Bootstrapper's Paradise

Opus 4.6 Just Dropped — Here’s What’s Different (First Impressions + Testing)

Sean Boyce — Fri, 06 Feb 2026 08:29:55 -0500

Opus 4.6 and ChatGPT 5.3 just dropped and I’ve been testing them extensively.
In this episode I break down what’s new, what’s better, and why you
need to upgrade ASAP if you’re building SaaS or doing any technical work.

Key takeaways:
• Opus 4.6 is proactively strategic — it thinks ahead for you
• Performance benchmarks crush 4.5 in every category
• Anthropic’s hilarious Super Bowl ads taking shots at OpenAI
• Why staying current with AI models = staying competitive
• More capacity means fewer bottlenecks

TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 - Intro: New models just dropped
0:45 - Anthropic’s Opus 4.6 announcement
1:30 - Super Bowl ads and the OpenAI ads debate
2:30 - Anthropic as the best platform for professionals
3:15 - Performance benchmarks: 4.6 vs 4.5
4:00 - First impressions and quotes (Notion, GitHub)
5:00 - How I’m using Opus 4.6 (outreach, book, social)

🏝️ JOIN BOOTSTRAPPER’S PARADISE:
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🔗 LINKS MENTIONED:
Anthropic Opus 4.6 Announcement: https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-opus-4-6
OpenAI GPT-5.3-Codex: https://openai.com/index/introducing-gpt-5-3-codex/
Anthropic Super Bowl Ads: https://youtu.be/FBSam25u8O4?si=CkH2UbX1yd-EvJPv

Tools: Claude Opus 4.6, ChatGPT 5.3

#AI #Opus46 #ChatGPT #SaaS #Bootstrapping #AITools #IndieHacker #TechReview

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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What Happens When AI Tries to Replace Your SaaS

Sean Boyce — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 09:05:08 -0500

I talk about competition a bit, but this perspective is relatively new. What if AI comes out with features that compete with your SaaS?

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Picking Your Tech Stack in the Age of AI

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 08:51:31 -0500

Let's talk about why you shouldn't obsess over your tech stack as well as the best way to pick the tools right for your project and get moving.

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Learning from the Clawdbot Saga

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 07:58:53 -0500

Clawdbot is creating all kinds of noise. Let's unpack it to find out what matters most.

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From Design to Development: The Technical Phase Begins [Day 8]

Sean Boyce — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 12:13:51 -0500

Day 8 of building my SaaS in public - the technical phase begins!

I have a landing page (I can sell) and UI/UX design (I can demo).
Now it's time to wire up the functionality and bring this thing to life.

What you'll learn:
• Why set up a dev environment now (timing matters)
• The Demo Account pattern for product-led qualification
• Connecting Lovable to GitHub (two-way sync)
• Pulling code locally for Cursor/Claude Code development
• The bi-directional workflow (Lovable UI + local backend)

Tools covered:
• Lovable (lovable.dev) - UI/UX design
• GitHub (github.com) - Version control
• Cursor (cursor.com) - AI-powered code editor
• Claude Code - Terminal-based AI coding

The demo account change:
Instead of hiding the dashboard behind auth, I converted it to a
public "Demo Account" that anyone can explore. Product-led
qualification - prospects see what they're getting before signing up.

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

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Optimizing Your UI/UX to Demonstrate ROI

Sean Boyce — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 16:56:07 -0500

Day 7 of building my SaaS in public - and today we're optimizing
the UI/UX to get the app demo-ready.

Your product doesn't just need to solve the problem - it needs to
be easy to use AND clearly show the value it provides.

The biggest change? Showing DOLLARS instead of hours.

"47.5 hours captured" → "$12,350 recovered this month"

Same data. Completely different impact. That's ROI hitting users
right in the face.

What you'll learn:
• Why UI/UX optimization matters before the technical build
• The #1 change that transforms perceived value (show dollars)
• Adding collaboration features (status tracking, activity logs)
• Navigation and usability quick wins
• What to include before your first demo

Changes I made:
• Revenue chart instead of hours chart
• Removed unnecessary dashboard tiles
• Added report status tracking
• Added activity log for collaboration
• Fixed navigation (anchored menu)
• Added Help & Support section

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

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Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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How to Polish Your AI Landing Page for Launch

Sean Boyce — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 12:16:40 -0500

Day 6 of building my SaaS in public - and today we're polishing the
landing page to get it ready for launch.

AI-generated landing pages look good, but they're not quite ready.
There are telltale signs that hurt credibility - and I'm fixing them all.

The biggest AI tell? Em-dashes (—). Every AI model is obsessed with them.
They're a dead giveaway. Search and destroy.

What you'll learn:
• How to spot and remove AI "tells" in your copy
• Where to add CTAs for maximum conversion
• Section-by-section review checklist
• How to handle footer links and legal pages
• The exact prompt format for Lovable refinements

Changes I made:
• Removed all em-dashes
• Added CTAs to every section
• Simplified How It Works (removed redundant icons)
• Made integrations section symmetrical
• Fixed testimonial readability
• Cleaned up footer links

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

---
TIMESTAMPS:
1:16 - Why refinement matters for validation
3:12 - The em-dash problem (AI tells)
4:00 - Adding CTAs throughout
5:05 - Hero section review
5:15 - Pain section (emotional elements)
5:49 - How It Works simplification
6:41 - Integrations (symmetry)
7:12 - Testing changes with the market
7:45 - Testimonials (readability)
8:11 - Pricing section
8:57 - FAQ and lead capture
10:17 - Footer cleanup
11:20 - Legal pages discussion
13:01 - Reviewing the results
14:58 - Publishing with lovable
16:00 - Being security conscious
17:55 - Favorite domain finder tool
20:30 - Domain name strategy
20:54 - Wiring up your custom domain

---
🏝️ Join Boostrapper's Paradise:
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Online Community: https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#community
Private Coaching: https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#coaching
Website: bootstrappersparadise.com
---

Tools: Claude (claude.ai), Lovable (lovable.dev)

#SaaS #BuildInPublic #AppDesign #Bootstrapping #IndieHacker #AI

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Validate Your SaaS Will Work (Without Building It)

Sean Boyce — Sun, 25 Jan 2026 15:41:40 -0500

You've validated the problem. You've talked to customers. You're confident your SaaS idea could work. But building it still takes time, energy, and money, even with AI tools.

What if you could test whether your solution actually beats the existing alternative *before* you build it?

In this video, I break down the "Half-Step" method, a way to validate your solution design by combining manual work with automation to simulate what your SaaS will eventually do.

**The Framework:**
• TODAY: Your customer's existing solution (painful, expensive, time-consuming)
• HALF-STEP: Your process with manual + automated steps (the "Frankenstein" approach)
• TOMORROW: Your full SaaS solution

**Why this works:**
Your target market doesn't care if you're doing things manually behind the scenes. They care about RESULTS. Can you beat what they're doing today? That's the only question that matters.

I walk through a real example: a B2B outreach tool I'm considering building. Instead of coding it first, I'm testing the process manually to prove it works—and potentially selling it as a service before it's even a product.

**What you'll learn:**
• How to break your SaaS idea into testable steps
• When to automate vs. do manually
• How to turn validation into early social proof/case studies
• The "productized service" bridge to SaaS

---

🎁 FREE RESOURCES:
Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples):
👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

---

🏝️ Join Bootstrapper's Paradise:
Free Course: https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#course
Online Community: https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#community
Private Coaching: https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#coaching
Website: bootstrappersparadise.com

---

#SaaS #Bootstrapping #Validation #IndieHacker #StartupAdvice #ProductizedService #BuildInPublic

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

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Don't Confuse Output and Outcome (SaaS Framework)

Sean Boyce — Sat, 24 Jan 2026 15:16:19 -0500

Too many SaaS founders make the same mistake: they get excited about their *output* (the thing they build) instead of focusing on the *outcome* (what the customer actually cares about).

In this video, I break down the simple 3-part framework I use to think about any SaaS product:

**INPUT → OUTPUT → OUTCOME**

• INPUT: What you get from the customer
• OUTPUT: What your SaaS produces (the "how")
• OUTCOME: What the customer actually buys (the VALUE)

I walk through this using my legal billing SaaS as a real example, showing you exactly how inputs (emails, meeting notes) become outputs (automated billing reports) that enable the outcome customers actually pay for (recovered time, more revenue).

The key insight? Your marketing, your sales, your entire pitch should focus on OUTCOME, not output. Most founders do this backwards.

---

🎁 FREE RESOURCES:

Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples):
👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

---

#SaaS #Bootstrapping #IndieHacker #Framework #ProductStrategy #StartupAdvice

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Build v1 of Your SaaS UI with AI in 10 Minutes

Sean Boyce — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 10:50:13 -0500

Day 5 of building my SaaS in public - and today we're designing and
building the actual application interface.

We have a landing page. Now we need something to SHOW prospects -
something they can click through, visualize, and give feedback on.

What I built with Lovable:
• Dashboard with key metrics and value delivered
• Reports showing client, time, and dollar value
• Integration management (Outlook, Fathom)
• Client list
• Settings, account, and billing sections

The surprise: Lovable added a billing rate field I didn't ask for.
Now the dashboard shows "$4,250 recovered" - not just hours.
That's demonstrated ROI. That's how you sell.

What you'll learn:
• How to scope your V1 (what to include, what to skip)
• The prompt framework for app design with AI
• Working with AI like a designer (guidelines + creative freedom)
• Using your prototype to get feedback from prospects

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

Tools: Claude (claude.ai), Lovable (lovable.dev)

#SaaS #BuildInPublic #AppDesign #Bootstrapping #IndieHacker #AI

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building a Killer Landing Page for Your SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Thu, 22 Jan 2026 15:23:20 -0500

Day 4 of building my SaaS in public - and today we're putting everything
together to build a landing page.

All the research from Days 1-3 (problem validation, market validation,
competitive analysis) feeds directly into this. The result? A complete,
functional landing page built in under an hour.

The framework I use: PAIN → DREAM → FIX
• PAIN: Lead with the problem, use emotional language from research
• DREAM: Paint the vision of life without the problem
• FIX: Show how you actually solve it (3 steps max)

Plus: Social proof, pricing, and FAQ/objection handling.

What you'll learn:
• The 6-section landing page structure that converts
• How to turn research into compelling copy
• The exact AI prompt I use for landing page content
• How to handle social proof BEFORE you have customers
• Using Lovable.dev to build the page in minutes

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Perform Competitor Research for an Actual SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Wed, 21 Jan 2026 15:52:26 -0500

Before you build, you need to know who you're competing against - and more
importantly, where they're falling short.

In this episode, I do a deep dive on competitor research for my legal billing
SaaS. One competitor has raised almost $1 billion. Here's why that's actually
good news - and how I'll find my positioning.

What you'll learn:
• The exact AI prompt for detailed competitor analysis
• How to build capabilities vs. limitations profiles
• Finding real market sentiment from forums and reviews
• Manual website audit techniques (pricing, access model, messaging)
• Turning research into positioning strategy

What I found:
• No self-serve access (they're mostly sales-led)
• Low pricing transparent (opportunity!)
• Enterprise focus leaves SMBs underserved

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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How to Perform Market Validation (Real Example)

Sean Boyce — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 10:05:09 -0500

You validated the problem exists. But is it widespread enough to build a business?

In this episode, I go deep on market validation for my legal billing SaaS -
researching how common the problem is, what the competitive landscape looks
like, and whether this opportunity is worth pursuing.

What I found:
• Problem ranked #3 in the industry (effectively #1 for operational pain)
• 10-50% of billable revenue lost to this problem
• 20-55% of law firms affected
• Competitors have raised nearly $1 billion - that's VALIDATION

What you'll learn:
• The exact AI prompt I use to research market size
• How to rank your problem against other industry pain points
• How to find emotional quotes for your landing page copy
• Why competitors raising money is good news for you
• When to proceed vs. pivot based on research

🎁 FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building My Next SaaS In Public (The Idea)

Sean Boyce — Mon, 19 Jan 2026 15:28:11 -0500

Building a SaaS in public, starting with idea validation.

In this episode, I show you exactly how I turn a customer interview into

validated insights using AI. This is the first step in my process for

building a legal billing SaaS, and I'm documenting the entire journey

so you can follow along and apply it to your own projects.

What you'll learn:

• How to capture everything from customer interviews with AI notetakers

• The exact prompt I use to workshop findings with Claude

• The 5 validation categories that predict if a problem is worth solving

• How this feeds into landing page copy and technical planning

FREE RESOURCES: Get my complete Interview-to-Insight template pack (prompts, worksheets, and examples from this video):

👉 https://bootstrappersparadise.com/#build

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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My Plans to Build SaaS in Public With You

Sean Boyce — Sun, 18 Jan 2026 13:55:57 -0500

I love sharing my strategies and lessons learned with you, but there's just no substitute for actually showing you. I'm going to walk you through my plans to build my next SaaS application in public so you can see everything I do every step of the way.

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Effective Strategies to Identify Problems Worth Solving

Sean Boyce — Sat, 17 Jan 2026 11:07:48 -0500

Finding problems worth solving is a big pain point for my coaching clients. I want to share with you my most effective strategies so you can accomplish this successfully as quickly as possible.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

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Managing a Succesful Google Ads Campaign

Sean Boyce — Fri, 16 Jan 2026 07:51:28 -0500

There's a lot that goes into creating and managing a Google Ad Words campaign. Let's talk about the most important elements of managing it successfully for Bootrapped SaaS Founders.

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Avoiding (Still) the Biggest Risk in SaaS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 15 Jan 2026 07:37:49 -0500

By far the biggest mistake I see boostrapped SaaS founders make is they don't sell their product first. Let's talk about why this is a critical mistake.

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Best SaaS Growth System

Sean Boyce — Wed, 14 Jan 2026 07:40:18 -0500

Here's the effective growth system I've designed over many years of building bootstrapped SaaS businesses.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

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Fundamentals of Pricing Your SaaS

Sean Boyce — Tue, 13 Jan 2026 07:36:21 -0500

Pricing can be a mystifying topic. Let's unpack it and break it down into just what you need to know as of January 2026.

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Pros and Cons of Using Cursor

Sean Boyce — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 07:41:48 -0500

Cursor is still my preferred way to build SaaS in Jan of 2026, but it's far from perfect. Here's my Pros/Cons and current workflow to make sure I can make progress ASAP.

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Type of SaaS to Build or Avoid

Sean Boyce — Sun, 11 Jan 2026 10:07:35 -0500

Not all SaaS product builds face the same challenges, what should you consider when deciding what type of business to build?

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Solving for the SaaS "Moat" Problem

Sean Boyce — Sat, 10 Jan 2026 10:02:55 -0500

If anyone can build your SaaS then how do you build a moat around it?

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Now is the Perfect Time to Bootstrap Your SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 09 Jan 2026 07:33:16 -0500

Let's talk about why now is the perfect time to bootstrap that SaaS business you've been wanting to build.

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Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Don't Get Lazy When Using AI Agents

Sean Boyce — Thu, 08 Jan 2026 07:22:28 -0500

Here's why you don't want to get lazy when you're building SaaS with AI agents.

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Managing Requirements when Building with AI

Sean Boyce — Wed, 07 Jan 2026 07:32:23 -0500

What are the most effective strategies to managing requirements when building SaaS with AI?

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Top Analytics Tools for Bootstrapped SaaS Founders

Sean Boyce — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 07:35:44 -0500

What analytics tools should you be using for your bootstrapped SaaS product?

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Best Coding Models as of January 2026

Sean Boyce — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 07:58:34 -0500

What are the best coding models for boostrapped SaaS founders as of January 2026?

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How to Start Building a SaaS with AI

Sean Boyce — Sun, 04 Jan 2026 14:59:45 -0500

Here's how I get started when it comes to building a new SaaS product with AI.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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How to Think About Competition in Your Market

Sean Boyce — Sat, 03 Jan 2026 11:53:03 -0500

SaaS founders get a lot wrong about their competition. Let's discuss what it really means and how to actually think about it.

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Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Has AI Killed the SaaS Industry?

Sean Boyce — Fri, 02 Jan 2026 09:40:02 -0500

If everyone can just use AI for everything what chances do our SaaS products stand of being successful? Let's discuss.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

What Your Customer Actually Cares About

Sean Boyce — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 15:33:37 -0500

What does your customer actually care about when it comes to your SaaS product?

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Stop Obsessing Over Your Tech Stack

Sean Boyce — Wed, 31 Dec 2025 09:09:53 -0500

Learn how to stop obsessing over your tech stack and start making real progress.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

My Favorite Way to find a Problem Worth Solving

Sean Boyce — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 15:08:29 -0500

Let's review both my favorite strategy to find a good problem worth solving and a problem I had this week that someone should tackle ASAP.

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Supercharging User Research with AI

Sean Boyce — Mon, 29 Dec 2025 12:48:43 -0500

There's a ton of talk about AI related to software dev, but what about user research? What AI tools and strategies can we leverage to level up our game here?

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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No Code Platform or Custom?

Sean Boyce — Sun, 28 Dec 2025 10:10:39 -0500

Should you build your next app with a no-code solution or via custom development? Let's discuss.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Tech Stack Update (Dec 2025)

Sean Boyce — Sat, 27 Dec 2025 15:29:23 -0500

Here's what I'm building with as of Dec 2025.

Lovable - https://lovable.dev/
Cursor - https://www.cursor.com
Claude Code - https://claude.ai/ (Sonnet/Ops 4.5)
Vercel - https://vercel.com/
Railway - https://railway.com/
Supabase - https://supabase.com/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Has UI Design Work Been Made Obsolete By AI?

Sean Boyce — Sat, 27 Dec 2025 15:18:22 -0500

Has design work been made obsolete by tools like lovable?

Lovable - https://lovable.dev/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Does AI Help or Hurt Chances of SaaS Success?

Sean Boyce — Sat, 27 Dec 2025 15:07:06 -0500

Does AI make it easier or harder to succeed in building a successful (keyword) SaaS business today?

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Podcast Reboot

Sean Boyce — Sat, 27 Dec 2025 14:17:31 -0500

New name. New format. Bootstrapper's Paradise is a daily show about building SaaS without investors or even having to code. Five minutes, one actionable idea, every episode. Let's build.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Tech-to-CEO Journey & the High-Touch SaaS Model

Sean Boyce — Wed, 12 Feb 2025 18:10:38 -0500

Dive into the world of high-touch SaaS with Vee24's CEO, Tomer Azenkot. From tech roles to CEO insights, explore how close customer interaction propels company success. Uncover the power of video chat in elevating the buying experience and why focusing your market strategy reaps rewards. Join us for a masterclass in customer-centric growth.

Here are a few topics we’ll discuss on this episode of the Product Launch Podcast.

From coding to CEO: A tech journey
The value of direct customer experience
Video chat as a game-changer for sales
Importance of focused market strategy
Measuring SaaS success with precision

Resources:

Connect with Tomer Azenkot:

Connecting with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

04:45 - I'm not super technical or maybe I don't have an engineering background, so how am I gonna be able to like lead this team or this company or what have you? I end up finding it's almost the opposite of that, as in what you just described. If you follow more along the lines of that type of a path where you've, you've been close to the customer, you've been obsessed about representing them in certain situations and leading with that kind of data that can have a significantly greater positive impact, I would say, in terms of like the outcomes, successful outcomes or the success that we're trying to achieve with the companies that we're building. So huge advocate for it. I had to learn it the hard way. I skipped steps earlier in my career, I paid for it, but now I know how important. It's so appreciate you underscoring the importance.
05:42 - I'm not technical, but, or I'm not a salesperson, but it, I don't think that's a good answer. You have to be technical, you have to be a salesperson, you have to be everything, especially when you're in front of the customer. And, and using that as a scapegoat or an excuse is just doesn't cut it. Especially not when information is so available to us. You can, you can Google, you can, you can look things up real easily. You can ask someone for help.
09:26 - So in the world of retail, we focus very much on the high consideration purchases, so jewelry, cosmetics, high-end luxury products in general automotive. So if you're buying, buying a vehicle, you want to see the vehicle, you wanna maybe speak with someone and have a conversation with 'em that goes beyond something that you would ask a chatbot and financial services because seeing someone is really important in order to build trust. So it's not always about seeing the product over video, sometimes it's just about seeing another person on video like, like you and I are seeing each other right now over Zoom.
22:00 - Definitely measure very carefully everything to do with EBITDA and cash. That's something that, especially in, in let's say the last year, year and a half, where fundraising is more challenging. Many companies have to last need their rounds to last longer. And I think many companies have gotten into trouble because they initially raise money for let's say 24 months, but now they need to make it work for 48. Being able to predict cash flow is incredibly important. And it's not always very simple because you can't predict whether customers will pay on time or not, especially when you're longer-term contracts and they pay annually and non-monthly. So I've actually, as of about six months ago, I've shifted our cashflow tracking to a weekly basis instead of a monthly basis. And that's actually helped a lot. It helped me understand much more how the business operates, both in terms of cash going in and cash going out.
20:49 - Well one thing comes to mind, which is important for our, our investors and basically at the board level, I, I do a very good job, I think in measuring backlog of revenue. So beyond who's paying us today right now, based on what's committed into the future, we have kind of a chart that shows over time how much of that revenue is locked in for 12, 18, 24 months into the future. So that's something that not, I don't think everyone measures at, at this stage of a company. You know, when you're in, in your single digit millions in a RR something that I've measured always. And it's, it's good to show the investors, you know, we've renewed a contract with, with a particular customer and now they're locked in for the next two years of the next three years and that revenue is locked in and we can be very pre we can predict well the, the revenue into the future.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Scaling Startups Your Way: Melissa's Real-Tech Talk

Sean Boyce — Wed, 14 Feb 2024 05:00:00 -0500

Join Sean and tech whiz, Melissa Kwan, as they unravel the allure and struggles of bootstrapping startups. Melissa dives into founding eWebinar and transforming pains into gains, all while crafting a business that perfectly suits her digital nomad lifestyle. She drops valuable gems on pricing pitfalls and the underrated power of slow growth. Don't miss these candid confessions!

Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch Podcast:

Bootstrapping is a lifestyle, not just finance.
Price on value, not just to compete.
Growth is slow and steady, not instant.
Solving personal problems can fuel success.
Grandfathered pricing can be a trap.

Resources:

Connect with Melissa Kwan:

Connect with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

13:33 - Sean: So I'd love to hear you talk a little bit about why that strategy makes the most sense for you and how it compares to basically whatever type of situation you may have found yourself in if you were fundraising instead.
Melissa: Yeah so my first company was Bootstraps because I didn't know that raising money existed so this was 13 years ago like all the tech stars and Y Combinators came after that like shortly after that. But like you know I'm from Vancouver so it wasn't a big tech community right back then it was just meetups and then I guess along the way I learned that you know people raise money and build companies on other people's money which actually seemed pretty cool at the time but I didn't really understand that concept.
5:44 - I think when you build a company it becomes so much of your life and you're spending so much time on it that you have to start with what makes you happy first. And that's what I didn't do in my previous two startups I was like this is an idea it makes money, let's do this. But for 10 years I was always discontented and frustrated because I didn't start from a place of love I guess, like and love for myself.
05:48 - So coming to eWebinar I didn't choose eWebinar as a business. I really sat down and I wrote 10 non-negotiables that I had to have in my next business so things that made me happy. For example, I have to have a completely remote team of contractors because I know I'm not really great at managing people hiring and firing and having those tough conversations I wanted a product that could be sold 100% through the internet I was so sick of going to conferences and sitting at booths and doing face-to-face meetings.
03:10 - So I ended up living the problem of doing you know repetitive trainings and onboardings and always wondered why there wasn't an incredible product that solved that problem. And I think being able to build a company that solves a problem that I know so well and one that I feel really connected to because you know freedom has always been my number one priority and that was a problem that was restricting me from living my life cause I was also also digital nomadding.
08:30 - And if you think about those things like Alibaba, for example, was like the eBay of China right. They didn't need to show the world eBay was successful eBay was already successful, like Word for example was not the first Word software so it's kind of along the same line. So I think first is like make sure it's something that makes you happy that you want to work on and especially if you're a bootstrap company don't go and try and start a blue ocean opportunity unless you know exactly what you're up against. Find something that you know you can improve and make that your business and you can probably cut down on at least two or three years of trying to get something new out there on the market.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

From Side Hustle to Tech Stardom: The PickFu Story

Sean Boyce — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 05:00:00 -0500

Dive into the journey of John Li, PickFu's co-founder, as he switches from tech giant to startup maven, revealing how keen insights and customer feedback fuel software success. Discover how PickFu's savvy use of AI revolutionizes consumer research, making it a game-changer for all seeking market savviness.

Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Insights on finding product market fit.
AI integration and the future of PickFu.
Co-founders quit Big Tech jobs.
PickFu's evolution from side to main.
Importance of the qualitative feedback.

Resources:

Connect with John Li:

Connect with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

1:33 - We realized, we quickly realized that doing display advertising is not a fun game. It's not a fun industry to be in. And so we've built a number of products along the way. One of those things along the way that we built was PickFu. So initially Justin and I were trying to figure out ways to get unbiased feedback and also being just two co-founders trying to figure out a tiebreaker. And so being the engineers that we were, we didn't really want to talk to strangers at a coffee shop. So instead we built a tool to help us get unbiased feedback from a whole bunch of strangers on the internet.
4:13 - I wish I had a really good answer for you, but I think it was really more about, well, trying to see it as many industries as possible and seeing which ones, which ones got the most value, like which customer segments got the most value from our product. We've always built PickFu, it's a, you know, consumer research platform to make it as simple as possible for anyone to access a pool of consumers to get unbiased feedback for their creatives. So we try to make it industry-agnostic. It still is industry agnostic, but just sort of trying different customer segments like, hey, how do authors like it?
8:11 - For other places there might be more dots to connect, in which case it's much harder to make that value prop. Like for example, if you're a game developer, game developers use PickFu, like a kind of like a digital focus group to market test different character designs or different game concepts before launching. Now I think we provide a lot of value in that situation, but it's much harder to make a economic argument at that point.
15:06 - I think we, we try to tell our customers, you know, you want to test before you invest, right? Like, and previously you don't have that capability, but PickFu does give you that opportunity to test the hypotheticals to test in a sandbox. I mean, we have software companies who are using PickFu to test their landing pages, their billboards, their, you know, their Google ads, all of this stuff. Because why wouldn't you wanna know how your market's gonna react before putting, you know, either launching it or putting a whole bunch of paid spend behind it.
21:53 - We hear that a lot from our users is that there's a nice magic moment of when they're actually seeing they, we try to make it easy to set up a poll so it takes like a minute or two, right? And then once you launch it, it goes out, it goes out to the panelists. The crazy thing is that those panelists start responding immediately. So it's almost a game of watching, hey, you know, there's another person coming right now and they're, what are they gonna say about, you know, what are they gonna say about my website or my, you know, or my creatives or so on. And it's, yeah, it's pretty addictive.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Joining Sean's SaaS Community: Free Access Offer

Sean Boyce — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 08:43:31 -0500

Summary
Dive in with Sean as he spotlights the power of SaaS communities! Yearning for your feedback and eager to foster dynamic interactions, he unveils a thrilling offer for listeners to join his nascent community for free. Email or survey, choose your path to shape content that resonates with you. Hit play for an episode that bridges the gap between podcast and participation.

Key Points

Build a SaaS community.
Sean seeks listener engagement.
Free community access offer!
Use email/survey to respond.
Help shape future content.

Quotes

"I love creating the podcast. I love chronicling the things that I'm doing with my SaaS businesses and sharing those strategies with you. But part of what I don't get is feedback from you and questions from you."

Community

If you're interested in joining the community, email me at sean@nxtstep.io

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Marketing in an AI World: Risks & Opportunities

Sean Boyce — Fri, 01 Dec 2023 07:17:45 -0500

Summary
Dive into AI's rapid evolution with Sean's latest panel experience! Uncover why businesses lag in tech adoption, the SEO balancing act, and making smart tech choices. Plus, learn to leverage AI for operational efficiency and potentially create market-worthy solutions of your own!

Key Points

Most businesses lack an AI strategy
Keep pace with SEO's AI transformation
Overcoming tool selection anxiety
AI as a tool for operational efficiency
Building and marketing your own AI solution

Quotes

"It's really interesting to get a sampling from folks out there in terms of where they're at related to artificial intelligence."
"My best advice is to keep one foot in the old world and one foot in the new world."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

SaaS Strategies in a Crunch: Growth in Tough Times

Sean Boyce — Wed, 29 Nov 2023 07:43:10 -0500

Summary
Dive into the seismic shifts challenging SaaS companies in 2023's economic terrain! Sean unpacks the OpenView Benchmarks report, reveals key survival tactics for SaaS founders and CEOs, and uncovers the profitable edge AI integration offers. Tune in for insider insights to pivot, adapt, and outperform in a financial squeeze!

Key Points

SaaS trends from OpenView 2023
Economic dip's impact on SaaS
AI native companies excel
Monetizing AI fosters growth
Only 15% capitalize on AI

Quotes

"'cause it was so cheap to access money. Money was cheap because interest rates were low."
"But good news is there are pockets here where performance hasn't just beat expectations, but actually they're growing faster than anticipated."
"You have a greater than three times likelihood of being an outlier in that growing faster than a year before if you are an AI native company."
"What you need to do is figure out not just how to leverage it appropriately, but you have to figure out how to successfully monetize it."
"If you can do that, you can dramatically increase the probability of better financial performance in a more difficult economic climate for your SaaS company."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Stop Managing Passwords: The OTP Revolution

Sean Boyce — Tue, 28 Nov 2023 07:27:09 -0500

Summary
Join Sean as he decrypts the world of design patterns, focusing on the seamless authentication revolution of one-time passcodes (OTPs). Learn why rehashing old methods is out, and how adopting OTPs can be a game-changer for software innovation and security.

Key Points

Design patterns simplify innovation.
OTPs transform authentication.
Password management made obsolete.
Exponential improvement with OTPs.
Guide to essential design patterns.

Quotes

"What they (design patterns) are essentially is the modern day standard for how something should work."
"You punch in your email. If you wanna go that route and it sends you a code, you punch that code in and you're good."
"So if you can ever eliminate steps in the process and accomplish multiple things at the same time, that is, and what I refer to as an exponential improvement, or like a 10 x effect could be 10 times better than the previous design."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

SaaS in 2023: Growth Trends Unveiled

Sean Boyce — Mon, 27 Nov 2023 08:02:29 -0500

Summary
Dive into the SaaS world with Sean as he unpacks OpenView's latest report. Discover why growth rates are plummeting and which outliers are defying the trend. Is it all about AI and vertical specialization? Tune in for insights on the evolving SaaS landscape amidst a shifting economic climate.

Key Points

SaaS growth rates decline sharply
Economic climate impacts SaaS
Outliers defy downward trends
AI-native SaaS sees success
Specialization boosts SaaS growth

Resources

https://openviewpartners.com/2023-saas-benchmarks-report

Quotes

"Some, I would say a third is not all that uncommon based on the data that I'm looking at. Some of them are down by half or more than half, which is a pretty dramatic fall off from where we were previously just a year ago."
"There's been a pretty dramatic shift in the macro economic climate that's predominantly been the catalyst of which I would say has been the steep increase in interest rates."
"However, the remaining category, the outliers that I mentioned that makes up the balance, which is about 27%, those companies are growing faster than last year."
"Now in the report, and I'm gonna dive into this in greater detail in future episodes, but they categorize anyone that's falling into this category that's growing faster than last year as, which probably won't become a surprise to many those companies that are AI native."
"So the more specialized your SaaS product is, the higher growth rate those companies have seen as well."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Future Tech Fails: Learn From Design Oversights

Sean Boyce — Thu, 23 Nov 2023 11:15:24 -0500

Summary
Ever excited about creating something groundbreaking only to overlook essentials? Sean dives into the innovation paradox, sharing epic blunders from tech history and tips to ensure new solutions don't leave users cold, or in some cases, literally cold. Tune in and learn to innovate without sacrificing the crucial bits!

Key Points

Understand before innovating.
Some legacy features are vital.
When new doesn't always mean better.
Costly redesign blunders.
Innovate without losing functionality.

Quotes

"What I mean by that is providing supposedly updated, arguably better solution, but missing something important, which ultimately means you take functionality away."
"So we have, as a family had problems multiple times where it's too cold outside, we can't turn on the heat, it's too warm outside, we can't turn on the air conditioning."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Profit Will ALWAYS Matter More Than Growth

Sean Boyce — Mon, 20 Nov 2023 07:29:43 -0500

Summary
In today's episode, Sean dives into the profits vs. growth debate, inspired by startup dramas from Silicon Valley. He analyzes the roller-coaster stories of WeWork and Uber, urging a pivot to profitability over reckless expansion. Tune in for a gripping discussion on sustaining software businesses through smart economics, and why growth for growth's sake can be a perilous pursuit.

Key Points

Importance of profitability in SaaS
Growth vs. solid economics debate
WeWork and Uber's dramatic stories
Pitfalls of growth for growth's sake
Control and ownership through profit

Quotes

"Now, I wanna talk to you about this from the perspective of a couple of drama series that I've dove into regarding kind of these spectacular successes and failures in the startup world."
"Not a hundred percent sure why perhaps some precedents were set along the way, but it certainly appears that that is a flawed strategy for a bunch of obvious reasons."
"But growth for growth's sake is severely flawed and it's ridiculously unsustainable at the same time."
"The sooner you do that, the more you remain in the driver's seat, the more that you remain in control, the more that you remain largest percentage owner of your business..."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Navigating Tech Turbulence in Economic Headwinds

Sean Boyce — Fri, 17 Nov 2023 06:41:24 -0500

Summary
Join Sean as he decodes the US economic tremors and their ripple effects on tech and software companies. From rising interest rates to strategic survival, this episode is a must-listen for every techpreneur seeking to steer their ship through stormy monetary seas.

Key Points

In-depth look at US economics
Interest rates rocking tech boats
Layoffs & hiring freezes insight
SaaS spending and growth tips
Profitability as a safety net

Quotes

"Now, something I may not have shared before is I actually have quite a bit of experience and background in business in addition to my background and experience in tech and engineering."
"And what is happening at the moment is there's a tightening in the broader US economic cycle."
"Now, they typically do that when something like inflation starts to increase significantly and apply a lot of pain to American consumers."
"So if you haven't noticed, there has been a pretty rough patch for the tech industry."
"A lot of the larger companies were laying off thousands of people."
"If you have solid fundamental economics and your business is profitable from day one, Then these larger gyrations in the broader economy are not nearly as impactful to what it is you're trying to do."
"'because it puts you in the driver's seat and it significantly reduces the negative impact these gyrations on the water the larger, broader economic landscape can have on your business."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Thriving in the AI Disruption as a Software Founder

Sean Boyce — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 06:54:52 -0500

Summary
Dive into the AI tidal wave with Sean as he shares vital strategies for software company founders. Discover how to shield your innovations from copycats, why niche dominance is key, and why playing it safe could be your biggest risk. Tune in for an insider’s take on staying afloat in the bustling sea of AI development.

Key Points

Disruption is rapid in the AI era.
Importance of defensible strategies.
Markets are quickly saturated.
Niching down boosts defensibility.
Diverse product strategy is safer.

Quotes

"Progress is gonna continue to fly at us more quickly than ever because of how capable these tools are in terms of enabling you to build something rather impressive rather quickly."
"Markets for low touch software products in the AI era are becoming more saturated more quickly, which means that if you're to continue to double down on whatever it is that you've built, you really need to do so in a direction or area that starts to add back some of these areas of defensibility..."
"So if you've built a low touch software product, if you turn it into a business rather quickly and cost effectively, just expect others to be able to do the same."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The AI Hype Cycle: Separating Fear from Future

Sean Boyce — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 06:50:04 -0500

Summary
Dive into the AI frenzy with Sean and learn why there's no need for panic. From AI adoption curves to practical applications, get the reassurance you need to embrace technology without fear. This episode is your guide to understanding AI’s true pace of change and how it can be a powerful tool in your arsenal.

Key Points

AI isn't changing everything overnight
Adoption of new tech takes time
Learn AI at your own pace
Use AI effectively in business
Don't panic, just understand & apply

Quotes

"The daily lives of most folks shouldn't change dramatically all of a sudden."
"It's still important though, for you to invest the time and energy to figure it out, understand it, and most importantly, focus in an area where it can help you."
"There's a lot of ways to be able to make significantly more progress and a lot less time because of what these tools can do."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Startup Savvy: Advertise, Validate, and Scale

Sean Boyce — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 07:08:05 -0500

Summary
Dive into the world of SaaS advertising with Sean's expert take on how to go from naught to a software sensation! Get the scoop on early validation, economical campaigns, and savvy scaling. Let's turn your software dreams into profitable realities.

Key Points

Validate SaaS ideas with ads
Save resources with strategic testing
Create landing pages for impressions
Use ads for early business proof
Plan for scalable ad campaigns

Quotes

"Some people love it, some people hate it. My opinion, I've kind of been on both sides of this spectrum, probably somewhere in the middle, but I certainly lean towards the fact that advertising can provide a lot of value for us who are building software companies."
"I've been working on product X for months, maybe years. I spent a lot of time, I spent a lot of money and I can't get anyone to use it, or I don't have any users, or I can't get anyone to pay for it, something like that."
"You can do the keyword research, you can figure out what the volume looks like in terms of who's searching for that."
"I've made those mistakes. I'm trying to make sure you don't."
"You can validate all these things by designing and building an ad campaign and marketing it through a landing page that gives the impression that you already have the software."
"I've done this very recently and this exercise works very well that you don't need the actual software to test whether or not your concept, your idea can be successful as an actual business."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Sky's the Limit: Low-Touch Software Competitive Research

Sean Boyce — Mon, 13 Nov 2023 07:20:43 -0500

Summary
Dive into the world of low-touch software business with Sean. Discover the skyscraper technique's role in content marketing, SEO and how it helps us perform competitive research better when it comes to low-touch software products. Join us as we explore competitive research, product-led growth, and Sean's unique insights on building innovative tools. Watch, listen, and level up your product game!

Key Points

YouTube move for daily podcasts
Advantages of low-touch software
SEO and skyscraper technique value
Gaps in the market & competitive research
Product review videos for insight

Quotes

"I'm starting to record my daily podcasts as live streams or prerecorded videos."
"Now, as I've been doing the product review videos, I've been learning a lot about what other people Are building in the area in which I wanna build software."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Embracing the Power of Product-Led Growth

Sean Boyce — Fri, 10 Nov 2023 06:45:49 -0500

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the concept of product-led growth and the advantages it offers to software companies. He highlights how a product-led approach simplifies the customer experience and enables efficient and scalable growth. By keeping software simple, companies can leverage product-led techniques to achieve success with minimal resources.

Key Points

Product-led growth involves leading with the product in all aspects, using concepts like freemium tiers and free trials.
Getting people into the product early accelerates the decision-making process and helps users determine if the solution solves their problem.
Product-led companies tend to be low-touch, offering simpler software that is easier for users to understand and derive value from.
With a product-led approach, the software does most of the work, allowing companies to scale efficiently and eliminate the need for a large team.
Product-led growth not only focuses on company growth but also emphasizes the importance of keeping software simple.
By keeping software simple, the user experience and usability are enhanced, facilitating a better product-led approach to growth.
Leveraging product-led techniques enables companies to maintain low overhead, become highly profitable, and experience efficient and effective growth.

Quotes

"The sooner you get people into the product, the sooner you're gonna be able to enable them to figure out whether or not it's something that they're looking for."

(Generated by Podcast Show Notes at podcastshownotes.ai)

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Real-Life Examples of Convenience as a Value Proposition

Sean Boyce — Thu, 09 Nov 2023 07:14:38 -0500

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the concept of convenience and its immense value. He shares personal anecdotes and highlights real-life examples to showcase how convenience can enhance customer experience and generate profits. Whether it's using Uber to deliver packages, partnering with delivery services for same-day phone deliveries, or leveraging existing infrastructure to test a new service, convenience plays a pivotal role in attracting customers and validating product propositions.

Key Points

Convenience is highly sought after and customers are willing to pay for it.
Uber's package delivery feature showcases the value of convenience and cost-effectiveness.
Apple's partnership with delivery services like Uber demonstrates the power of convenience in same-day phone deliveries.
Leveraging existing infrastructure, like Uber drivers, can be a cost-effective way to validate value propositions.
Customers are willing to pay for a less-than-ideal but convenient experience during testing phases.
Building convenience into your software or SaaS product can provide a competitive edge.
Look for opportunities to provide convenience and enhance value for your target market.

Quotes

"It's another excellent example where people are willing to pay for convenience."
"Look for areas of opportunity to provide more value to your target market customer. By providing them with convenience."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Problem Worth Solving that Wall Street Journal Created

Sean Boyce — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 06:42:53 -0500

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the pattern of people always getting what they want in the software product industry. He highlights the importance of closing gaps and provides examples of companies like Wall Street Journal that create gaps in their services. Sean emphasizes the need for businesses to give customers what they want and explores the opportunities for innovation that arise from these gaps.

Key Points

People will always find a way to get what they want in the software product industry.
The actions and omissions of businesses can create gaps in the market.
Wall Street Journal's difficult subscription cancellation process is an example of a gap.
Innovative solutions like privacy.com address the gap created by Wall Street Journal.
Companies that don't give customers what they want may face negative consequences.
Gaps in the market present opportunities for entrepreneurs and innovators.
Identifying customer complaints can lead to profitable problem-solving ventures.

