two people, you're doing all of this as a founder, but the moment you have three, four, or more people on your team, you have to figure out a way to communicate how the product is changing effectively. Otherwise, your prospects, sales, and support won't know that. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the g

In this bonus episode of Startups For the Rest of Us, we realized that we have never talked about the refocusing of MicroConf US and MicroConf Europe and growing our extended hallway track to focus on helping founders build more connections. Since we started the event in 2011, we've done 35 of them now. The feedback we've always gotten is that the hallway track is the best part of MicroConf, and the speakers are an excuse to get us all in a room so that we can meet one another and build those relationships. After Covid hit, we decided to take a chance and adjust our traditional format. We cut down the number of speakers and focused more on additional ways to grow the hallway track. In MicroConf US - Denver - this April, we’re at 5 speakers. All the rest of the time is spent doing activities and connecting with other founders, including through offsite adventures, roundtables, workshops, etc. Finally, we’ve also introduced Founder by Founder, which is like speed networking. We set a seven-minute

In episode 646, Rob Walling catches up with James Kennedy, the founder of ProcurementExpress, about James’s unconventional approach to price increases. Every year, James does an annual price increase across the board. He talks about how he communicates it to both leads and customers, the pros and cons of this approach, and why it is been a net positive for the business. Topics we cover:  2:03 - About ProcurementExpress 4:41 - How big is the ProcurementExpress team? 7:43 - Why did James change the company name? 9:48 - What led James to settle on an 8% annual price increase for all customers 15:02 - Communicating the annual price increase to new customers 17:01- How James uses these annual price increases to close more deals 17:36 - When you shouldn’t do annual price increases 23:04 - SaaS buying patterns that James sees 24:00 - The best subject line that James has ever written Links from the Show: James Kennedy (@JamesKennedy) I Twitter ProcurementExpress TinyS

Mastermind Matching applications are now open.  Whether you are in the process of validating your SaaS idea and looking for product-market fit to finding a scalable marketing channel, or maybe you are looking for an extra dose of accountability and support as you grow the company, joining a mastermind can help. With hundreds of successful matches under our belt, we have brought together founders from all walks of life, from over 50 countries across 20 time zones, with a collective $150M+ in ARR. To do this, we focus on a number of key data points to get a feel for each entrepreneur’s experience level, expectations, work and personality styles, and other key criteria that allow us to make informed matches, including: Location Time zone Language Experience Level Current Revenue Level Goals Skill Set Industry served Whether or not this is your first business If you already have 1 or more established businesses (like an agency) and building a SaaS as a 2nd business, et

In episode 645, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he covers whether bootstrapping is the anti-bro movement, the difference between working with someone good vs. someone great, and the rise of outrage culture on social media and how that doesn’t leave much room for nuanced thinking. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide n

In episode 644, Rob Walling chats with Dan Martell about founder productivity, delegating, and the difference between being effective and efficient. Dan also shares the key frameworks from his first book, Buy Back Your Time, which was released this week. Topics we cover:  2:40 - Dan’s process for writing his first book 7:56 - The Buyback Principle 12:31 - Hiring and delegating to an assistant 18:02 - The Buyback Loop: Audit, Transfer, and Fill 25:19 - Why no one does it right, and I can’t afford to hire are limiting beliefs 30:53 - 1-3-1 hack Links from the Show: Dan Martell @DanMartell) I Twitter Buy Back Your Time: Get Unstuck, Reclaim Your Freedom, and Build Your Empire The SaaS Playbook  If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you. Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Stitcher

In episode 643, Rob Walling chats with fan favorite Derrick Reimer, the founder of SavvyCal, as they answer listener questions. They cover topics ranging from SaaS feature flags to communicating product needs to a technical founder and combating imposter syndrome. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers who can ge

In episode 642, Rob Walling chats with Tara Reed, who is the founder of Apps Without Code. We talk about her journey getting into no-code, bootstrapping Apps Without Code to $5M ARR, and the decision she made last year to throttle growth to become more profitable. In our conversation, we also cover some of the pros and cons of no-code tools, along with some entrepreneurial mindset shifts that new entrepreneurs need to make. Topics we cover:  1:46 - How Tara came up with the idea for Apps Without Code 3:56 - Why Tara deliberately scaled the business back from $5M to $3M in ARR 5:35 - Tara’s approach to building the Apps Without Code Team 6:04 - Two ways that Apps Without Code makes money 10:50 - The biggest no-code limitations today 16:29 - Using no-code tools to build MVPs and internal apps 19:07 - Tara’s preferred no-code platform 20:24 - The biggest positives of building with no-code tools 22:40 - The biggest drawbacks of building with no-code tools 26:56 - 3 entrepren

In episode 641, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure as he answers more listener questions. Topics covered range from dealing with high churn when your tool is project-based, what product feedback to listen to in the early days, and when to hire project-level thinkers vs. task-level thinkers. Topics we cover:  3:18 - Dealing with high churn when your tool is project-based 8:38 - Going upmarket 9:42 - Who to listen to in the early days to improve your product 15:47 - Should I worry about people copying my business idea? 24:26 - Should I join MicroConf Connect if I’m still in the idea validation phase? 25:54 - Hiring project-level thinkers vs. task-level workers Links from the Show: The SaaS Playbook MicroConf 2023 Accountability Challenge  MicroConf Connect  If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you. Subscribe &

In episode 640, join Rob Walling, Einar Vollset, and Tracy Osborn for Hot Take Tuesday, where they analyze and discuss some of the latest news. We dig into ChatGPT, the new tool everyone is talking about from OpenAI. We also discuss Elon Musk acquiring Twitter and the drama around this entire endeavor and whether or not the U.S. is in a recession right now. Topics we cover:  2:06 - ChatGPT 14:29 - Is there a path to bootstrap an AI startup? 18:59 - Is the U.S. in a recession right now? 29:37 - Elon Musk acquiring Twitter and the drama around his early moves Links from the Show: Tracy Osborn (@tracymakes) I Twitter Einar Vollset (@einarvollset) I Twitter ChatGPT  If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you. Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Stitcher

In episode 639, Rob Walling chats with Andrew Berkowitz, the co-founder and CEO of Suggestion Ox, about the secret sauce to building happy, high-performing teams and how we as founders need to unlearn some of the strict policies that have been in place for hundreds of years. Suggestion Ox is a feedback platform that helps HR teams build candid communication between leadership and employees. And before that, Andrew co-founded a sports management platform that was acquired in 2021. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce.  Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description,