Quotes

"The people are always going to get what it is that they want one way or the other."
"When your teaser time period expires and the rate jumps back up, if you want to cancel or be done with the subscription, you can't do so online in almost all states."

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Unleashing the Power of Competitive Research for Low Touch Software Products

Sean Boyce — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 06:28:25 -0500

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of competitive research for building low touch software products. He emphasizes the advantages of a product-led growth approach and highlights how self-service software allows for easier competitor analysis. Sean shares his own experience of reviewing and incorporating lessons from competitive products into his own software. He also provides insights on what can be learned through competitive research, including understanding the competition's vision, finding inspiration, and identifying areas for improvement.

Key Points

Low touch software products enable product-led growth and scalability.
Competitive research for self-service software is more straightforward due to similar user experiences.
Sean recommends reviewing and evaluating competitive products to learn from them.
Competitive research provides insights into competitors' visions and what works well.
Look for inspiration and examples that validate your own vision.
Evaluate competitors' workflows to identify what not to replicate and improve upon.
Competitive research holds value throughout the growth of your company.

Quotes

"Low touch software products pave the way for product-led growth and maximum scalability."
"Reviewing competitive products provides inspiration and evidence that your vision holds water."
"Competitive research helps identify what not to replicate and how to solve problems better."
"There's so much to be learned from competitive research for low touch software products."

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From Humble Beginnings to Success in Entrepreneurship: Enduring Global Phenomena

Sean Boyce — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 05:00:00 -0500

In this episode, Lloyed Lobo, Co-founder and Board Member of Boast.AI and bestselling author of “Grassroots to Greatness” shares his incredible journey from economic hardship in Kuwait to becoming a successful entrepreneur. He emphasizes the importance of community, communication, creation, and consistency in building a successful business. Lloyed discusses how building strong relationships, effective communication, continuous creation, and unwavering consistency can lead to long-term success. He also highlights the significance of building a community of practice rather than just a community of products and shares his experiences in creating an audience through curated content and offline meetups. The episode explores the key stages that transform an idea into an enduring global phenomenon and encourages aspiring entrepreneurs to focus on community-led growth for sustained success.

Lloyed Lobo is a WSJ Bestselling Author and a Co-founder of Boast.AI and Traction. He's a seasoned entrepreneur and community builder with a passion for taking businesses from 0 to 1. Lloyed has been involved in the U.S. and Canadian startup ecosystem for over 15 years, and he's known for helping bootstrap Boast.AI to 8 figures ARR, a fintech platform that provides businesses with R&D and Innovation funding. Additionally, he co-founded Traction, a global community with over 100,000 entrepreneurs and innovators, where leaders behind fast-growing companies share their business insights via various platforms such as webinars, podcasts, meetups, retreats, and conferences. He's also serving on the Board of Directors at Wishpond, a martech company, helping drive its success. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Lobo highlights that effective communication is vital for entrepreneurs, emphasizing the significance of learning to articulate ideas, build relationships, and inspire others.
Building a strong community is essential for success.
Consistency is key to achieving long-term success.
Understand your target market's problems, goals, aspirations, and circle of influence.
Create online content to build an audience, but bring them together in offline meetups for community interaction.
An audience evolves into a cult-like brand through the stages of audience, community, movement, and religion.

Resources:

Connect with Lloyed Lobo:

Connect with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

03:02 - “Literally there's nothing that a small group of people who are united by a great sense of purpose that they can't do right? They can literally move mountains. The other thing is the entrepreneurial spirit. I think as I was reflecting back and writing this book, like everyone asked me like, where did you learn to become an entrepreneur? Or like, did you always have it in you? And I think entrepreneurship is not something you're born with. We're not what we're born with. We become what we're nurtured through. We become the average of the people we surround ourselves with.”
17:35 - “So now your early days of a company, you want to build a community-led company. Where do you start? You don't even have a target market. How do you figure out your target market? Again, four things to figure out your target market. Number one, do you have a passion for this audience or the content you're creating? If you hate your audience, you'll never be able to sustain. Building a community-led company or a business is a long slog. It's a marathon of the heart and mind. If you hate your audience, you'll never be able to sustainably create.”
35:05 - “People listen to you or buy your product, you have an audience. When you bring that audience together, it becomes a community. When that community comes together to create impact towards a greater purpose that's beyond your product or profit, it becomes a movement. And when that movement has undying faith in its purpose through sustained rituals over time, it becomes a cult or a religion.”
35:45 - “If the influencer stops creating, they lose the audience. But if you build this community, it will sustain probably longer because it's a human-to-human connection. And you know, we create so much content on all these platforms like LinkedIn and Instagram. If they change the algorithm, what happens? You're done. So the key to sustaining for the long haul is community.”
12:20 - “If you can't communicate, you don't have an audience, you have an empty room. Clearly articulating your vision to excite and inspire people is something a founder needs to do day in, day out. It's not a one and done activity because people who are energized and inspired can move mountains. If you want to communicate just to inform people, just send an email. But you want to energize people 'cause that's how companies that are enduring are built on energy, on inspiration, on vision.”

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The Importance of Designing Your Business Model Before Building Your Software

Sean Boyce — Mon, 06 Nov 2023 07:15:21 -0500

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the significance of implementing a SaaS business model from the start. Understanding human psychology and pricing strategies is essential for success in selling software products. Without a solid business model, sustaining operations and securing funding become challenging. Sean highlights the difficulties faced by products that begin as free and later attempt to convert to paid, using examples such as Wikipedia and ad blockers. He advocates for starting with a paid model as a validation test, while cautioning against relying solely on a free tier.

Key Points

Strategic pricing and a well-designed business model are crucial for the success of a SaaS business
Human psychology plays a significant role in pricing and customers' willingness to pay.
Products that start as free face difficulties in converting to a paid model or securing funding.
Wikipedia's community-funded project struggles with consistent funding due to the perception of being a free resource.
It is harder to transition from free to paid than to start with a paid model from the beginning.
Offering a free trial instead of a free tier can limit downside risk and provide valuable insights into conversion rates.
Starting with a pricing strategy and validating the ability to charge for a product early on avoids future challenges.

Quotes

"I didn't really fully understand how people think about pricing and there's actually a lot of psychology and pricing in terms of what we'll pay for or what we won't."
"If you start with a product that's expected to always be free, your ability to convert that into a paid Product is limited."
"From a pricing strategy and a human psychology perspective, I think more than likely why they need to do that so frequently and why it's probably so difficult is because of this human psychology in pricing."
"Going the other direction is so much harder than if you start paid outta the gate."
"Most of the people that I've worked with in B2B SaaS fashion that have attempted a strategy like that have not been very successful with it."
"Have a pricing strategy outta the gate, validate whether or not you can charge for your product right away, and that will make a lot of these problems essentially be something that you're realistically never going to have to deal with."

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Stop Reinventing the Wheel: Leverage Design Patterns for a Better User Experience

Sean Boyce — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 08:14:26 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of design patterns in software development to ensure a smooth and intuitive user experience. By following industry standard best practices and not reinventing the wheel, developers can create products that are consistent, user-friendly, and valuable.

Key Points

Many software products suffer from poor usability due to developers reinventing common design elements.
Design patterns are standard solutions or approaches for common functionalities in software development.
Implementing design patterns ensures consistency, code manageability, and reduces confusion for users.
Usability and user experience improve when products adhere to industry-standard design patterns.
Competitive analysis can help identify popular design patterns in successful software products.
Innovate in the unique aspects of your software, but maintain consistency in common functionalities.
Deviating from industry standard design patterns may lead to a poor user experience and confusion.

Quotes

"So many folks... are reinventing the wheel when it comes to typical usability elements.
"Design patterns... are a way to do things and prevent confusion and mess in your code base."
"User-friendly software follows industry standard best practices or design patterns."
"Don't try to jump the gun... because you'll wind up confusing more people than helping."
"Competitive landscape analysis can reveal design patterns for improved usability and experience."
"Innovate in unique areas, but maintain consistency in repetitive functionalities across software products."
"Deviation from popular design patterns makes it harder for users to understand and use your software."

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Creating a Revolution WITHOUT New Technology

Sean Boyce — Thu, 02 Nov 2023 08:01:14 -0400

Summary
Discover how to build remarkable products without inventing new technology. Many early-stage founders feel pressured to be innovative, but this episode explains how repurposing existing technology can lead to success. The story of Uber exemplifies this approach, where they revolutionized transportation without creating any new technology. By understanding the top problem of a target market and utilizing existing tools, you can provide a better experience in a cost-effective and efficient way.

Key Points

Not every product needs to be built with new and innovative technology.
The misconception that being truly unique and inventive is necessary for success.
Better tools are constantly being developed, like AI, that can enhance product building.
Henry Ford popularized the assembly line, rather than inventing it from scratch.
Uber's success was not dependent on new technology but on offering a better experience.
Uber repurposed existing technology like mobile phones and GPS for its solution.
By combining existing options in a unique way, Uber quickly changed the transportation industry.

Quotes

"You really do not need to do almost anything innovative from the perspective of creating new technology."
"Understand what the top problem worth solving is for that target market."
"Create a solution with that existing technology that provides a better experience."
"Relieve a lot of pressure, make your job a lot easier, and enable you to bring a better solution to market significantly faster and more cost effectively."

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Sales is a Process, Not a Personality Trait

Sean Boyce — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 08:44:51 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the misconception that sales is only for a specific type of person and highlights that sales is actually a process that anyone can learn. He explores two different approaches to sales - low touch and high touch - and emphasizes the importance of finding the right match between a problem and a solution. Sean also shares insights on how to design an effective sales process for a SaaS business.

Key Points

Sales is about matching a problem with an appropriate solution.
Low touch sales leverage a product-led approach, using software to qualify prospects.
High touch sales involve synchronous interactions with different buyer personas.
Hybrid approaches that combine both low touch and high touch sales exist.
The goal of sales is to ensure customers receive value and continue to pay.
Sales can be turned into a process for any type of business, including software.
Asynchronous low touch sales can happen without direct intervention.

Quotes

"Sales is really about following a process, and I want to talk more about what that process is because in my opinion, anyone can do it effectively."

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Sales as Matchmaking: Helping Others and Generating Success

Sean Boyce — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 08:00:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the crucial role of sales in building a successful SaaS or software business. He highlights that sales mastery is the key to achieving progress and success in the industry. Sean explores the common misconceptions about sales and explains why it is essential to approach it as matchmaking, focusing on solving customers' problems. By generating consistent sales, businesses can gather feedback, improve their product, and drive revenue growth.

Key Points

Sales is the most important element and the catalyst for progress in the software industry.
Building an effective sales process is vital for converting prospects into paying customers.
An effective sales process helps businesses understand the value their product provides and drives revenue generation.
Without an established sales process, product development efforts will not yield results.
Start by focusing on selling your product and finding potential customers in your target market.
Developing a real sales channel is permission to move forward with your project.
Generating consistent sales is the most crucial milestone to achieve in the software industry.

Quotes

"If you can generate sales, everything else will essentially fall into place."
"Bad sales is not representative of what it should be. Sales is simply matchmaking."
"Sales is about helping somebody make progress and providing value."
"An effective sales process is the catalyst for building a successful business."
"You have to design the sales process first before perfecting your product."
"Generating sales consistently is the most important milestone to start with."
"Sales mastery reduces pressure and allows you to enjoy the process of helping others."

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The Exciting and Wild World of AI: Deep Dives and Game-Changing Tools

Sean Boyce — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 05:00:00 -0400

In this captivating episode, the podcast delves into the world of AI tools with Chris Carr, the President and CEO of Farotech. An expert in the field, Chris discusses the transformative potential of AI across diverse industries. Explore the game-changing capabilities of LLMs and innovative plugins that are reshaping the AI landscape. The episode unveils the exciting possibilities AI brings to marketing strategies, enabling hyper-personalization, and driving business growth. Join us for a fascinating exploration of the AI industry's future.

Chris Carr is the President and CEO of Farotech, Philadelphia's fastest-growing marketing agency. With over two decades of experience in web development and inbound marketing, Chris has revolutionized lead generation and conversion for clients through innovative SEO and online marketing strategies. His exceptional expertise has reduced client costs by 80% and propelled clients to outrank competitors by 90%, with remarkable growth in keywords on Google. Holding an Applied Generative AI Certification from MIT Professional Education, Chris is a pioneer in harnessing AI for marketing success. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch Podcast:

The use of tools like TalkBerry to improve efficiency and quality of written content.
The emergence of chat interfaces and their seamless integration with AI tools.
Embrace AI as a valuable component in software development.
Seek vendors and software programs that integrate AI technologies for optimal results.
Explore the potential of hyper-personalization in marketing through generative art.
Cold outreach and generic messages are becoming less effective, emphasizing the need for personalized communication.
Businesses are advised to be prepared for the impact of AI by utilizing resources like the AI today resource.

Resources:

Connect with Chris Carr:

Connect with the host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

04:21 - “One of the things that we're always trying to fight against is hallucinations. So, what Claude allows you to do is it allows you to upload a file almost as many as 75,000 words. That's essentially like a Harry Potter book, you know what I mean? What I usually do to try to eliminate hallucinations is I'll say, I'll upload one document that has all of my buyer personas, all of my bestselling blogs, my case studies, certain reports, just everything that I can think of about my brand, my clients, my services, every single piece of information that I can into this super document.”
12:14 - “What I recommend that you do is use a program like Advanced Data Analytics that's built into ChatGPT. A lot of this functionality is going to be built into Microsoft 365 and with duet it's just not there yet. But essentially what they allow you to do is they allow you to upload large data files. And when you upload large data files, it basically dissects the data and you can ask it questions in natural language processing so you can start to talk to your data specifically.”
15:08 - “So what I believe is going to happen with companies is you're going to look at all of your software programs and you're going to look at what's the most value I can get out of the APIs that each of these software programs. And then from there what I'm looking to do is develop what's called like a centralized AI co-pilot. And the AI co-pilot is going to get information to and from these software programs. And what you can do at the high level is that you have complete transparency about the health of your business. And you can start to look at your inventory system and start to say, well if we're low in this inventory, what would happen if we increased our prices by maybe $5 per unit?”
22:15 - “It's sort of like a world of hyper-personalization that's what I believe is coming down the line. So, what you need to know there is you need to know what are the tools and the technologies that I can do, that are going to know the demographics and the information about my potential client. So if I'm going to get the right message to the right client at the right time, now I'm doing it in the most hyper-personalized way. So if I'm using old techniques that don’t know my client inside and out, when this wave of AI hits, you might not be ready for it.”
25:47 - “We have always, as a marketing company said “Hey Mr. And Mrs. Client, we do some really amazing cool stuff. And they're like “oh, that's cool, let's do it”. And then I look at their current model and I'm like, actually you're not even doing foundational things. From a marketing perspective, you're not on the first page of Google, you have no social presence, your blogs aren't effective and you are not even making data-driven decisions. Alright? But here the thing is that if AI allows us to do those foundational things a whole lot stronger and quicker, now I have the ability to do those superpower things that we never got around to doing. And so what I believe is going to happen in the future is that we will all be top-graded.”
10:16 - “And like changing the way people were searching too, it almost feels like the way that we used to use Google or some still do, we still use it to an extent, but it feels like archaic. It feels like you're banging sticks and stones together. When you're actually using something like these chat interfaces with these AI tools, it makes what you're doing more conversational and then you can continue the thread.”

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Using Existing Tools to Create a Unique Solution: The Meal Train Example

Sean Boyce — Mon, 30 Oct 2023 08:09:53 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a personal story about Meal Train, a software that helps new parents with meal planning. He emphasizes the importance of solving problems using existing technology and how niche markets can lead to success. Sean also discusses potential improvements for Meal Train and highlights the value of user feedback.

Key Points

Meal Train simplifies meal planning for families with newborns, allowing friends and family to coordinate and provide meals.
The success of software products often lies in solving unique problems using existing tools.
Niche markets, such as new parents in need of meal assistance, offer opportunities for software solutions.
Meal Train's main features include a calendar system and the ability to sign up for meal slots or contribute to gift cards.
The software can be further improved by incorporating a food ordering feature, which would enhance the user experience.
Sean encourages entrepreneurs to start with a simpler version of their software and iteratively build upon it based on user feedback.
User suggestions and support channels play a crucial role in shaping the future development of a software product.

Quotes

"You can apply existing technology in very specific ways to solve unique problems."
"Most of the success in the software world comes from figuring out how to use the tools already available to solve unsolved problems."
"Meal Train simplifies the coordination of meal planning for families with newborns."
"Starting with a simpler version and iterating based on user feedback can lead to a successful software product."
"User suggestions and support channels provide valuable insights for product improvement."
"Meal Train can further enhance their software by incorporating a food ordering feature."
"Niche markets like new parents seeking meal assistance offer great opportunities for software innovation."

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How Technology Transforms the Shopping Experience: Lessons in Innovation

Sean Boyce — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 08:55:17 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the importance of convenience and value when it comes to building software applications. Using the example of grocery shopping, he discusses the different options available and how each step towards convenience translates to increased value for the buyer. By observing and innovating, software developers can create better solutions and continually improve the user experience.

Key Points

Convenience is a key factor in strengthening the value proposition of software applications.
Grocery shopping, a common chore, offers insights into the evolution of convenience.
Different options like self-checkout, handheld scanners, and mobile ordering provide increasing levels of convenience.
The goal is to minimize the time, effort, and hassle involved in the shopping process.
Observing the problems and pain points experienced by users helps identify areas for innovation.
Software and technology play a vital role in enhancing convenience and delivering value.
Continual improvement is crucial in creating successful software products.

Quotes

"Each step in the process provides more convenience, which translates to value for your buyer."
"Software and tech play a key role in creating an efficient and convenient shopping experience."
"Observing problems and pain points helps innovators create better solutions."
"Convenience is a key factor in strengthening the value proposition of software applications."
"The goal is to minimize time, effort, and hassle, providing a better user experience."
"Software and technology enable us to continually improve and deliver more value."
"Convenience and value go hand in hand when building successful software applications."

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Why Personas Are Overrated

Sean Boyce — Wed, 25 Oct 2023 07:51:40 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the difference between personas and ideal customer profiles (ICPs). While personas offer generalities, ICPs provide specific and actionable insights into customers' needs and problems. Discover why understanding your ideal customer's context is crucial for building effective software solutions.

Key Points

Personas focus on demographic information, while ICPs dive deeper into specific customer details.
ICPs help identify the root of the customer's use case and the problems they need to solve.
Knowing how to address an ideal customer's needs and measure the solution's value is essential.
Ideal customer profiles provide intricate insights into customers' requirements and desired progress.
Resumes-like personas might be a good starting point, but ICPs offer more comprehensive detail.
Exploring ICPs helps ensure your software adequately addresses the specific use cases of different personas.
Understanding everything about your customers, including their context, is crucial for effective software development.

Quotes

"Your ICP gets more intimate, including a lot more detail."
"A persona is just generalities, while an ICP is actionable."
"What I need to know is what problem I need to focus on solving."
"ICPs get at the intricacies of what your ideal customers need."
"ICPs provide the context of helping customers solve their problems."
"ICPs offer the detail to build better solutions for specific personas."
"ICPs ensure you can close the gap between your software and your customers' needs."

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How to Find a Solution Worth Building

Sean Boyce — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 07:38:51 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of finding a solution worth building after identifying a problem. He emphasizes the need for a comprehensive and inventive approach to problem-solving, using an example of a parking issue in his city. Rather than relying on temporary mitigation tactics, Sean encourages software entrepreneurs to think outside the box and create permanent solutions that truly solve the problem at hand.

Key Points

Identifying a problem is just the starting point; finding a solution worth building is the next step.
A comprehensive solution must be better than existing alternatives and meet the needs of the target market.
Conventional solutions may not always be effective; a more creative approach is often required.
Solving persistent problems requires thinking outside the box and considering unconventional methods.
The example of a parking problem illustrates the need for a better and more accessible solution.
Redesigning the area to enhance public transportation accessibility can be a more permanent solution.
The goal is to find a solution that solves the problem comprehensively and permanently, not just temporarily.

Quotes

"You really can't make it better from there. It just winds up being wasted time, money, resources until you kind of sputter out."
"That's a mitigation tactic that has been attempted for years, maybe decades at this point. Yet the problem remains."

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Can You Make a Bad Door?

Sean Boyce — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 13:17:17 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean delves into the distinction between a bad product and a poorly implemented user experience. Using a real-life example of confusing office doors, he explores the challenges of design and usability. Ultimately, he argues that the responsibility lies with the design and urges businesses to prioritize consistency and user testing when creating software and products.

Key Points

Something as simple as the design of the office doors can create confusion and leads to user errors.
Users struggle to differentiate between different options if their appearance is similar.
Consistency of experience is crucial to avoid confusion and improve usability.
Solving the problem requires redesigning the experience, not just providing instructions or signs.
Similar mistakes can be observed in software design, where assumptions about user intuition can lead to poor user experiences.

Quotes

"You can instruct people, you can teach people, but at the end of the day, you're always gonna have this problem unless you really fix it for good."
"We just assume that the experience that perhaps is intuitive for us is gonna be intuitive for them, and very rarely that's the case."

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Managing Notifications: Striking the Balance

Sean Boyce — Fri, 20 Oct 2023 08:53:31 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of managing notifications in software and SaaS applications. He draws a parallel between the widespread disregard for car alarms and the potential negative impact of excessive or irrelevant notifications. Sean emphasizes the need for generating notifications that provide value and are valued by users, highlighting the significance of striking a balance in notification management.

Key Points

Excessive notifications can lead to user fatigue and result in unsubscribing, marking emails as spam, or ignoring notifications in software
Notifications should be generated at appropriate times and provide specific value to users and customers.
Carefully monitor the actions users take in response to notifications to ensure their effectiveness.
Designing notifications with a specific purpose helps ensure their value and relevance.
Notifications that fail to provide value can drive users to use software less or cancel subscriptions.
Balancing the frequency and content of notifications is crucial for maintaining user engagement and satisfaction.
Notifications should not disrupt the user experience but rather enhance it by delivering timely and meaningful information

Quotes

"Notifications have become like car alarms, completely ineffective and ignored."
"Car alarms going off frequently have conditioned people to disregard them, even the car owners themselves."
"Generating noisy notifications can lead to user dissatisfaction, unsubscribing, or marking emails as spam."
"Notifications must happen at the right time and provide value to users."
"Watch how much action users take from the notifications you generate to gauge their effectiveness."
"Balancing notifications ensures they are valued by users and not seen as a nuisance."
"Design notifications with a specific purpose and avoid overwhelming users with excessive noise."

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What Does 'Just Use AI' Mean?

Sean Boyce — Thu, 19 Oct 2023 08:02:46 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean tackles the misconceptions around using artificial intelligence (AI) for everything and provides a step-by-step approach to leveraging AI effectively. He emphasizes the importance of understanding what specific problems businesses face and how AI can help eliminate bottlenecks in their processes. Sean shares his own experience of using AI to develop software products and highlights the exponential improvements AI brings to simplifying complex operations.

Key Points

AI can make complex operations simple and drastically improve software capabilities.
Identifying bottlenecks in business processes is crucial to finding problems that AI can solve.
Understanding the specific needs and challenges of each business is essential for effective AI implementation.
Leveraging AI requires building better solutions around identified bottlenecks.
AI tools enable faster and more efficient production of desired outputs.
AI software revolves around taking inputs, producing outputs, and eliminating process bottlenecks.
Show notes and short-form video creation tools are examples of AI eliminating bottlenecks in different business operations.

Quotes

"AI makes the really complex, really simple, which is a dramatic change in terms of the tools we have available."
"Every business has a bottleneck, and improving that step brings the biggest improvement from the smallest change."
"AI dramatically improves the possibilities for significant progress in business operations."
"AI can help make your software significantly better by figuring out how to use this process."
"Understanding what's standing in a business's way of more progress is key to solving their unique problems."
"Leveraging AI requires building a better solution around the identified bottleneck."
"AI is a significantly better tool for eliminating process bottlenecks and improving efficiency."

Resources

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Unlocking the Value of Customer Support for SaaS Applications

Sean Boyce — Wed, 18 Oct 2023 08:00:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the importance of not outsourcing or delegating customer support for SaaS applications. He explains how valuable feedback from users can be in improving the software and increasing revenue. Sean shares his own examples of how support channels have helped him enhance his products.

Key Points

Interacting with software users allows you to understand their experiences and improve your product.
Delegating customer support means missing out on valuable feedback and potential revenue.
Feedback from users can lead to important enhancements and the discovery of new market opportunities.
Setting up a sustainable number of support channels helps manage and prioritize feedback effectively.
Email support and analytics tools like Hotjar are effective channels for gathering user feedback.
The feedback Sean received contributed to the addition of multi-language support and a new pricing tier.
Customer support interactions can uncover design pattern flaws and prompt necessary corrections.

Quotes

"Just because users are using your software doesn't mean they're getting value from it."
"Providing more value means more revenue, longer customer lifetime value, and happier customers."
"Understanding user interactions and feedback is crucial for making improvements to your software."
"Your support channels are important opportunities to discover missed opportunities and great product ideas."
"Direct feedback allows you to learn about key opportunities and make your company more valuable."

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Why It's Critical to Intimately Understand the Problem YOUR Software Solves

Sean Boyce — Tue, 17 Oct 2023 08:00:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a personal story comparing electric vehicles to gas powered vehicles and highlights the importance of understanding your product's use case. He emphasizes the need to avoid misleading marketing by setting realistic expectations for your audience. Sean explores the practicality of electric vehicles for long road trips and discusses the efficiency and convenience of gas powered vehicles in certain scenarios.

Key Points

Electric vehicles may not be practical for long road trips due to constant battery drainage from appliances like the heater.
Gas powered vehicles offer faster refueling times compared to the longer charging times of electric vehicles.
Understanding the specific use case and target market for your product is crucial for its success.
Consider the practicality and efficiency of your product in real-world scenarios.
Electric vehicles may be more convenient for short trips in urban areas if charging facilities are accessible.
Careful marketing and setting realistic expectations is essential to avoid disappointing customers.
Delivering on the top problem your product is solving is key to customer satisfaction.

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What Happens When You Lose Sight of the Top Problem Worth Solving

Sean Boyce — Mon, 16 Oct 2023 08:07:17 -0400

Summary
In this episode, John discusses the common issue of software products losing sight of their main problem while adding unnecessary features. He shares examples, such as Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), where additional functionalities undermine the user experience and reduce productivity. John emphasizes the importance of maintaining focus on the top problem being solved and avoiding the distraction of secondary or tertiary issues.

Key Points

Adding irrelevant features to software products can diminish the user experience.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) promises advantages like security and flexibility, but often fails to deliver a productive experience for users.
Secondary and tertiary problems should only be considered after fully addressing the top problem.
Expanding a software product without maintaining focus on the main problem can lead to dissatisfied users.
The productivity of the workforce should always remain the top priority.
Companies often neglect the primary objective while solving secondary or tertiary problems in software development.
Maintaining a focus on the main problem is crucial for creating a successful software product.

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Unlocking the Magic: Reaching the Milestones of Customer Value in Your Software

Sean Boyce — Fri, 13 Oct 2023 07:57:05 -0400

Summary
In this episode, we explore a critical milestone in the customer's experience with software: when they receive significant value. Drawing from a personal example of using the Magic Merlin Suit for newborn sleep training, we discuss the importance of meeting customer expectations, achieving a strong problem-solution fit, and the concept of time to value. Getting customers to use and pay for your software is only the first step – it must also deliver on its promises. The faster customers reach the value milestone, the better for software growth and virality.

Key Points

Converting customers to use and pay for your software is just the first milestone.
Delivering on promises and providing value is essential for customer satisfaction.
A strong problem-solution fit is crucial to solving customer pain points effectively.
Time to value refers to how quickly customers receive value from your software.
A shorter time to value leads to better growth, virality, and referral marketing.
Virality occurs when satisfied customers enthusiastically share their positive experiences.
The sooner your software reaches the time to value milestone, the more referrals and growth opportunities it generates.

Quotes

"It kind of is like magic, which is how you know that they've got branding for their experience on point."
"You have to have both. You can't have one or the other."
"The smaller that window, as in the faster you get them value, the better for your software."

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Simplify to Succeed: The Power of Starting Simple with Software

Sean Boyce — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 07:54:05 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of starting simple when creating software. He compares the functionality of a hammer to a Swiss Army knife and explains why offering fewer choices can lead to greater value and customer satisfaction. By resisting the urge to make software more complex, creators can provide a clear and user-friendly experience, ultimately leading to success.

Key Points

Offering too many features can overwhelm users and decrease usage and value
Humans are often overwhelmed by too many choices, leading to decision paralysis.
Studies have shown that offering fewer options can actually lead to increased sales.
Starting with a simpler version of software allows users to quickly understand its value.
Providing a clear initial experience and value encourages customer loyalty.
As customer needs evolve, additional features can be added in sequence.
Resisting the urge to make software complex leads to faster progress and success.

Quotes

"More often than not, typically speaking, less choices are better because people could figure it out for themselves more quickly."
"The simpler you can make the initial version of your software, the better...people are gonna be able to figure out what it is, how it works, how to use it."
"Resist the urge to make your software more complex and more feature rich. Start simpler and that's gonna help you make progress much more quickly."
"The easier it is for you to get your software off the ground...the easier it is for you to get your software off the ground."
"Once it's off the ground and you have happy paying customers, that's when you can learn more about where to go next."

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Capture Bugs and Enhancements with Video Feedback

Sean Boyce — Wed, 11 Oct 2023 08:02:45 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the power of using Loom, a video capture tool, to obtain feedback that is efficient and effective. He emphasizes the importance of visual communication and demonstrates how Loom can be utilized to capture bugs and suggest enhancements for software. By leveraging this tool, users can save time and effortlessly share valuable feedback with their development teams.

Key Points

Loom is a video capture tool that simplifies the process of capturing and sharing feedback for software.
Video format is more effective in communicating issues compared to verbal explanation.
Loom videos enable clear demonstration of bugs, their replication, and desired fixes.
Using Loom videos reduces the need for time-consuming one-on-one meetings with development teams.
Loom can also be used for usability testing, allowing users to navigate software and provide valuable feedback asynchronously.
The ease of use and shareability of Loom make it an ideal tool for gathering feedback and making software improvements.
Engaging power users to record videos about desired functionality can provide additional valuable feedback.

Quotes

"Having the video and making the video easily accessible is crazy important for sharing feedback for all the parties involved."
"Trying to explain it to them verbally is never really gonna be as effective as if you show them visually."
"People are visual learners for the most part, and a lot of folks still don't really understand that."

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What To Do When You Miss the Obvious: Design Patterns and SaaS Applications

Sean Boyce — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 07:30:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of recognizing and rectifying missed design patterns in SaaS applications. He shares a personal experience of overlooking a crucial feature that affected user accessibility. Sean emphasizes the value of user feedback and the opportunity it presents to improve software and enhance the overall user experience.

Key Points

Overlooking design patterns is a common mistake even for experienced product developers.
Quick product launches allow for testing and learning from user experiences.
Active support channels help address user requests and identify overlooked features.
Monitoring feedback enables continual improvement and aligns the product with industry standards.
Embracing design flaws as opportunities to enhance the software and user satisfaction.
User feedback provides valuable insights for making necessary product adjustments.
Building with users ensures a collaborative approach to creating better software.

Quotes

"Regardless of experience, you're going to miss something relatively obvious. But that's okay, it's an opportunity to make your product better."
"Keeping your support channels active and monitoring them helps you stay on top of user requests."
"Recognizing design flaws and fixing them brings the user experience up to industry standards."
"User feedback presents opportunities to enhance the software and meet customer expectations."
"Building with users involves using their feedback to continually improve your product."

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Harnessing the Magic of AI: Unlocking its Potential

Sean Boyce — Mon, 09 Oct 2023 08:32:42 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean delves into the world of AI and discuss its seemingly magical capabilities. He highlights the fascinating ability of AI-powered technology to create videos that seamlessly switch between multiple languages while maintaining facial expressions and intonations. While AI can be overwhelming, Sean encourages listeners to embrace it at their own pace and leverage it as a tool to build better solutions. By understanding how AI works, one can identify bottlenecks and apply AI to eliminate them, leading to significant progress and value.

Key Points

AI technology can be seen as magic for those unfamiliar with its capabilities.
AI-powered technology can switch effortlessly between different languages.
Sean urges listeners not to panic but to embrace AI at their own pace.
AI should be viewed as a tool that can elevate the effectiveness of existing processes.
Understanding AI empowers individuals to leverage it and create innovative solutions.
Sean focuses on eliminating bottlenecks using AI technology to increase productivity and value.
By leveraging AI effectively, one can strengthen the value proposition of their software.

Quotes

"Any seemingly advanced technology or any technology that's advanced enough is seemingly indistinguishable from that of magic."
"AI is a tool like any other. It may be the most capable tool that we have available, like the most powerful piece on a chessboard."

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Don't Play Games When It Comes to Names

Sean Boyce — Fri, 06 Oct 2023 08:00:51 -0400

In this episode, Sean discusses the often overlooked topic of branding and naming in building SaaS businesses. He shares the example of HBO's disastrous rebranding to HBO Max, highlighting the importance of maintaining a strong brand and avoiding confusing naming changes. Sean emphasizes the power of thematic naming and how it can positively impact marketing efforts by instantly conveying the purpose of a product.

Key Points

Branding and naming have a significant influence on your marketing efforts.
HBO's rebranding to HBO Max resulted in confusion and backlash from its user base.
The name HBO was synonymous with high-quality content and had a strong brand reputation.
Thematic naming, like Sean's product "Podcast Show Notes," helps users understand its purpose immediately.
Creating a thematic name facilitates efficient customer acquisition and marketing communication.
Avoid making naming mistakes like HBO did to preserve brand recognition and goodwill
Effective naming and branding can enhance storytelling and marketing for your product.

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The Slow and Steady Path to Success in SaaS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 05 Oct 2023 08:58:20 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the often overlooked path to success in the SaaS industry. While many focus on rapid growth and exponential revenue increases, Sean highlights the importance of taking a slow and steady approach. He emphasizes the need for commitment, sustainability, and staying in the game for the long haul. By adopting a bootstrapping strategy and maintaining control over your business, you have the potential to achieve the success you've always desired.

Key Points

Everyone aims for a hockey stick growth curve, but it's not the norm.
The time and commitment required to reach extraordinary levels of success are often underestimated.
Building a sustainable business is crucial to staying in the game.
Bootstrapping allows you to progress at your own pace and make continuous improvements.
VC-funded startups face pressure to hire fast and make rapid progress, which often leads to failure.
Keeping a nine-to-five job while slowly building your business can yield long-term success.
Even as a bootstrap business, you can achieve hockey stick growth with time and perseverance.

Quotes

"I would rather see you keep a nine-to-five, start working on learning these concepts, building what you want to build, and make progress slowly but surely."
"It gives us control, allows us to do the things we wanna do with our business, and eventually reap the majority of the reward."
"The success that you're ultimately likely to achieve will probably follow a similar path, it just might take a little bit longer."

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Why Your Software Needs an Answer to AI NOW

Sean Boyce — Wed, 04 Oct 2023 07:45:45 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into software applications to prevent obsolescence. He emphasizes that AI technologies will continue to evolve and improve, and waiting too long to incorporate them could be detrimental. Sean highlights that AI provides unique abilities to solve problems in a considerably better and more efficient way, allowing for increased value and functionality. He encourages listeners to evaluate their products, identify areas where AI can enhance performance, and stay updated on innovations in the industry.

Key Points

AI technologies are rapidly advancing and can greatly improve software applications.
Incorporating AI early is crucial to prevent being left behind by competitors.
AI offers exponential value and efficiency by solving previous generation's problems.
Evaluate where your product stands in terms of AI integration and consider how to leverage AI tools.
Identify bottlenecks in your process that could be eliminated or improved with AI.
Research industry innovations and observe how others are leveraging AI to enhance their products.
Experiment with AI tools to evaluate their impact and consider incorporating them sooner rather than later.

Quotes

"The AI technologies that are available today are just the beginning. They are only going to get better and more than likely, considerably better."
"AI is providing unique abilities to be able to solve previous generation's problems in a considerably better way."
"You really need to evaluate where your product is at the moment, if it incorporates AI and if it does, so how?"
"What could stand to be considerably faster? Where could you cut out 90% of the time, effort, or resources that it takes to produce the result of whatever it is your product does? More than likely, the answer to that is AI."
"I strongly encourage you to do this research now, figure out how these tools work. Learn more about if you were to incorporate them where you would, and then start doing some experimentation with them to evaluate the results."

(Generated by Podcast Show Notes at podcastshownotes.ai)

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Memrise: AI-driven Language Learning Platform and the Power of Immersive Experiences with Ben Whately

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 17:00:00 -0400

In this episode, Ben Whately, the Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Memrise, an innovative language learning app, shares his background in neuroscience and the development of a unique language learning approach. The episode explores the limitations of traditional methods and the power of experiential learning. Sean and Ben discuss Memrise's evolution to an AI-driven platform, offering personalized courses and immersive experiences, along with the potential of AI in language learning and the importance of resilience in the startup world

Ben Whately is a versatile entrepreneur and tech innovator who has made significant strides in the world of language learning and climate tech. As the Co-founder of Memrise, a language-learning app with over 65 million users, he has played a pivotal role in transforming the way people learn languages. Currently serving as Memrise's Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer, Ben combines his expertise in pedagogy, social products, media entertainment, and business strategy to continually enhance the learning experience for millions. Beyond language learning, Ben is also the CEO of Angry Teenagers, utilizing Web3 technology to combat climate change. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Memrise initially focused on memorizing words and phrases in context, then expanded to incorporate other aspects of language learning.
Being an early adopter of mobile can give a business a significant growth advantage.
AI startups have the potential to disrupt industries and ride the wave of innovation.
Balancing user feedback and founder-level insights is crucial for product development.
Understanding the changing customer insights and adapting to them can lead to business success.
Timing played a significant role in Memrise's success with AI integration.

Resources:

Connect with Ben Whately:

Connect with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

12:18 - “The reason that we unlocked growth was that we got onto mobile early enough that there were only two or three other mobile language learning apps. Apple and Google have to keep featuring different ones. We got on there early enough that we got big featuring early. We then got really good at working with Google and really understanding how to give the Google team the information that they want. Google is so metrics-driven that the more you can show them how they are building things that are helping you to grow your business, the more the internal team in Google can show off to their bosses, Hey look, this is how Google, this is how we work. Look at the great impact we had. And that allows you to get more visibility.”
15:56 - “So for us, the big growth channel was getting in the app stores early enough and then SEO taking over later on. We've never been able to compete with Duolingo or Babbel on marketing spend. They spend tens, hundreds of millions. I think our marketing spend last month was probably like $4,000. Like we just don't spend money on it, it's all organic. But we reach a point where we're like, we've got two massive gorillas in the room, and Duolingo and Babbel who are spending a huge amount and getting massive traction on that. It sucks a lot of the air out of the room.”
25:46 - “Clearly, generative AI is a way, that allows us to create tools there that you can practice with in a way that had never been possible before. So that's really been the kind of renaissance for Memrise, being another platform shift, getting into AI, Generative AI, before anyone else was there and applying it in all these different ways.”
19:33 - “I actually now see this a lot in companies that I advise where you're trying to get this balance between really good product and growth thinking where you're talking to your users all the time, you're understanding what it is they want, you're testing things really, really quickly. Particularly growth experiments have to be super fast. You want to be doing five iterations a week and getting them out with this idea of we've actually got to build something that's quite fundamentally different.”
27:20 - “I feel like that's another key takeaway here is people expect people like you and I, in terms of the products that we're building to have a plan hammered out all the way through in terms of how we're going to get there. But a lot of it keeps going. Build yourself a sustainable path to be able to continue to keep going and then take advantage of the opportunities that come at you from wherever. Just like this one I've used the AI stuff that you guys are building and Memrise. It's fantastic and it really does create much more of that immersive experience.”

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From Subscription Fatigue to Customer Satisfaction: Evolving SaaS Pricing

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 08:33:37 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean dives into the world of SaaS pricing, discussing the current landscape and the different models available. He emphasizes the need to adapt and find the pricing strategy that aligns with your product, customers, and profitability. Whether it's the traditional subscription model or a pay-as-you-go approach, Sean highlights the importance of making informed decisions to ensure success in the evolving SaaS industry.

Key Points

Subscription pricing remains popular for most SaaS products.
Consider alternative models like pay-as-you-go to better suit specific applications.
Overuse and abuse of subscriptions has led to subscription fatigue.
BMW's failed attempt at charging for built-in car features highlights the inappropriate use of subscriptions.
Pay-as-you-go models can provide flexibility and cost-efficiency.
The childcare service example showcases the benefits of pay-as-you-go in a specific context.
Every SaaS business should conduct thorough research to determine the most suitable pricing model for their product and customers.

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Don't Waste Time Reinventing the Wheel in B2B SaaS Design

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Oct 2023 07:49:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, we explore the common mistakes made in designing user experience for B2B SaaS applications. Many people waste time trying to reinvent basic elements that already work well across software. Instead, it's important to focus on innovation in areas that provide unique value. By leveraging design patterns and industry best practices, you can create a consistent and user-friendly workflow.

Key Points

SaaS applications should follow industry-standard design patterns for basic usability.
Competitive research can help identify successful design elements to replicate.
Innovate in the areas that provide unique value, not in reinventing the wheel.
Focus on creating compelling titles and summaries to attract listeners or users.
Borrow design patterns from existing products to ensure a familiar and intuitive workflow.
Invest time in researching and taking notes on what competitors do well and don't.
Prioritize guiding users to the critical elements where the product's value stands out.

Quotes

"What I mean here is things like your login page, your password reset, how your menu works, everything else that has to do with the basics in terms of usability for your software."
"You can take a two birds with one stone approach while you are performing your competitive research using the other products on the market."
"Focus on innovating in the internals and the component of your application that is unique."
"What I do need is a compelling title, great summary, and something that's going to motivate their listeners to click on and then listen to that episode."
"Innovate there in that space, not how they log in, how they access support, how they reset their passwords, all this kind of stuff."
"If you do that, you'll save yourself a tremendous amount of time and you will create a workflow that isn't confusing."

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Unveiling the Mystery: How Much Effort is Needed for Problem Discovery

Sean Boyce — Fri, 29 Sep 2023 07:41:33 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean dives into the importance of user research and discovery in finding problems worth solving. He emphasizes the need to validate the market demand before building a product and shares insights on the volume of interviews required. Sean also recommends conducting research in a sprint format to uncover patterns and make informed decisions.

Key Points

Building a B2B SaaS or product requires starting with a problem worth solving.
Validation of market demand is crucial before moving forward with development.
The number of interviews is not as crucial as identifying patterns in the data.
Narrow target markets can lead to quicker problem discovery.
Wider target markets may require more interviews for diverse insights.
Conduct research in sprint format, with 3-5 interviews per sprint.
Learn from previous interviews to refine the research process.

Quotes

"You have to start with a problem worth solving."
"It's not about the number of interviews, but the patterns in the data."
"The decisions on target market impact the effort and time required."
"Conduct your research in sprint format for focused insights."
"Refine your process based on lessons learned from previous interviews."
"Identify the top problem and understand its impact on the target market."
"Tie your solution's ROI to tangible numbers such as lost time and revenue."

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The 'Faster Horse' Fallacy About User Research

Sean Boyce — Thu, 28 Sep 2023 07:40:12 -0400

Summary
Join Sean as he delves into the commonly misinterpreted quote by Henry Ford and uncovers the true value of user research. Discover the fascinating backstory of the iPhone's creation and learn how understanding progress and problems can lead to successful product development.

Key Points

User research is essential for developing successful products and businesses.
Misinterpretation of Ford's quote leads to the misconception that users have no idea what they want.
Customers provide insight into problems they face and the progress they desire, rather than suggesting specific features.
The quote highlights the importance of understanding users' desired progress and creating innovative solutions.
User research helps identify market opportunities and ensures products meet customer needs.
The creation of the iPhone involved a collaborative effort by a team of engineers, debunking the notion of one individual's magical invention.
Don't underestimate the importance of conducting user research to uncover customer needs and optimize product development.

Quotes

"I think it's often misinterpreted, making success a lot harder to achieve."
"Users don't need to tell you what to create; they need to express their problems and desired progress."
"Understanding the progress users want to make leads to successful products."
"User research is vital in uncovering market opportunities and customer needs."
"The iPhone's creation involved a team of engineers and a lengthy development process."
"User research is crucial, debunking the misconception that it's a waste of time."
"Interpret research findings to create a solution that addresses problems and enables progress."

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The Benefits of Bootstrapping for SaaS Startups

Sean Boyce — Wed, 27 Sep 2023 08:32:12 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the crucial decision between fundraising and bootstrapping for SaaS startups. He highlights the advantages of bootstrapping, including maintaining control, focusing on building the business, balancing effort, having better options when selling, and reaping the benefits of hard work. He also emphasizes the importance of negotiating from a position of power when considering fundraising.

Key Points

Maintaining control of your company is easier when bootstrapping.
Splitting focus between fundraising and building the business can hinder success.
Balancing effort is easier when bootstrapping for a lifestyle business.
Setting a high valuation through fundraising can limit selling options.
Reaping the benefits of your hard work is more achievable through bootstrapping.
The majority of SaaS company sales occur in the six and seven-figure range.
Bootstrapping allows for negotiating from a position of power when considering fundraising.

Quotes

"If you choose to fundraise, then you're letting a whole bunch of other people have a big chunk of your company."

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Uncovering Real Problems: Key Steps to Building a Successful B2B SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Tue, 26 Sep 2023 17:00:00 -0400

In this episode, Mac Martine discusses topics such as persistence, mental hurdles, and sustainable approaches in business. They talk about the importance of talking to people, understanding customer needs, and following the money in building a B2B SaaS product. The benefits of bootstrapping and the freedom it provides, as well as the ability to pivot quickly, are explored.

Meet Mac Martine, a dynamic entrepreneur and co-founder of Aware, a revolutionary platform providing in-depth personal and team analytics for LinkedIn. Mac's journey spans founding and exiting Castanet, an automated outreach SaaS platform, to launching The SaaS Bootstrapper, where he offers invaluable insights through his podcast, newsletter, and consulting. With a knack for fostering growth and clarity, Mac's impact on the SaaS and entrepreneurial landscape is palpable. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Timing, luck, and market factors play a role in success and are often beyond our control.
Strategy, smart decision-making, and knowing what to do each day contribute to greater efficiency and productivity.
Building solutions to non-existent problems is a common challenge in the B2B SaaS industry.
Talking to people and understanding their needs is crucial before developing a product.
Iteration and feedback from potential customers are essential for successful product development.
Bootstrapping allows for independence, control, and the ability to prioritize personal goals.
There's an advantage in being able to outmaneuver and adapt more quickly than funded startups.

Resources:

Connect with Mac Martine:

Connect with our host, Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

11:01 - “So I think it's being able to, trying to find a way to slow down and enjoy the process and you know, I think you can move fast 'cause you know there are going to be a lot of people that are like, you have to move fast, you have to go. It's all about speed. Yeah. Like it's not all about speed and speed comes from counterintuitive things sometimes it's about making smart decisions, not stupid decisions where you have to undo this stuff all the time and having a strategy and knowing what you're doing so that every day when you get up you know exactly what to do.”
15:45 - “And so now I'm getting into a particular industry and then before too long with sales teams it's very quickly lead gen. Because that's what it's all about. And so, okay, now we're talking about like lean gen, lead gen tools. What are they using? What do they need? What are the pro? And so it just went further and further that way. And there were some different ideas that I would experiment with. Sometimes it's going home and like spending a few hours or a few days coding something to see if I could even do something, a particular thing. And I might take it back to 'em and be like, is this kinda what you were thinking? And then see and oftentimes like a big lesson there was like people suggest things that they think are cool but cool doesn't sell.”
18:20 - “Essentially, these answers lie with your customer or your market. If you do that research, if you talk to people, especially businesses like know who you're talking to, searching for these problems, you're following the money, money usually follows the problems they're trying to solve, solve. You can eventually uncover, well here's an opportunity, right? I know these, this group of people or these businesses are trying to solve this problem and this is the way they're trying to do it. I know I can do better than that or I could build something that will impress them, right? Provide them with a return. You spoke to that if built to provide that ROI, right? You can, you can essentially iron out a lot of that, at least in theory based on the data you're collecting back before you even start building. You're so far ahead of the game when compared with the masses in terms of what they're doing with products.”
08:26 - “So like I think there's misconceptions out there where folks think this should happen in like days or weeks when in reality a lot of people that have done so successfully, it takes many months or years sometimes and that's okay, right? But like what can help people that want to do this be on a path that's more sustainable that doesn't create this like situation where there's this immense pressure and stress where I call it the like struggle porn aspect where it's like everybody's in this like startup life and you have to be like ramen noodles and working like 20 hours a day or something crazy in order to actually achieve success. Yeah, I feel like that has not been my experience.”
20:27 - Mac: “There are people are, everyone's on Facebook, I love Facebook and that's where people are and I might as well just use that. I don't need a website. I'm like, oh my god, first of all, I think that's terrible but fine. Like I can't really, like I'm not going to sit here and try to convince you otherwise. But it really crushed my assumption, right? That like I thought was a totally valid assumption. I never would've, I never would've guessed that that was the case. But little did I know. So yeah, we can think we're brilliant, and we're onto something and little do we know like people are going the opposite direction of what we thought was the right way to go.”
Sean Boyce: “That's some excellent advice too, right? Because it can create you, it can prevent you from wasting time money on something that we think might be a good idea, but ultimately it doesn't connect with our target market audience for whatever reason. And it doesn't necessarily mean that it's, whatever they're doing is the, is the best solution or the optimal solution, but it is what they see or what they're willing to use essentially.”

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Benchmarks and Insights: Analyzing Conversion Rates

Sean Boyce — Mon, 25 Sep 2023 08:00:47 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean delves into the importance of conversions after product launch. He shares his insights on measuring the success of free trials and paid conversions. Sean also provides a benchmark based on his own product, podcast show notes, to help you gauge your own performance.

Key Points

Measure the number of people signing up for free trials and converting to paid customers.
Tracking conversions is crucial for post-launch success.
Benchmarks for conversion rates vary widely, making it challenging to find reliable data.
Sean shares detailed data from his product, podcast show notes, to offer a benchmark for comparison.
The podcast automation tool helps create show notes from uploaded audio files.
Sean's product experienced an average signup conversion of 27.5% and a paid conversion of 10.9% over five months.
It's important to focus on profitability and sustainability in addition to conversion rates.

Quotes

"It's all about measuring how many people are signing up for a free trial if your product offers that"
"I'm gonna dive deeper into the numbers for my own product, how well it's performed, and share that with you so you can see how well you're doing."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How AI Technology Levels the Playing Field for Small Businesses

Sean Boyce — Fri, 22 Sep 2023 07:35:03 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the advantages of bootstrapping a B2B SaaS product business, highlighting the unprecedented opportunity created by advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) technology. While many competitors opt for traditional VC fundraising, Sean shares how leveraging AI technologies like OpenAI's ChatGPT enables small businesses to compete and even surpass larger companies with significantly more resources. With a focus on profitability, control, and scalability, Sean encourages listeners to embrace this new era of leveling the playing field.

Key Points

Bootstrapping offers advantages over VC fundraising, allowing for control and flexibility.
AI technologies like OpenAI's ChatGPT enable small businesses to develop impressive products quickly and cost-effectively.
Competitors still following the traditional path of VC fundraising risk running out of resources quickly.
The odds of building a billion-dollar company through fundraising are exceptionally low.
Building a profitable and sustainable business should be the focus instead of chasing unicorns.
Small businesses can keep up with or surpass larger competitors by leveraging AI technology.
Avoid the pitfalls of rapid growth and bloated teams that slow down results.

Quotes

"Software companies are intended to be built to be scalable, and hiring tons and tons of people is not scalable."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Stop Forcing Bad Workflows in Your B2B SaaS Products

Sean Boyce — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 07:44:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the significance of not imposing a poor workflow on your B2B SaaS product. He emphasizes the need to match user expectations, avoid overwhelming options, and focus on specific use cases. By evaluating analytics and addressing signs of user dissatisfaction, you can optimize sign-ups and conversions.

Key Points

Understand the workflow experience within your B2B SaaS product
Don't create a generic workflow that confuses and overwhelms users
Tailor your product to address specific use cases and provide value
Analyze conversion rates and use tools like Hotjar to identify rage quits
User behavior, such as U-turns and application abandonment, can indicate workflow issues
Striking a balance between narrow focus and solving a significant problem is essential
Eliminating customers with a narrow focus misconception is a common pitfall

Quotes

"Problem comes when you actually convert that user into signing up for your product and the experience that they have."
"You want to go as narrowly focused as you can while still solving a rather large problem."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Blue Ocean vs. Red Ocean Strategy: Finding Success in an Existing Market

Sean Boyce — Wed, 20 Sep 2023 14:22:06 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the common misconception of competition in building a B2B SaaS company. He explains why having competition is actually a good thing and how it can be leveraged to enhance your product. Sean also shares insights from an interview with Melissa Kwan, the CEO of Ebin, who provides valuable perspectives on the Blue Ocean and Red Ocean strategies. By understanding and learning from existing products in the market, you can create a better product and differentiate yourself effectively.

Key Points

Mistakenly thinking that a B2B SaaS product needs to be one of a kind
The benefits of competition and why it is essential for success
The time-consuming and expensive nature of Blue Ocean strategies
The advantage of the Red Ocean strategy in an existing market
Learning from existing products to improve your own offerings
Identifying gaps and weaknesses in competitors' products
Leveraging pricing and features to differentiate your product

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Power of the Five Whys: Uncovering Context for B2B SaaS Solutions

Sean Boyce — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 07:32:48 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of truly understanding the problem context in UX research and discovery, particularly for B2B SaaS companies. He emphasizes the significance of going deep with line of questioning, as just knowing about a problem isn't enough. By sharing examples and strategies, Sean highlights the value of uncovering greater context through effective questioning techniques.

Key Points

Understanding a problem goes beyond awareness and requires grasping all the intricate details.
Demo calls provide an opportunity to gather valuable information and context, but going deep enough with the line of questioning is crucial.
Asking follow-up questions to dig deeper helps uncover the full context of the problem.
Gathering the rest of the context is like exploring the hidden part of an iceberg.
Stopping at surface-level information means missing out on valuable insights.
The five whys technique is recommended to uncover greater context and understanding.
Obtaining a comprehensive understanding of the problem space is essential for B2B SaaS success.

Quotes

"They're not going deep enough with their line of questioning, and that's creating problems in getting enough value out of those conversations."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Uncovering Solutions: Moving Industries Forward by Applying Cross-Industry Strategies

Sean Boyce — Mon, 18 Sep 2023 07:41:52 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of going industry specific when finding problems worth solving in B2B SaaS. By specializing and targeting a specific market, not only does it make it easier for potential customers to find you, but it also increases your chances of success. Sean emphasizes the need for thorough research to ensure that there is a problem to solve within the chosen industry. Furthermore, he explores the concept of industries being at different levels of progress, and how cross-industry strategies can be used to move industries forward.

Key Points

Going industry specific increases chances of success in B2B SaaS.
Specialization helps in finding and attracting target market.
Thorough research is essential to identify industry-specific problems.
Industries progress at different rates, affecting software development.
Problems in slower-moving industries may already have solutions in more progressive industries.
Lack of awareness about cross-industry solutions hinders progress.
Applying solutions from forward-facing industries can propel industry progress.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

A Better Way to Find a Problem Worth Solving

Sean Boyce — Sat, 16 Sep 2023 10:49:22 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of finding a problem worth solving and the common mistake of trying to create a completely new solution. Instead, he encourages listeners to leverage existing solutions and focus on improving upon them. By understanding the target market, problem context, and current limitations, it becomes easier to build a successful B2B SaaS business.

Key Points

Focus on finding a problem worth solving before designing a solution.
Trying to create something completely new often struggles to gain traction.
Educating customers and explaining how to use the solution is time-consuming.
Instead of innovating, analyze the existing solutions being used.
Understanding the limitations of current solutions helps identify areas for improvement.
Building upon existing solutions increases the chances of success.
Leveraging variables and context provides a targeted approach.

Quotes

"Start with an area and an industry and a product that already has all these variables combined, which will make your odds of achieving success that much greater."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

AI-Powered Advertising: Maximizing Campaign Performance with ChatGPT

Sean Boyce — Fri, 15 Sep 2023 07:54:25 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the power of AI in scaling B2B SaaS businesses. He explores how AI can automate tasks, enhance language generation, and optimize ad campaigns. With examples ranging from show notes creation to copywriting and advertising, Sean highlights the benefits of leveraging AI tools for growth.

Key Points

AI automation tools can save time and enable us to do more.
AI language models like ChatGPT can help improve communication and copywriting.
Leveraging AI tools beyond typical use cases can enhance B2B SaaS growth.
Crafting optimized language on landing pages motivates users to take action.
Tools like ChatGPT assist with creating impactful and emotionally charged copy.
ChatGPT can provide various language options and refine them to your needs.
AI-powered tools like ChatGPT optimize ad campaigns by testing different copy combinations.

Quotes

"There's a ton of people creating and sharing AI tools because of what they're capable of and how easy it is to get started."
"You wanna create a bunch of different titles and descriptions, different language to figure out which one's gonna resonate best."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How To Provide Value Faster For New Customers

Sean Boyce — Thu, 14 Sep 2023 08:02:50 -0400

Summary
In this episode, learn how to ensure your customers quickly receive value from your product, leading to increased customer satisfaction and ROI. Explore the concept of engineering as marketing, streamline your onboarding process, and leverage secondary problems to guide customers towards your core offering.

Key Points

Engineering as marketing is a growth strategy used by successful B2B SaaS companies like HubSpot.
Build valuable tools that provide immediate value to customers, creating a connection to your product.
Evaluate your product experience to determine when customers start receiving value.
Reduce the steps required for customers to develop a habit with your product.
Identify secondary problems related to your core offering and solve them to engage customers.
Use half steps in the onboarding process to make it easier for customers to receive value.
Avoid overwhelming customers with too many hoops to jump through during onboarding.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How To Maximize Your Free to Paid Conversions for B2B SaaS Products

Sean Boyce — Wed, 13 Sep 2023 07:31:32 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a trick to maximize free trial to paid conversions for B2B SaaS products. Instead of restricting access to valuable functionality, Sean advises giving everything away during the free trial. By leading with the best features, you can hook users and increase conversions.

Key Points

Restricting access to valuable functionality reduces conversions.
Providing access to everything during the free trial can hook users onto your product.
Users may get frustrated if they can't experiment with the features they find most valuable.
Boost conversions by leading with your best functionality during the free trial.
Rolling users into the highest tier after the trial can lead to more paying accounts.
Don't lock users out of experiencing the best your product has to offer.
Leading with valuable functionality first can increase your conversion rates.

Quotes

"If you are restricting access to your most valuable functionality...that is more than likely gonna reduce the amount of conversions."
"Give everything away...use it to get them hooked onto it."
"If your product is not leading with your best functionality...I would encourage you to make that change."
"It boosted paid conversions by a considerable margin."
"Don't lock them out of experiencing it all together because they might just bail on you."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Evaluating Competition for B2B SaaS Products Made Easy

Sean Boyce — Tue, 12 Sep 2023 07:53:57 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares valuable insights on how to evaluate competition when building B2B SaaS products. While it's common for founders to obsess over competition, Sean explains that it's unnecessary and shares the advantages of low touch products that come with free trials. He encourages listeners to experience existing products to gain inspiration, identify areas for improvement, and understand market trends. Sean also emphasizes the importance of simplicity and usability in product design.

Key Points

Don't obsess over competition, as customers often know less about it than you do.
Low touch B2B SaaS products offer the advantage of free trials and easy access.
Evaluate existing products to gain inspiration, improve workflow, and explore new ideas.
Monitor competition before, during, and after product development and launch.
Analyze pricing models to understand market trends and make informed decisions.
Learn from the results and performance of existing products as benchmarks for your own.
Prioritize simplicity and stick to a primary workflow to avoid confusion and usability issues.

Quotes

"The advantage of a low touch product is the easy access and opportunity to experience it for yourself."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building Your B2B SaaS: Cost-Effective Strategies & Design Patterns

Sean Boyce — Mon, 11 Sep 2023 07:50:22 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how to build a cost-effective B2B SaaS product, providing insights into hosting environments, development tools, and solution engineering. He explores the use of no-code/low-code platforms for prototyping and recommends transitioning to custom development when there's potential market demand. Sean also shares his experiences with hosting platforms like Heroku and highlights the advantages of powerful options like AWS and Azure.

Key Points

Choose tools that help you create an important customer experience and solve problems efficiently.
Simplicity in the solution design makes scaling and development easier.
No-code/low-code tools like Bubble.io are suitable for prototyping, but lack scalability.
Consider hiring developers from platforms like Upwork and test their skills before making a selection.
Transition from builder tools in the zero to one phase to custom engineering for long-term growth.
Hosting platforms like Heroku may offer convenience, but more complex options like AWS provide better performance and flexibility.
It's important to find the right tech help to manage hosting platforms effectively.

Quotes

"Pick whatever helps you create an experience that solves the problem for your target market customer."
"No-code/low-code tools are great for cobbling something together quickly for testing market demand."
"Transition to custom engineering to have the freedom to build and expand your product in the future."
"Hire developers by testing their communication, responsiveness, and ability to deliver on a simple development task."
"AWS offers better performance, flexibility, and versatility compared to platforms like Heroku."
"Simplicity in solution design makes scaling and development significantly easier."
"Finding the right tech help is crucial in effectively managing hosting platforms for your SaaS product."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Transforming Negative Feedback into a Product Opportunity

Sean Boyce — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 07:17:00 -0400

Summary
Discover how turning negative feedback from paying customers into an opportunity can enhance your product. Learn how emotions play a vital role in decision-making and how to use them to your advantage. Leverage support channels to gather valuable feedback and discover unique ideas for improving your product.

Key Points

Negative feedback from paying customers can be an opportunity to improve your product.
Emotions are powerful motivators and often drive decision-making.
Use support channels to tap into emotionally charged feedback from customers.
Ask customers why they want to cancel, delving into their expectations and missed opportunities.
Losing access to feedback from testing, using, and paying customers can hinder product improvement.
Leverage support channels to gather ideas and workshop with users to make your product better.
Patterns and feedback from customers can inform product development and marketing strategies.

Quotes

"For the most part, everyone makes decisions for emotional reasons, maybe angry, happy, sad, whatever it is."
"The feedback that you might get can fall into one or two categories, either it's rational feedback and sometimes it's irrational feedback."
"I want to cancel my account because your product, I thought your product was gonna be automated."
"I'm worried about losing access to vital information from someone who's been testing, using, and paying for your product."
"This is a great area of opportunity to make your product better."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Boost Your B2B SaaS Growth with AI-Powered Advertising Campaigns

Sean Boyce — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 08:30:41 -0400

Summary
Learn how to harness the power of AI to enhance your advertising campaigns and drive better results for your B2B SaaS business. Discover the importance of creating multiple combinations in your campaigns, how AI tools can generate compelling ad content, and the advantages of using AI to create visuals. With AI-driven optimization, you can take your advertising campaigns to the next level.

Key Points

AI enables you to create multiple combinations for testing and optimizing your ad campaigns.
By providing parameters to AI tools like Chat GPT, you can generate titles, descriptions, and call-to-actions quickly and affordably.
AI tools like Chat GPT can iterate on the generated content based on your feedback and preferences.
Take advantage of AI tools to save time and effort in producing various ad combinations.
Use AI tools to create visually appealing images that enhance the impact of your ads.
Paint the picture of the pain your target audience faces and the successful outcome your product offers in your ad content.
AI-driven optimization helps you identify winning combinations and eliminate underperforming ones.

Quotes

"Most advertising campaigns recommend creating multiple instances of variables to maximize testing combinations."
"AI tools like Chat GPT can generate compelling ad content based on parameters and background information."
"AI tools are faster and more cost-effective than traditional agency approaches in creating ad combinations."
"AI tools can iterate on generated content based on your feedback, refining it to fit your requirements."
"Using AI for ad campaigns saves time, creates multiple options, and enables production of numerous combinations."
"AI tools can enhance the visual aspect of ads, especially for image-based campaigns."
"AI-driven optimization shows you the most effective combinations, allowing you to eliminate underperforming ones and double down on winners."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Achieving Billion Dollar Status in B2B SaaS Without Investment

Sean Boyce — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 07:38:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, we explore MailChimp's journey to a $12 billion acquisition without raising significant funding. We discuss the key takeaway that success in B2B SaaS can be achieved without investment and highlight the effectiveness of a product-led approach. Maintaining a low touch approach and keeping the product focused also contributed to MailChimp's success.

Key Points

Success in B2B SaaS can be achieved without taking investment dollars.
MailChimp's acquisition by Intuit for $12 billion showcases the power of bootstrapping.
The product-led approach allowed MailChimp to succeed by making it easy for users to get started and find value.
Simplifying the product and avoiding expansion into unrelated areas helped MailChimp maintain its focus.
Taking a low touch approach throughout the growth trajectory can be advantageous in B2B SaaS.
MailChimp's success challenges the notion that investment is essential for reaching unicorn status.
The lessons from MailChimp can be applied to other B2B SaaS companies seeking success.

Quotes

"You can be that successful without having to take investment dollars."
"The product-led approach can ultimately lead to the kind of success that you can have."
"Letting the product do the selling made feedback funnel through the product, eliminating bottlenecks."
"Maintaining a low touch approach throughout the growth trajectory is significantly advantageous."
"You can be ridiculously successful in B2B SaaS without needing to take investment or capital."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Reverse Engineering for Success: Learning from Leading Products

Sean Boyce — Tue, 05 Sep 2023 07:27:57 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the often overlooked strategy of leveraging research to bring the best B2B SaaS product to market. He emphasizes the importance of studying the top products in the industry and understanding their limitations to create a product that surpasses them. By following this approach, Sean believes that B2B SaaS companies can avoid reinventing the wheel and focus on innovating to provide a truly exceptional solution.

Key Points

Researching the leading products in the market is crucial for innovation.
Understanding the limitations of current options helps in building a better product.
Car manufacturers often use reverse engineering to improve their designs.
Many B2B SaaS companies struggle to create well-rounded products.
Starting from scratch makes the development process harder.
Researching and experiencing existing products provides inspiration.
Identifying areas for improvement is essential for creating a superior product.

Quotes

"No one sits out to start from zero to make a product that isn't better than the current options available."
"You need to figure out what the limitations are of the leading options on the market today."
"Let's figure out what the best version of this product looks like on the market today and let's build on top of that."
"Figure out what they do well and figure out what they do not so well."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why It Is So Important To Sell Your B2B SaaS Before You Build It

Sean Boyce — Mon, 04 Sep 2023 07:52:40 -0400

Summary
Generating revenue, becoming profitable, and growing your business are the ultimate goals of building a SaaS product. Selling your product upfront can provide valuable insights and increase your chances of success. In this episode, Sean shares a real-world example of selling podcast show notes before building it, resulting in effective sales. He contrasts it with the experience of not selling Schwarz Maker first and the challenges it faced. Sean explains why selling your product before building it is a crucial step that can save time and help you make the right decisions.

Key Points

Selling your B2B SaaS products before building them provides valuable insights.
Skipping the selling step can lead to challenges in target market definition, value proposition, communication, positioning, and marketing.
Selling first enables you to identify and address problems earlier, compressing the timeline to monetization.
Creating a landing page, communicating your value proposition, and including pricing help test the market and measure conversions.
Comparing the cost of generating traffic to the return on investment provides valuable data for decision making.
Selling before building can save you time and resources by avoiding underwhelming results.
This strategy helps you avoid the common trap of rushing into building a product without sufficient market validation.

Quotes

"Selling your product upfront is going to provide you with a crazy amount of value before you go deep down the building rabbit hole."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Hilarious Examples of Design Failures: From Toys to Software

Sean Boyce — Sat, 02 Sep 2023 08:43:12 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the valuable lessons we can learn from poorly designed products mentioned in a Reddit thread. He shares funny stories of physical products and software that don't meet user needs. The key lesson is to design products that solve your own problems for better understanding and success in the market.

Key Points

Poorly designed products are a common frustration for users.
Designing a product without using it yourself can lead to flaws and inefficiencies.
Personal experiences with a dishwasher and a mechanic's oil change highlight design failures.
Software examples, like search functions, also demonstrate design flaws.
Designing products to solve your own problems gives you an advantage in the market.
Solutions designed by problem owners have a natural understanding of user needs.
Regular use of your own product helps identify and improve its performance.

Quotes

"If you're not designing a product to solve your own problem, then you're just not naturally going to be using this product to understand whether or not it does what it is you need it to do."

Reddit Thread

Link - https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1674arj/what_product_was_so_poorly_designed_that_you/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Measure and Optimize Content Performance for Better Search Rankings

Sean Boyce — Fri, 01 Sep 2023 08:41:37 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares valuable insights on measuring and optimizing content performance to improve search rankings for B2B SaaS businesses. He discusses the tools and techniques necessary for tracking progress, as well as the importance of sustainability in building long-term search rankings. With practical tips and strategies, Sean helps listeners understand how to attract more organic traffic and increase conversions.

Key Points

Track your website's search ranking using tools like Google Search Console and SEMrush
Configure and set up both free and paid performance measurement tools to gain comprehensive data
Continuously monitor domain authority and search rankings to identify areas of improvement
Optimize images, tags, focus keywords, and descriptions to enhance SEO juice
Incorporate video content to improve search rankings as it is considered the future of search
Link relevant videos to relevant articles to provide additional value to readers
Remember that building sustainable search rankings takes time and effort, especially for competitive keywords

Quotes

"We wanna start with the end in mind, which is how do we get the right type of traffic to your website and landing pages?" (Sean)

Tools

Free
- Google Search Console - https://search.google.com/search-console/about
- Google Analytics - https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/analytics/
Paid
- SEMRush - https://www.semrush.com/
- Ahrefs - https://ahrefs.com/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Create Great Content to Boost Your B2B SaaS Product's Search Engine Rankings

Sean Boyce — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 07:54:49 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the importance of creating high-quality content to improve search engine rankings for your B2B SaaS product. He introduces the Skyscraper Technique, where you build upon top-ranking organic results to create a better, more comprehensive piece. He also discusses the use of automation and AI tools to streamline content creation and shares tips on writing an effective article.

Key Points

Great content is crucial for organic search rankings and B2B SaaS growth.
Copywriting forms a solid foundation for content marketing.
The Skyscraper Technique involves improving upon existing top-ranked content.
Research and analyze the domain authority and quality of the top organic results.
Incorporate successful elements like length, copy-visual balance, and content style.
Use automation and AI tools to speed up content creation without sacrificing quality.
Create a detailed outline before writing the article to guide the process.

Quotes

"The Skyscraper Technique allows you to build on what's already working and create a better version."
"Research the top organic results for your target keyword and analyze their domain authority and content quality."
"Incorporate successful elements like length, visuals, and content style into your own article."
"Automation and AI tools like Jasper Surf can help you streamline content creation."
"Creating a detailed outline is crucial before starting the article-writing process."
"Leverage a mix of automation tools and personal writing to achieve your content goals."
"Following this strategy has led to significant improvements in organic search rankings."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Unleash the Power of Keyword Research for Maximum ROI in Content Marketing

Sean Boyce — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 08:11:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his proven strategies for B2B SaaS growth through content marketing. He emphasizes the importance of keyword research and search engine optimization to increase ROI. By working backwards from what people are searching for, Sean reveals how to create valuable content that targets the right audience. He also explains the significance of focusing on less competitive keywords and leveraging a root keyword to build a strong foundation for long-term success.

Key Points

Keyword research is crucial for maximizing ROI in content marketing.
Climbing organic search rankings is the key to unlocking unique opportunities.
Tools like SEMrush and Ahrefs assist in tracking progress and optimizing results.
Working backwards from what people are searching for ensures relevant content.
Build a better solution for a specific target market's problem.
Google's keyword planner provides valuable metrics for keyword selection.
Start with less competitive keywords and gradually target more competitive ones.

Quotes

"You really need to know which keywords you need to be targeting that give you the best opportunity to increase your ROI in content marketing."
"Less competition means bigger opportunity for you to get at or near the top of the search rankings sooner."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Scaling Growth Through Content Marketing: My Step-by-Step Process

Sean Boyce — Tue, 29 Aug 2023 07:48:34 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a step-by-step process for successfully scaling growth through content marketing. He emphasizes the importance of investing in content as a key growth channel for B2B SaaS product businesses. Sean also addresses the misconception that SEO is dead and highlights the relevance and effectiveness of organic search results.

Key Points

Identify keyword opportunities to make your content visible to potential customers.
Create great content that engages and provides value to your audience.
Position your product by connecting it to your content and encouraging further exploration.
Track your progress over time and optimize your content to stay competitive.
SEO is still relevant and can produce significant ROI.
Research existing top-ranking content to improve and exceed expectations.
Set up tracking tools like Google Search Console and SEMrush for performance measurement and improvement.

Quotes

"Content is still king and a key growth channel for B2B SaaS product businesses."
"SEO is still very real, relevant, and does not have a great replacement at the moment."
"Identifying keyword opportunities and creating great content are crucial steps to success."
"Track your progress and optimize your content to stay ahead of the competition."
"Investing in SEO and organic search can significantly increase your ROI."
"Research top-ranking content and learn from their success to improve your own."
"Using tools like Google Search Console and SEMrush will help you measure and improve your SEO performance."

Tools

Google Keyword Planner - https://ads.google.com/home/tools/keyword-planner/
Google Analytics - https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/analytics/
Google Search Console - https://search.google.com/search-console/about
SEMRush - https://www.semrush.com/
Ahrefs - https://ahrefs.com/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Make Your B2B SaaS Product Better: A Process for Success

Sean Boyce — Mon, 28 Aug 2023 07:53:21 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a step-by-step process for improving your B2B SaaS product. By identifying and targeting the right personas, automating feedback collection, and continuously evaluating user data, you can make significant enhancements to your product over time.

Key Points

Define your target personas and ensure that the users of your product match those personas.
Collect feedback from your target personas to gain valuable insights and identify areas for improvement.
Utilize automation to streamline the feedback collection process and receive a consistent flow of user data.
Regularly evaluate user feedback to identify patterns and make data-driven product enhancements.
Remember that both your product and target market are dynamic, so continuous improvement is necessary.
Address any mismatches between user feedback and targeted personas to avoid designing your product in the wrong direction.
Analyze user performance and evaluate customer complaints to identify opportunities for growth channel optimization.

Quotes

"If you're making a bunch of changes and you're getting different outcomes, how are you gonna know which variable led to that outcome?"

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Analyzing Conversion Data to Improve Product Performance

Sean Boyce — Sat, 26 Aug 2023 09:08:11 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the significance of measuring conversions for B2B SaaS products. He discusses the role of Google Ads in tracking desired outcomes and explains the process of setting up conversions. Sean also highlights the importance of optimizing campaigns based on conversion data and shares his own experience with product performance.

Key Points

Conversions allow Google Ads to track desired outcomes and campaign effectiveness.
Setting up conversions in Google Ads requires adding code to landing pages.
Measuring sign-ups for free trials and paid subscriptions are crucial conversion steps.
Conversion data helps optimize campaigns and improve product performance.
Inactive conversions become active once someone goes through the process.
Separate conversion steps for free trials and paid subscriptions are essential.
Analyzing conversion data enables data-driven decision-making and product improvements.

Quotes

"Google Ads gives you the ability to track conversions and optimize campaigns." (175 characters)
"By measuring conversions, you can monitor how effectively your product is converting." (127 characters)
"Analyzing conversion data helps make data-driven decisions for product improvements." (130 characters)
"Setting up separate conversion steps for free trials and paid subscriptions is crucial." (124 characters)
"Inactive conversions become active once the process is initiated." (72 characters)
"Conversions are key to understanding campaign effectiveness and optimization." (89 characters)
"Conversion data empowers you to compare and improve your product performance." (104 characters)

Related YouTube Video - https://youtu.be/mXVOFE8pcNs

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Strategies to Supercharge Your B2B SaaS Growth: Make Ads and SEO Work Together

Sean Boyce — Fri, 25 Aug 2023 08:04:04 -0400

In this episode, Sean discusses strategies for B2B SaaS growth by investing in growth channels that support each other. By combining effective ads and SEO content marketing, businesses can validate their product, understand customer behaviors, and climb organic search rankings. This episode reveals the power of complementary strategies for maximizing ROI.

Key Points

Investing in both ads and SEO content marketing can enhance growth.
Ads provide short-term results, while SEO content has a longer-lasting impact.
Ads help identify keywords and customer search behaviors to inform SEO strategies.
Climbing organic search rankings allows for long-term visibility and cost-effective marketing.
The ROI for ads is contingent on budget, while organic results can be free.
Ads and SEO complement each other by uncovering valuable keywords for targeting.
Prioritize successful ad campaigns to optimize SEO content marketing efforts.

Quotes

"Investing in growth channels that support each other can take your growth quite a bit further."
"Ads are effective for short-term validation, while SEO content marketing offers long-term benefits."
"Knowing what keywords your ad campaign performs well for can inform your SEO strategy."
"Climbing organic search rankings enables free and sustainable visibility for your business."
"Ads and SEO are complementary strategies that can maximize ROI and pull back on ad budgets."
"Successful ad campaigns can be prioritized for optimal investment in SEO content marketing."
"Combining ads and SEO can lead to a positive ROI and all-profit sustainability."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why Regularly Using Your Product is Crucial for Building a Great B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 24 Aug 2023 07:28:30 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the significance of regularly using your own B2B SaaS product to increase your chances of success. He discusses how building a solution to your own problem naturally integrates product usage into your routine, ensuring a better understanding of its quality and user experience. Sean shares personal experiences and highlights the advantage of being intimately familiar with your product and its context. He stresses the importance of constantly sampling and holding your product to the highest standards, as it enables you to address any issues and impress others with its experience.

Key Points

Build a B2B SaaS solution for a problem you personally experience to ensure regular usage.
Using your own product provides a deeper understanding of its quality and user experience.
Lack of personal product usage makes it harder to design and build a great B2B SaaS.
If you're not in the target market, it becomes challenging to force yourself into product usage.
Regular product usage allows for data gathering, top-of-mind awareness, and improved designs.
It's analogous to a chef not tasting their own food – personal experience validates quality.
Ensure your product solves a problem of your own for accelerated progress in B2B SaaS.

Quotes

"You should always be trying and sampling your own product and holding it to the highest standard."
"If you are regularly using your product and building it into your routine, then you have a huge advantage on most people building B2B SaaS products."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Compensation Comparison: How Bootstrappers Fare Against VC Backed Startups

Sean Boyce — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 07:51:41 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the benefits of bootstrapping and why it often outshines the VC backed model for startup success. He analyzes compensation data, revealing that both bootstrappers and VC-backed founders typically earn less than $100k annually, with some founders not paying themselves at all. Sean highlights the challenges of relying on future success and equity and emphasizes the diminishing returns of VC-backed compensation. He also explains how bootstrapping offers more control over compensation and time management. Ultimately, he concludes that bootstrapping provides better potential for future success, health, sustainability, and lifestyle.

Key Points

Half of surveyed founders, regardless of funding source, earn less than $100k annually.
About 5% of founders don't pay themselves at all, which is unsustainable.
Founders often pay themselves less than market rates, hoping for future success and equity to make up for it.
VC-backed compensation begins to fall behind bootstrapped compensation as numbers surpass $200k-$300k per year.
VC-backed founders have less control over their compensation due to voting rights and investor involvement.
Failure in the VC-backed model results in a significant financial setback and the need to start over.
The time founders invest in VC-backed startups often devalues their compensation rate.

Quotes

"You're already betting on a future that's unlikely. That's a problem because it affects your compensation now."
"If there is extra and everything's operating healthy and you wanna take more profit, you might be locked out of being able to do that."
"Your rate for your time ends up in the toilet, it ends up being ridiculously low."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Funding Your B2B SaaS Business: Forget About the Unicorn

Sean Boyce — Tue, 22 Aug 2023 07:45:31 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the realistic growth expectations for B2B SaaS businesses and the importance of funding not only the project but also the entrepreneur's lifestyle. He explores two schools of thought: the struggle porn mentality and the more common approach of bootstrapping and building lifestyle businesses. Sean shares his own experience and advocates for a balanced approach that allows for success, work-life balance, and maintaining control.

Key Points

Lower levels of success in B2B SaaS often take longer than advertised on social media.
Funding the project and the entrepreneur's lifestyle is a critical component of success.
The struggle porn mentality promotes sacrificing everything for unrealistic hopes of becoming an instant millionaire.
Bootstrapping and gradually transitioning to full-time focus on the B2B SaaS business is a more common path to success.
Balancing work and side projects during the transitionary phase can provide stability and supplementary income.
The model of gradually shifting focus and income between the job and the B2B SaaS business offers flexibility and control.
Avoiding the VC model reduces risks and eliminates the pressure to achieve success within a specific timeframe.

Quotes

"I talked about the fact that it often takes people a lot longer to achieve lower levels of success than is typically advertised all over social media."
"Some people, and unfortunately much of what's published out there talks a lot about what I call the struggle porn."
"The other school of thought is people who seem to be bootstrapping, building lifestyle businesses, having started something on the side."
"I started working essentially alongside me running some of these projects until some of my B2B SaaS products became successful enough."
"You're funding your own growth, right? I was taking the proceeds from the work that I was doing, investing those into my project."
"Remove that pressure to do so by a certain period of time so that you can have a relatively normal lifestyle, a normal work-life balance."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Setting Realistic Timeline Expectations for B2B SaaS Revenue Goals

Sean Boyce — Mon, 21 Aug 2023 08:13:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares the reality of setting realistic timeline expectations for revenue goals in the B2B SaaS industry. He debunks the stories of overnight success and emphasizes the importance of patience and perseverance in achieving significant milestones. The journey itself is the exciting part, and with dedication and hard work, a SaaS business has the potential to reach remarkable levels of scale.

Key Points

Hitting substantial revenue goals in B2B SaaS often takes years, contrary to overnight success stories.
Many successful entrepreneurs reached impressive milestones after launching their product, establishing successful channels, and putting in substantial effort.
It's important to have realistic expectations and understand that significant growth typically requires time and dedication.
Scaling a SaaS business can lead to catching momentum and achieving viral growth, but it's not guaranteed.
Growing a business involves experimenting, evaluating channel performance, doubling down on winners, and replacing losers.
Sales, marketing, and product should all improve over time as you focus on areas that need the most attention.
Building a strong foundation through blocking and tackling the fundamentals is crucial for long-term success in the SaaS industry

Quotes

"If you start googling around, there will be stories of ungodly amounts of money made in ridiculously fast timeframes, but take that with a huge grain of salt."
"For the most part, everyone I know who hit impressive revenue goals did it in at least a year, if not longer."
"It's not necessarily a probability; significant viral growth requires consistent effort, but catching a lucky break is possible."
"The journey itself is the exciting and interesting part of building a SaaS business."
"It's hard to build a lasting SaaS business on a weak foundation - strong defense and fundamentals are crucial."
"Have realistic expectations and enjoy the love of the game in pursuing your SaaS business."
"With dedication and perseverance, a SaaS business has the potential to reach remarkable levels of scale."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Troubleshooting B2B SaaS Conversions: How to Address a Lack of Paid Conversions

Sean Boyce — Sat, 19 Aug 2023 10:56:44 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean addresses the issue of low or no paid conversions for B2B SaaS products. He highlights two potential reasons for this problem: targeting the wrong market and inadequate product value. Sean suggests reaching out to the target market audience for feedback and leveraging analytics tools to gain insights. He specifically recommends using Hotjar for screen recordings and user feedback. By identifying patterns and making necessary improvements, businesses can improve their conversion rates.

Key Points

Low paid conversions in B2B SaaS may indicate issues with market targeting or product value.
Reaching out to the target audience for feedback is crucial in understanding their experience and preferences.
Tools like Hotjar can be used to gather feedback through custom automations and screen recordings.
Analytics tools provide insights into user behavior and product performance.
Identifying patterns and solving key issues can significantly impact conversion rates.
Nail down target market issues by consolidating use cases and running focused experiments.
Quality and performance play a crucial role in achieving successful conversions.

Quotes

"Often the culprit (with low paid conversions) is that you either are targeting the wrong market or you've got problems with essentially the quality or the value really that your product is providing."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Pitfalls of the Freemium Model: Why a Free Trial is Superior for B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 18 Aug 2023 09:20:11 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of designing a proper business model for B2B SaaS from the beginning. He dives into the flaws of the freemium model and highlights why a free trial is a superior alternative. With insights from founder Brian Castle, Sean emphasizes the need to avoid giving away too much for free without achieving desirable conversions and profits. For those interested in bootstrapping and maintaining control over their business, he recommends free trials as an effective strategy.

Key Points

Freemium models often lack a clear path to profitability and rely on a massive user base for monetization.
Brian Casel's experience with freemium led him to abandon it in favor of payment and free trial options for his communication tool product.
Offering everything for free without seeing conversions can be detrimental to revenue and growth.
Freemium models require unlimited time and potentially unlimited funds, making them unsustainable for many businesses.
The goal of freemium is to monopolize the market, but this approach is risky without additional funding.
For bootstrapped businesses, free trials offer lower exposure and allow costs to be included in customer acquisition expenses.
Free trials provide a fixed period or limited capacity for testing product viability and conversion rates.

Quotes

"With the freemium model, (the promise is) you're gonna get a wave after wave of users... but there's a huge missing piece in the middle." (Sean)
"You might be stuck in a situation where you're giving a ton of everything away for free and people are not converting." (Sean)

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Harnessing Negative Feedback for Product Improvement

Sean Boyce — Thu, 17 Aug 2023 07:28:45 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the significance of negative emotions in building successful B2B SaaS applications. Negative feedback from users can provide valuable insights into areas of improvement. By leveraging this feedback and understanding the "why" behind user behavior, businesses can enhance their product experience and increase success.

Key Points

Negative emotions can be a strong motivator for users to provide feedback on their experience.
Providing support channels, such as email or chat, allows users to share their feedback and problems.
Screen recording tools like Hotjar capture users' sessions, providing additional context for their feedback.
Asking follow-up questions helps to gather more information on users' negative experiences.
Receiving negative feedback is normal and provides opportunities for product improvement.
Qualitative data is crucial in understanding the "why" behind user behavior, which cannot be solely captured by analytics.
Giving users the opportunity to share the "why" behind their actions helps businesses better understand and enhance their product experience.

Quotes

"Negative emotions are a strong motivator in encouraging users to provide feedback."
"Screen recording tools like Hotjar provide valuable context for users' negative experiences."
"Receiving negative feedback is an opportunity for product improvement."
"Understanding the 'why' behind user behavior is crucial for enhancing the product experience."
"Users' feedback helps businesses better understand and meet their needs."
"Qualitative data is essential in capturing the 'why' behind user actions."
"Enhancing the product experience leads to increased success for businesses."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Truth About the VC Route: What Founders Need to Know

Sean Boyce — Wed, 16 Aug 2023 08:03:39 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explains why he recommends avoiding venture capital (VC) and instead opting for bootstrapping. He highlights the downsides of VC, such as losing control and being pushed beyond what's best for your business. He also discusses the low success rate of VC-backed startups and the high opportunity cost for founders. Sean advises building a B2B SaaS product while maintaining a stable job, allowing for financial security and gradual transition.

Key Points

VC investors have different goals and may push startups to become unicorns, regardless of what's best for the business.
Less than 0.1% of startups become unicorns, making it unlikely to achieve a billion-dollar valuation.
Taking VC money may lead to loss of control and influence over the business's direction.
Startup founders often sacrifice a high quality of life and financial stability for uncertain outcomes.
Bootstrapping offers the advantage of low overhead and the ability to learn and grow while maintaining a stable income.
Having discretionary earnings allows for investment in the SaaS company and multiple attempts at success.
Gradual transition from a stable job to full-time entrepreneurship is a smart strategy for minimizing risks.

Quotes

"They're gonna push you to go beyond that limit, even though that's what you wanna do." (Sean on VC investors' push for unrealistic growth)
"What you were making was probably less than you could have been making on the open market." (On the opportunity cost of startup founding)
"Try this over and over again until you are successful." (Encouraging persistence and multiple attempts at success)

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Maximize Conversions: Designing Landing Pages that Convert

Sean Boyce — Tue, 15 Aug 2023 07:33:16 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the critical need for easy-to-understand sales and marketing strategies, specifically for micro SaaS businesses. He emphasizes the importance of simplifying your website and landing pages, providing a crystal clear message about your product and its solutions, and guiding prospects on the next steps to take. With engaging content and a focus on user experience, Sean explains how to avoid frustrating potential customers and increase conversions.

Key Points

Simplify your sales and marketing assets, such as your website and landing pages.
Be crystal clear about who you are, the problem you solve, and how you solve it.
Utilize one call to action to make it easier for prospects to know what to do next.
Speak directly to your target market to address their pressing questions.
Use above-the-fold content for quick understanding and validation.
Highlight the problem you solve and how your product works.
Incorporate social proof and benefits to increase interest and trust.

Quotes

"Your landing page needs to speak to your target market prospect buyer persona to give them the answers to their most pressing questions as quickly and easily and efficiently as possible."
"If there are too many places for them to go or wherever they land is too ambiguous, they can't figure it out, people are gonna get frustrated and they're gonna quit just like I did."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Best Practices for Managing Customer Self-Service Account Cancellation

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Aug 2023 07:48:05 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his recommendations for enabling self-service cancellation for customer accounts. He emphasizes the importance of simplicity and automation in low touch B2B SaaS products. Sean cautions against deliberately confusing or deceptive cancellation processes and highlights the need to retain customers through incentives rather than barriers.

Key Points

Self-service options are essential for low touch products to maintain efficiency and profitability.
Tracking customer Lifetime Value (LTV) through cancellation data helps improve retention strategies.
Checking invoices regularly prevents charges for unused subscriptions.
Avoid deliberately deceitful cancellation experiences to prevent upsetting customers.
Companies like Comcast have faced reputational damage due to complex cancellation workflows.
Changing a customer's mind with incentives can be a cost-effective strategy for retention.
Simplicity and transparency in cancellation workflows minimize brand damage and reduce manual work.

Quotes

"Nobody wants to lose paying customers, but managing the cancellation process can be time-consuming and inefficient."
"Self-service options are at the core of a low touch product, enabling greater profitability."
"Deliberately deceptive cancellation processes can lead to customer dissatisfaction and negative brand reputation."
"Offering incentives during cancellation can help retain customers and reduce the cost of acquiring new ones."
"Simplicity and automation are key to minimizing manual processes and overhead in B2B SaaS businesses."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Produce an Immediate Return for Your B2B SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Sat, 12 Aug 2023 09:12:03 -0400

Summary

Join host Sean as he shares insights on how to generate an immediate return for your B2B SaaS product. Discover the importance of solving your own problems, identifying bottlenecks, and leveraging software to improve efficiency and reduce expenses. Whether you're a business owner or professional, this infotaining episode will help you unlock the potential of your B2B SaaS product.

Key Points

Rushing untested solutions to market is a common mistake in the B2B SaaS space.
Solving your own business problems is a reliable way to ensure immediate returns.
By automating processes and eliminating bottlenecks, your business can scale more efficiently.
Building software to address your own problems saves time, reduces errors, and cuts expenses.
Calculate the potential ROI of your B2B SaaS product by comparing costs and expected savings.
Business owners can explore bottlenecks within their organizations and develop software solutions.
Even non-business owners can identify inefficiencies and automate processes in their roles.

Quotes

"Solving your own problems is the key to building successful B2B SaaS products."
"By eliminating bottlenecks with software, you can produce an immediate return."
"Automation improves efficiency, reduces errors, and leads to significant cost savings."
"Build solutions that address inefficiencies and improve operational efficiency."
"B2B SaaS products can generate ROI even before considering selling to others."
"Identify bottlenecks, automate processes, and unlock the potential of your B2B SaaS product."
"Software can revolutionize how businesses operate, whether you own one or not."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Unleashing the Power of Email Marketing: A Guide to Boosting Conversions

Sean Boyce — Fri, 11 Aug 2023 07:58:16 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the potential of email marketing as a tool to increase conversions and gather valuable feedback from users. He discusses the benefits of automation and shares his strategies for creating effective automated email journeys. By maximizing engagement and continuously investing in user research, Sean highlights the value of qualitative data and offers insights on leveraging email marketing for business growth.

Key Points

Engaging users through email marketing can lead to more conversions and customer feedback.
Investing in automation streamlines the process and allows for consistent communication with users.
Automated welcome emails that thank users for signing up and provide support information can improve onboarding.
Creating automated journeys to gather feedback at specific points in the user journey increases the likelihood of obtaining a response.
Investigating user behavior through analytics tools helps determine the optimal timing for email communication.
Qualitative data, such as text-based feedback, provides valuable insights into user preferences and motivations.
Gradually automating the feedback process allows for tracking and trending improvements over time.

Quotes

"There's so much potential in email marketing, yet it's typically untapped."
"Investing in automation makes email marketing easier and more consistent."
"Automated journeys ensure the right message reaches the user at the right time."
"Qualitative data is among the hardest to obtain but proves to be the most valuable."
"Tracking and trending improvements over time is crucial for product development."
"Email marketing is a powerful tool for boosting conversions and gathering customer insights."
"Mastering email marketing and automation can drive growth for your business."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Solving the Conversion Problem: Engaging with Customers for Answers

Sean Boyce — Thu, 10 Aug 2023 08:16:02 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of focusing on one step at a time when building a funnel of conversions for a B2B SaaS product. While his new marketing automation tool has seen impressive sign-up numbers, the conversion rate from free trials to paid customers is lacking. Sean shares his approach to solving this problem by engaging with customers through email campaigns and finding out why they aren't converting. By obtaining valuable feedback, he hopes to make improvements and increase conversions.

Key Points

Sign-ups for the marketing automation tool are high, but conversions to paid customers are low.
Engaging with customers directly through email is an effective way to obtain feedback.
Using an email marketing tool, such as MailChimp, allows for automated outreach to customers.
Short, engaging emails that ask for qualitative feedback can help uncover the reasons behind low conversions.
Surveys and click-through responses can also provide valuable insight into customer preferences.
By understanding why customers are not signing up for the paid product, improvements can be made.
Sean plans to implement email campaigns to gather feedback and hopes to share the results in a future episode.

Quotes

"If you only zoom in on one area and focus on sign-ups, that's good, but not great."
"The user has the answers to these questions. You need to go to your customer to get them."
"Engaging with customers through email is an excellent way to gather qualitative feedback."
"Creating short, engaging emails can help uncover the 'why' behind low conversions."
"Asking customers what kind of value they've gotten and how to make the product better can provide valuable insights."
"Email campaigns can be used to gather feedback and understand the larger problem behind low conversions."
"Collecting feedback from customers will help improve conversions and increase overall success."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Short-Term vs. Long-Term B2B SaaS Growth Strategies: Start with the End in Mind

Sean Boyce — Wed, 09 Aug 2023 08:55:38 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the differences between short-term and long-term B2B SaaS growth strategies. He emphasizes the importance of starting with the end goal in mind and measuring the economics to ensure performance. Sean shares his approach of leveraging Google Ads for short-term results and investing in SEO content marketing for long-term success. He highlights the need to constantly measure ROI and evaluate the effectiveness of different channels.

Key Points

Short-term strategies rely on Google Ads for quick results and testing variables like keywords and landing pages.
Investing in ads requires a budget, but by setting parameters and tracking metrics, one can control acquisition costs.
Long-term strategies involve SEO content marketing, targeting the same keywords to climb search rankings gradually.
Content generation through SEO-oriented strategies helps promote the product and attract trial users.
Both short-term and long-term strategies aim to increase paying customers and revenue for B2B SaaS businesses.
Measuring ROI is crucial in determining the success and profitability of marketing channels.
Constant assessment of performance allows for optimization or replacement of ineffective strategies.

Quotes

"I want paying customers. I wanna go beyond that too, as in I wanna maximize my LTV and ensure that they're having a great experience."
"The outcome I'm looking for is more paying customers. Then I work all the way backwards to start from, to include all the steps along the way and everything respectively than need to measure."
"In this case, it happens to be the same for both of these channels, but for me, one's a short term, one will work relatively quickly."
"Start with the end in mind and then work backwards from there to wherever you are at the moment and try to measure all of the economic elements all along the way."
"You can try to optimize it to see if you can improve the economics and performance, or ultimately you have to replace it."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Diversifying Risk and Maximizing Return with Multiple Products

Sean Boyce — Tue, 08 Aug 2023 15:08:39 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the advantages of having multiple products in your business. By diversifying risk and maximizing return, you can evaluate the performance of each product and make informed decisions about investment and allocation of resources. Sean shares his experience with launching multiple products and the importance of comparing and improving their performance.

Key Points

Diversifying risk by having multiple products mitigates the impact of potential failures.
Comparing the performance of multiple products helps identify which product deserves additional investment.
By analyzing click-through rates of ad campaigns, you can evaluate the effectiveness of each product.
Allocating resources to the product with a better return on investment can accelerate growth.
Multiple products enable you to experiment, innovate, and solve unique problems across different industries.
Building a system to launch multiple products allows for ongoing evaluation and improvement.
Sean plans to launch more products this year and will continue sharing lessons and insights.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Challenging the Notion: The Benefits of Working on Multiple Projects

Sean Boyce — Mon, 07 Aug 2023 07:17:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the controversial topic of running multiple projects simultaneously. While the startup world often advises entrepreneurs to focus on just one project, Sean challenges this notion by highlighting the benefits of diversification. He emphasizes the importance of protecting oneself and finding success through working on multiple projects, but not necessarily at the same time.

Key Points

Advisors and investors often suggest focusing on one project for maximum success, but this advice may not align with an entrepreneur's well-being or overall goals.
The odds of achieving major startup success are incredibly low, making diversification an important consideration for protecting oneself from failure.
Diversifying projects can provide insurance and increase the chances of success by not putting all the eggs in one basket.
While multitasking is not effective and should be avoided, working on multiple projects sequentially allows for exploration, comparison, and redirection of time and resources.
Launching multiple products in a year is possible by dedicating different days or periods to each project.
By pitting products against each other, an entrepreneur can make informed decisions and adapt investments accordingly.
Challenging the notion of exclusively focusing on one project can lead to a more balanced and successful entrepreneurial journey.

Quotes

"I'm looking out for you, the entrepreneur."
"I'm not advocating for you go out and work on like five projects at once...multitasking is not a thing."
"I've launched two products just this year already. So clearly I'm working on multiple projects, but some days I'll work on one other days I'll work on the other."
"If one is more successful than the other, I can redirect time, investment, whatever. And I want you to be able to do the same."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Build Profitable Growth Channels for B2B SaaS Businesses

Sean Boyce — Sat, 05 Aug 2023 07:24:10 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explains why it is crucial to focus on the next step when developing profitable growth channels for B2B SaaS businesses. Many people make the mistake of trying to accomplish everything at once, which can lead to confusion and ineffective results. Sean highlights the step-by-step approach he takes with Google search ads as an example, emphasizing the importance of methodically progressing towards the desired outcome.

Key Points

Focusing on each individual step after completing the previous one ensures a methodical approach to developing profitable growth channels.
Jumping ahead or attempting too much simultaneously can lead to unclear results and difficulty in identifying what drives success.
Sean leverages Google search ads to test and validate profitable growth channels for his B2B SaaS product businesses.
The steps in his process include engaging users with targeted ads, driving traffic to the landing page, encouraging users to create an account, and ensuring they find value in the product.
By focusing on each step separately, Sean can measure the efficiency and effectiveness of his ad campaign, analyze conversion rates, and determine user satisfaction.
Taking a stepwise approach allows for clear analysis of the impact of each change made, leading to better-informed decisions.
Ultimately, the goal is to convert free accounts into paid accounts by delivering enough value to the users.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Avoiding Burnout: Tackle One Problem at a Time

Sean Boyce — Fri, 04 Aug 2023 07:48:50 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his insights on how to effectively grow a B2B SaaS business. He emphasizes the importance of not trying to do everything at once, but instead focusing on a sustainable routine. Sean also recommends prioritizing the top problem at hand and leveraging platforms like YouTube for expert advice. He personally found success in learning about SEO and Google search ads from YouTube channels. With these tips, you can navigate the complexities of B2B SaaS growth more easily.

Key Points

Don't try to do everything all at once - find a sustainable routine.
Prioritize the top problem at hand to build a successful business.
YouTube is a valuable resource for learning about B2B SaaS growth.
Sean recommends Matt Diggity's YouTube channel for SEO advice.
Aaron Young's YouTube channel is great for improving Google search ads.
Overwhelming yourself doesn't lead to success - prioritize and tackle one problem at a time.
Leverage visual learning through YouTube videos to master important topics.

YouTube Channels

SEO (Matt Diggity) - https://www.youtube.com/@MattDiggity
Google Ads (Aaron Young) - https://www.youtube.com/@AaronYoungGoogleAds

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Importance of Measuring Conversions in Google Ads Campaigns

Sean Boyce — Thu, 03 Aug 2023 07:28:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean dives into the world of Google Ads and how to optimize campaigns for B2B SaaS landing pages. While impressions, clicks, and click-through rate are important, Sean explains that measuring conversions is the key to success. He shares how to set up conversions in Google Ads and emphasizes the importance of tracking the actions users take after clicking on an ad. By doing this, you can gain valuable data and insight to better understand ad performance and achieve the desired outcome of converting more users to paying customers.

Key Points

Impressions, clicks, and click-through rate are common metrics in Google search ads.
The click-through rate is important, but conversions are the most crucial factor to measure.
Conversions refer to the actions users take after clicking on an ad, such as starting a trial or creating an account.
To measure conversions, you can set up events in the conversions section of your Google Ads campaign.
Google Ads provides code to be placed on your website for accurate measurement.
Tracking conversions allows you to understand how your ad is performing in terms of its desired outcome.
By connecting data and measuring conversions, you can create a better funnel and optimize your ad campaign.

Quotes

"A better click through rate means that your budget is being managed more efficiently."
"If you've designed and built your ad campaign, but it isn't measuring conversions, then it's a huge missed opportunity."
"By going into your Google Ads campaign and looking for the section about conversions, you can create essentially an event to measure conversions."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why We Ship Our Products at 75% Completion

Sean Boyce — Wed, 02 Aug 2023 08:18:20 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of shipping products when they are 75% complete. He shares his own experience of launching a new product and explains why waiting to add more features can hinder progress. Sean emphasizes the value of getting feedback from real world users and highlights how it can influence the direction of a product. He encourages listeners to launch their product at a good enough stage and make changes based on user feedback.

Key Points

Launching a product at 75% completion allows for valuable user feedback.
Waiting to add more features can prevent a product from being launched.
Real world users who sign up and provide feedback are crucial for product development.
Iterating on a product without user feedback can lead to wasted time and effort.
Launching a product earlier helps identify any issues or areas for improvement sooner.
Getting feedback from users influences the product roadmap and future updates.
Lack of user engagement or feedback indicates a different challenge that needs to be addressed.

Quotes

"The best thing when you launch your product is to get feedback from real world users."
"Increase your odds of being successful by fixing the next problem on the list."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Solving the Problem of Converting Users to Paid Customers

Sean Boyce — Tue, 01 Aug 2023 08:05:28 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the common challenge of converting users to paid customers and provides strategies to overcome it. He emphasizes the downside of offering free tiers and free trials that provide too much value, leading to users being satisfied with the free offering. Sean suggests reaching out to users who didn't convert to understand their experience and make improvements. Additionally, he recommends configuring free trials to balance the value provided while minimizing expenses. Converting users into paying customers requires trial and error, but these tactics can help boost conversions.

Key Points

Offering too much value for free can discourage users from converting to paid customers.
Reaching out to users who didn't convert can provide valuable insights for improving the product.
Limiting the costs of a free trial helps minimize expenses while still showcasing the product's value.
Understanding fixed and variable costs helps in designing an optimal free trial configuration.
Balancing the value provided in a free trial motivates users to convert to paid customers.
Converting users to paid customers often requires trial and error to find the right approach.
Implementing strategies to boost conversions can help grow your product.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Truth About Hockey Stick Level Growth in SaaS Businesses

Sean Boyce — Mon, 31 Jul 2023 08:37:49 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean debunks the myth of the hockey stick level growth trajectory in SaaS businesses. While often glamorized, achieving exponential growth is not necessary for success. Sean explains that this type of growth is more common in consumer-based applications and is driven by factors like virality and strong referral networks. He emphasizes the advantages of slower, more stable growth in the B2B world, especially for high-touch and complex software products. Ultimately, Sean encourages listeners to focus on building profitable, sustainable businesses rather than chasing the elusive hockey stick trajectory.

Key Points

Hockey stick growth is commonly talked about in the SaaS world, especially in the VC-backed space.
It is not necessary to achieve hockey stick level growth to be successful in the SaaS industry.
Consumer-based software applications are more likely to experience exponential growth due to virality and referrals.
B2B businesses tend to grow at a slower pace but benefit from stability and longer-term plans.
Rapid growth can lead to failure just as quickly, so slower growth can be advantageous for business stability.
Profitability, growth, and helping customers are better measures of success than the hockey stick trajectory.
Conversations with VCs and the need for funding may not be relevant for those pursuing bootstrapped businesses.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Diversifying Channels: A Path to Accelerated Growth

Sean Boyce — Fri, 28 Jul 2023 08:29:25 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of adapting your growth strategies as your B2B SaaS business evolves. He highlights the need to constantly monitor performance, traction, and growth metrics to determine whether your current channels are effective in reaching your goals. Sean emphasizes the value of investing in new channels, such as SEO, content generation, and affiliate marketing, to supplement existing channels and drive accelerated growth.

Key Points

Regularly monitor performance, traction, and growth metrics to ensure continued growth.
Paid ads may plateau, necessitating the exploration of new channels.
SEO and content generation can boost traffic with relevant keywords.
Supplementing with affiliate marketing and cold outbound tactics can expand reach.
Understand the unit economics and return on investment for each channel.
Evaluate channel performance over time to identify when to invest in new channels.
Focus on investing in channels that provide a return and align with growth goals.

Quotes

"What got you to where you are may not get you to the next level."
"Invest in more channels that can help you reach your growth goals."
"Supplement your current channel with SEO, content generation, and affiliate marketing."
"Monitor performance to identify when to supplement or shift to new channels."
"Invest only in channels that produce a return on investment."
"Regularly evaluate channel performance and adapt strategies accordingly."
"Unlock accelerated growth by diversifying your channels and investing strategically."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Don't Rush! Building a B2B SaaS Business is a Marathon, Not a Sprint

Sean Boyce — Wed, 26 Jul 2023 09:27:49 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the importance of not rushing when building a B2B SaaS business. Drawing from his own mistakes and experiences, he highlights the advantages of going at your own pace and focusing on reasonable growth expectations. Sean also addresses the fear of competition and the need to avoid the "struggle porn" mentality that can hinder progress. Whether it's supplemental income or a new level of work-life balance, building a B2B SaaS business should be an enjoyable journey.

Key Points

Building a B2B SaaS business is a marathon, not a sprint.
Take advantage of the inherent benefits of bootstrapping and the potential for passive income.
Rushing to scale may lead to unnecessary stress and mistakes.
Competition in the market doesn't mean there aren't opportunities for success.
Building a B2B SaaS business can provide supplemental income or replace your day job.
Prioritize work-life balance and enjoy the journey, rather than obsessing over struggles.
Following the right process can lead to easier business operations and increased benefits.

Quotes

"You can do this at your own pace and it can provide supplemental income to your day job, or it can eventually replace that income."
"Take advantage of the fact that these businesses can be easier to run if you follow the right process."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Designing the Early Experience: Tiers and Free Trials

Sean Boyce — Tue, 25 Jul 2023 10:42:17 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean introduces a new video tool for creating digital shorts. He also discusses the importance of designing the early experience with product tiers and offers insights on offering a free trial. Sean shares how he tests pricing and functionality through tiers, weighs the costs and benefits of a free trial, and explains how to limit exposure and boost conversions.

Key Points

Short form video content is exploding on platforms like YouTube and TikTok.
Sean's podcasting agency needs a tool to help with video creation.
Creating digital shorts involves automated selection of engaging content from long-form videos.
Designing the early experience includes deciding on product tiers and features.
Offering a free trial can lower the barrier to entry but increases costs.
Limiting exposure and liability is crucial when offering a free trial.
Sean manages his costs by treating the free trial as part of customer acquisition cost.

Quotes

"Offering a free trial is a great way to lower the barrier to entry."
"I limit what they can do with the tool in the free trial to avoid incurring unnecessary expenses."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Boost the Value of Your B2B AI SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:35:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how to make your micro SaaS business more valuable. He explains the high valuation multiples of SaaS businesses and explores the potential increase in value by making slight variations in product customization. Sean advises leveraging AI tools and building proprietary features that can evolve over time to better serve user needs and deliver enhanced results. Tune in to discover how these strategies can significantly boost the value of your B2B SaaS business.

Key Points

SaaS businesses offer high valuation multiples due to their profitability and low overhead
Customizing your product and providing better user experiences can increase the value of your micro SaaS business.
Leveraging AI tools like Open AI's GPT can enhance your SaaS product's effectiveness.
Staying focused on solving specific problems for a particular audience is crucial for micro SaaS success.
Building proprietary features that employ machine learning and data science can make your product more accurate and valuable over time.
Learning from user feedback and usage patterns helps in continuously improving your product.
Sean shares his plans to integrate these strategies into his own products and promises updates on their progress.

Quotes

"SaaS businesses often experience significantly higher multiples in terms of their valuation cause of how profitable they are."
"There's no inventory to manage. There's not a ton of overhead that's very attractive to someone who may ultimately want to buy your business at some point."
"Leveraging some of these AI components in the value proposition of what it is that your product does can make it even more valuable."
"Start building something proprietary that can leverage things like machine learning and data science concepts to become more accurate over time."
"You're gonna be able to learn from how they're using your products at the moment in order to produce even better results."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Dangers of Benchmarking: Don't Let Others Define Your Success

Sean Boyce — Sun, 23 Jul 2023 10:48:37 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the idea of comparing your progress with yourself rather than getting caught up in the exaggerated success stories found on the internet. He emphasizes the importance of setting realistic goals and building your own path to success, based on your unique circumstances and aspirations. By focusing on steady progress and personal benchmarks, you can achieve success on your own terms.

Key Points

Don't compare your progress to others; focus on improving your own performance.
Be aware of the extremes and unrealistic claims found on platforms like Reddit.
Coaching experience has given Sean insights into B2B SaaS performance.
Bootstrap and part-time approaches can offer convenience and potential upside.
Avoid the "struggle porn" mindset—pursue your passion without draining yourself.
Benchmark against your past self, evaluating progress over time.
Learn from the story of the tortoise and the hare—slow and steady wins.

Quotes

"Realistically speaking, when it comes to B2B SaaS level performance, a lot of the stuff I find out there on the web is like, you know, I, I'm a 10K MRR in two weeks or whatever. That's unrealistic."
"Your goal should be to try to do better than that, not necessarily look in any of these areas, see who's achieving some ridiculous levels of success theoretically, and then feeling bad about that or that you're not doing something right or whatever."
"I'm still around to tell a lot of these stories, so I believe that probably means some things are going right and I'm hoping to transfer some of that knowledge and experience to you."
"Be careful. You compare yourself against, largely compare yourself against yourself to make sure that you're making the right kind of progress in the right areas and basically build according to what is reasonable for you, right?"

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why We Ship at 75%

Sean Boyce — Wed, 12 Jul 2023 07:27:02 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the concept of shipping at good enough, emphasizing that perfection can be the enemy of progress for B2B SaaS founders. He advises keeping the product simple and focusing on solving a specific problem for a target market. Sean also highlights the importance of gaining feedback from random strangers to avoid biased opinions and improve the product.

Key Points

Perfection can hinder progress for B2B SaaS founders.
Simplify your product and solve a specific problem.
"Skip the spinning rims" and focus on timely delivery.
Seek feedback from random strangers to gain unbiased insights.
Verify your product soon after committing to building it.
Avoid getting trapped in an endless cycle of perfectionism.
Learn from feedback and make necessary improvements.

Quotes

"Perfection is the enemy of good."
"Keep your product simple and solve a specific problem."
"Skip the spinning rims. We're on the clock."
"Seek feedback from random strangers to avoid bias."
"Verify your product as soon as possible after committing to building it."
"Ship it 75%, get it out there, and start getting feedback."
"Let feedback influence your next steps."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Don't Build in a Vacuum: How To Avoid The Perfectionist Trap

Sean Boyce — Tue, 11 Jul 2023 07:59:36 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean emphasizes the importance of not building a product alone and encourages early-stage B2B SaaS founders to seek feedback. He discusses the perfectionist trap and the benefits of building in public. Sean also suggests leveraging your network to gather usability feedback before launching a product.

Key Points

Building a product alone for an extended period can hinder progress and lead to unrealistic expectations.
The fear of negative feedback often prevents founders from sharing their product with others, perpetuating the perfectionist trap.
Sean advocates for building in public and shares updates on his software projects to combat the concerns associated with transparency.
While customer base, business model, and profitability are vital, obtaining feedback on usability is often left to the market.
Sean advises using his engineering and UX experience to design a simple product before opening it up for feedback.
Seeking feedback from your network can provide valuable insights into the usability of your product.
Getting a diverse range of perspectives ensures that your product meets market standards and expectations.

Quotes

"If you're constantly working on making your product perfect, it's never gonna get there because it's an unattainable goal."
"Your standards may be too high or too low, so it's crucial to have a sample size that represents what the market deems acceptable."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Explaining Features and Optimizing Workflows

Sean Boyce — Mon, 10 Jul 2023 07:53:12 -0400

Summary
In this episode, we discuss the challenge of some users struggling to understand and use all the features of a B2B SaaS application. We emphasize the importance of keeping the product simple, especially in the beginning. However, it's normal for users to ask questions and seek assistance, even for seemingly obvious features. We highlight the opportunity to optimize workflows based on user feedback and the importance of ensuring features work consistently. This feedback can lead to making improvements and enhancing the product's overall user experience.

Key Points

Design your B2B SaaS application to be as simple and straightforward as possible.
Users may still struggle to figure out even seemingly obvious features.
Embrace user questions and see them as an opportunity for improvement.
Connect the dots and guide users through the steps to solve their problems.
User feedback can help identify suboptimal or non-obvious workflows.
Verify that features are functioning correctly to ensure consistency.
Utilize user feedback to optimize the product and enhance the user experience.

Quotes

"Not all of your users are going to be able to figure out how to use all of your B2B SaaS application features."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Breaking Through Plateaus: Strategies for Continued Growth

Sean Boyce — Fri, 07 Jul 2023 08:15:36 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his insights on what to do when the growth of your B2B SaaS business stalls or plateaus. He discusses evaluating and optimizing existing channels, expanding into new keywords and channels, and leveraging organic traffic to increase return on investment. With strategic advice and practical tips, Sean provides valuable guidance for breaking through growth plateaus and ensuring sustained business success.

Key Points

Evaluate the performance of your current channels and invest more in well-optimized channels with positive ROI.
Explore new keywords and market shifts to expand within existing successful channels.
Consider adding new organic traffic channels to complement or replace paid traffic.
Invest upfront in creating quality organic content to enhance search rankings and measure conversions.
Leverage the fixed cost of content creation to achieve long-term return on investment.
Look for opportunities to increase ROI by driving more traffic and optimizing channels.
Focus on driving both traffic and ROI to achieve sustained growth.

Quotes

"Investing in more organic traffic as opposed to paid traffic... try to compliment and then potentially, eventually replace some of the paid traffic."
"Consider other channels that can not just drive more traffic to your site, but also increase the return on investment at the same time."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Using Customer Feedback to Drive Growth in Your Business

Sean Boyce — Fri, 07 Jul 2023 08:13:54 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean dives into the importance of finding answers to your burning questions regarding the performance of your B2B SaaS product and your business. He shares his own experience with analyzing his automated podcasting B2B SaaS performance and highlights the role of customer feedback in driving growth. Sean recommends using one-on-one conversations with users to gather valuable insights and shares his own approach to reaching out to customers who have churned. Find out how you can unlock the potential for growth in your own business by leveraging customer feedback.

Key Points

Understanding the performance of your B2B SaaS product is crucial for business growth.
Customer feedback is an invaluable source of information to identify areas of improvement.
Payment gateway billing dashboards like Stripe provide essential data on growth and churn.
Comparing monthly results helps to track growth and identify patterns.
Your customers are your best source of answers and insights regarding product performance.
Reach out directly to your users through personalized emails for deeper understanding.
One-on-one conversations with users yield richer context and better survey questions.

Quotes

"Most of those answers you're looking for are going to lie with your users and your customers."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Tracking B2B SaaS Performance: Beyond Payment Gateways

Sean Boyce — Wed, 05 Jul 2023 07:26:55 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of tracking various metrics to understand the performance of your B2B SaaS beyond what payment gateways offer. He emphasizes the need to focus on the end goals and industry standards, as well as tracking user growth, conversion rates, customer acquisition cost, and lifetime value. By analyzing these metrics, you can optimize your B2B SaaS performance and make informed decisions.

Key Points

Look beyond payment gateways and track additional metrics for a comprehensive understanding of your B2B SaaS performance.
Start with the end goals in mind and gather relevant data to determine how your product is performing compared to industry standards.
Measure user growth and conversion rates to evaluate the effectiveness of your marketing efforts and free trial offers.
Calculate customer acquisition cost (CAC) by analyzing the expenses and new users generated through channels like Google search ads.
Determine your lifetime value (LTV) and assess its ratio with CAC to ensure your B2B SaaS performance is optimal.
Monitor performance month over month to identify trends, improvements, or signs that require further analysis and intervention.
Use the insights gained from tracking metrics to address performance issues and enhance your B2B SaaS product.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Stop Reinventing the Wheel: Utilize Stripe's Built-In Dashboard for Business Insights

Sean Boyce — Tue, 04 Jul 2023 07:39:43 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explores the importance of tracking metrics and performance for B2B SaaS businesses. He highlights the usefulness of the payment gateway Stripe and its pre-built dashboards to provide valuable information on financial performance. Sean emphasizes that many metrics, such as recurring revenue, user acquisition, customer retention, and growth across tiers, are readily available on Stripe's dashboard, eliminating the need to create custom tracking systems. He stresses the significance of utilizing these metrics to make data-driven decisions and improve business performance.

Key Points

Stripe's payment gateway offers a comprehensive dashboard that provides crucial metrics for B2B SaaS businesses.
Metrics like recurring revenue, active subscribers, growth trends, and tiered performance can be easily tracked on Stripe's dashboard.
Retention metrics, such as churn rate and lost revenue, help businesses assess customer loyalty and identify areas for improvement.
Analyzing averages, such as revenue per subscriber and potential lifetime value, enables businesses to calculate return on investment.
Comparing customer acquisition cost to lifetime value helps evaluate profitability and make necessary adjustments.
Using the available metrics and business intelligence drives informed decision-making and ensures positive growth.
Future episodes will delve into making changes based on data insights to further optimize B2B SaaS businesses.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

LTGP vs. LTV: Why Gross Profit Matters More

Sean Boyce — Tue, 04 Jul 2023 07:29:32 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean introduces the concept of Lifetime Gross Profit (LTGP) as a powerful metric for B2B SaaS businesses. Instead of focusing solely on revenue and the traditional Lifetime Value (LTV) metric, he emphasizes the importance of considering gross margin and profit. By subtracting the cost of goods sold from revenue, businesses can calculate their LTGP and gain insight into their actual profitability. Sean explains how this metric helps identify whether a business is on track to becoming self-sustaining and financially healthy.

Key Points

Focusing on profit or gross margin is crucial for building a profitable B2B SaaS business.
LTGP (Lifetime Gross Profit) is calculated by subtracting the cost of goods sold from revenue.
LTGP provides a more accurate picture of a business's profitability compared to LTV.
Businesses should consider tracking LTGP instead of LTV for better financial understanding.
Low profitability numbers require early detection to make necessary corrections.
Monitoring LTGP helps ensure alignment with industry standards and best practices.
Improving profitability leads to a healthier financial and economic standing for a business.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why Your B2B SAS Product Concept Should Stay Fluid

Sean Boyce — Fri, 30 Jun 2023 07:11:28 -0400

Summary
In this episode, we discuss the importance of treating your B2B SAS product concept as a fluid idea, rather than getting too attached to it in the early stages. We explore the significance of validating your product idea and why competition can actually be a positive sign for your business. Embracing a fluid concept and understanding the need for validation will greatly benefit your journey to building a successful B2B SaaS product.

Key Points

Validate your product idea before getting discouraged by competitors in the industry.
Research and discover if your idea solves a problem that businesses need to address.
Focus on building something that people not only need but are willing to use and pay for.
Redesign your concept to align with the milestones necessary for a successful product.
Don't become too attached to your initial idea, as testing and validation may require adjustments.
View competition as validation that your direction has potential in the market.
Being the only product in a specific niche may indicate a lack of demand or market support.

Quotes

"You need to validate whether or not what you're thinking about doing really has any potential."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Don't Waste Time: Validate Your B2B SaaS Idea ASAP

Sean Boyce — Thu, 29 Jun 2023 07:25:08 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of validating your B2B SaaS product idea early and not being afraid to find out if it's not a great idea. Many entrepreneurs spend years working on a concept without testing it in the market, which can lead to wasted time and effort. Sean emphasizes the need to sell your concept as soon as possible, as finding out early whether your idea has potential or not is crucial for building a successful business.

Key Points

Waiting too long to validate your B2B SaaS idea is a common problem among entrepreneurs.
Testing your concept with the target market early on allows you to gather data and make necessary adjustments.
Building too far down the wrong path can result in the need to backtrack or start over.
Providing a solution to a top problem for your target market is essential for success.
If the feedback from the market is not positive, it's better to know sooner rather than later.
Don't be afraid to get your concept in front of the market and listen to the feedback.
Early stage validation criteria and data can provide confidence and guide your next steps.

Quotes

"We wanna get your product concept and idea in front of a target market as fast as possible cuz you find out that what it is that you've been working on won't sell."
"If you build too far down the wrong path, then you're simply going to need to backtrack or start over before you can actually make any kind of progress."
"If you're not providing a solution to a top problem for your target market, they definitely will not pay for it."
"Don't be afraid to get that concept out and in front of the market as soon as you can and don't take whatever feedback you're going to get."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Measuring the ROI of Your B2B SaaS Product

Sean Boyce — Wed, 28 Jun 2023 07:37:05 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of measuring the return on investment (ROI) for your B2B SaaS product from your customer's perspective. By quantifying the time and cost savings, as well as potential revenue generation, you can prove the value of your product and ensure customer satisfaction. Sean uses his podcast show notes automator as an example to illustrate how measuring ROI can help position your product for success.

Key Points

Measuring ROI for your B2B SaaS product is crucial for proving its value to customers.
Time and money are the two main ways to quantify ROI.
The difference between the customer's previous experience and how they can now do it with your product is their ROI.
ROI should be measurable for customers to determine the value of your product.
Demonstrating a solid ROI increases the likelihood of your product being retained during budget cuts.
Sean's podcast show notes automator provides both cost savings and significant time savings compared to manual efforts.
The tool's capacity to generate show notes in minutes offers a more than 10x ROI in time.

Quotes

"This is what's going to ultimately enable you to prove the value that your product can provide to your customer."
"If you can measure the time savings or the cost savings or the potential to generate more revenue, that is the value that we're looking to quantify."
"They should ultimately be able to measure it themselves as well too."
"If your tool's providing a return, they're gonna do this math and if they can prove that they're getting a solid return off your product, yours is highly likely to not be cut."
"My tool costs between that range per month as in their savings is going to be a multiple of that."

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Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Prioritize to Reach Profitability ASAP

Sean Boyce — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 07:45:54 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his insights on when and why to reinvest in the growth of a B2B SaaS and how to strategically prioritize important business aspects. He emphasizes the importance of taking a lean approach in the beginning, only investing in what is necessary and waiting until a certain revenue threshold is hit before properly buttoning up your business. Sean also advises investing time and proceeds into growth channels and being cautious of investing too much beyond losses.

Key Points

Only invest in necessary business aspects until a certain revenue threshold is hit
Use policy generators instead of costly lawyers for basic legal agreements
Invest time and proceeds into growth channels, but be cautious of investing too much beyond losses
Take a lean approach in the beginning to preserve budget and focus on generating revenue
Strategically prioritize important business aspects and only button up when necessary
Be careful of investing in channels that do not produce a return
Preserve profitability to ensure a successful and sustainable business

Quotes

"Remember, you're trying to get this product to be as successful as possible, as fast as possible."
"I largely wait on those until I know the product is generating a certain amount of revenue."
"I want you preserving your budget and I want you preserving your time so that you can focus almost all of that effort in making sure that this product can generate enough revenue."
"Be careful investing too much beyond the losses that you're already taking, cuz that can create a trend that could be difficult to get out from with under as well too."
"Preserving your profitability and making sure that your product can be a successful, profitable, and sustainable business longterm, those should be your priorities."
"It's good to have your policies in place, but they have a bunch of policy generators online."
"Lean is always better because it's more efficient, it preserves resources, and then you have more options down the line."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Using Data and Machine Learning to Help Restaurants Operate More Profitably

Sean Boyce — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 05:00:00 -0400

Matt Wampler, CEO and co-founder of ClearCOGS, talks about how their company uses data and machine learning to help restaurants reduce waste and increase profits. He shares the importance of customer research and finding the right balance between innovation and simplicity. They also discuss ClearCOGS's growth and their approach to making businesses more efficient, finding bottlenecks and processes, and investing in co-founder relationships.

Matt Wampler is the CEO and Co-Founder of ClearCOGS, a company that utilizes POS data and proprietary machine-learning models to help restaurants minimize food waste and optimize inventory management. With his expertise in executive management and a passion for leveraging technology, Matt leads ClearCOGS in revolutionizing the way restaurants save money and improve their operations. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

ClearCOGS helps restaurants operate more profitably with data and machine learning.
Restaurants make many operational decisions based on feel, which isn't always accurate.
As their system gathers more data, it becomes more intelligent and predictive.
Focusing on a singular pain point can be more effective than trying to solve multiple problems with a bloated system
Investing in maintaining that relationship is essential to business success
Onboarding for a new customer went from six weeks to one day
ClearCOGS helps restaurants percentage off their food costs and move big needles

Resources:

Connecting with Matt Wampler:

Connecting with Sean Boyce:

Quotables:

02:13 - “So what we do at ClearCOGS synthesize all of that data down, we look at the day of the week, the month of the year, your short-term trends, yearly seasonality, long-term trends, all these external data points just to figure out for this store.”
07:44 - “Meeting the customer where they are, in my world, at least the world of restaurants, that couldn't be more true. Like there are better ways to do what we do. There are ways to get more accurate numbers. There is not a better way to operationalize or implement it. And we built out a solution that is very, you know, where the customer is and what they need. And I attribute a lot of our success to that.”
08:15 - “Because I see a lot of B2B SaaS products companies, founders trying to almost like invent the future, which I get it right? And there's a time and a place for innovation, and I'm not saying that you shouldn't be focused in that area, but at the end of the day, whatever you're building as a solution, you're going to have to sell it to a problem. And ideally that's a painful problem that your target market is currently experiencing.”
15:01 - “It's so easy to over-engineer solutions, and we just assume, you know, add the spinning rims kind of thing, like might as well, like while you're in there, let's automate everything, right? But that singular focus on the top problem is what I've seen be one of the greatest strengths from most B2B SaaS companies that have achieved solid growth, especially earlier on in keeping software simple.”
17:21

Matt: “You have got to shift from product ideas to how do we apply those ideas to sales? How do we apply those ideas to marketing? How do we apply those ideas to relationship management? It's really about where you focus the innovation and, and really try and like constrain yourself on the product side.

Sean: Excellent point. And refining that as well too. I couldn't agree more with this is why, when I'm typically doing discovery, or I'm learning more about companies that have done that.”

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How to Ensure You are Making Progress

Sean Boyce — Mon, 26 Jun 2023 07:57:06 -0400

Summary
Sean talks about developing a routine to make consistent progress and prioritizing B2B SaaS products. He also advises against oversubscribing to avoid burnout.

Key Points

Developing a routine is crucial for prioritizing projects
Creating a schedule enables focused work on specific tasks
Routines help ensure that time is appropriately set aside to accommodate and manage multiple obligations
Avoid overcommitting to prevent burnout
Overcommitment leads to longer periods off of working on important projects
Projects need to be prioritized in order to maintain consistency and prevent feeling overwhelmed

Quotes

"Depending on what your personality is like, you may or may not suffer from something similar to a varying degree."
"The way I've been able to figure that out is because I'm aware of the fact that I get excited about new projects."
"I've gotten better and tried to make progress on focusing on what I need to do first before I start something new."
"I encourage you to get into and develop a routine and then to schedule the particular time for what you wanna work on and when you wanna work on it."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why Building for Consumers is So Difficult

Sean Boyce — Sat, 24 Jun 2023 08:46:56 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean talks about the differences between building for businesses and consumers. He uses his experience in building a podcast automation application to explain why building for businesses is advantageous. One of the main differences he highlights is that businesses are expecting progress, while consumers are expecting perfection. Sean believes that it's impossible to achieve perfection, but progress can be made, and that's what businesses are interested in.

Key Points

Consumers are almost always looking for perfection, which is nearly impossible to achieve.
There's a tremendous variation among consumers, which makes it difficult to satisfy the masses.
Businesses are focused on progress, and they're not immediately ready to dump something after trying it.
Once businesses find something that moves the needle, they usually stick with it because they know the implications of giving up that progress.
Businesses don't expect perfection, but they place a monetary amount on the value that software can provide.
It's advantageous to build around a business because you can avoid confusion in terms of who the product is for.
Taking consumer feedback and business feedback equally could lead to a confusing product that's pulled in different directions.

Quotes

"Businesses are looking for progress. Consumers are often looking for perfection."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Turning Criticism into Gold

Sean Boyce — Fri, 23 Jun 2023 07:39:03 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how he turned negative feedback into a gold mine by asking for more details. By doing so, he was able to learn more about the use case and functionality his customers were looking for, leading to improved features and a better product roadmap.

Key Points

Asked for more details from a customer with negative feedback
Discovered a suitable alternative that supposedly had done a better job
Learned more about the use case and functionality for his product
Determines which features are worth investing more into and optimizing
Relied on experimentation to see if people would use a particular feature
Feedback was suboptimal, giving him context on how to improve it
Can now focus more on redesigning features with greater context

Quotes

"Now I have verified all of those things, which was what I wanted...hopefully things like this will be more of a thing in the past."
"I didn't want to go too far down the road of building the perfect feature before I knew people actually needed it and would be willing to pay for it."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

A User HATES My Product, Now What?

Sean Boyce — Thu, 22 Jun 2023 07:40:42 -0400

Summary
Sean shares his experience of receiving emotionally charged negative feedback through his support channel and explains how it can be an opportunity to learn more about how to improve your product. He advises to ask for more details like use case, expectations, and identify competition to help make the product better.

Key Points

Emotionally charged feedback can be a great opportunity to learn more
Look for the constructive criticism between the lines
Don't panic after the initial reaction
Ask questions to get more feedback
Identify the user's use case and expectationsIdentify the competition and why they feel their product is better
Take this as a sign of progress and an opportunity to make your product better

Quotes

"It's a great opportunity to learn more because it's not all of what they shared."
"There's constructive criticism everywhere. It's just, you might have to look between the lines in order to see it."
"Don't panic cuz if this is one user or the occasional user, that's honestly to be expected."
"Try to get whatever kind of feedback you can that you think will be the most helpful in figuring out how to make your product better."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Turning a Product Gap into a B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Wed, 21 Jun 2023 08:20:27 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean talks about the opportunity to create successful B2B SaaS products by building off existing products in areas where they can be improved. By identifying gaps in tools commonly used in the industry, individuals can create products that meet the needs of the market. These products can either add functionality to existing products or become products themselves.

Key Points

Extending the capability of existing products can lead to successful B2B SaaS products.
Products that are commonly used and paid for have already been validated by the market and have identified needs.
AI can be an area of opportunity in improving existing products.
Incorporating keyword research can lead to successful content creation and search engine optimization.
Finding gaps in commonly used products can lead to creating successful B2B SaaS products.
Building solutions for personal problems can lead to successful products for others.
Bringing improved functionality to existing products can be a successful strategy in B2B SaaS.

Quotes

"There are ways to extend the capability and functionality of products that are already on the market."
"So if you're trying to figure out where you might want to get involved in terms of B2B SaaS and something you might build to provide value for someone, this is a great area to look for a whole bunch of reasons."
"I've been leveraging this routine and strategy that I've built for myself from a number of others who have a lot of experience in search engine optimization."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Never Start a B2B SaaS with More Than a Single Feature

Sean Boyce — Tue, 20 Jun 2023 07:10:32 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares the advantages of starting a B2B SaaS with a single feature. He emphasizes that a micro SaaS is when you turn a feature into a product, which makes it easier to market, understand, and use. Building a simple product has marketing, sales, and positioning advantages as it makes it easier to solve customers' top problems. On the design and build side, adding unnecessary functionality only makes the product more complex and harder to understand for users.

Key Points

A micro SaaS is when you turn a feature into a product
A single feature product is easier to market and understand
Solving one problem at a time is more efficient than solving multiple
Adding unnecessary functionality makes the product more complex
Building a simple product has marketing, sales, and branding advantages
Building with users helps to measure the accuracy of assumptions
Start with a simple product and get feedback from users

Quotes

"Building a product as a single feature gives you a tremendous amount of advantages."
"You're gonna make your life so much easier if you keep, if you start very simple."
"The more you build into your product without testing it with actual users and customers, the more likely you are to build in the wrong direction."
"But if instead you try to guess all the stuff right outta the gate and think, oh, they're gonna want this, they're gonna want that, you're going to get it wrong."
"So keep it simple, especially in the beginning. You're gonna do yourself and your customer a lot of favors."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Power of Asynchronous Conversations for Coaches with ClarityFlow’s Brian Casel

Sean Boyce — Tue, 20 Jun 2023 05:00:00 -0400

In this episode, Brian Casel, founder, and CEO of ClarityFlow, discusses the benefits of asynchronous messaging for coaches and the recent rebranding from Zip Message. They also talk about the importance of name changes and pricing strategies for SaaS startups, and ClarityFlow's success with their demo-led approach and upcoming updates, including mobile apps, courses, community spaces, and payments integration. Lastly, Casel emphasizes the value of sales calls for research and development.

Brian Casel is a software company owner and founder known for his expertise in software product design and web development. He is the mastermind behind ClarityFlow (formerly ZipMessage), a popular asynchronous messaging tool for professionals in coaching, consulting, and remote teams. With a successful track record of founding and operating businesses like ProcessKit, Audience Ops, and Productize, Brian's vast experience also extends to his roles as a designer, web developer, and podcast host. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Clarity Flow is growing to include payments for coaches, personalized coaching programs, and community spaces for coaching groups
Castle and his team are 100% asynchronous and use tools like Slack and GitHub to collaborate effectively
Names can affect the success of a product and the perception of its direction.
Customer research, both live and asynchronous, can provide valuable feedback for naming and strategy decisions.
Analyzing usage data and creating custom reporting can also help identify a target audience and pricing strategy.
Inbound demo requests have become a preferred way for some coaching businesses to evaluate the product
The success of a demo-led approach influences product development, marketing materials, and customer success

Resources:

Connect with Brian Casel:

Connect with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables:

02:59 – “My team and I, we literally don't have calls live, like live calls. We're a hundred percent asynchronous. And it's weird, it's a little bit weird, but I'm not exaggerating. Like we literally just have, we use Slack and we use GitHub issues and stuff like that when we're working on stuff. But we do have like video meetings where they're seeing my face, they're seeing my screen, I'm seeing their response. We're collaborating together on things, but we're doing it across the world, across time zones and spread out at a time that makes sense”
03:38 – “But we can really still have the same level of collaboration as if we're on a live call together. I actually would even argue that it's better because we have space in between our collaboration. So I could ask something and then my marketing assistant can think about it and do some work and jot down some notes and then get back to me with her thoughts and then I digest that and I get back. So, I really think that communicating asynchronously and having these meetings at like a slower, more spread out pace really, really helps a lot.”
04:41 – “I can't help but think sometimes nowadays when I'm on one-to-one meetings, or even worse if I'm in a group setting at so many meetings and so much time and effort and energy is largely wasted because yeah, only one person could be talking at a time, right? So if you've got a meeting with like 10 people on it or grows even larger than that, just the, the cost to hold that session when most people aren't really doing much. It’s asynchronous for the win all day there.”
11:229 – “So if you look at our site now, it's like, yeah, we're still like an async conversation at the core, but we're building into more of a platform to run an entire coaching business. So I got to really understand exactly what they're trying to do, and then that informed all the features that we're rolling out now.”
19:18 – “I think especially when you start to gain traction with your product, right? Prioritization becomes critically important because if you put the wrong step in front of a step that should have been prioritized. Like you said, you could pause something that's really important for a really, really critical moment, like an inflection point.”

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Bottleneck is the Top Problem Worth Solving

Sean Boyce — Mon, 19 Jun 2023 07:32:08 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of focusing on the bottleneck to successfully find problems worth solving in B2B SaaS. He emphasizes that the bottleneck is the slowest step in a process, and by optimizing it, one can achieve the best return on investment. Sean also highlights common mistakes in B2B SaaS, such as not applying the concept of the bottleneck to the target market, and explains that the bottleneck never truly goes away, but simply moves to another step in the process.

Key Points

The bottleneck is the slowest step in a process
Focusing on the bottleneck provides the best return on investment
Common mistakes in B2B SaaS include not applying the concept of the bottleneck to the target market
Solving a problem that isn't at the top of the customer's list will be harder to sell and generate revenue from
The bottleneck never truly goes away, it just moves to another step in the process
Continuously optimizing the bottleneck will improve the product and generate more revenue
The key problem worth solving for B2B SaaS is always the bottleneck on the critical path of operations for the target market customer

Quotes

"Your focus should almost exclusively be on the bottleneck in terms of what your product should be doing almost at all times."
"If you are not focused on the step in the process, which is the bottleneck, then you're not gonna get the best return on investment from an optimization standpoint."
"If you try to optimize something that's not the slowest step, you're not gonna see a change in the output, which ultimately will not impact the outcome."
"Whatever floats to the top, that's the top problem worth solving for your B2B SaaS."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Where and When to Reinvest in Your B2B SaaS as it Grows

Sean Boyce — Sun, 18 Jun 2023 08:38:21 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean advises B2B SaaS businesses to focus on profitability as their products grow. Once companies validate their ability to attract users and paying customers, they should calculate their gross margin to determine profitability and break down revenue and variable costs. Sean believes that profits should be invested in support or growth, specifically in low-touch products. By building processes and delegating tasks, businesses can measure their performance against outcomes to ensure return on investment.

Key Points

Validate ability to attract users and paying customers
Calculate gross margin to determine profitability
Invest in support or growth
Build processes and delegate tasks
Measure performance against outcomes
Focus on return on investment
Optimize for SEO and content creation

Quotes

"Online sources, your website and marketing can really do a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to bringing you new customers."
"I like to build the process, I like to test it myself and verify that works."
"Set output goals in terms of how much output that I want to produce."
"This episode is really about A, how to make sure that you are performing well enough financially as your product continues to grow, and then B, what you might do with some of that budget once you've achieved that milestone."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

There Are Problems Worth Solving All Around You

Sean Boyce — Sat, 17 Jun 2023 09:47:17 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the advantage of building a B2B SaaS solution around a problem you personally have. Using his own podcast show notes application as an example, he emphasizes the benefits of having direct access to a built-in customer base and the ability to understand the problem space intimately. He also suggests that individuals who work full-time in a specific industry can identify pain points in their workplace and build a B2B SaaS application around them.

Key Points

Building a solution to your own problem increases the odds of success in B2B SaaS.
Personal context in the problem space provides a wealth of knowledge and understanding.
A solution for your own potential business can also serve as a solution for others.
Identifying pain points in your workplace can lead to B2B SaaS ideas.
Access to a built-in customer base provides valuable feedback for product development.
Understanding the priority of pain points is crucial for product development.
Individuals can build a B2B SaaS application without owning an underlying business.

Quotes

"You know everything about the problem space. You've got so much context relatively naturally."
"More than likely you work in that industry because it attracted you for some reason, which probably means that you have some level of interest still with regard to either that company, that business, that industry, whatever, something about it."
"Try to see what you can do to understand what the priority is in terms of what needle needs to be moved and what direction, how significantly which bottlenecks are slowing the process down."
"You then have access to everything that I just described, but you didn't actually have to build the underlying business."

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Using Data to set B2B SaaS Pricing

Sean Boyce — Fri, 16 Jun 2023 07:09:23 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses his approach to product pricing for B2B SaaS, from setting an initial price range to optimizing the structure based on data. He shares his experiment in testing price sensitivity, incorporating benchmark pricing, capturing inbound leads, and designing tiers based on feedback from paying customers. Sean also explains how he monitored usage and set limits around variable costs to ensure profitability.

Key Points

Start with a price range and test price sensitivity
Incorporate benchmark pricing and customer feedback
Design tiers based on feature demand and willingness to pay
Monitor usage and set limits around variable costs
Determine gross margin and profitability
Use data to optimize pricing structure
Consider raising prices to improve margins

Quotes

"In the end, I just picked a place to start and that was that"
"I even did some interviews with some of them and that was super helpful"
"I wasn't giving away too much, is that I wasn't incurring so much cost and not generating enough revenue"
"I'm gonna keep you posted along the way as I make those changes as well too"

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Find the Bottleneck to Optimize Your B2B SaaS and Increase ROI

Sean Boyce — Thu, 15 Jun 2023 07:24:32 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of Return on Investment (ROI) and how B2B SaaS founders can measure ROI for their users. He emphasizes the value of understanding the customer's perspective and offers tips to identify the slowest step (bottleneck) in the process in order to optimize it and generate maximum ROI.

Key Points

ROI measurement requires understanding the customer's perspective
Identify the slowest step (bottleneck) in the process for maximum ROI
Optimizing a step that is not the bottleneck won't provide ROI
Time savings is a great way to calculate ROI
Ask customers what would break first if they had to double output
Determine how much time is being wasted on the bottleneck
Automating or saving time on the bottleneck leads to maximum ROI

Quotes

"There are lots of ways to measure return on investment, but the perspective ultimately that matters most is the one of your customer."
"The slowest step in the process, coincidentally, is also the bottleneck."
"If you're consistently working on optimizing a step that is not the slowest in the process, there won't be any ROI"
"By far, one of the best [ways to calculate ROI] is the time savings element."
"If volume and output needed to double immediately, where would your process break first?"
"Start there. Find out just how much time is being wasted, and then figure out how your B2B SaaS can help optimize that step."
"The more you're able to eliminate [the bottleneck], the more return on investment you're able to provide to them."

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Reddit Strikes Back: The Monetization Dilemma

Sean Boyce — Wed, 14 Jun 2023 08:42:24 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean dives into the difficulties of monetizing a B2B SaaS product or free software based on Reddit's struggle. The social media giant is attempting to improve their economic and financial performance, which includes charging for third party access to their data. However, this has sparked controversy and backlash, with the popular mobile app Apollo protesting due to their inability to afford the proposed charges. The situation has led to temporary subreddit strikes, locking out access, and creating a potential loss in revenue. The lesson learned here is to establish proper fundamental economics and profitability early on in building a software business.

Key Points

Reddit is struggling to become profitable despite generating decent revenue.
The company is proposing charging for third party access to their data to improve their financial performance.
The popular Reddit mobile app Apollo is protesting the proposed charges due to affordability.
The situation has resulted in temporary subreddit strikes and a potential loss in revenue.
Establishing proper fundamental economics and profitability is crucial in building a software business.
Companies like MailChimp have never raised VC funding and are still highly profitable.
Monetizing a B2B SaaS product or free software can be difficult without proper economics.

Quotes

"They're trying to figure out how to improve the economic and financial performance of the underlying business."
"If they can't afford it, then that functionality may go away."
"Be careful what business model you are leveraging, especially when you're getting started."

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B2B SaaS Business Model Overview

Sean Boyce — Tue, 13 Jun 2023 07:24:49 -0400

Summary
Sean discusses the important components of the B2B SaaS business model and how it generates revenue. He explains the different strategies for a subscription-based business model, including a freemium model and a free trial. While he is not a fan of the freemium model, he sees the value in a free trial. Sean emphasizes the importance of understanding the activation points for conversion from free to paid users.

Key Points

B2B SaaS business model is about generating revenue
Subscription-based models are common
Freemium model includes different tiers of capabilities, some for free
Free trial is a good option for understanding the product’s capabilities
Conversion from free to paid users is important
Activation points need to be identified
Measuring conversion percentages is crucial

Quotes

"You need to take a look at what you're working on building and which of these options make sense."
"You can measure the first and most important activation point, and that's can you convert users that are using your product for free to a paid tier?"
"This is an overview of the B2B SaaS business model and probably the most important component.

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Freemium Model vs Free Trial: Which is Better for Your B2B SaaS?

Sean Boyce — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 07:32:13 -0400

Summary
Sean discusses the pros and cons of the freemium model in B2B SaaS and why he prefers a free trial to a free tier. While the freemium model can help form a habit with users and has a low barrier to entry, it also comes with risks such as users not converting to paid plans and undermining the value of the product.

Key Points

Freemium model creates a tiered system with free access and paid upgrades
Freemium model helps form a habit with users, but also comes with risks
Free trials offer a limited period of use before requiring payment
Understanding activation points is crucial for setting up a successful freemium model
Converting users from free to paid plans is difficult
Freemium models can inadvertently devalue the product
A free tier can be a safer option than a freemium model

Quotes

"Getting them to switch from how they used to solve it to how they solve it with our product is harder than probably most of us think."
"And the freemium can really help you do that with a very low barrier to entry for your users and customers."
"It is insanely difficult to convert someone who is expecting a product to be free then to become a paid user of something."
"That's why it's really difficult to start out with a free product and then at a later date try to monetize it."
"Takeaway here is to better understand what a freemium model is and compare and contrast those differences with instead of free tier for gaining access to your B2B SaaS."
"And also, in my personal opinion, why I don't love the freemium model, it's got limited application and I think too much risk and why I strongly prefer you to consider just offering a free tier instead."

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Why The Latest Version of AI May Not Be Worth the Upgrade

Sean Boyce — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 07:17:16 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean talks about the importance of testing a new version of an API or component before upgrading. He shares his experience with Open AI's API and the differences between version 3 and version 4 of their tool chat GPT. Sean emphasizes that the focus should always be on customer benefit and that upgrading may come with trade offs like slower performance and higher costs.

Key Points

Not all new versions of APIs or components are necessary to upgrade to
Testing before upgrading can help determine if a new version consistently generates better results
Customer benefit should be the key focus in deciding to upgrade
Differences between versions may be negligible in terms of output
Upgrading may come with trade-offs like slower performance and higher costs
Waiting to upgrade may sometimes make more sense
Both technical and business-oriented perspectives should be considered when deciding to upgrade

Quotes

"Testing that I've done, not all of these tools are really ready for mainstream."
"The differences not all that significant in terms of the ultimate output."
"Don't feel compelled to have to blow up everything you're doing or switch to the new version immediately."

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Why You Might Want To 'Skip the Spinning Rims' When Building Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sat, 10 Jun 2023 08:44:59 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his experience of building a B2B SaaS product and how he 'skipped the spinning rims' or steps that may be deemed unnecessary or out of order. He suggests skipping the legal route to get trademark protection for naming components of the product as it took forever and cost a fortune. Instead, pick a name and run with it and if someone else comes after you for it, change the name. Sean recommends using generators for legal policies such as terms of service and data policy, instead of spending thousands of dollars on a legal team, as it saves time and money. He advises considering skipping non-essential steps that distract from the real mission of making the B2B SaaS product successful.

Key Points

Skipping legal processes, such as trademarks, can save you time and money
Pick a name and run with it and if someone comes after you for it, change the name
Generators for legal policies can be significantly cheaper and save time
Consider skipping non-essential steps that distract from the real mission
Legal teams take a copy or template and update it with your inputs
Skipping these steps won't slow you down in making the B2B SaaS product successful
Be careful who you ask for advice as they may recommend going the proper trademark route

Quotes

"Marketing is hard and it's gonna take a minute for your product to get on the map."
"It distracted us from the real mission and that was making the B2B SaaS product successful."
"I'm here to give you an alternative opinion based on real-life experience."
"The impact of it was very minimal and is something that you can do too, but it won't slow you down."

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Measuring Early Stage Financial Performance for Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 09 Jun 2023 11:23:30 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean talks about how to measure the early stage economics and financial performance of your B2B SaaS. He explains the importance of tracking revenue, expenses, and gross margin as a percentage of revenue. By doing so, you can identify where you need to make changes to improve profitability.

Key Points

Track revenue, expenses, and gross margin as a percentage of revenue
Use a spreadsheet to measure financial performance
Calculate cost of goods sold to determine gross margin
Aim for a gross margin percentage of 80% or higher
Identify which levers you need to move to improve financial performance
Incorporate all expenses into your calculations
Focus on gross margin as the most important element to start with

Quotes

"Take your revenue, subtract your cost of goods sold, take that out of revenue that'll give you the gross margin number"

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How To Generate Free Leads For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 08 Jun 2023 07:56:32 -0400

Summary
Want to generate free leads for your B2B SaaS product? Look no further than SEO. After validating your UVP, doing keyword research and writing optimized articles can get you to the top of Google's search results. In just a few days, Sean was able to rank in the top 10 for his chosen keyword, and he's sharing his procedure with you.

Key Points

SEO can be a cost-effective way to generate leads
Keyword research is key to identifying topics that rank well
Search intent matters - make sure you're providing the right content
Benchmark against successful articles to create an effective outline
Consistent tracking of your article's performance is important
Success may vary, but even modest results can make a big difference
Organic traffic can replace advertising budget for better optimization

Quotes

"I'm in the top 10, which used to be the benchmark for hitting the first page of Google."
"Even if I get slightly less, but I still get great results, that's fantastic."
"I'm getting the traffic from the work that I did building the organic content."

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Ranking on the First Page of Google: Tips and Tricks

Sean Boyce — Wed, 07 Jun 2023 08:34:46 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how to rank on the first page of Google through search engine optimization. He talks about creating content that should rank more effectively for search engine results and how to track performance through keywords. Sean shares his procedure for creating SEO-focused content and how it has helped him climb the rankings. He emphasizes the importance of deep diving and good keyword research before investing time in producing content to track keywords.

Key Points

Validate the value proposition and if you can grow your SaaS product into a business profitably.
Look for areas of opportunity to optimize and get more traffic to your site economically.
Use SEO to target relevant keywords for organic traffic generation.
Create SEO-optimized content for keywords to track their performance.
Use SEO tools like SEMrush to track performance and leverage the strategy.
Double down with this procedure and produce more SEO-focused content that can rank effectively.
Do a deep dive and good keyword research before producing content.

Quotes

"I'm closely monitoring that and I'll keep you posted as I learned those updates as well cuz Google's making some pretty aggressive changes." (01:43 - 01:50)
"I built the procedure about a week ago after doing a deep dive on various channels, YouTube, others." (02:12 - 02:19)
"I created a SEO optimized piece of content, which was an article that's on my site around a keyword that I wanted to track for performance." (02:46 - 02:57)
"I'm definitely gonna leverage this strategy further because it's showing some early promising results." (03:51 - 03:56)
"Other stuff I'll be sharing with you over time as well too is how I'm picking which keywords to track and then create content for." (04:30 - 04:36)
"It's really important to do a deep dive and a good amount of keyword research here before you start, you know, blasting out articles." (05:36 - 05:43)

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HBO's Rebranding Blunder: A Lesson In Naming

Sean Boyce — Tue, 06 Jun 2023 08:09:40 -0400

Summary
Sean discusses HBO's rebranding blunder and how it made finding and accessing the app much more difficult for him. He emphasizes the importance of thematic naming and being intentional with your branding.

Key Points

HBO changed the name of their app from HBO to HBO Max to Max, which caused confusion.
Thematic naming makes it easier to market and understand a product.
Changing names should be done carefully to avoid confusion for customers.
Rebranding can create a real mess if not done correctly.
Sean is a fan of thematic naming in products.
Naming is important in marketing and positioning a product.
Making it harder for people to find a product is bad for business.

Quotes

"You could create a real mess and HBO seems to have done that." (05:03 - 05:06)
"If it's gonna be harder for people to find it, I see that as a bad thing." (05:30 - 05:34)
"Be careful with your naming because if you make a potential boneheaded move like that, you can cause a lot more harm than you may have been expecting to." (05:40 - 05:47)

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Hammering Negative Keywords: How to Optimize Your Advertising Campaign Performance

Sean Boyce — Mon, 05 Jun 2023 08:08:28 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how to optimize your advertising campaign performance by focusing on your click through rate (CTR). He shares his strategies for leveraging negative keyword lists to improve CTR, including regularly updating the list and monitoring performance. Sean explains how he achieved a 10% CTR and emphasizes the importance of customizing your campaign for full control.

Key Points

Click through rate (CTR) is the most crucial metric for measuring campaign performance
Negatively assess which keywords are producing irrelevant traffic
Build up negative keyword lists on a regular basis
Optimizing performance takes vigilance and regular updating
Customizing your campaign provides complete control
CTR can continually be improved
Cost-effectiveness should always be the driving factor in deciding investment

Quotes

"If you just set it and forget it, then over time the performance is gonna dip"
"Managing your negative keyword list is one of your most effective levers to improve the metric that matters"
"Optimizing your advertising campaign is the key at an earlier stage of driving traffic to your B2B SaaS product"

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Boost Your SEO Ranking with AI-Assisted Strategies

Sean Boyce — Sun, 04 Jun 2023 11:23:30 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares a guide he's built on leveraging AI-assisted strategies to generate more organic content and boost your B2B SaaS SEO rankings. He explains how he went deep down the rabbit hole of SEO and created a step-by-step guide full of reverse-engineered advice from YouTube channels such as Matt Diggity and Neil Patel. By verifying keywords and search intent, evaluating performance, and identifying keyword opportunities, he aims to create the best SEO content to drive organic traffic to his landing pages and websites. He also emphasizes the potential of AI tools to make your content creation process more efficient and effective.

Free Resources

Key Points

AI-assisted strategies can help generate more organic traffic
Reverse-engineer advice from experts such as Matt Diggity and Neil Patel
Verify keywords and search intent for optimal traffic
Evaluate the performance of your SEO content
Identify keyword opportunities for growth
AI tools can make content creation more efficient and effective
SEO content creation requires detailed step-by-step procedures

Quotes

"I went deep down a rabbit hole of figuring out SEO AI content generated pretty much everything in 2023." (00:47 - 00:58)
"Both Matt's and Neil's channels are mentioned and linked in the guide that I'm providing to you by email." (02:38 - 02:44)
"But before I get there, I wanna build a procedure that I know works and I'm gonna test on myself." (04:19 - 04:24)
"There is a ton of progress that's been made in terms of artificial intelligence tools to help us be more effective and more efficient with that work." (04:59 - 05:06)
"Is the AI content outperforming the organic content? Is the organic content outperforming the AI content, any even more than that?" (05:39 - 05:45)
"Get a copy of that guide. It'll be linked in the show notes below, and let me know what kind of feedback you have." (05:46 - 05:50)

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Working on Multiple B2B SaaS Projects at the Same Time

Sean Boyce — Sat, 03 Jun 2023 08:17:40 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses why it's okay to work on multiple B2B SaaS projects at the same time. By splitting time between multiple projects, you can diversify your portfolio, have more freedom and flexibility, and continually refine your prioritization skills. Sean recommends using the bootstrapped approach instead of raising capital, which can limit your options and commitments. It's essential to have your own cash flow, so you are not solely dependent on your projects' success.

Key Points

Splitting time between multiple B2B SaaS projects diversifies your portfolio and provides more diversification
The bootstrapped approach provides more freedom and flexibility than raising capital.
You need to have your own cash flow, so you are not solely dependent on your projects' success.
Pursuing multiple B2B SaaS projects requires extra prioritization skills to make the most impact with your time.
Different projects may require different stages of development or milestones, keeping them in an assembly line process.
Pursuing multiple projects can help refine your prioritization skills.
Raising capital limits you and commits you to investors, who expect a certain return on investment.

Quotes

"It's totally okay to shift gears or pivot temporarily, permanently, or to run both technically simultaneously." (01:17 - 01:27)
"I strongly prefer the freedom and flexibility that the bootstrapped approach provides you." (02:19 - 02:25)
"If anyone's giving you feedback to the extent of, you know, you have to focus on only one thing and not more than that, I would take that with a grain of salt." (04:34 - 04:43)

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How To Handle Negative Customer Feedback

Sean Boyce — Fri, 02 Jun 2023 14:16:55 -0400

Summary
In this episode, the host shares his experience in dealing with unhappy B2B SaaS customers and the importance of managing negative feedback. He emphasizes the need to not panic and instead understand the situation at hand. The host offers insight into how to handle unhappy customers on a case-by-case basis and how to learn from the feedback received.

Key Points

Don't panic when receiving negative feedback
Understand the situation at hand
Learn from the feedback to improve the product
Handle unhappy customers on a case-by-case basis
Consider offering refunds for goodwill
Decide whether or not to allow the customer to sign up again
Customer's always right slogan is 100% wrong

Quotes

"I'm big on, let's see what we can't learn from the users in terms of them reporting feedback to see if there's anything we can do to improve the situation or our product." (02:09 - 02:20)
"The slogan or the phrase of the customer's always right, that is 100% wrong." (04:03 - 04:08)
"But beyond that, the point to take away from this really is this stuff is normal." (05:01 - 05:05)

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Controlling Your Destiny in Changing Economic Conditions

Sean Boyce — Thu, 01 Jun 2023 08:01:38 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the pendulum shift from growth at all costs to cost-cutting in the B2B SaaS industry due to changing macroeconomic factors like inflation and interest rates. He highlights the implications for building and selling B2B SaaS applications and recommends building a sustainable business by being fiscally responsible and controlling your own destiny.

Key Points

Interest rates and inflation have made everything more expensive, leading to cost-cutting measures.
Multiples for selling B2B SaaS applications have decreased significantly from historic highs.
Building a sustainable B2B SaaS business requires being fiscally responsible and understanding your profitability.
Reinvest earnings back into the business to reach desired growth.
A bootstrap approach and part-time work can be advantageous.
Working in the target market industry is a bonus for building a B2B SaaS application.
Managing your own product and business in a fiscally responsible way allows for greater control over your destiny.

Quotes

"There's been a major pendulum swing in the direction from growth at all costs to cost-cutting." (00:15 - 00:23)
"Highly recommend controlling your own destiny by managing your own product and your business in a fiscally responsible way." (05:53 - 05:58)

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How To Play The Long Game With B2B SaaS Growth

Sean Boyce — Wed, 31 May 2023 20:08:39 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of moving beyond pay per click advertising for SaaS growth, and investing in content creation and search engine optimization (SEO). He emphasizes the need to create content that solves problems for your target market, and provides tips on using Google Ads console to find high-performing keywords. Sean stresses that SEO and content creation are long-term strategies that require consistent investment, but can yield a high return on investment in terms of driving organic traffic and increasing exposure for your SaaS product.

Key Points

Pay per click advertising should be cost-effective, with a positive return on investment
Content creation and SEO are important channels for SaaS growth
Creating content that solves problems for your target market is crucial
Google Ads console can provide insights into high-performing keywords
Investing in SEO and content creation is a long-term strategy that requires consistent effort
SEO and content creation can yield a high return on investment in terms of driving organic traffic
SaaS products should be validated before investing in SEO and content creation

Quotes

"I try to get every dollar back that I spend in advertising in the first month" (01:01 - 01:05)
"Those are the problems that your customers are searching for solutions to in ideal fashion" (03:18 - 03:22)
"Sort by what's performing best, what is giving you the best return on investment? What is performing well start creating content around that" (04:15 - 04:23)
"SEO and content creation is one of the next best things to invest in after you've passed some of those milestones" (04:44 - 04:49)

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Don't Fall for "Struggle Porn"

Sean Boyce — Tue, 30 May 2023 07:40:50 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean debunks the notion that you have to quit your day job to succeed in building a B2B SaaS company. He shares his experience of doing it part-time while still being able to sustain it in a healthy manner. He emphasizes that working backwards from your goals and following a sustainable process and strategy will make your journey more straightforward.

Key Points

Quitting your day job is not necessary to succeed in B2B SaaS
"Struggle porn" culture is unsustainable and borderline ridiculous
Building B2B SaaS part-time is practical, reasonable, and less risky
Keep your day job if you like it and use a portion of your income to fund your B2B SaaS venture
Having an advantage of being in the industry or target market of your solution is a bonus
Establishing a good track record and income before quitting your day job is appropriate
Ignore bad advice and build your company on your own terms

Quotes

"The whole struggle porn thing that's just totally unsustainable and borderline ridiculous." (02:00 - 02:04)
"If you have a day job and you like it for the most part, then keep it." (02:43 - 02:46)

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A Simple Yet Powerfully Effective Naming Strategy For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Mon, 29 May 2023 09:29:14 -0400

Summary
Naming your B2B SaaS application is not just about creative or obscure references that only you are privy to. The biggest error startups make here is not realizing the importance of a name that relates to the product's function and helps customers connect the dots. Instead, a thematic name that reflects the outcome of your product for your target market is a more effective naming strategy. In this episode, Sean emphasizes that marketing is hard and getting the word out there is even harder when your name does not relate to what it does. Therefore, your name should be as straightforward and simple as possible to make life easier for your business.

Key Points

Thematic names are more advantageous than obscure names.
Marketing with a name that reflects the product's function is easier.
A name that is memorable makes for easy brand recognition.
Choosing a simple and straightforward name is crucial for startups.
Obscure references are one of the worst things that can happen to naming.
Naming is a key part of branding and, thus, requires consideration and attention to what the name says about your brand.
Naming a product with a name related to its function makes life easier for a business.

Quotes

"Those obscure reference words, I think, are some of the worst things that have happened to naming." (01:10 - 01:15)
"If you name your product as close as possible to what it is, what it does, and the outcome that it generates, this can make life a whole lot easier." (01:31 - 01:42)
"I want people to understand what it is, what it does, the kind of outcome that they may be looking for." (02:16 - 02:21)
"I want that process to be as easy as possible for them to connect the dots." (02:22 - 02:26)
"Decide for yourself what do you think would be the best strategy to help you with what it is you're trying to do when it comes to naming." (02:56 - 03:04)

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Why You Should Build Your B2B SaaS in Public

Sean Boyce — Sun, 28 May 2023 10:20:00 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean explains the benefits of building your B2B SaaS in public. He highlights the challenges of B2B SaaS marketing and how creating valuable content can help attract potential customers. By sharing the journey of building your product in public, you become a part of the build-in-public movement and can better understand your target market.

Key Points

Marketing B2B SaaS is harder than expected
Most people think about competition wrong
Sharing valuable content attracts potential customers
Performing discovery on your target market is essential
The build-in-public movement helps with marketing
Producing content can help you understand your target market
Organic content is key to growing your B2B SaaS

Quotes

"Marketing is a lot harder than most people expect it to be." (00:17 - 00:20)
"It's not always very obvious in the beginning exactly what's gonna resonate with your audience." (03:09 - 03:13)

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Optimizing Your B2B SaaS Landing Page

Sean Boyce — Sun, 28 May 2023 10:16:07 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares tips on how to create an effective landing page for B2B SaaS. He urges entrepreneurs to focus on explaining what their product is and what it does to their target market. Sean provides a simple guideline to follow while creating landing pages, which is centered around communicating the most important outcome to the prospect and removing any obstacles with your B2B SaaS application.

Key Points

Landing pages must be concise and effective in communicating the product and its benefits
Simplify how your product is going to help the customer overcome their obstacles and achieve their desired outcome
Highlight the emotional and pain elements that your B2B SaaS solves and communicate them effectively
Don't try to do too much and avoid giving too much detail
Ensure to describe above the fold what matters most to the prospect
Your objective as a B2B SaaS is to enable a successful outcome for your customer
Continuously evaluate and improve your landing pages

Quotes

"It's good to step back, not obsess over your websites and landing pages and all this kind of stuff for a little while." (01:14 - 01:21)
"Most people are just looking for that successful outcome, which matters most to them." (01:46 - 01:51)
"It's not just a page to advertise, it's a page to speak to...the outcome that's most important to your prospect." (03:03 - 03:09)
"Keep what you are positioning on that page. Center it around these concepts..." (03:24 - 03:29)

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How To Build Effective B2B SaaS Tiers

Sean Boyce — Fri, 26 May 2023 07:14:57 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses how to set up and design effective B2B SaaS tiers to capture the most value. He recommends starting with the basics - identifying the successful outcome that the target market is looking for and using that as the foundation. Sean advises creating different tier options for price testing, even before the product is built. He stresses the importance of gathering feedback from users and suggests using the support channel to ask for questions. Sean recommends staying lean and keeping it simple, to keep development costs lower and help grow the product more quickly.

Key Points

Start with the successful outcome that the target market is looking for
Create different tier options for price testing
Gather feedback from users through the support channel
Stay lean and keep development costs lower
Stay focused on achieving milestones
Keep the product simple
Don't try to meet all use cases under the sun

Quotes

"Create an option of separate tier oftentimes that's built into the landing page before I've even built a product." (01:29 - 01:35)
"They will start providing you with feedback and you can be more proactive in asking for it." (01:55 - 01:59)
"That can influence you in terms of do you go deeper into a particular target market." (02:49 - 02:53)
"That helps you ship more into the product faster and will help you grow and achieve kind of the milestones that you're looking for more quickly." (04:22 - 04:29)

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Why Keeping your Users Aware of Product Updates is Crucial

Sean Boyce — Thu, 25 May 2023 08:20:30 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean talks about the importance of keeping B2B SaaS product users informed about updates through email, as it adds value to their experience, ensures they are aware of the changes and helps convert free users to paid.

Key Points

Email updates help users understand the continuous value added to the product.
Pointing users toward new features allows for measurement of user experience through analytics and support channels.
Updating free users about new features may encourage them to convert to paid users.
Too many B2B SaaS products are not marketing new features to users.
Use a simple email platform like MailChimp for updates.
Visuals, such as screen recordings, can make email updates more engaging.
Screen Studio is a tool for creating fancy screen recordings to advertise new features.

Quotes

"I wanna make sure that the paying customers for my product understand that I'm adding more value continuously to their experience." (00:28 - 00:36)
"If they aren't in there all day, every day, or they are unaware for any reason where I've made those changes in the product, I wanna point them in that direction so that they can use those features." (00:41 - 00:52)
"For anyone who hasn't converted, they may not have converted because they haven't seen all of the value they're looking for yet." (01:12 - 01:18)
"Most people aren't super engaged with heavy text. They're looking for visuals, graphics, something like that." (02:23 - 02:30)
"It's local software that you can access. And what it gives you the ability to do is essentially do a fancier version of a screen recording." (02:46 - 02:55)
"It might be more effective as well too, in terms of what you are trying to come across, being received more effectively by them." (04:10 - 04:16)

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The Value of Building Your B2B SaaS With Your Users

Sean Boyce — Wed, 24 May 2023 16:33:33 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean discusses the importance of gathering user feedback for B2B SaaS applications in order to improve the product and increase its value proposition. He emphasizes the importance of engaging directly with early users to gain insights into their usage patterns, preferences, and opinions on where the product should develop next. Sean outlines various channels for soliciting feedback, including email, analytics tools, and one-on-one interactions. He stresses the value of maintaining ongoing communication with users and leveraging their feedback as a key driver for business growth.

Key Points

Soliciting user feedback is critical for improving B2B SaaS products and growing the business.
Early users are a valuable source of insights into usage patterns, preferences, and opinions.
Feedback channels can include email, analytics tools, and one-on-one interactions.
Effective feedback strategies involve ongoing communication and engagement with users.
Leveraging user feedback can influence product roadmap decisions and increase the product's value proposition.
Advertising new features and functionality can encourage users to participate more in support channels.
One-on-one interactions with users can yield valuable insights and help build strong relationships.

Quotes

"It's good for them to hear and see that you are actively managing it and looking to make it better." (02:46 - 02:51)
"That's the kind of feedback that you're looking for. You're looking for people that want to participate in this process." (03:25 - 03:29)
"Once you are converting users to happy paying customers that are getting value, they're gonna continue to be one of the best sources for you to figure out... what specifically you need to build in order to make sure your product offers more value." (04:01 - 04:17)

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Why Managing Profitability for B2B SaaS Is What Really Matters

Sean Boyce — Tue, 23 May 2023 07:42:36 -0400

Summary
Sean discusses the importance of managing profitability for B2B SaaS companies and why it should always be a goal.

Key Points

Growth for growth's sake trend in the VC world has led to historic numbers of failures of tech products and B2B SaaS product companies.
The economic conditions have changed and interest rates have risen considerably, making solid business fundamentals and economics more popular among investors.
Managing towards profitability should always be the ultimate goal for B2B SaaS products.
Companies should focus on healthy business fundamentals and economics to run a sustainable business.
While capital may be needed to get started, companies should manage towards profitability as soon as they can.
Managing towards profitability allows for more control in the long run and a more sustainable approach.
Few companies have successfully raised round after round of investments for growth's sake.

Quotes

"Healthy business fundamentals and economics are key to running a sustainable business." (01:29 - 01:37)
"You need to be able to take in more than you spend, but you need to be able to do so in a manageable way." (02:19 - 02:24)
"Now that's come back into, or it's become more popular, I guess, again. But in my opinion, it never really fell out of style." (03:40 - 03:49)
"So long story short here, despite the trends that happen over time, if you manage your B2B SaaS product and business towards profitability, that's something that won't go out of style and you'll have more control in the long run because that approach will be more sustainable." (03:58 - 04:14)
"Despite the trends that happen over time, if you manage your B2B SaaS product and business towards profitability, that's something that won't go out of style and you'll have more control in the long run because that approach will be more sustainable." 04:01 - 04:14

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Understanding B2B SaaS Multiples: What to Know Before Selling Your Business

Sean Boyce — Mon, 22 May 2023 08:02:41 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares insights into B2B SaaS multiples and what factors can impact the negotiated sale price of a business. He explains why multiples can vary and provides benchmarking information and resources to help entrepreneurs make informed fiscal decisions when it comes to selling their B2B SaaS.

Key Points

B2B SaaS multiples can vary depending on factors such as the state of the economy and the industry.
In the past, B2B SaaS products were selling for a 10x multiple on revenue, but current market conditions have led to lower multiples of 3-4x on top of revenue.
Understanding the market and your B2B SaaS's cash flow is crucial when deciding whether or not to sell.
Multiples can affect the ultimate sale price of a business.
OpenView's annual SaaS benchmark reports can provide valuable information.
Cheap borrowing rates can lead to higher multiples, while increasing interest rates can cause multiples to drop.
Ultimately, the decision to sell depends on a number of factors, including personal goals and the potential for future growth.

Quotes

"There's a number of factors that will affect what type of multiple you may be looking at all the way from specifically what your B2B SaaS is and does all the way to and through what is the state of the greater just larger economy look like at the moment." (00:33 - 00:49)
"If you don't have an interest in selling, you may or may not be interested in selling depending upon a number of these factors." (05:36 - 05:42)
"Obviously a 10 x on top line revenue is very different than a three x on top line revenue." (05:42 - 05:46)
"So long story short, I'm gonna be talking a lot more about this on the show as well too, to provide this insight with you as I'm learning where it is currently in the market." (05:56 - 06:04)

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Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode what I want to talk to you about are B2B SaaS multiples. That is, if your B2B SaaS scales to the point where you're considering or thinking about selling it, what might you ultimately be looking at in terms of a negotiated sale price? Now the first thing I'll say is that people have a tendency to throw around statistics when it comes to talking about multiples, but in reality, like many other things in our market and our world, this can be a range. And there's a number of factors that will affect what type of multiple you may be looking at all the way from specifically what your B2B SaaS is and does all the way to and through what is the state of the greater just larger economy look like at the moment. So I wanna share some of those variables with you as well as some benchmarking information and give you somewhat of an idea what to expect.

Now, depending upon where you are in the history of building and scaling your B2B SaaS, you may be more or less interested in entertaining this at the moment. But even if you aren't in a position to potentially sell what you've built so far, then it's still good information to know either way, because then you can factor it into the fiscal decisions that you make as you're growing and scaling your B2B SaaS. So the first thing I'll share is one of the more common, I say numbers or stats that's been tossed around in my circles relatively recently, I'd say within the past year or so, is that B2B SaaS products have a tendency to sell for 10 x multiple on revenue. Now obviously what that means is based on the revenue that your B2B SaaS is able to generate within a year period of time, so the ARR or the annual recurring revenue, what it was, at least when this was common, relatively common knowledge or where the market was, you would receive potentially a 10 x multiple on that if you were looking to sell your B2B SaaS.

So for example, if your SAS product was bringing in, let's just call it about 10K per month, so you were 10K MRR, right now, that would be about 120K ARR. If you just took that monthly number and you scaled that up. Now, if you were to supposedly sell that and your benchmark at the moment was 10 x on revenue, then you'd be looking at potentially being able to sell that business for up to $12 million. Now that's what it was, but that's not what it is now. So there's a number of good resources out there, and one I'll link to in the notes, and that's from the company OpenView where they do, they have a tendency to do these annual SaaS benchmark reports, which provide a lot of good information

From unsuccessful B2B SaaS companies cuz they see a lot of deal flow and in it. Now, the one that I'm referring to is from 2022, but it's got some good information in it, which I think has only kind of continued into 2023. So it's more than likely still relatively accurate. But something to note is that, and what I'll talk about in this episode, the larger economy can dramatically affect what the open market is saying in terms of what a B2B SaaS product or company might ultimately be worth. And back when money was cheap, and when I say money was cheap, interest rates were low. So borrowing rates were real, were very low, the Fed funds rate was held at zero for a long time. That's part of the larger economic levers that the federal government has in terms of determining fiscal policy and trying to essentially make sure the economy is is relatively healthy.

That rate which banks borrow from is ultimately a catalyst for how, what the open market ultimately can offer when it comes to borrowing money. So for the longest time, like throughout the pandemic, those rates were very, very low, almost like at historic lows, which made it cheap and easy to borrow money. And when that was the case, a lot of people were spending, a lot of people were borrowing. So there was a lot of activity and that was part of the idea was rates were lower to try to courage activity and there was a lot of it. And when there was a lot of it there, it pushed the multiples up. So that's how we got to the 10 x multiple and and considerably higher in some instances, depending on your growth rate, your industry, a bunch of other factors that we'll talk in about in future episodes.

But for now, what I want you to focus on is because of inflation has been very high and because of the fiscal policy reversing and us raising interest rates continuously over greater part of a year and change at this point, the multiples have come down and they've come down considerably. So lately what I've been seeing in terms of B2B SaaS products or companies on the open market and what they may be selling for, I'm seeing more between the three and four multiple on top of revenue. And again, that would be arr. So that's what I want to start sharing with you is more about this information so you have an idea what to expect, and also where the market is at any given point in time, you can factor that into your decision because obviously if your B2B SAS product is throwing off great cash and you're appreciating that cash flow, if you don't have an interest in selling, you may or may not be interested in selling. Depending upon a number of these factors. Obviously a 10 x on top line revenue is very different than a three x on top line revenue. So you know, ultimately as the economy ebbs and flows and as some of these other factors come into play and those numbers change, you might ultimately want to change what you do with your B2B se. So long story short, I'm gonna be talking a lot more about this on the show as well too, to provide this insight with you as I'm learning where it is currently in the market.

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Getting Paid To Perform Discovery For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sun, 21 May 2023 09:03:40 -0400

In this episode, Sean shares his strategy on how to find and solve business problems for B2B SaaS by using consulting services as a way to perform discovery. By positioning it as consulting, B2B SaaS founders can get paid to do research and understand which problems are worth solving, all while helping their clients solve those problems themselves. This method provides cost-effective ways to gain insight on target markets and allows for a source of positive revenue throughout the process.

Key Points

B2B SaaS founders can use consulting as a way to perform discovery and find business problems worth solving.
Using services as a solution to a particular target market or industry can provide insights that could be used for a future SaaS product.
The research and discovery performed during consulting could be a valuable source of income and lead to overall sustainability.
Understanding which problems are worth solving can help B2B SaaS founders better understand the tools, resources, or help they need to help eliminate those problems.
Consulting allows for a cost-effective way to gain insight on target markets and provide value to clients.
B2B SaaS founders can earn income while performing discovery and finding valuable insights on potential problems and solutions.
Consulting can ultimately help B2B SaaS founders be more successful in the long run by providing valuable insight prior to creating a SaaS product.

Quotes

"There's a way for you essentially to get paid to perform discovery if you do so by positioning it as consulting services." (01:34 - 01:41)
"If you are offering services as a solution to a particular target market or industry, then you can essentially get paid to perform the discovery." (01:44 - 01:52)
"As a consultant in the work that I do, I'm looking for essentially the same thing - these problems we're solving, like what is preventing my customer and my client from making the kind of progress that they want to." (02:03 - 02:17)

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Transcript
Sean here, and in this episode, what I want to talk to you about is if you're having trouble figuring out which problem to solve or even how to find a problem worth solving, I wanna share with you a strategy or two that has worked very effectively for me in order to help you do that in the past, and that's where you'd look to potentially compliment what you want to do from a product perspective or with B2B SaaS with services. Now, I know this sounds counterintuitive because for those of us that wanna build B2B SaaS businesses, we're looking for that scalability. We're looking for small teams to make big impact. But when I wanna share with you, and my latest article on my website dives deep into this topic because I've had a lot of success with it, and so I have a lot of other B2B SaaS founders complimenting that effort with services.

Now, if you think about discovery, which is part of the process that helps you find those problems worth solving, it's similar to typical research, right? As in you're looking for people within a particular target market that have problems. And as you're learning about those problems and the impact that it causes their business, that starts to give you the kind of context you may need to find out whether or not those problems are ultimately worth solving, and if software or a SaaS solution could help move the needle in a significant way to help those customers with relieving those problems. Now, that process is actually strikingly similar to a particular service model, which is something else that I've also done significantly in my career, and that's consulting. So what I'm getting at here is that there's a way for you essentially to get paid to perform discovery if you do so by positioning it as consulting services.

The bonus here is that if you are offering services as a solution to a particular target market or industry, then you can essentially get paid to perform the discovery, which will help you better understand which problems are worth solving, and in particular with software or a potential SaaS solution, which could be yours in the future, right? As a consultant in the work that I do, I'm looking for essentially the same thing. These problems we're solving, like what is preventing my customer and my client from making the kind of progress that they want to. I dip into my bag of tricks in terms of what I know about the industry and the work that I do, which is helping B2B SaaS companies scale to help them understand the tools, resources, or help from me that they're gonna need to eliminate those problems and to make positive progress and momentum that they're looking for in order to get them to where they need to go. As I'm doing that, and this could apply to you in any industry that you want to build B2B SaaS solutions for, you can essentially do the same thing because you're trying to help them with solving their problems as well too. So what I want to share with you here is that if you're trying to figure out, how do I get better at finding problems or solving,

And what are potential, any other more cost effective ways to do so, it's essentially consulting in that the research and discovery that you may do independently on your own dime and time is something that if positioned properly as you're better understanding these problems end you feel like before you even have a SaaS product that you can bring to market or a position as a solution to those problems, you can solve those problems or help your clients with solving those problems yourself, and that as a service if valuable enough, as in if you're solving a painful enough problem for that target market, you can get paid to do it as well. Also, which doubles as positive revenue and income for you to help you and make your project more sustainable, as well as getting paid to perform discovery, which is just bonus and extra.

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Why Emotional Reactions to Your B2B SaaS Are Actually A Good Thing

Sean Boyce — Sat, 20 May 2023 10:05:01 -0400

Summary
In this episode, Sean shares his experience with receiving emotional reactions about his B2B SaaS product and explains why it can be a positive sign. He emphasizes the importance of addressing users' concerns and how lack of reaction is a much bigger problem. The presence of strong reactions means that the product is being used and providing value.

Key Points
• Emotional reactions to a product can be a good sign of engagement and value.
• Addressing user concerns is crucial to maintaining customer satisfaction.
• Lack of reaction to product issues may signify low usage and value.
• Availability and usability issues can be solved, but lack of reaction is a harder problem to address.
• Emotional reactions indicate potential product market fit and value for the user.

01:02 - 01:09
• "If you're getting a reaction like that when your product has some type of issue [...] that's a really good thing."

02:10 - 02:17
• "You can fix availability, you can fix usability. If your product is out there in the wild, your users and customers are interacting with it."

02:31 - 02:43
• "You wanna look for areas of opportunity for a product to generate emotional or strong reactions, because that actually is a sign of positive feedback as in the value that your product is providing."

02:43 - 02:59
• "When it becomes unavailable, the sooner you hear about feedback from your users about availability or usability, whatever the issue might be, the stronger potential your product market fit, and the more value they may be getting out of the product experience."

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode, what I want to talk to you about is that if you are getting strong emotional reactions about your B2B SaaS product from your users and customers, even if those emotions are negative, why that can be actually be a very good thing. Now, the example that I'm gonna share with you is my podcasting B2B SaaS application called Podcast show notes. And what happened recently was that it was offline or unavailable for some users for a number of hours. As such, I got a flurry of messages through our support channel about them not being able to access and use our application. Some users, as you can imagine, were pretty upset now, while they rightfully should be, and this is always something that more like when it happens to you, not necessarily if, if you get to this point, is something that you should address as soon as you can.

What I want to share with you today is that that is actually a great sign. And here's what I mean by that. If you're getting a reaction like that when your product has some type of issue, whatever it is, usability, availability, it doesn't matter. But if the reaction you get is strong, emotionally charged, potentially about your users and customers not having access for some reason, are not being able to get what they had been able to get from your product previously, that's a really good thing. That's a sign of the fact that they're using your product, they're getting value out of their product, and at this point they may need your product. So that is what it looks like when your users start to form habits around their process and your product. So all of these are largely good signs. Now, on the other hand, what I want you to consider is that what if that happened and you didn't get any feedback, as in no one said anything.

That's actually the worst situation. That's considerably worse than if they're reaching out, they're complaining, and even if they're emotional about it, or particularly upset, if you're not getting any reaction whatsoever, that more than likely means that the product either isn't being used or it's not providing a ton of value. So those are much harder problems to solve. You can fix availability, you can fix usability. If your product is out there in the wild, your users and customers are interacting with it. But if you are not getting any reaction when the product isn't available, that's harder a problem to solve. And I'm always gonna prefer the formula over the ladder. So what I'm kind of getting at here is that you wanna look for areas of opportunity for a product to generate emotional or strong reactions, because that actually is a sign of positive feedback as in the value that your product is providing. When it becomes unavailable, the sooner you hear about feedback from your users about availability or usability, whatever the issue might be, the stronger potential your product market fit, and the more value they may be getting out of the product experience.

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How To Solve The Moat Problem For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 19 May 2023 07:38:38 -0400

AI has made it easier to build more capable B2B SaaS products. However, this has made it harder to build defensibility into your product. Let's talk about how to solve the 'Moat Problem' for your B2B SaaS.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you more about how to solve what I call the AI mote problem. Now, if you're considering adding AI to your B2B SaaS or your B2B SaaS already incorporates artificial intelligence, and I'm sure you're very familiar with this problem now, one of the products I'm working on now leverages AI tools to strengthen its value proposition, and that's my podcasting tool.

And one of the challenges with that is, The bar, the barrier to entry is relatively low. For those that know how to leverage artificial intelligence tools these days, meaning that it's very easy to potentially build a basic competitor to what I've been building in this instance and what others may be building as well.

As such many that have experience in this realm are considering it to be a growing problem for those that want to create a defensible B2B SaaS product. And we're referring to that as the moat problem, as in is very difficult to create any form of a moat to protect your business or your idea or your investment into any particular B2B SaaS if it incorporates or heavily leverages artificial intelligence.

Now, there is. The strategy that I think works best in terms of making your product more defensible is all related to continuing to go deeper as opposed to wider in your target market. So that's the first thing. The second is the moat ultimately will materialize over time as you are continuing to add functionality that's addressing the top problem worth solving for your target market.

I'll give you a little bit more context here. Now, you might begin by building a product that solves a very specific problem, hopefully the top problem we're solving, which I talk about a lot, and that should give you great early traction. Now if you've made it to this point with your product, You're going to need to go further in order to potentially continue growth success and to go from a product to ultimately a business, because just starting with a single feature may not turn your product into a business.

You might need significantly more contribution than that. So if you leverage this strategy successfully enough, then it will become a business and the deeper you go into your target market, solving the top problem over and over again until you have created. A complete experience that offers your target market a ton of value to the point where your product essentially is invaluable to them, as in it's a key part of what they do now all day, every day for your business customers, and they really couldn't live without it.

Now you've got something that amounts to real potential of a significant moat, and that's gonna be something that's gonna be very difficult to replicate. Whether or not they're leveraging artificial intelligence doesn't matter all the time, effort, and energy that you've put into creating that product experience and providing all of that value for your target market.

That's the defensible element for your B2B SaaS.

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Make Sure You Know Who Your B2B SaaS Product Is For

Sean Boyce — Thu, 18 May 2023 07:19:30 -0400

After your B2B SaaS product begins to get traction, ideas or improvement will fly at you fast. If you aren't laser focused on who your product is for (and who it isn't) your product could become a convoluted mess. Let's talk about this strategy and how to manage it effectively for your B2B SaaS.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about why you need to remain laser focused on exactly who you're building for. When I say what, what I mean is your B2B SaaS product, who specifically is it for? As in, who's your target market? Who's that buyer persona? Who has the problems worth solving that you're trying to help?

Reason why I mentioned this is because once you start gaining some traction with your product, it's entirely possible and even likely, That ideas are just gonna fly at you fest. From people that are using your product, even people that aren't. So it can get really noisy really fast, and this is where it's going to test your resolve in terms of your ability to remain laser focused on precisely who you're building for.

And if you haven't defined that right outta the gate, it gets a little bit harder to do. But this is an opportunity to get definitive about that, and that's a good thing. The more definitive you are about. Who your customer is and who they aren't, the easier it's gonna be to understand which ideas make sense, or which problems worth solving you should be chasing, and which ones you should not.

The most easiest or the easiest distinction here for those of us building B2B SaaS products, applications that we're trying to turn into profitable businesses is the business versus consumer argument. Now, I'm building a podcast post-production kind of automation tool at the moment. On podcast show notes, and that can be in terms of who the customer is for that product.

That can be podcast agencies, so specific businesses that basically manage podcasts for businesses or. Podcast hosts, and I would consider the former example to be a business and the latter to be a consumer. So one would be B2B and the other would be b2c. Now, if I tried to build around the needs of both, it's gonna kind of turn my product into a convoluted mess, or I should say that's the first step on a slippery slope that really leads to your product becoming a mess because you're trying to build around the needs of.

Two potentially very different target market customers, and I know they sound similar, but the needs are definitely different. I'll give you just one example for the podcast agencies, for the most part, they have teams, teams of people helping their customers with managing the podcast. The consumers on the other hand, which are probably just host.

They may be doing everything themselves. They may not have a team of people. So something like user management may make sense for the podcast agency, but it may not make any sense for the podcast host or the consumer variation. So just that, just with that example, you can see how almost an entire module that might get built into your product would be used or leveraged very differently depending upon who you're building around.

Now the B2B versus B2B distinction can be a little bit easier to see, but sometimes not really. What the challenge is here is avoiding chasing a market that could be very difficult to figure out where the patterns are. And this is why I love building around businesses is because they have long-term goals in mind and they stick to them.

For the most part, they have to, right? They define plans, they put up a lot of time, effort, energy, money. Into building these long-term plans, and your objective is to help them achieve those. That's the successful outcome they're trying to generate for our B2B customers, consumers, on the other hand, I've always felt as like herding cats.

I'm sure you've heard some variation of that phrase before, but there's just a lot of opinions. There's a lot of inconsistency, and it's very difficult to define the patterns around there. Also, there may or may not be budget because consumers may be doing this as a hobby. They may be trying to generate revenue with it.

But their strategies may be flawed, potentially severely flawed to the extent where that revenue may never be coming, which means that the conversation with you and your product in terms of whether or not it's worth investing into is very different with consumers than it is for businesses. So I strongly recommend, and vast majority of the content I'm producing is all B2B oriented.

I'm only building SaaS products for businesses for those reasons and more, but, Even beyond that, even if you're talking about multiple business customers, you need to make sure which one you need to be laser focused on because that is gonna be where the source of where you're gonna go to find new opportunities to build features and functionality around to strengthen your products value proposition.

And if you're chasing anything else that has the potential to turn your product into a convoluted mess.

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Why Your B2B SaaS Should Go Deeper Into Your Target Market

Sean Boyce — Wed, 17 May 2023 07:44:01 -0400

When B2B SaaS products start to get traction sometimes they get lost by going wider across markets instead of deeper into the market where they already have traction. Let's talk about why this is a mistake what going deeper into your target market actually means.

Build a profitable B2B SaaS business for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about where to grow from and how to do it after you've gotten some initial traction with your target market for your B2B SaaS. So if you've been through the process of con converting prospects to paying customers and they're getting value out of using your product, you're probably gonna want to know, okay, now what?

How do I continue to grow from there? How do I continue to be successful and then scale this product? The key here, my opinion is to go deeper into your target market, not wider. I see this mistake from time to time, and I'm gonna explain to you what I mean. So let's say, let's use my podcasting product for an example.

Now I'm building a tool to automate essentially the process of creating great titles and summaries and key points and quotes and all that kind of stuff from an individual podcast episode. Now there are plenty of people that can use that functionality and different types of personas are signing up for my product.

And by that I mean it's podcasts in general. Individuals who may be recording podcasts like myself and podcasting agencies as in businesses that do podcast production for anybody who wants one in particular for businesses now. The idea that I'm pursuing for my product is to build it around podcasting agencies as opposed to individuals.

So there are two options in terms of where I can go. I can go deeper into one of those two areas, or I can go wider and I can try to apply to both. Now, the objective here, in my opinion, is to go deeper as opposed to wider first. So that's a a key sequential step, as in that should happen first. And this comes from lessons learned from great books like Crossing the Chasm, which talk about what it's gonna take you to get from those early adopters to essentially like the early, and then ultimately late majority, which is a much larger percentage of the target market.

In the early days with your product, you're not gonna have reached the kind of market penetration you're ultimately looking for. To establish what some might consider to be product market fit for your B2B SaaS. And until you do, you should continue to go deeper until you have essentially made the kind of progress and you've made the kind of market penetration that you're looking for with who your target market is in the beginning.

Until you reach that, don't go wider because you're gonna spread yourself too thin and your product isn't really gonna be a great fit for any of the potential target markets that you're pursuing. I just gave you two examples for the product I'm building. If I build around both of them, that ultimately is gonna mean that I'm only really gonna fit one or the other, but not either very well, and that's what I'm looking for.

That's what I'm trying to achieve in the early days. So instead of doing either or, Pick one, pick one, and then continue to go deeper. And what I mean by that is continue to build around that specific target market's needs. And as you continue to do that, then your fit in that market is only going to continue to increase.

You will gonna continue to become more defensible. You're gonna continue to become more unique. Cuz more than likely, as you are getting more specialized, other people are not. So you're gonna want to continue to do that until you reach the kind of traction with that market that you're looking for. And then we'll talk about it in another episode.

But after you've had that level of success, assuming that's worked out, Then, and only once you reach essentially like a saturation level, which is a certain percentage of traction within that target market, then should you consider going wider because you're looking to grow beyond that target market, but not before that.

So the key here is really to focus on how do you continue to success of your B2B SaaS product. And my strong recommendation, especially in the early days, is to go deeper into your target market and not wider across others.

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Why Customer Research Should NOT Focus on Solution Design for Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Tue, 16 May 2023 07:24:51 -0400

Customers are bad as designing solutions (hint: that's your job) so let's talk about how to steer conversations with them away from this topic and make sure you get what you need from that time spent to provide them with the value they really need.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about why when you're in the research and discovery mode with your customer, you want to avoid. Having them dictate to you. Solution design, allow me explain integrated detail, and I'm also gonna share an antidote. So a million years ago, I used to work as a mechanic working on cars.

We work on like passenger vehicles doing oil changes and replacing tires and stuff like that. So I learned a lot about that trade, but more importantly, I learned a lot more about how the professionals in that industry, Do that job well and important for that role was efficiency cuz of how the business model operated.

But either way, one of the things that they told me early on was to be careful of what a customer says the problem is. And I want, I kind of wanted to know why. So they, I had asked them for an example and they shared one. They shared an example in terms of why this is such a problem. From the perspective of if someone came in and thought they needed an alignment, which is where they essentially, they realign the drive wheel, which front two wheels in your car, that's when you turn the steering wheel.

Those are the car, those are the wheels that move. They said that some people will come in and it was a common problem, say that their steering wheel was vibrating at highway speeds. So when the car got up to speed, they'd feel vibration in the steering wheel, and then they would march into a mechanic shop and they would demand an alignment without providing sometimes even any additional context.

Now, the problem comes in the fact that that problem is not connected to the solution that they think it is. So if that mechanic shop went ahead and just gave them an alignment, They get their car back and it still would have the original problem. So in that example, the customer is not sharing with you what the problem is.

They're trying to tell you what the solution should be, and that's a problem. Cause customers are not particularly equipped for solving their own problems. That is your job now. Instead, what they tell me to do. Is to listen for the problem as they describe it, as in why they feel like they need an alignment.

And if you had asked that question, you would've found out that it was their steering wheel vibrating at highway speeds. Now, the real solution to that problem is to balance your wheels. So that has nothing to do with an alignment. But in the end of the day, if that's what you do to correct the problem, the customer gets their car back and it no longer has the problem.

That's all they care about. So the point of this story is that, The customer just wants the problem to get solved, but they might jump around and dive into solution designing with you because that's a natural thing for humans to just do. It's part of basic human psychology. So what I'm trying to describe here is that, and I'm doing this now with several of my products, but when you are interacting with a user free trial or otherwise paying customer, that's using your B2B SaaS, And you start talking about the additional value your product can provide.

For example, what you wanna stay away from is the customer saying things like, wouldn't it be great if, or maybe your product could do this. Cuz there that's them ideating around solution design and there may or may not be value there, but more than likely there isn't. Because of how they're describing it should work as probably either not ideal or not going to work.

When you ultimately figure out, remember back from the mechanic story. How whatever they're asking for is tied back to a real problem, and that's where you wanna focus. So if they start basically throwing feature ideas at you, you need to make sure that those are gonna solve real problems of theirs. So when they share that kind of stuff, ask them, okay, well if we did that, what problem would that solve for you?

And then if they can connect that to a problem, what kind of impact is that problem causing? Making sure it's connected to a problem ensures that they'll get value out of it, meaning that they'll use it. And then asking them what kind of impact that problem has will help you prioritize that against the list of any other request that they have.

That's the best way to manage that conversation. Now, if they throw a solution design element at you or a feature request and they can't tie it back to a problem, that means it's not really a priority for them. And it's highly likely that if you invest a time and money in building that, that they wouldn't actually use it.

So anyway, long story short here is stay away from solution designing with customers from their perspective, and if they do volunteer or anything like that. Make sure you tie it back to a problem cause that's what's going to be necessary in order for you to verify whether or not if you build functionality that solves that problem, whether or not that's actually gonna provide real vol, real value for them and move the needle.

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Stop Worrying About People Stealing Your B2B SaaS Idea

Sean Boyce — Mon, 15 May 2023 07:57:40 -0400

There's a famous quote in the B2B SaaS circle that goes something like this - "Don't worry about anyone stealing your idea, if it's any good you'll have to hammer it down peoples throats".

I want to talk about why you should NOT be protective over your idea.

How to build a profitable AI-powered B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about your idea, which you may be very protective over, but I wanna explain to you why you probably shouldn't be. There's a famous quote that's often attributed to one of the godfathers of computing. I don't know whether or not that's actually the case.

I can't find great records on that, but it doesn't matter. The whole point of the quote is really what's important here, and that's, don't worry about anyone stealing your idea. If your ideas any good, you're gonna have to hammer it down someone's throat. I love this quote because I've experienced this in that your ideas are probably not as worth protecting as you think they are, and that's really what speaks to the value of execution and that being the most important element of what it is you want to do with your potential idea, which could become a business.

And in terms of the way I described them in a B2B SaaS application or product. So now I mentioned this because I'm getting more deeply involved in venture building and helping people with getting their ideas off the ground, turning them into successful, profitable B2B SaaS products. And I'm still getting a lot of people coming to me that are very hesitant to describe anything about their idea, or they're unwilling to share all of the details.

Now, what I can tell you is that that. Essentially is almost a sign or a flag to an advisor, to a potential investor of the fact that you may not have been through this before and that you may not be ready for a conversation with someone at that level because the ones that have been there, myself included, know that there really is nothing behind an idea.

From a value perspective, your idea really isn't worth all that much. If you haven't turned it into a successful business already, that's where the value comes from. So if you're worried about someone stealing your idea, you're thinking about this all wrong. And instead what you should be doing is you should be sharing your idea with as many people as possible in order to try to get validation and feedback on it in terms of how much value it can provide to the target market.

And especially you wanna reach out to those personas who could be your users or buyers. So that's what really matters. So if you're still in a situation where you're afraid to share your idea with anyone, then this work may not be for you, or you just may not have this experience yet. Trust me when I say that for the most part, people are not necessarily looking to steal your ideas, and even if they are.

There's so much work they have to put into in order to turn that into anything that it's really not worth worrying about. And in reality, if there is no competition out there for what it is that you're doing, that's an, that's a different in problem entirely. If there is no one out there trying to do what you were doing, that sounds like an advantage, but it's really not.

Um, so don't worry about anyone stealing your idea. Get it out there, test it, validate it, see what it can become.

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Please Sell Your B2B SaaS BEFORE You Build It

Sean Boyce — Sun, 14 May 2023 09:22:15 -0400

I'm getting more involved with venture building. As such, I'm seeing more deal flow which shows me where most people are making the biggest mistakes. Thus far, the biggest one is building before you sell. 9 times out of 10 if you build before you sell then you won't be able to sell that product.

How to build a profitable AI driven B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about, again, what I think is the most important thing you can do as a B2B SaaS founder to increase your odds of success. And that's to please sell before you build. So I'm getting involved with venture building now, and that means I'm looking for folks who have ideas that they may want to pursue and turn into a successful B2B SaaS business.

As such, I'm seeing more volume of what folks are working on and that's giving me greater insight into the patterns of what's preventing people from being successful. Now, having been down this road myself before, as in having been someone who's built before they sold, and that product, and ultimately the business inevitably failed.

I've lived this experience. I write about it all the time. I have an email course that walks you through. Precisely how to do this if you're unsure, but by far the biggest thing that you can do to increase your odds of success if you wanna compete in the B2B SAS world is to sell before you build. Let me talk a little bit about why building is very expensive, both capital wise, as in how much money it's going to take and how much budget you'll need to invest.

And time-wise, how long it's gonna take for you to ultimately build whatever the first version of your product is. More importantly, if you build in the wrong direction, most of what most or all of what you've built may be useless because you might be building something you can't sell. Think of it this way.

Let's say you already have a product and you're considering whether or not to build feature A or feature B. Now, if you go to the customers that you have or prospects or whomever, and you say, Which of these two features would you be willing to pay for? And if they said they would not pay for feature A, but they would pay for feature B, which one would you build?

Right. It becomes painfully obvious. I. You would never build feature A because you know you can't sell it, right? It's the same concept, but it's applied to your entire product and ultimately what becomes your business. So if you aren't doing this, you are dramatically increasing your odds of failure, and that is one of the major reasons that I believe the startup failure rate to be so high.

So the best thing that you can do to avoid that trap altogether is start selling whatever it is you want to build. Like you've already built it, you do not need the product in order to build it. And I'll walk you through a ton of examples about how to do this, some in great detail in an email course that I created, which is tagged onto the end of these episodes in terms of where you can go to sign up.

But that said, my website. Next step IO slash B2B SaaS. I walk you through. Just how to consider selling whatever it is you're thinking about building or validating the idea you want to chase before you go down that long. Expensive, time consuming road of actually building something. So if anyone, now just to give you an imp, an idea in terms of what I'm seeing from a venture building perspective, cuz I'm looking for more folks to partner with to help them achieve success in this world.

If someone comes to me and they've already built something that they have no validation criteria for, I 99% of the time already know they've made a major mistake. Because of everything that I've talked about in this episode. So hopefully I can get to more folks before they decide to build because it will.

It has major implications for the potential for your product and ultimately your ability to turn that into a business.

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Why Solving Your Own Problem Is An Advantage In B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sat, 13 May 2023 08:11:16 -0400

There's a HUGE difference between solving your own problem and solving someone else's when you are trying to succeed in building a B2B SaaS. Let's talk about the pros and cons of each approach.

Build a profitable B2B SaaS using AI for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode what I want to talk about is why I'm such an advocate for solving your own problem with your B2B SaaS, especially if you're doing this for the first time. Now, if I'm gonna start by describing what happens if you don't solve your own problem. There's a huge challenge that a lot of people that want to build a B2B SaaS to bring a potential solution to market.

If they're building for a target market that they're not intimately familiar with, I've done this too, so I can explain what some of the limitations will be if you attempt that strategy. Now, what you're probably not realizing when you begin this kind of venture of this journey is all the things you don't know about that target market.

Like whatever it is problem wise, you want to try to solve. If you're not in it all day every day, or you haven't been in it four years, there's so much nuance you're going to miss and not understanding all of that detail is going to cause problems for you. The product, everything along the way is just gonna take longer and be harder.

So, Number one, whatever you're building for in terms of a target market, if it isn't one that you live in on a daily basis, you're gonna need to be really passionate about it because there's a lot you need to learn. You almost need to become whoever it is you're building for. And I'll give you an example.

So I've built products and human resources. I built products in marketing. We, I talked about my podcasting tool. Now evaluating, bringing a tool to market for the legal industry. One for the accounting industry, right? I like exploring different target markets, but I haven't professionally worked full-time in most of these industries.

And the big difference is for the ones in which I have, especially the ones I've built businesses in, the amount of understanding that I have. Of all the level of detail that I need to know in order to build products for that industry is significantly higher than it is in some of these other industries, and that makes all the difference when it comes to figuring out the problems that I wanna solve, how I wanna solve them, how my tools expected to provide that level of value for that target market.

Because it helps you move significantly faster. So if you're trying to achieve greater success and less time, a better place to start would be your business, as in what's the biggest problem or challenge you need to solve as opposed to someone else's business or an industry that you haven't spent as much time in yourself.

So, If you're considering where to start and you have the opportunity to choose between solving a problem for your own business or the industry in which you work versus something that you don't have an intimate level of understanding in, I'm always gonna recommend you choose the former because that's gonna enable you to move significantly faster and achieve greater success and less time than if you need to go learn everything about a relatively new industry to you.

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Making Sure You Do The Right Research For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 12 May 2023 07:20:23 -0400

When starting out, you may want to capture research to better understand your target market. This can be super informative. However, not all forms of research are created equal. Let's talk about the different types and when to leverage each so you don't get bad data.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS business for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you more about a topic that comes up quite a bit as it pertains to the research that you wanna do to figure out which problems you wanna solve for your B2B SaaS customers. Now, there's different ways to gather feedback from a target market.

For the most part, those break down into two categories. There's qualitative and there's quantitative types of data that you can collect. For the most part, the qualitative data usually takes the form of interviews or conversations for you to learn more from a target market. And there's different ways to gather that, which I'll talk about next.

The second or quantitative is usually some form of asynchronous method of capturing information from a similar target market, like surveys, for example. Now, In the beginning, I hugely favor qualitative over quantitative, and I'm gonna explain why. But what I want to inform you of is that most people are often very interested in collecting survey data, and there's for various reasons for this, I'm sure, but I believe that to be a trap in the beginning because it can severely limit what you can learn, and it could also be misleading, pointing you in the wrong direction.

Here's why. Because in the beginning, if you don't know your target market intimately well enough, as in if you haven't had a decent number of conversations with them in one-on-one capacity, then it's gonna be really difficult to create an effective survey because you're not necessarily gonna know which questions are more relevant than others.

As such, this is why I'm a huge favor in, in huge, in favor of the qualitative conversations and capturing that type of data first, because that's gonna enable you to learn some of the most important and relevant information. And it will also inform your ability to create the best surveys as well. So let's talk about the different types of qua qualitative information that you can collect when performing this research.

Now, there's two different methods that this breaks down into as well. Also, There's one-on-one conversations, really a personalized approach. There's also different types of group conversations, like focus groups, which you've probably heard of before. You may have been part of one on either side as well.

Also, I'm also not a huge fan of focus groups. I. Also, especially in the beginning, and the reason for that is it's susceptible to a number of different problems. Two that I can think of right away is what I call group think. That's where the consensus of the room seems to be heading in a direction, but that other people in the room are more than likely just.

Gravitate or want to kind of go along with the flow in terms of where the room is heading, if a few, and that can be misleading because it could be a few people in the room dominating the conversation and taking it in a direction that other people in the room don't agree with, but are kind of unwilling to just fight that what seems to be inevitable or just natural so far in the dialogue that's happening in the room.

Groupthink is a big problem with focus groups. Uh, the other one is the loudest voice, which is related to that, where someone's being adamant about something or maybe combative, whatever it is. Other folks in the room may not feel comfortable speaking up or fighting that momentum for whatever reason. So, You can get a lot of misleading information.

Now. It sounds great, it sounds efficient, and it sounds like you could kind of do everything all at once. But that's like, uh, which I've said the other day, 10 women making a baby in a month. It's not really, that might be possible from a theoretical perspective, but in practice it doesn't work like that.

So instead, hu, I'm a huge advocate for personalized one-on-one conversations, especially in the beginning. Uh, a qualitative nature so that you can figure out what type of information's most relevant, what questions work best, and how to get the information that's gonna inform all of your decisions from here.

Do a series of those and then you'll get better at them along the way. Plus, you'll learn better information as you get a better understanding and what you should be asking. And where the areas of opportunity are. So that process will naturally become more efficient and more effective. And then from what you learn, investing in that process, that can inform other more efficient methods you might wanna leverage at scale.

And that's where you can consider some quantitative methods that will have a high impact as well too, like issuing surveys because now you know how to design that survey because you've had enough one-on-one conversations to understand the patterns.

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How To Avoid The Consumer Trap For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 11 May 2023 07:23:13 -0400

Now that AI tools can help us more further much faster, it's easier to lose the thread on who we're building for and get excited about building for consumers. Let's talk about why this can be a big problem for your B2B SaaS and how to avoid the trap.

How to build a profitable B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode what I want to talk to you about is avoiding the consumer trap. Now, when I'm talking about building SaaS businesses, what I'm talking about is b2b, which is why I combine the two building B2B SaaS businesses. And the key part of that is the B2B element. As in business to business, you're building a proper business and you're selling the proper businesses.

This makes a big difference when it comes to the success, the trajectory, figuring out the problems we're solving, the features you want to build. All of those elements become more straightforward, in my opinion, if you're building for businesses and not consumers, however, these days with the capabilities of AI and how quickly and easily you can produce something.

Much more capable than we used to be able to in a previous generation of the tools we had access to. It can become a little bit enticing or more so to also go after a consumer crowd. I'll give you an example. So I'm building tools for B2B podcasters and really that's podcasting agencies. Not just people who have their own podcasts, which might be about whatever, cooking, sports, something like that.

That's more of a hobby. It's probably not a revenue stream for them. It's probably not affiliated with the business, at least not yet. If that's the case, I don't really want them to be part of my target market. I want the agencies that are helping people. Build and set up podcasts, but doing so for business, like one that I have as well called Podcast Chef.

And the reason why I want that is because those businesses have clear long-term goals. They have revenue stream, they have budget set aside for ensuring that they can solve certain problems. And the more faster, the more effective and efficiently they can solve those problems, the more successful, the more potentially profitable their business can become.

I can work around that set of parameters because those are consistent usually from business to business. However, when you fall into the consumer crowd, it's like herding cats. There are. Things to chase. There are an unlimited number of things you can chase and places to get stuck because consumers, they, everything in their lives, there's so many variables that they're managing.

There's so many combinations as well too, that it could be much harder to detect the patterns because there's just that many different types of consumers. Businesses, on the other hand, are a little bit more stable in that way, which makes things quite a bit easier for you as a potential B2B SaaS builder to solve their problems.

So this is why. I want you to ensure that you are consistently focusing on building for businesses as opposed to consumers. And to be careful not to fall into the consumer trap because it's easy to do. I, I should say, it's easier to do now that AI is so capable and will enable you potentially to solve their problems too.

Now, if consumers are purchasing your product and it's built for businesses, that's okay. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about if you are beginning to. Update and influence your product roadmap in the direction of consumers as opposed to businesses. That's going to be a challenge and create problems for you in the future.

So make sure you are building around businesses, especially if you are looking to be successful in the B2B SaaS world. And I think it's a lot easier to succeed when you're building for businesses as opposed to when you're building for consumers. But don't let yourself get caught into what I consider to be the consumer trap cuz that can mess up your roadmap and jeopardize the long-term success for your SaaS business.

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How To Invest In SEO For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Wed, 10 May 2023 07:50:23 -0400

Once you've verified that your B2B SaaS can produce a return on investment through paid traffic, you'll want to develop a strategy to improve that ROI over time by investing in SEO. Let's talk more about what it is and how to do it.

Launch a profitable B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk to you about how to start making progress against performing well from an SEO perspective, which is gonna help continue to drive traffic and leads at your B2B SaaS applications landing page Now. As I've talked about building the podcasting tool that I'm working on now, I talked about early testing using ads to really evaluate the strength of that value proposition.

However, once you get to and through an important milestone there, which is being able to verify that you can go from. Basically people you know, driving traffic to your landing page, to people, reaching out and beginning a potential free trial that you may be offering with your product. And then ultimately converting into a paying customer.

You're going to want to look for other channels you can invest in, which will over time send you more traffic. One of those is a longer term investment. G, I can produce excellent results as long as you maintain it, and that's. SEO or search engine optimization. Now that means to produce content so that you climb the search rankings for relevant keywords, but do so in organic fashion, as in the initial test that I was just mentioning is essentially a shortcut for you to get to the top of those results of the search engine when people are searching for relevant keywords and phrases related to what it is your product does.

But that's obviously paid traffic, so you're investing in driving that traffic to your site. However, if you ultimately have the domain authority or content that boosts that authority relevant to those specific keywords, then you will climb the rankings to inevitably, ideally be on the first page of Google search results at or near the top, which will be similar to paid traffic.

You'll be ideally right under. Where those paid traffic links are at the top, but you will receive potentially similar levels of performance, but you won't have to pay for the traffic. So that's the major advantage of. Being able to climb the SEO rankings, which is something I believe worthwhile in investing.

After you get to and through that milestone, if you can't get there yet, then you have other things to figure out before it makes sense potentially to make that an investment. The other thing worth knowing as well is that improving SEO performance is a long-term commitment, usually as it's typically not something you could do.

Immediately. It's something that you need to start on and need to work on typically, at least for months in order to climb those rankings and then wind up on the first page of Google, cuz that's the idea. But you can use tools like from companies such as S scm Rush ah Res, in order to track and monitor your progress.

Four relevant keywords, which isn't just for you. It can also be for your competitors as well too, so you can see what they're ranking for, what you're ranking for, and you can get a better idea in terms of what are the keywords that you should be focusing on in order to climb those rankings yourself.

But if you've made it to and through that milestone, this is a worthwhile investment. That will ultimately produce significant return in the long run. But keep in mind that it is a long-term investment so the results won't materialize overnight. Versus with ad traffic, you can essentially turn that on whenever you'd like and throw a budget at it, and that will produce results.

If again, you've verified that you've made it through that milestone, and you have the ability to convert those prospects and eyes on your landing page to trials and then customers, but over time, that investment makes sense because it's gonna be a potentially better. Return on investment in the long run.

So for a period of time, as you're waiting for those SEO results to improve, you can essentially manage both if that's possible. Ideally, you will be able to do that as you've converted new prospects and trial users to paying customers. Then as your SEO results start to ramp up, your ad budget can ramp down, and then you can ultimately increase your return on investment in MA maintaining that as a channel.

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Validating Your B2B SaaS When Ads Are Too Expensive

Sean Boyce — Tue, 09 May 2023 07:42:43 -0400

Not all industries are created equal. Some will have ridiculous PPC budget ranges for you to compete over traffic. Let's talk about what to do when this happens. Hint: it's not spend more.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS or less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode what I want to talk to you about is what to do if you ultimately find out that whatever your primary channel is, let's say it's driving traffic via ads, doesn't end up being as effective as you wanted it to be for various reasons. But in this episode specifically, I'm gonna talk about budget.

If you find out what you were going to do with ads ends up being significantly less cost effective because ads are. Maybe for example, way too expensive, what to do instead. So the first thing to note is that I don't want you to force that, as in, if you've built SaaS applications before, like I have, oftentimes there can be keyword opportunities that might be a dollar per click, for example, which I think is entirely reasonable and can work really well at low budgets in order to do effective testing.

But in certain industries, the paper click could be. Dozens of dollars per click. It could even be hundreds of dollars per click. Some of them get ridiculously expensive, A lot of big companies, mostly making a lot of money, but that drive the ad budget up to these astronomical levels, which means that.

It's really not great at that point for early stage testing. You don't wanna pour that much budget into just a landing page in order to try to determine whether or not your product that's being advertised on your page has a strong value proposition. So the question then is what to do instead? Well, number one is I don't want you to force it, right, as in just ramp up budget, because I think that's just not cost effective.

The second is, I want you to remember that we're working backwards from. The end result that we're trying to achieve, and that's to validate your value proposition. So in order to do that, all we really need to do is have a programmatic, systematic way, or at least a way, it doesn't even have to be either of those two to gain access to enough target market users in order to determine the viability and the potential that your product has.

So what are some other ways that we can do that? Well, some of them can be more manual, others can be more automated. I have a tendency to prefer the automated options, but not exclusively. I balance oftentimes with a few of those other strategies as well as in myself personally. I've done everything from leveraging my own network and folks that I can meet locally or even in person, all the way to and through something like a code email outreach or an outreach on LinkedIn.

So now this is gonna depend on your target market, as in where are they, where are they paying attention, how can you gain access to them? All of those options. And for each of them, you can leverage different automation strategies to make this process a little bit easier to manage. But remember also in the earlier stage, we're trying to get what I consider to be quote, like a wave of prospects or customers to really test the value proposition of your product.

So you don't need a. An unlimited number of prospects as part of this phase. What you really need is you need enough. You need a decent subset of customers in order to determine how much viability your product ultimately has. So don't worry about gaining access to an unlimited number of prospects at this point.

As such, any of those strategies can work effectively as well, and you can substitute those in for what might have been your primary strategy before, which is my personal favorite in trying to drive traffic with ads. Now, if that doesn't end up being cost effective, like some of these use cases I just mentioned.

Then instead, you can leverage some of these other strategies to essentially do the same thing. But in the end, what we're ultimately going to do is once we verify and validate all these things, we want to establish your brand. We want to establish your domain, and we wanna try to drive as much organic traffic as possible.

And that's where SEO comes into the mix. And I'll talk more about that in another episode, perhaps tomorrow. But as far as for now, what I really want you to walk away with this from is, It doesn't have to be paid ads, as in if the early homework you're doing is showing that that's not as cost effective as you're expecting it to be, then I want you to consider switching up your strategy to achieve the same thing as opposed to just continually pouring good money after bed or wasting too much in the beginning of testing your product.

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How To Measure The Value Your B2B SaaS Provides

Sean Boyce — Mon, 08 May 2023 07:31:39 -0400

Measuring the value of your B2B SaaS can be tricky. Your customer showering your product with praise often isn't enough. Let's talk about where to look for and how to find REAL value from the perspective of your customer.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk about how to determine the value of your B2B SaaS from your customer's perspective, because that's really what matters. Now, this is an element that's gonna help you better understand how sticky your product can become, as in how easy is it gonna be for your customer to essentially incorporate your product into their routine?

That means longer ltv. And an opportunity to generate more value for ultimately what becomes your business. Now, I've talked a bit about how to start soliciting and gathering feedback from the usage of your product, from your paying customers as they're using it more frequently and they've got requests for new features and kind of open up that communication channel as well as potentially build a subset of what I might consider to be quote like beta testers.

That's an excellent place to go to, to start collecting feedback in terms of what does their experience actually look like in terms of value Now, and there's a couple different ways to potentially measure this, but from my perspective, my favorite and the one that's probably the most defensible is the ROI or return on investment element where I'm looking for the ability to be able to measure and quantify in terms of dollars and cents.

How much value they are getting out of the product experience. Now, this isn't always straightforward and sometimes it's also not easy, but it is very important cause it is hard to argue against hard costs and savings in terms of value if your product is ultimately translating to them, being able to save money, generate money, save time.

All of those things are what I consider to be associated with hard costs that they had to spend before. And they potentially don't need to do now or. New revenue they're able to generate now that they're crediting back to your product. Now, if you're able to determine this, that's a great long-term predictor of value.

Stickiness, increases in LTV or lifetime value of the customer, and a few other metrics as well too. And this is arguably the most important one. So that's what I'm always looking for when I'm asking for feedback from my users, from my customers, I'm asking them for. How is the product valuable for you, and can you articulate?

Some of those details, I'll continue with that conversation until I have what I feel is a full picture of the actual value my product is providing for them in terms of dollars and cents to them and their business. So that's where I would recommend focusing. To get a better understanding in quantifying the actual value your product is providing for them.

This will help you figure out whether or not your product is nice to have or a need to have, and also based on the language that they use, you'll get a real understanding relatively quickly how valuable they feel your product is and how important or integral it now is to their entire process.

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How and When To Build Beta Testers For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sun, 07 May 2023 08:20:11 -0400

Founders often talk about "beta' as a concept anywhere from their product to users. I want to share with you what I've found that works (and doesn't work) when it comes to the concept of "beta" strategies related to your B2B SaaS.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS business for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and in this episode I want to talk about the beta concept, and I'm doing air quotes since you can't see me now. People talk about having beta version of their product using beta testers and users for their product. Bunch of different concepts, and I wanna talk to you about. What I think works here and what I think doesn't work.

Number one, I don't love the concept of a quote beta version of your product, especially if you haven't launched it. A lot of people talk about that in the very early stages. They try to find a handful of folks to test it with. I, I say skip, although that that just adds, in my opinion, unnecessary time to the process.

Just launch your product to whomever's, willing to use it. And those can become your, your first wave of users, beta users, if you wanna refer to them as such. But anybody can sign up. I think that saves time and gets you feedback a lot faster. I think the whole process is more effective if you approach it in that way.

Now, what I think does make sense is after you have a wave of users and you have verified again that you can turn prospects into users and then users into paying customers, once you've validated the fact that you have essentially a funnel or a process for that, That's a big checkbox. Once you've done that, you want to engage with them a bit deeper.

And potentially a subset of them to engage a bit deeper, to learn more about the direction in which your product should go. What problems should your product be solving beyond what it does currently? That way you can continue to make it better so folks are continually getting more value out of it, and that return on investment for you should look like an extended LTV or lifetime value, as in how long your users and customers are paying for access to your product because of set investment.

Now, I think this is where it makes sense to entertain this as a process, but again, not before you launch your product, after you launch your product. So flip that around. But once you have and you verifi verify the fact that you're able to process through those phases successfully to a certain percentage and keep track of your baseline there, then what you could do is start engaging with folks that have expressed interest beyond the typical user.

They're reaching out to your support channels. They're asking questions. Maybe they have ideas they've shared with you. Those folks are perfect for creating essentially a subset of users to get a better understanding in is the actual persona, as in the people that are using and paying for your product, same as you had initially designed it and built all of your positioning around great testing to be done there.

Beyond that, look for additional ways that you can engage with them to better understand. Okay. You know, what has your experience been like with a product? How are you getting value out of it? You can even capture some social proof or some quotes to share on your website, to encourage others to sign up.

But beyond that, you can work with them to learn more about, okay, what's next? Like, what do you, what else do you want this to do? How else could it be better? So I'm getting that feedback now from my podcast product, and I'm getting a ton of positive feedback. So folks are reaching out, they're engaging with me, I'm asking them these follow up questions, and I'm getting so much helpful information.

Back through the channel and I, I'm getting that because I just straight up released my product. So I released my product. People are paying for it, people are using it, and they're sending me ideas in terms of how to make it better. This is something I've talked about quite a bit, uh, in theory. I'm using it now, obviously in practice with this example so that you can see how it works as well too, and it's also something that I want you to do.

So if you're thinking about how to leverage beta concepts for your product, this is where I think it will be great to start and where I think you'll get the most value.

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Pricing Tier Strategy For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sat, 06 May 2023 07:31:31 -0400

If you don't manage pricing tiers for your B2B SaaS correctly, it will make validating your value proposition harder and growth slower. Let's talk about if and when to introduce different pricing tiers to your B2B SaaS application.

How to launch a profitable B2B SaaS product for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how to price your product after you have a number of users and customers that have converted plus regular usage with your product. Now, one of the things that's hard to know in the beginning is what is regular usage and demand on your product ultimately going to look like.

One of the things I wanted to know to figure out how I would kind of accurately gate my free trial. Was, what did the typical usage look like during that period? So I know essentially how much I may essentially be giving away, or how aggressive I want to be in providing free value before I expect a user to convert into a paying customer.

So, Ultimately what I did was I looked at and I measured what that average usage looks like and then figured out what the cost may be range wise with a level of confidence in terms of what that's ultimately going to cost me. So now I've got an idea how much more I'm theoretically investing into converting those users into paying customers.

Cuz I'm already, I already have paid channels, which is driving those. Kind of views, impressions, and clicks to my site. I know what that costs. Now I need to figure out, once they convert into using the products, once they begin a free trial, how much are they using the product at that point? And what is that costing me to then try to get them over the next milestone, which is going from just a free trial user to a paying customer.

So if you haven't done this exercise before, figure this out by. Getting a better understanding of what average usage in your product looks like, and then attempting to add up all of the costs associated with what essentially that free trial period may be costing you based on where you draw those lines.

So how you gate, essentially the free trial, that'll give you an idea of how much more budget is being invested into attempting to convert those users into paying customers so that you can figure out where you wanna draw that line and how aggressive you want to get. Now there's a certain amount of value in.

Kind of this somewhat lost leader mentality, or investing a couple of extra bucks or whatever it may be for your product in order to try to get your users to become paying customers, um, without essentially, you know, giving away all of your budget or putting your product at risk financially. That is because first impressions are important, and if you can convert someone successfully into a paying customer, obviously they're seeing value, especially if they've used your product through a free trial.

Plus, if you have converted them, then they're essentially yours to lose, meaning that if you're driving the product in the direction that they want to go, then more than likely a solid percentage of those should remain paying customers, which is the name of the game here. So, Those are a number of things to keep in mind when you're figuring out how to price your product for success, but a more data driven way to think about it so that you're not, so that you're being responsible with the budget in terms of how you're leveraging it to try to get your users past those activation points to become recurring paying and happy customers.

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The Other Reason Your B2B SaaS Product "Doesn't Work"

Sean Boyce — Fri, 05 May 2023 07:36:24 -0400

Besides the obvious technical issues, there's a deeper meaning behind your users providing you with feedback that your product "doesn't work". Let's talk about what that might really mean and what to do about it.

How to launch of profitable B2B SaaS business for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today What I wanna talk to you about is the other reason users and customers might claim that your product quote doesn't work. Now, the first one's probably pretty obvious, and that's because it doesn't technically as in something's broken with your product. That one's probably pretty straightforward.

The other reason is that in terms of how I would interpret it, is really what they mean is that your product is too hard to use as in what they're trying to do with it. The output or the outcome they're trying to generate from it is too hard for them to figure out how to do. Now, this falls into any number of different categories, but regardless, your users and customers are gonna treat your product the same way.

Now, especially if you're starting out or launching a B2B SaaS application, you might not get this precisely right on the first try, and that's okay. What's important is for people to. Jump through the hoops to be able to use it so that you can get the feedback in terms of what doesn't work. Right. So don't immediately think that someone reporting something not working means that your product can't do it technically.

That's what I'm trying to explain is, and that may or may not be the case. More than likely it's probably not. But uh, at least if it's only a few people reporting that feedback, if it's consistent across the board and it's tons of users, then yeah, you may have a legitimate technical issue, but, The deeper meaning behind people giving you feedback about product and not working, especially on a case by case basis, is probably more than likely a usability issue.

So what you want to do in that case is you want to really figure out where people are getting stuck. Why are they giving you that feedback? How does your product work in terms of what it is they're trying to do, and why do they feel that that's suboptimal? If you can dive deeper into that and start to figure out why you can more than likely see the patterns.

Because the challenge when we're building products, especially new, and then also if you aren't in your own target market, is there's so much context to learn. Terms of bridging that transition from what I call the existing solution, or however your users and customers were solving that problem before, to getting them to ultimately using your product that you may or may not have.

And oftentimes, if you're not in that target market, as in, if you're not literally in the shoes of one of those users and going about the same type of daily routine that they are, it can be difficult to capture that feedback. That's why it's important to have tools like Hot Jar in there and other analytics tools, plus ways to capture feedback from them so that you can learn more about how they are using the product.

When you see how they're using the product, you'll see what comes intuitively for them. Then you shouldn't be looking at potentially designing around what's intuitive for you, but more than likely what's intuitive for them, because that's gonna be an easier user experience for them, better usability, and make it significantly simpler for them to get more value out of the use of your product.

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Pricing Your B2B SaaS Responsibly

Sean Boyce — Thu, 04 May 2023 07:32:04 -0400

A lot goes into pricing your B2B SaaS. Let's talk about the free trial stage and what that may be costing you so you know how to properly 'gate' it and just how much to give away to try and convince users to become paying customers.

Take my free email course on launching a profitable B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

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Maximizing The Impact Of Your Product Feedback

Sean Boyce — Wed, 03 May 2023 08:00:51 -0400

I share my preferred cost-effective tools for capturing early feedback for your B2B SaaS then what you should do with the feedback and when.

Launch your own profitable B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is want to start doing with the feedback once you start getting it. Now that usage is ramping for your B2B SaaS. So I've incorporated a couple different ways to capture feedback, and if you haven't done this yet, but you haven't active SaaS application with users actively engaging with it, you need to add a few.

That way you can start getting feedback asynchronously from their usage, good, bad, and otherwise, which will inform what you might do with the product next. Two tools that I have incorporated, both of which have been helpful and are relatively low cost or no cost, depending on how much you use them, is Hot Jar and talk Talk as in T A W K talk is a chat tool, so that'll enable folks to engage with any of your support or send you notifications if support is unavailable.

That tool is free and also has a mobile component so you can get notifications, your phone if you're out and about, which is also convenient. And then Hot Jar is an analytics tool which incorporates a bunch of different pieces of feedback, which I all find very helpful. It has screen recordings. It has heat maps.

It also has the ability to capture survey responses as well also. So I've configured both of those for my podcasting tool, and I'm starting to get feedback, starting to get good feedback. Something I've been getting more recently is related to how the tool works and what users might like to see, instead of how it works by default at the moment.

So they're looking for some advanced options. Now, one of the things that I'll caution you with here is, As you're starting to collect feedback, don't necessarily feel the need to incorporate every little feature exactly how it's requested from everyone that's submitted feedback. Instead, I would recommend engaging with them if they've given you the permission to do so, to get a little bit more clarity in how whatever they're requesting, essentially they would like it to work best, and that's number one.

The second important element here is to. Make sure that you are building around the patterns of what's being requested, as in one user may want to take the product in the left direction, and another user may wanna take the product in the right direction. Your objective is to try to find that middle ground between all of the feedback that you're getting, which gives everyone progress, as in it might not be specifically exactly what everyone individually asked for, but.

If you try to build specifically in one direction for one user, you might build the product away from the direction of what some of the other users are requesting. So you want to make sure that you avoid that. Anything that you're adding to your product experience, you want to try to do so, so that the maximum number of your users get additional value out of it.

That's a good way to build a, as I call it, a data-driven product roadmap for the future direction in which you wanna drive your product.

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Revolutionizing Video Editing with AI with Latte’s Michael Martin and Timothy Wu

Sean Boyce — Tue, 02 May 2023 17:00:00 -0400

This episode, Co-Founders of Latte Michael Martin and Timothy Wu talk about their video production software that combines AI and social media, how they grew the Latte platform so quickly, and the future of video editing technology.

Michael Martin built the world's largest student media platform with 10 million subscribers, 4 billion annual video views, and 3 million monthly web visitors. During this time he developed an understanding of community building, marketing, and how consumers think and behave.

Timothy Wu is an ex-cryptocurrency trader, lawyer, and self-taught programmer, with experience working across multiple domains and cognitive modalities.

Timothy and Michael are the Co-Founders of Latte, an online platform that makes short-form video editing effortless with AI. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Combing social media and AI.
Creating an automatic highlight extraction engine for video content.
How to choose a product's name.
How ChatGPT affected other AI companies.
Why startups need to be able to adapt quickly.
Ways to promote a product pre-launch.
How to grow a platform.
The importance of building the right type of customer base.
The future of video editing technology.

Resources:

Connecting with Michael Martin:

Connecting with Timothy Wu:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables:

11:28 - “The best way to promote podcasts possibly one of them there is to create these short engaging snippets to post on multiple social media accounts so that’s where this current version of Latte came from but we’ve since realized there’s a lot of problem with video itself and there is a lot more to be solved.”
19:27 - “They’re not going to post one video, they’re not going to use Latte post one video and then suddenly they’re viral on social they have to do it consistently over a period of weeks and months and years and this is something that’s quite hard for most creators, for the majority of creators who are just doing it for fun and just doing it for a hobby they’re just doing it for a passion and don’t want to turn it into a job and by subscribing to software that they have to pay for it becomes not aligned for why they’re doing it.”
21:43 - “The problem we’re solving was personal branding on Twitter and Linkedin and so we thought the best way to market this product was by embodying the product and so every single post we did we created with Latte itself and so we stuck to this and we made hashtag made with Latte and we teased the product before it was launched we started to hint towards things and then when it was out we were posting about it we were creating posts about Latte that were made with Latte.”
24:01 - “So creating several videos on TikTok one of them gained thirty thousand views in the space of a week and then this resulted in a spike of seven hundred users in a week which is very exciting but it led to a lot of problems people found out about the product who didn’t have the best intentions and they started essentially manipulating the product they found some vulnerability in our system and basically they were getting unlimited videos for free so we had to act quickly on that we had a very large power bill the following week.”
25:12 - “What we’ve realized from our previous founder experience and what’s the proper way to build a company is don’t kid yourself focus on the key metric which is revenue and are people going to pay for it now.”
28:07 - “A special property of early stage tech startups is that you’re always rehoning your focus at every step of the way you always receive new information from different stakeholders different parties different customer bases and you just have to try and make the best decision you can in light of imperfect information.”

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Growth Strategies Beyond Paid Ads

Sean Boyce — Tue, 02 May 2023 07:27:24 -0400

Paid ads are great for validating your B2B SaaS value proposition, but the exercise may be expensive if the PPC (pay per click) budget to compete in your industry is expensive. Let's talk an alternative growth strategy that also works really well and will cost you a lot less.

Free email course on how to launch a profitable B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today, one I want to talk to you about are growth strategies for your B2B SaaS that goes beyond paid advertising. Now, I talk a lot about Google search ads, and I like it for various reasons. Number one, it's quick and easy to determine its cost effectiveness and enables you to relatively easily figure out whether or not your value proposition has strength.

Now, having said that, it may not always be cost effective given. The particular industry or product that you're building. This is why I'm such an advocate for doing that research up front before you build, before you decide where you want to build. As I mentioned in a previous episode, I'm now building a new B2B SaaS or working on one that is very competitive.

The industry that it's in, people are just throwing money at. Ads in order to kind of get traffic in that way. As such, if I went to try to compete with them, they would easily crush me or more realistically kind of just drown me out. So I'm not gonna go head to head there. But what may make more sense are a few other options, and this is where it really is important for you to dive deep into who your customer is, who the buyer is.

Understanding those personas, really understanding their industry, the problems that they experience, how they go about solving them. Because it starts to help you understand how they think, where they go, what they do. And depending on the questions that you may ask them, you can learn even more about that as well.

You can figure out other ways to connect with them as an audience, because at the end of the day, what you're trying to do is get your product in front of them to see whether or not they have value for it. So other options here, if paid advertising isn't where you want to begin. It could include any number of options.

The other two primary ones that I leverage is call email. Still that can work if you do it really well. And SEL search engine optimization. I typically think of SEO as basically the organic version of the paid ads. So in the beginning, your domain doesn't have authority, so you're investing in paid advertisement to try to get.

The right eyeballs on your landing page to see how well it's converting. Now, if the budget there makes sense, Aspen, assuming you wanna spend relatively conservatively, then that as an option will work. However, if it doesn't, something like an investment in SEO will ultimately provide you with essentially free organic traffic if you're able to climb those search rankings.

But getting there isn't free and it can take a while. So it's a kind of a different approach. If you've ever heard the kind of hunting versus farming analogy, I would apply kind of the hunting analogy or the hunting version to the ads option and the farming one to seo. But doing them both, uh, can be really powerful.

Doing either out of the gate can work, it's just they're not necessarily gonna have the same level of effectiveness. One's got a longer tail, and that would be the SEO option. And this is where cold email comes in, because I think this is another good, relatively quick. But, uh, can be a cost effective way to determine whether or not the product that you're working on has, is ultimately gonna be cost effective.

You can leverage a number of different platforms to work up. A sequence of messaging that can be more personalized than most people send. That is a really critical factor in the success of leveraging this as a tactic, because most people are sending largely generic messages, but the more customized yours are, the more specifically are to the needs of your target market, the better you're gonna be able to do in terms of performance, and then ultimately measuring the strength of your value proposition, and you'll likely be able to do that.

Much more cost effectively. That's more than likely what I'm gonna do In this case, I'm gonna leverage one or both of those other strategies for now so that I can get the information that I need without having to burn through a crazy budget in order to try to make ads work. Because the PPC for the industry that I'm targeting now, it's just astronomical.

It's like really expensive. So anyway, I wanted to share with you other growth strategies beyond paid advertising because there's plenty.

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Why Keyword Research Is SO Important

Sean Boyce — Mon, 01 May 2023 07:41:32 -0400

If you've been following along, you know I've been building B2B SaaS tools for podcasting agencies. I'm now researching other industries which just so happens to include legal. Based on my research, there is a BIG difference in the keyword research data comparing those two industries. Let's talk about why this is such important information for you to know BEFORE you consider building.

Launch your own B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is why something like keyword research before you go too deep or at least down the path of potentially building your B2B SaaS is so important. Now, we all need a channel in order to determine whether or not we can drive traffic to our landing pages.

We can convert prospects into paying customers. That's critically important for us to be able to grow successfully our B2B SaaS product and business. Now, one of the ways that I've been leaning into pretty aggressively is keyword research and Google search ads. I've been able to use that to validate whether or not the B2B SaaS concepts that I'm considering pursuing have strong enough value propositions to succeed at scale, and it's worked very well thus far.

Now, the reason why I'm mentioning that the keyword research before you go too far down that road for whatever problem you may wanna solve with the SaaS product. Is so important cuz if that's gonna be one of your primary channels, that's gonna be a really effective way for you to determine how cost effectively you can perform.

Essentially that test, as in how cost effectively does that channel perform, the ability to convert prospects into paying customers and et cetera. Now, the reason why I mentioned this is I'm evaluating bringing another B2B SaaS product to market, and this one would be for the legal industry at the moment.

Now, one huge difference between what I've been working on, which is podcasting tools versus potentially solving a problem in the legal industry is the keyword research, the PPC range for what you might pay for your traffic based on key phrases and words. It's significantly higher for the legal industry than it is for someone who has interest in podcasting.

I'm talking about an a magnitude of a hundred x as in, you know, it might be a couple of dollars per click for something related to podcasting, but it may be over a hundred dollars, sometimes up to $200 per click in the legal industry, which is a pretty dramatic change. So now, whereas the tools in the legal industry oftentimes are more expensive, You know, depending on where you're getting started, if you're trying to validate a concept using Google search ads and expecting to leverage advertisement, at least Google search advertisement, in order to be able to do that, you're gonna have to have a ridiculous amount of budget available in order to generate that traffic.

So that's another reason why I say it's so important to perform this research upfront because it really starts to get. Take shape, uh, at least in terms of what the financial perspective might look like in terms of you trying to build a business that specifically solves whatever problem you're considering.

So perform it either way, whether or not you're planning on using it, because it's good insight into what your economics ultimately might be in order to be able to compete in that industry.

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Tracking the Market After Launch

Sean Boyce — Sun, 30 Apr 2023 10:57:38 -0400

Once your product is live, you are likely to hear more about other products on the market that are competitive to yours. Let's talk about when and how to track what they are doing as well that can help you succeed.

Free email course on how to launch a profitable B2B SaaS for less than $750 - https://nxtstep.io/b2bsaas

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how to keep track of the market, in particular, the competitive options that your customers may also be interested in, similar to what it is that you're doing with your B2B SaaS. Now I'm talking about competition, obviously, but. From the perspective of where you should be when you're thinking about this.

My recommendation would be after you've launched your product, after you know you can turn cost, you can turn prospects into paying customers, you know that they're getting value outta the product, you're seeing some consistent usage. Those are all good metrics to make sure that you get past first. Once you've done that, then you're gonna wanna also know more about what the rest of the market looks like.

Because it's not just where you start, it's also where your product may go. How do you make sure that you continue to make it better? Now, you can do that by engaging with your customer base, and that's always primary because they will tell you what they need next or what else could stand to provide them with more value.

And you should be looking for ways to gather that information as frequently as you can via chat or. Email communication or whatever, right? Provide your customers with the ability to provide you with feedback. At the moment, I'm using Hot Jar to collect survey data on different pages throughout the experience.

That is my B2B SaaS application for podcasting. Now, the other element is what else is going on in the market? You need to track that as well. That's the threat of new in the Porter's five Forces model. So if you're keeping track of this as well, And you're just Googling random stuff that might be related to what your prospects and potential customers may also be looking for.

You're going to probably learn more about other options on the market, other products, and there's a lot that can be learned from doing a little bit of homework here as well too. Now, I don't want you to obsess, and I also don't want you to freak out. If it looks like someone else is doing something similar to what you're doing, I found probably a half dozen of these already that started right around the same time I did with my podcast show notes tool.

Now, that is largely a good thing, right? Competition helps us educate the market. It also indicates that there is a market, so all of those are positive signs. Now, When you're doing this homework, I want you to learn a little bit more about a couple of things, right? Who are they selling to? How are they positioning what their product is and what it can do?

What can their product do? What are they priced at? What is the experience like to gain access to the product? And if they've got a free trial, even if it's paid, you may want to take a spin. Take it for a spin yourself to see what you can't learn about how their product experience works, right? There's so much to be learned about this from the perspective of.

Where your product fits into the market, right? And how you may position yourself. Cuz we're always looking for unique angles and areas of opportunity to improve all of those categories that I just mentioned. So do this homework as well. Also see what kind of buzz is being created in different circles, but don't, again, obsess over this.

This isn't something to spend every day on. This is more like a. Every couple weeks things. This might be a once a month thing, once a quarter thing where you dive deep and see like what's going on in the greater landscape. But when someone mentions a name to you, especially as you're circulating the B2B SaaS product, you're building and growing.

And it's somewhat related to what it is you're doing. Someone may be aware of another tool. Keep track of that so that you can keep track of them a little bit over time as well too. And there's other automations that you can set up, like Google alerts if you wanna learn a little bit more, or if their name pops into the news and that can send you email inbox kind of notifications when they potentially change something or launch something new or whatever.

But either way, there's a ton to be learned from here as well too, right? Where are they and what direction are they heading? That can help you define essentially where you want to go as well too.

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Be Careful To NOT Chase Their Dreams

Sean Boyce — Sat, 29 Apr 2023 12:30:26 -0400

When interviewing potential future customers, it's easy for them to get sucked into all kinds of magical capabilities of tools like AI. It's your job to avoid chasing dreams and instead to stay focused on the top problem worth solving.

Free B2B SaaS Launch Course - https://nxtstep.io/b2b-saas-course/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is not chasing the supposed magic that AI is, or at least that everyone still thinks that AI is. Now, I'm doing interviews at the moment, still performing a lot of discovery and research to look for new opportunities to build B2B SaaS applications around with my new favorite tool, that being artificial intelligence, at least the tools made available and widely available these days from companies like Open ai.

Now more than ever, we're able to build stuff that is ridiculously capable and very, very quickly. So that presents a lot of opportunity. As such, you may be as excited as I am to just divide and conquer and find all the problems you can and ship as many toll as possible. Now, that sounds great and exciting.

One of the challenges with that is still everyone's perception of what AI is. Now, if you were. Excited about pursuing strategies like that. I don't want to discourage you. What I want to do is I wanna encourage you and in the right way, I want you to, while you're performing your discovery, make sure that you're not falling into the trap of chasing the dream in terms of who you're interviewing.

It's like where you're performing that discovery. Now I'm looking at a number of different industries, and with some of the interviews that I've done just yesterday as I was conducting the interview, I was learning about the problems worth solving and. I had uncovered one and a solid one at that. So largely the interview was complete from my perspective, as in I got what I needed.

I know that there's a painful problem. That's a great option that can be solved by an AI tool that I could build a SaaS application around. The challenge, however, is it's easy to. Continue to go deeper, to continue searching even after you've found a great problem we're solving. And what I mean by that is, as you're interviewing folks, they might just assume that AI can perform magic, which now, don't get me wrong, the tools are very impressive these days, but there's, it's still not magic.

Like there's still logic and routine and all that kind of stuff too, what those tools can do. The problem that I'm getting at is in the interview, The subject that I was researching or performing the discovery with, they continued to come up with quote unquote new ideas for what the toll that I may be building can ultimately do.

And that's the risk. That's what I want you to be conscious of, because in these conversations, people may be coming up with all kinds of ideas. Now, they may be enthusiastic, and I don't want to be discouraging to you or to them, but I wanna make sure that you're focusing on. Again, the problem we're solving and the ideal problem we're solving.

So if you've found a solid one, which I have, move forward with that. First, be careful not to fall into this trap of basically just solving more and more problems all at the same time, or trying to perform some form of magic and produce significantly more features than you really need to in order to get started in these discovery interviews.

It's easy for people to get excited about the capabilities of ai, but. They don't know typically as much as we do about what they can realistically do. And more importantly, they're also typically not as honest with themselves, at least in those moments about what they can realistically handle, as in they may wanna skip all the steps and just automate the whole thing, or think that that's what they want.

But in reality, I've tried to provide products like those, and more often than not, they fail. Why? Because people aren't ready for them. They're not ready to skip all kinds of steps. They're ready for their most painful, most time-consuming step to go away because they've been dealing with that forever. So if you can build your tool around solving that problem, which sounds much more along the criteria that I've set and talk about extensively around problems or solving, that is still the best place to start.

You could continue to. Allow those conversations to move forward and talk about cool ideas and all that kind of stuff, and who knows? Maybe that's future material that can go on your roadmap as in where the product may go from here. But don't skip the best problem we're solving that you've identified, especially if it's relatively straightforward.

That's a great place to start, right? Software cannot be too easy to use, especially if you are working with industries that are not as familiar with some of these concepts like ai.

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Share Your B2B SaaS Story With Your Users

Sean Boyce — Fri, 28 Apr 2023 08:16:36 -0400

While your building and scaling your B2B SaaS, it's always best to communicate these details and updates with your users. I'll walk you through how I do this strategically and technically plus the value I receive from investing this time.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is telling your B2B SaaS story along the way with your users. Now, that's a different way, essentially to describe email marketing, but what I'm trying to share with you is that you wanna bring your users along for the ride as your B2B SaaS product is evolving, cuz you want to try to establish a relationship with them early and often.

And get feedback from them whenever you can in terms of what it is you're building, or even better, what you should build next, cuz it will further extend what your tool is capable of doing in terms of solving their problem or making their lives easier. That makes your products stickier. That also may help you better understand are there areas of opportunity to capture more value, provide them with more value, which enables you to potentially build new tiers or generate more revenue.

Now, I've done this more recently with my podcasting tool and I've come up with a lot of great ideas. Initially, I started out by solving a problem related to converting the most common input to the most commonly requested output, which was a great place to start. So that enabled me to generate. A flood of traffic, which meant new users, which meant paying customers.

That was the milestone I was trying to achieve first. But now that I have, what I'm looking to do is how do I potentially extend the capabilities of what the tool can already do? How can I take that and how can I provide more value? And I've come up with a number of different other outputs, which would be relatively straightforward changes for me to make on the value proposition side, but I could provide the user base and my target market with potentially a lot more value.

So I'm refining those ideas now, but it all began with interacting with them and sharing the story along the way. Even if they aren't responding to you, it will help you formalize your thought process in terms of what you're sharing with them and where you might go next. So the way that I've set this up technically is when users are converted in Stripe, which is the payment gateway that I'm using to manage those emails are being sent to my email management platform with the moment is MailChimp.

And then that enables me to communicate with my users in terms of any updates that I want to share, new features that have been shipped. Anything else that's going on with the product so I can keep them all in tune. And as well, I'm regularly requesting feedback from the specific messages that I'm sending to them, which I might send once a week, several times a week, maybe one every other week.

Either way, I'm making sure that they're receiving communication along the way, which is helping them understand how the product is evolving and the fact that I want their input to learn more about what else the product can do to make their lives better.

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Campaign Optimization - Hammering Negative Keywords

Sean Boyce — Thu, 27 Apr 2023 07:35:13 -0400

When you launch a Google search ads campaign that's going to rank for not just your keyword or phrase but options like it as well. Some of them won't be relevant to your B2B SaaS. Let's discuss how to further optimize your campaign to solve this problem with something called negative keywords.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is further optimizing your Google search ad campaigns with respect to negative keywords. Now, as I've mentioned before, I like Google search ads for attempting to validate as much as you can about your unique value proposition for your B2B SaaS, especially in the early days.

It is a relatively quick and cost effective way to see whether or not. You can cost effectively convert impressions to clicks to users and to customers. If you're able to do that and you're able to do that in a way that produces a positive return or even enables you to break even maybe on your first or second month's, uh, volume of revenue, then you've got great traction.

And this can be positive momentum that you need in order to continue to grow and scale from here. It also set you up further than down the road to invest in. Content marketing and a whole bunch of other things that we're gonna talk about as well. But for today's episode, I want to talk about negative keywords.

Now, when I say negative keywords, what I mean is. After you set up a search campaign, what that's ultimately gonna do is gonna require you to pick a keyword word or phrase. But you're also gonna rank for other combinations that are similarly related to that keyword word or phrase. But not all of them are gonna be relevant, and this is where negative keywords come into play.

So, for example, for my podcast show notes tool, that's what I wanna rank for. I wanna rank for people looking for. Help creating show notes. What I don't wanna rank for is people are looking for help starting a podcast because it's not what my tool does, it doesn't provide any value for those folks. So B, before I created essentially my negative keyword list in Google search ads, I was.

Ultimately getting traffic to my site, that was not as accurate as it could be. I was, people were finding me, I was getting impressions and sometimes even clicks, but that of which I was paying for related to that traffic in terms of what they were searching for, which isn't relevant to my tool, was something that was zapping my budget.

So it was something that I was paying for, but I was never gonna get. Any results out of that? Definitely more than likely no usage or revenue. Once those people wound up on my site or saw my ad and didn't click on it, uh, saw my site and realized that the tool doesn't do anything for them. That is wasted budget.

So in order to optimize this, what you wanna do is you wanna hammer your negative keywords. And what I mean by that is you want to create a list of negative keywords that you want to continually update as you are going in there and and monitoring your ad campaign in terms of how well it's performing, to make sure that you're not ranking for any keywords that are not relevant to whatever it is your tool does.

Now this is gonna happen automatically, so you need to continually. Monitor to make sure that you're not falling into this trap as well too, because it's going to zap your budget and it's only gonna be sending you bad traffic that you're gonna have to pay for. So make sure you do your research on negative keywords and that you maintain that as you're looking to further optimize your campaign, especially if this is one of your more effective channels, uh, and in the beginning when you're trying to ultimately validate that unique value proposition.

This traffic could be really important because the more you optimize it, the the better it's gonna perform.

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How to Start Thinking About Scaling Your B2B SaaS Operation

Sean Boyce — Wed, 26 Apr 2023 07:52:17 -0400

As your B2B SaaS product begins to scale so will the work required to maintain the momentum. I want to walk you through my through process and a few strategies I use to measure the balance I'm currently managing and where I may need help next to ensure it remains in balance.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is how to be thinking about growing and scaling your B2B SaaS operation as your product continues to go deeper into product market fit. Now, I talk a lot about the early stage of figuring out the problem that you're going to be solving, how you're going to be solving it, but don't you start to gain some of that traction.

And I've got a product that's in that phase at the moment, you wanna be thinking about how you want to scale that operation from the perspective of. A, what it is that you want to be doing, and B, essentially what it is that you don't. Now, as you continue to grow and scale, there's gonna be more demand on each of the respective areas that it's gonna be required in order to continue to maintain your operation.

And that could be anything from sales, support, marketing, engineering, et cetera, and management, which is probably what you're doing most of the time at the moment. Now, you may have one or more team members already helping you, but if you are trying to figure out. At what point you should be adding more?

Good way to be thinking about that is as you start to feel like you're unable to continue to do more working on the business versus working in the business, then you want to try to reset that balance. So if you're doing a lot more of the busy work, but it isn't as much from a strategic perspective and it's not moving the needle as in it's just maintaining, you're gonna want to get yourself some of that time back.

So, Look for and understand where the bottlenecks are in your internal process. Just like we do when we're looking for problems we're solving with our target market customers, we're trying to figure out where's their critical path, which one is the bottleneck? Repeat the same process for your own operation.

Try to find out which of the steps or the roles that you're playing at the moment is consuming a significant portion of your time. Especially if it's something that you don't necessarily want to do or something that isn't particularly complicated or hard to do, and it's something you could probably get help for sooner rather than later.

And I have a tendency to think about this in three different phases as well. From the bottom up, from anywhere, from admin or administrative work at the first level, operations on the second, and then business development, sales, marketing, those types of things are the third. From the lowest level to the highest level for me historically, has been the opportunity to be able to delegate those rather successfully with less effort.

Now, your mileage may vary of course, but that's typically how I think about it. So some of the stuff on the earlier side that I look to do, uh, it, for example, as my B2B SaaS product starts growing and scaling. Is if the support channel starts to become particularly active and I start to get quite a bit of messages or feedback maybe about bugs, feature requests, whatever is, that starts to become something that I have essentially developed a routine or a process for that I could train someone else up on managing for me, perhaps even part-time in the beginning.

That might be something I look for sooner rather than later to give myself that time back. I wanna make sure that I. Develop the process or the procedure that I want someone to follow to make sure that I'm still maintaining the insight that's coming in from that channel because it's still valuable information, but a number of the steps, or the majority of the time, I don't necessarily need to do myself.

So I'm gonna look for somebody that can help me with that. And then you'll want to continue to repeat this process as you're growing and scaling to make sure that you are maintaining a good balance of that opportunity for you to work in the business versus the opportunity for you to work on the business.

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Pricing Your SaaS B2B Product - Tips and Best Practices with Check’s Jacob Jolibois

Sean Boyce — Tue, 25 Apr 2023 17:00:00 -0400

This episode, Co-Founder of Check Jacob Jolibois talks about building trust with B2B businesses, the importance of properly understanding pricing, and how to price a SaaS B2B product.

Jacob is the co-founder and Chief of Product at Check, an early-stage SaaS company helping home service operators streamline and automate their business.

Jacob brings together the business, technical, and customer objectives to build a product Operators love to use, improving the quality of life for them and their users.

Jacob has spoken on stages around the world from TEDx to Web Summit, the world’s largest tech conference, bringing awareness to the power and impact of design. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How to build trust with B2B businesses.
The benefits of a sales-led approach.
The best way to communicate with your clients.
How to price a SaaS B2B product.
The scaleability of sales teams.
How to understand pricing.
The process of creating a successful newsletter.
The benefits of writing a newsletter.

Resources:

Connecting with Jacob Jolibois:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables:

03:35 - “You’re inserting yourself into the core of their business in a way that is incredibly dangerous if you do it wrong because you can screw up a lot of things in their business and so you have to build trust there and marketing is a slower way to build trust than direct sales, when you build that relationship it changes the game.”
05:30 - “You’re not charging enough for the value you provide these people are relying on you to run their business you provide extreme value there charge what you’re worth if you’re not charging what you’re worth it’s going to have a long hard road ahead.”
11:10 - “A lot of Founders have the tendency to underprice and the reason is it’s scary to hear no and so you want to make it a no-brainer yes and so you will classically undercharge, what the experts will tell you if you start talking to folks who have been there and gotten the t-shirt is when you raise your prices you're raising the perceived value of your product as well and so oftentimes your conversion rates go up your loyalty goes up your retention it really does craft a different message.”
16:33 - “You should be trying something every quarter, if you’re not adjusting pricing or adjusting packages or adjusting the frequency of charging whether it’s per month, per year, quarterly whatever then you’re not experimenting enough because you’ve got to dial it in over time you’re not going to get it right out of the gate.”
1:39 - “I started a newsletter called Making Product Sense and I write to about 3000 readers from basically every tech company you can imagine and try to break down learnings from building products and companies from some of the folks who do it best.”

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When to Create New Tiers for Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Tue, 25 Apr 2023 07:50:16 -0400

Creating new tiers for your B2B SaaS can offer your customers new valuable options and create more revenue generating opportunities for your business. However, I want to talk about when the time is right to do this and it isn't typically right out of the gate.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is when it's time to introduce additional tiers or options that are priced differently into your B2B SaaS application. Now, I've talked a bit about when you're getting started and you're launching your B2B SaaS and keeping things simple.

I still think that's very important. If you reduce the number of options that your customers have to choose from, it means they're gonna move through your activation points faster. Something I always refer back to are examples of products, and I usually use D two C or products that are even simpler to visualize outside of the SaaS world, just for illustration purposes only.

But if you're familiar with the mattress company, Casper, When they first launched that product and they were selling over the web D toc, which enabled you to skip going to the mattress store, when it was time to pick something new out, they launched with one product. They only had one mattress, which meant that.

Your selection anxiety just disappeared immediately because you only have one option. I still feel like that is the best way to launch a B2B SaaS application, as in there's one price for one product. You don't need to worry about which options do I choose yet, because in the beginning, what you're trying to validate is whether or not they want to buy it at all.

Are they gonna take the next step? Go from learning about what your product supposedly can do and how it can help them to actually using it and then paying for it. Now, if you've gotten past that point, you might be thinking, okay, well at some point, do I add new tiers with new options, and are they priced differently?

That answer can certainly be yes, if you're having the kind of success that you were looking for with that original approach. By all means, feel free to continue with that because you can continue to be successful leveraging that. But if you start to get feedback from your users in terms of. What else they want, what they're looking for in terms of additional features that potentially speaks to new opportunities, specifically in this area.

So that's where I'm at with my podcasting product at the moment. Starting to get feedback about what else the tool can also do. Right now it's just creating show notes. But what if it could help us writing articles or writing e emails or social media posts or whatever, right? So I'm gonna be working on extending the capabilities of that product.

But as I'm doing that, that's expected to be providing my customers with more value, and I'm looking to capture some of that value as well. So for the product that's going to go beyond what the initial set of features included, I'm looking to be creating new tiers for enabling them to elect some of those additional options as well.

Also, which is gonna continue to maximize both the revenue and the profit. Potential that my product is gonna be capable of generating, but I didn't do that before. I had verified that people are going to be actively using, actively paying for, and actively getting value out of my product. That is an all important first step.

And the more you complicate that or make that confusing, the harder it is gonna be to verify that. So I think this is a really important sequential step, and once you get past the sequential step, that's how I'd recommend you thinking about expanding from there into new tiers that could also create additional revenue and profitability opportunities for your B2B SaaS.

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Protecting Your B2B SaaS Against the AI Moat Problem

Sean Boyce — Mon, 24 Apr 2023 07:21:49 -0400

AI has lowered the bar to entry into markets meaning more competition for your customers. This has the potential to cannibalize the market.

How should you respond? Let's discuss.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is something that I've been referring to as the AI mote problem. Now, if you've heard me share any of this terminology before, you probably have an idea of what I'm about to say, but what it is, is more context around how you should be thinking about strengthening your value proposition for your B2B SaaS, given the remarkable capabilities of the AI tools which are arising.

Very quickly in popularity and their capabilities in terms of enabling people to be able to do significantly more with their SaaS applications much faster and more cost effectively. Now, before we had access to these tools, converting inputs to outputs generating remarkable outcomes may have required significantly more coding, solution design, engineering, innovating.

The challenge with these tools, the good and the bad is that they're capable of remarkable things, and they can do that relatively quickly. So you can plug in an AI tool into almost any component or feature in your product and make it better, if not significantly better, not just much more quickly, but also more cost effectively.

Now, that has raised the bar for what all of our tools need to be capable of in order to compete successfully within our respective markets, but at the same time, That has also lowered the bar to entry into creating a product that is more capable faster and more cost effectively. So that raises the competition is really what I'm trying to say.

Different way to say it is what I started this episode by saying is it's a moat problem, as in AI has created a potential scenario where there's no moat around what it is you want to build because potentially what you've built, leveraging AI is something someone else can. Probably just as quickly cost, effectively, easily, all that kind of stuff.

So if it hasn't taken you very long to build whatever you were leveraging with the AI technologies, then more than likely someone else is either working on it or maybe working on that relatively soon. So I wanna talk about what you do if you find yourself in a situation like this. Well, it all depends on the problem that you're trying to solve, right?

We always go back to that. It essentially d. Everything or the, the most that it can for any individual B2B SaaS application project. The problem that you're solving is also going to help you with defensibility, that key element which will prevent potentially more people from cannibalizing the target market in your space.

Because you've selected a particular problem, perhaps in a niche or in a horizontal that is, doesn't have as. Competition for that target market. Now, you can always go more niche and you can always find a subset of a subset. To continue to make your tool more specialized and to dive deeper into whatever target market it is you're competing.

That's always going to be preferential and helpful, and is always gonna be probably the most effective strategy to increase the defensibility of what it is that you're building. The other thing that does is it enables you to benefit from, you know, the expert scenario as in where the you, the more you are specialized.

The more that is typically in demand, as in think of it from the perspective of if you have to have a knee operation, right? Who do you want to work on your knee? Do you want the generalist who works on basically all potential health related problems? Or do you want the specialist, somebody who only works on repairing knees?

Right? That's a pretty easy way to think about that. The other benefit to that is, number one, there's typically less specialists. Also makes supply a little bit harder to come by. Uh, at the same time, because they're so specialized and in demand when they, that problem is out there and needs to be solved by someone in their target market, that also raises the prices for what it costs to acquire their services.

And you'll stand to benefit from those same elements as well. So if you're concerned about the AI mode problem, it's real. I've seen it and I'm continuing to see it, and we're gonna talk more. These types of strategies that you can lever to leverage to go deeper into your respective niche to increase the defensibility for your B2B SaaS.

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Add AI as a Team Member to Your B2B SaaS Business

Sean Boyce — Sun, 23 Apr 2023 08:49:01 -0400

Everyone is thinking of leveraging AI as an internal component of their B2B SaaS, but you can and should take it way beyond that. AI can help you build your B2B SaaS business. In this episode I talk more about how.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to talk to you about is the other side of how AI can help you succeed in B2B SaaS. Now, I've talked quite a bit about how AI these days enable you to do significantly more, much faster, which enables you to provide a stronger value proposition and the dynamics of that.

If you haven't listened to that episode, go back and listen on one yesterday cuz it will walk you through some of those elements. But what I want to talk to you about today is the other opportunity. That AI has for you in terms of helping you build and get better at succeeding in B2B SaaS? Now, where I am at, I launched a B2B SaaS product in the first quarter of 2023.

And I'm planning to launch at least two in the second quarter of 2023, which demonstrates just how far we can move and how quickly, but also an acceleration of progress. So what I want to be able to do is working with a few members on my team is not just launch valuable B2B SaaS products, get better at it along the way, and also get faster.

And that's what I want to talk about in terms of how AI can help you. Now, I've already been using tools like Chat G P T to help me create better content, right? Gimme a story relevant to this or that, or whatever story I'm trying to tell is find me a good case study cuz those examples are really helpful.

I found ChatGPT to be very helpful for that. Oftentimes, and I've read so many case studies on different B2B SaaS companies that have been successful and unsuccessful, and I try to bring those to you as antidotes, but I don't always remember the names cause there's so many. I remember the stories largely relatively vividly, but sometimes I forget the name of the company or when it happened or whatever.

So really helpful for from that perspective, but it goes way beyond. Tools like Chat, G B T these days can help you with all of the components of the process of designing, building, launching, and then succeeding with B2B SaaS, all the way from finding those problems we're solving or helping you find those problems we're solving to and through building the actual application.

And we've been experimenting with that with great results so far. Now a step in between, which I'll talk about as well, is when you are figuring out the positioning and how you're going to market your unique value proposition for the problem that you wish to solve. To your target market or your icp, your ideal customer profile, your AI tools can be very helpful in this regard as well, too.

Everything from how to workshop that, how to say it, giving you ideas, not necessarily copy paste, but giving you the inspiration to figure out, how do I articulate this? I've got all these pieces. How do I put 'em together in the right way? All the way to and through even the code that you can essentially eventually copy and paste or whatever.

Add to the website that you wanna stand up. So your landing page, which is going to communicate that value proposition to the target market, the AI tools can help you with that. Then when you get to building, you can now relatively easily and quickly get code that works perfectly fine for your, for your product from these AI tools by asking.

And input to be translated to an output. So you can build B2B SaaS applications piecemeal. Now, by getting those components, or as I like to refer to them, Lego pieces from the AI tools, by prompting it or asking those tools what it is that you need. Think of it like building a building, but. Modular fashion.

So with like Lego pieces, each piece goes into a certain spot and enables you to build modular home much more. And that can be much more flexible and agile, but also faster. And that's the key. It's really the speed because a lot of the stuff that we're doing in B2B SASS is reinventing the wheel.

Everyone's building like an off module and a dashboard and all this kind of stuff, a payment gateway, et cetera, and wiring all that stuff up is not. The, that's not what's gonna make your product unique, right? What's gonna make your product unique is how. You are uniquely solving the problem worth solving for your target market, and those are the internals.

Everything else should essentially be done as quickly as possible, and there's pretty much universal standards at this point in terms of what people have come to expect from an experience perspective. So anyway, the point of this episode is to go beyond just thinking of using AI for the internals of what your product can do.

Leverage AI to actually help you build or go from your idea stage all the way to and through launching your actual product.

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AI is Low-Hanging Fruit for B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sat, 22 Apr 2023 08:21:08 -0400

AI gives B2B SaaS founders the ability to do SO much SO quickly. I want to talk about why this is good and bad plus how you should be thinking about building your SaaS to be defensible.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how AI is the lowest hanging fruit opportunity at the moment in B2B SaaS. Now, I've talked about this. I've recorded episodes on it and I've written about it. AI is capable of doing way more, way faster. Right now, the tools that are out there and available will enable you to create experiences that took previously significantly longer and way more capital to produce.

That's a good thing in one regard, in that it lowers the bar in terms of how hard it is for you to create a more powerful experience. So to do more with your B2B SaaS application. However, the challenging thing there is, it's easier for everybody else as well. So you need to strike a balance here in that you need to figure out how to make sure that your value proposition is strong enough to be defense.

But capable enough to provide your target market with enough value. Having said that, I believe AI is still the biggest opportunity for all B2B SaaS applications out there, ones that have grown and scaled to epic levels like HubSpot, and ones that are brand new people that are working on iterating and bringing new products to market.

Now, I'm probably gonna be producing quite a bit more content on this topic because I'm leveraging AI extensively. Uh, in certain instances, and this is something I had traditionally not done, I'm almost looking for applications to use AI from the start, but in reality, what I'm doing is I'm still starting with those problems, and what I'm doing is I'm looking for how AI might make our ability to create a value proposition to solve the biggest problem we're solving for our target.

Faster, more cost effective, easier to use, all of those types of things. And AI is capable in all of those ways. I've got a laundry list. I mean, I typically always do, but I've got a solid list of products with real potential that are in my backlog, several of which I'm gonna be releasing over the remainder of this year, and I'm gonna be bringing those updates to you as we converse over the podcast.

What I want you to take away from the message from this episode is that if you aren't taking a closer look at its capabilities, you really need to be, you need to check out all of the AI tools out there. You know, start with Open AI's Chat, G P T. That's a great place to get started and then extend into some of the others as well.

Also, figure out of the tools that are out. Whether you're going direct to the key component, like the one I just mentioned, or you're gonna be building off of APIs that are also leveraging AI tools, right? Because in the end, what really matters to your target market is how easily conveniently cost effectively, consistently are you solving their biggest problem, right?

They're not really gonna care all that much about the internals of your product. What people are really looking for is, can you. Whatever I have as an input and produce whatever I need as an output that enables them to achieve the outcome that they're looking for. And if you can help them make those outcomes more successful, they're gonna credit you with all of that value and that's gonna be worth something to them.

Now, how much that's precisely worth and what you should charge for access to it, that depends on your target market, the problem, the impact, the cost. And we're gonna talk about all that stuff in greater detail as well too. But I want you to start explor. AI in terms of what it can do to level up the capabilities of your B2B SaaS application.

And you need to make sure you strike a fine balance between not just doing something that almost anyone can do with AI so that your, whatever it is you're building into your product is defensible. Um, but understanding that these tools are more powerful now than ever, and they can help you move a lot further, a lot faster.

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How AI Can Help Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Fri, 21 Apr 2023 08:02:11 -0400

The AI world is vast and changing rapidly. While that world is figuring itself out, I'd like to share with you what I think are the biggest strengths of AI at the moment to help you succeed in B2B SaaS.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is what I think is the best opportunity for leveraging AI to enable you to be more successful with B2B SaaS. Now, there's so much changing so quickly in the world that is AI these days that it'd be impossible to cover all of it, but what I'm trying to help you prevent is freaking out based on how much is changing and how quickly.

Worrying tremendously about how disruptive it's going to be to our way of life and eliminating jobs and all that kind of stuff. This is, I've been, you know, I'm old enough, fortunately, unfortunately, to have been through a number of different technical revolutions, like the early days of the internet and how dramatically that was changing everything.

But the long and short of it is new technology. Is invented inevitably. And that changes things typically for the better. But for the most part, the people that have a more difficult time with it are those that fight it. Uh, and the people that typically have a better time with it are those that learn it and understand how to leverage it.

Right? How, how can it make your life better? How can it help you with whatever you're trying to do? I think that's the mentality to be in yet. So having been through that a few times, that's always worked out pretty well for me, and I encourage you to do the same. But what I really want to talk about is where I think the strengths are in terms of where AI is at the moment.

Now, much like other technology we've seen in recent years, like blockchain for example, it is still kind of being figured out in terms of where it's going to land and. How it fits into the ecosystem, right? But it is definitely one of the more disruptive ones, if not the most disruptive one that I've seen because of its significant capabilities.

However, having said that, until we really have a better understanding and where it's going to land and how most people are leveraging it, I wanna share with you how I am leveraging it for the most part thus far. And that's really to create what I'd consider to be different types of transformations or conversions.

You can think of it as. As in you have something in one format and you need it in another, and the AI tools thus far seem to be great for helping you figure out how to do that. Now, one of the tools that I've been working on, that I've told you about a few times already is I have a podcasting agency and we have bottlenecks.

In that process, I created a tool to help you. Automatically get show notes in a couple of minutes from a recorded episode. You don't need to edit the file at all. You could just upload the audio file and then in a few minutes after you press the button and let it go. It produces show notes, which comes with titles and descriptions and all that kind of stuff.

I'm using AI to do something like that, that I think is a good example of. Input, taking an input and creating an output, right? Which before I had to have team members do, I had to have folks listen to the episode. I had to have folks write them. I had to have folks edit them. Right now, I've essentially automated almost that entire step, which is pretty remarkable.

So what I'd encourage you to do is think about it in this way, as in, I think one of the bigger strengths for the AI tools at the moment is being able to, Take your inputs and create the output that you're looking for in a particular step in the process for whatever it is you're trying to do. I would start by experimenting there because it's a limited scope, enables you to figure out your variables, get clear on what the tran type of transformation you're trying to make, and then figure out how to fit the AI tools into the picture to evaluate whether or not they could do a better job than however you're doing that step today.

And if they can, you just might look to incorporate that into your.

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Fake It Until You Make It Is BS

Sean Boyce — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 07:31:06 -0400

Companies like Theranos have shown that 'fake it till you make it' is all BS. Still, there are too many people that feel this strategy has merit. I want to tear it apart by breaking down why it doesn't work. We'll also talk about what you should do instead.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is the ill faded strategy that is typically making the rounds, at least somewhere in the business world of the so-called fake it till you make it approach. Now, I pretty much hate everything about this yet in business and especially in tech or software and sas, it's always making the rounds because there's always a group of people out there trying to vy for unicorn.

They want to be the billion dollar company. They want to be the next big thing, and they're willing to skip as many steps as possible in order to try to pull that off. I don't know why. I mean, I understand the appeal of course, but I don't know why this isn't looked at more objectively because of the ridiculously low success rate.

I studied the numbers on this, and the numbers are just ridiculous. I think it wound up being a 1.3% success rate for those that actually attempt this strategy and then have an acquisi. That goes beyond that valuation. But anyway, I know it's not necessarily a logical approach, so to speak, so that may or may not deter the people who are trying to leverage this strategy.

But what I wanted to draw your attention to is that this is, this tactic has been falling further out of favor. And I think that's a good thing. And that's probably a combination of things like Theranos, where. You know, founder Elizabeth Holmes was sentenced to prison for 10 or 11 years for defrauding investors, combined with, you know, these economic factors as well too, in that money's no longer cheap.

So with rising interest rates comes basically like tighter wallets for the most part, and people being, especially investors being less likely to invest in just the next whatever thing. Now, having said all of that, The development of AI tools has led to potentially more activity in the space where people are spinning up just about anything that has AI in the name.

I think Y Combinator, like two thirds of their applicants are working on something AI related, which is probably somewhat predictable. Anyway, what I wanted to talk about is I wanted to issue caution when it comes to strategies like, Right. I don't think this is something that should really ever be entertained besides the fact that it's ridiculously low success rate for probably relatively obvious reasons.

It doesn't. It doesn't enable you to build a company, a business, a product with solid fundamental economics. And that's something you can do from zero without investment, you can do it totally bootstrapped, you can do it nights and weekends. You can build a proper business that's going to be financially viable.

Using the slow and steady approach. It's really like, whereas everyone else is trying to do the fake it till you. My experience has been, it's more like if you remember the story from maybe when you were younger, the tortoise in the hair, slow and steady typically wins this race, right? But you gotta know which steps you need to do and which ones you need to complete, and how comprehensively you need to complete them before you move on to the next step.

And there's not a lot of people talking about that. So I'm gonna be continuing to provide more of that type of content as we move forward because it. I've been doing and it's been working out just fine. I, you know, I'm not married to any particular concept I'm working on. I'm looking for problems worth solving, right?

That's the place to start. And then when I find one that looks like it's got a lot of opportunity for me to provide a bunch of value back to the ICP or the ideal customer profile, I look to design a UVP or a unique value pro. To capture that value provided back to the icp and then we can take a component of that as well also, and that becomes potentially the revenue that we're generating for providing for, for solving that problem, for that target market.

That's really what it's all about. And then it's slow and steady there. You can always accelerate or you can always invest more. You can always dedicate more time. Right. But I'm also an advocate for only doing that when it makes good financial sense for you.

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What To Do When Users Get ANGRY

Sean Boyce — Wed, 19 Apr 2023 08:25:13 -0400

Eventually you're going to break something in your B2B SaaS. This may lead to some strong reactions and angry emails from your users. After the initial shock wears off, you'll have time to fix whatever is broken. However, the good part is that your users are engaged and now you have an opportunity to learn critically important information about how to make your product better.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is what to do if all of a sudden you've made your users angry. Now, if you get an emotional reaction like that, you might immediately think that you need to panic and pounce all over what went wrong, or find out what went wrong and scramble.

But what I want to tell you is that I want to interrupt that essentially right away and say that any type of an emotional reaction about your product is probably a good thing. Now what I mean by that is that means people are engaged. That probably means people are using your product as such. They have a good reason to get to that point at least.

So, so far that is a sign of progress. Now, whatever the reason that you've gotten some type of a strong reaction from your users, maybe something that was working broke or whatever, whatever the reason. If they're reaching out to you and sharing more details about that, that's a good thing. You want them to provide you with as much feedback as possible, because that can be really hard to get, and that feedback helps us get greater context around what I call essentially the why component of their experience, right?

With analytics and other tools, survey tools, et cetera, we can get things like what people are doing. We can get things like how they're doing it. The big missing piece though, typically, and what a lot of these tools lack is the ability to give us insight into why people are doing what they're doing. So that's.

We need more qualitative data. The quantitative tools are not great at giving us insight into that, but that information's super powerful because if we understand more about the why, we have an understanding in terms of what motivates your users to do what they're doing. Use your tool, not use your tool, and that insight's really helpful to figure out how to make your tool better and better.

So if you've gotten some type of strong emotional reaction from your users or something's broken or whenever, you can really use that essentially as almost a metric for how engaged are the folks that have access to your product. And it'll help you figure out essentially what's wrong, so that you can fix it.

So that's good too. So after the initial potential shock wears off for, oh my goodness, that I just upset my entire user base, realized that there is. There is some flexibility here in terms of them being reasonable to an extent, to give you the time you need in order to fix whatever went wrong. But the good news is that they're engaged, and the more engaged that they are, the more feedback they're gonna get.

The more feedback that you're gonna get, the better you can figure out how to improve your product from where it is at the moment.

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Don't Panic About AI

Sean Boyce — Tue, 18 Apr 2023 07:40:54 -0400

I'm seeing more and more instances of people freaking out about AI in a bad way. It seems many people think that all their skills will become obsolete overnight which dooms their future.

I want to share with you why this isn't the case. New technology still takes a while to reach widespread adoption into all areas of our life. Let's talk about how to maintain our composure and make the most of the opportunity around us with AI.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is why you shouldn't be panicking about ai. Now, I've done some content already about AI and I'm working on another one in terms of how to leverage it when building your B2B SaaS and how to figure out how to leverage, how to get the most out of that as a tool when you're building your B2B SaaS product or company.

But I'm seeing a lot more content these days. That's talking particularly about the acceleration of the development of ai. Now, I know how this feels because I've observed it myself, and I've paid very close attention to it since OpenAI dropped chat, G P T. The updates seem to just keep coming and they seem to be significant.

I mean, we see things like going from chat G P T three to four, and the statistics that come with it, as in version three, had a 10% chance of passing the. Version four has a 90% chance. So we're seeing pretty dramatic improvements relatively quickly, which is somewhat unique for technology if you are laser focused in just this portion of history.

But if you zoom out over time, and I'm talking about decades, we've seen acceleration of technology pretty much always, you know, dating back to things like Moore's Law, for example. Technology has always kind of continued to accelerate. But the point that I'm trying to make here, I'm seeing content related to things like with the introduction of what's now being called auto GPT.

People are saying that things like learning prompt engineering is a waste of time, as in that's gonna become an obsolete skill because you can just continually funnel AI back into itself. And look, I get it. I'm doing some of that stuff as well too, but what I want to reinforce is, The skills that you're picking up and learning about how to use these tools are not going to be obsolete overnight.

Uh, I'll share an example with you about a apartment that I just moved into that I needed to wire up because I couldn't get the internet service provider I wanted, which required me to have to manage some things with the existing wiring loan. Now, a million years ago, I learned all these things because I have a background in network.

I even bought tools and I was crimping cables and terminating endpoints and basically running network cable throughout homes over however many years now. It's been a long time since I've done any of that stuff. Much of it, as it turns out, hasn't changed all that much, so those skills still relevant today, but I just haven't used them because my world has been software since forever.

However, I did need them, and it turns out I did have some of my older tools. So I ended up using them for a couple of hours and I went back to using all of that knowledge that I once gained, even though I hadn't used it in years. So anyway, I'm just sharing with you the fact that had I not had those skills, I would not have been able to solve those problems.

So they still came in handy. Having said that technology, especially in the world of AI, is going to continue to evolve. What you're learning about how to use it now is still going to be relevant. Another example I'll share is with like search engine optimization and getting good at asking questions of search engines like Google.

Despite the fact that AI has exploded and traffic to chat, G B T is accelerating and growing at a crazy pace. The vast majority of the problems people are searching for solutions still still overrule. That's why ads continues to be successful. I'm using it myself. Figuring out how to get good at search engine optimization and keyword research and all that kind of stuff is still very relevant today despite the fact that Chad G p t may be influencing that game.

So anyway, the point is not to panic about these developments. I'm seeing some people that are kind of falling into that category just. About them so that you can better understand how to leverage them to help you with what it is you are trying to do. Because there's always going to be new tools. That evolution is something that will never stop if you learn the latest but stable tools and you figure out how to leverage them in order to be faster, cheaper, better, whatever it is, that is a net result improvement for you in building, running, managing, owning your B2B SaaS.

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Where to Find More Customers for your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Mon, 17 Apr 2023 07:16:19 -0400

I've been getting more questions in my slack community about where and how to find more customers for your B2B SaaS. The real answer here is, it depends.

The answer is dependent on a number of variables like who you are building for, the problem you are trying to solve and where those prospects are searching for a solution to those problems.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is where to find your target market customers. Now, I've received this question a couple of times in my Slack community, and it goes something along these lines. It's where or how should I be advertising to get more customers for my SaaS product?

Now, the answer to that isn't Google or Facebook or Instagram or LinkedIn. The answer to that depends on who your target market customer is, and this is usually what I share back is which problem, like who has which problem that your product happens to solve, and where is that target market persona looking for a solution to that problem?

That's the question you need to be asking yourself really, in order to get the correct answer to that. Now, depending on what it is you're building or who you're building for, which is the most important part, folks may or may not be searching for solutions to the problem they have that you're trying to provide a better solution to on a platform that you're considering.

For example, the product that I'm building now, In podcasting, I knew Google search was gonna be able to move the needle for me there because I had done that homework before I even built the product. In fact, that was critical decision making information in terms of whether or not I would even move forward with the build.

I wanted to see who was searching for what, what did that traffic cost, what was the volume like, and if it was ridiculously competitive and low volume. Or either or. I may not ultimately even decided to build the product, but for sure I wouldn't have advertised on that platform. I found opportunities and I did some searching on those keywords myself to see what the results came up with, just to make sure that I was relatively well aligned in terms of the solution that I was gonna be positioning and marketing.

When folks search for those keyword. Was that going to match with what had appeared folks that entered those keywords were ultimately looking for, and that looked like it was. Yes. I have since run those experiments and it looks like it's working out so far, but I did that homework upfront. Now, if you're doing something that, now, to be fair, what I'm building obviously is b2b.

If what you're building is more b2c, maybe or maybe not, that may be the platform for you, right? Platforms like LinkedIn are great for b. Platforms like Instagram, however, maybe Facebook, you know, Instagram might be more b2c, who knows, right? Uh, Facebook may be a little bit of both. It depends on what it is again, you're planning to build and who you're planning to build it for.

So if you're wondering where to go to find more customers or prospects to your product to try to attempt to create conversions, make sure you first figure. Who it is you're building for and where those folks are hanging out, plus looking for solutions to the problem that your product is attempting to solve.

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Build a B2B SaaS Without Quitting Your Day Job

Sean Boyce — Sun, 16 Apr 2023 13:19:25 -0400

There's SO much content out there about how hard you must struggle and that you might have to give up EVERYTHING to succeed in building a B2B SaaS. In my opinion, nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, building your B2B SaaS business during nights and weekends can actually be a huge advantage for many reasons.

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Episode Transcription
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I'm gonna talk to you about is when and how to build your B2B SaaS business. Now, having said that, I've built multiple different types of businesses and in different ways, but my preferred option, having that experience now and having worked with a lot of people to help them build theirs, is to do so part-time when you're first starting up.

There's a lot of content out there and strategies about lean startup. They call it struggle porn, which I think is a great name for it because people seem to kind of glorify this, I need to barely scrape by before I become a millionaire overnight. None of which usually happens for almost anyone. So if you ever hear a story like that, that typically comes, those are the exceptions, obviously.

But there's so many advantages to building this business, essentially on your own terms. Right? And if you do that, and if you have a source of income, A primary job or consulting or contracting that you do also part-time. You can make sure that you have the cash flow that you need and take the time that you would like to building your B2B SaaS business, this isn't something you have to do full-time.

In fact, most of the B2B SaaS businesses I've built, and most of the ones that I've built that have been successful to the extent that I would like them to be, were built by me part-time. As in it wasn't the only thing that I was working. Now these businesses le lend themselves to this strategy relatively well because you can increase, you can create such great leverage in that B2B SaaS.

Businesses when done right, don't require a lot of human capital or the type of services you might need if you were building a traditional kind of service-based business. So that's one of the advantages. The other element here that I think is important to mention, What I recommend a lot of folks to do that come to me that want to build a B2B SaaS business, and especially if they don't have a ton of industry experience in the industry that they want to build a product for, is to go get a job in that industry.

I love the strategy for a whole bunch of reasons. Number one, you can make. Decent cash flow to cover your cost of living or take care of your family or whatever. Ultimately, you need, you've, you can use the cash flow from that job to cover those elements. Then you can carve out a piece of that to invest in building your B2B SaaS business when you're ready.

And one of the other advantages is if you get a job in. You're learning a lot of subject matter expertise and you're getting great understanding for the problems and challenges in that industry. The B2B SaaS product that I'm building at the moment, Is in podcasting. I just so happen to also own a podcasting service business or productized service business that makes the problems and challenges in that industry crystal clear for me to be able to figure out where is there opportunity to invest in building a SaaS business that's gonna create value for other people that have these problems.

Because I built that business, I know those problems intimately well. Essentially, I am my own target market, which is a huge advantage as opposed to. Seeing what you think might be a problem from afar, but never having actually worked directly in that industry, or at least as much as someone else who spent years in it may actually know in terms of the context around the problems and challenges to be solved.

So, points of takeaway from this episode are you don't need to dive head first and sacrifice everything in order to build a B2B SaaS business or be successful in B2B SaaS And. Doing it via nights and weekends and getting a job in industry can provide great cash flow and take a lot of the pressure off in terms of if and when your B2B SaaS ultimately takes off.

Plus give you a ton of expert insider information and knowledge in terms of the context around the problems and challenges in the industry for which you may wanna build that product.

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Optimizing Search Ads Variables

Sean Boyce — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 12:02:01 -0400

I've recently optimized my search ad campaigns to hopefully drive more conversions for my B2B SaaS application. I want to walk you through what I changed and why including some tips based on what I've learned if you intend to leverage search ads to drive traffic for your B2B SaaS.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is further optimizing your channels in terms of where you're getting the leads for your B2B SaaS. Now, in this case, for me, this is through search ads, so I am primarily getting the traffic for people that I'm trying to drive into my B2B SaaS from Google search ads.

Now, when I was beginning, and I always encourage this, I was moving pretty fast, so I set up a campaign. Essentially as quickly as I could, cuz I was doing a number of things simultaneously, like putting up the landing page, potentially working on the prototype, measuring how effectively I was converting people.

I was doing a lot. So cuz I was moving quickly, I just set up essentially the basics for the early campaign in order to run my early stage experiment to get a better idea in terms of how many prospects I was ultimately gonna be able to convert. Now. After I ran that experiment and I got the data back, which said how many folks I was ultimately able to convert and then sign off on essentially the early stage economic viability of the B2B SaaS that I was talking about building.

Then I had the information I needed in order to move forward with the build. So the build is done, the product is live. Now I'm trying to focus on converting people. Using the products to paint for the product. So that is the spot that I'm at at the moment with what I'm building. Now, in order to do that, I've already talked a little bit about further optimizing whatever channel you are using in order to ultimately get to and through this stage, which again, for me is via search ads now, because I had just set that up via the basics in the.

I, it was definitely not optimized, so I've recently gone back in there to dive in. I've been monitoring it, but I haven't done a deep dive. I recently did a deep dive and I learned quite a bit. As in number one, I'm expecting to kind of hit the throttle on trying to get as much activity from that channel as possible.

Number two, the channel is definitely not optimized because as I was looking at the details, what I saw was very different Click through rates. Depending upon what was being shown, where it was being shown, when it was being shown a number of different variables. So I wanna explain to you what a few of those were for me and the changes that I'm making based on the results that I've observed now, because I just kind of did things quick and dirty in the beginning.

Through Google it ultimately set it up with our quote unquote like smart campaign, which I would definitely encourage you to avoid because it is severely limiting in terms of what it is you can control, and that's the problem I was running into. I went in there and I was trying to make customizations to optimize my campaign and I really couldn't because it was started with that so-called smart campaign, which is I think essentially just meant.

Folks to get through the process as quick as possible. I'm trying to automate stuff for you, but it limits you in terms of what you can do. So you're very limited in terms of the modifications you can make, and that's the problem I was running into. So ultimately I replaced this campaign, but when I was evaluating the performance of it, I noticed a couple things.

Number one, Where they were displaying the ads, they were displaying them in a bunch of different locations. One of those was Google display ads, which is not what I wanted. Uh, that is like, I think blogs and stuff like that, if people place ads around there, so like you may have seen like a banner ad or something like that.

That's not what I'm looking for. So actually quite a bit of my budget was going to that. I simply, My budget going to search ads when people are searching with Google search engine and they're seeing the results, I want them to see mine at the top. So I wanted to modify that in that I wanted to remove the display ad component.

Another thing that I noticed was that a significant amount of my ad budget was going towards mobile applications, or mobile devices, I should say, as in when people were searching via Google, but they were doing so from their mobile. My application, though it is responsive, it's not really designed for someone to be using it via mobile phone.

All right? We're talking about, you know, a podcasting assistant, so to speak. You're moving files around, you're doing editings, that type of stuff. Most people are not doing heavy editing like that from their phone. They're doing it from their desktop. And this was even more obvious when I looked at the clickthrough rate and the conversions from desktop versus mobile, despite the fact that quite a bit of my budget was going through, uh, mobile platform.

Going to mobile platforms. The majority, the highest clickthrough rate was from desktops, which is essentially what I was expecting it to be. So long story short there too, I also removed the budget going towards mobile devices. I don't want to go through mobile devices, so no display ads, no mobile devices.

I wanted it to go just through Google search, and I wanted to just be displayed for folks that are browsing via desktop. So with just those two changes, I'm expecting to see some improvements, and I'll keep you posted of course, but I wanted to share with. What the process of further optimizing looks like and share with you some tips if you're gonna be using search or ads or anything like that in terms of trying to generate traffic in that too.

You know, unless you want to do, like I did a quick and dirty very early campaign, probably avoid setting it up via Smart Campaign through Google and instead give yourself access to some of those more advanced tools, cuz that'll help you with when you're ready to do further customizations.

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The Advantages of Solving Your Own Problem

Sean Boyce — Fri, 14 Apr 2023 07:36:17 -0400

When you're deciding what to build for your next B2B SaaS application, you can decide whether or not you want to solve a problem that you experience.

I want to talk about why this can be a HUGE advantage.

PS. I'm doing this now.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is one of my favorite patterns when you're building a potential B2B SaaS application and that's looking to solve your own problem. Now, I'll talk about that in a minute, but first I wanna share with you some context around why I am such a big fan of this pattern, and it's because it's a easier solution to one of the biggest challenges facing folks trying to build successful SaaS products or companies, and.

Many oftentimes try to build a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Now, I talk a lot about identifying problems worth solving, and the research work that I do is largely focused on being able to differentiate between just a problem that really won't be able to turn into a successful business or SaaS product and what I consider to be a problem we're solving that should now, the advantage of this strategy.

In building a solution to your own problem is you are your own target market, which is great insider information into how your customer thinks. I know it's a use case or an N of one, but that's better than a lot of founders often have that choose to solve problems in industries or for people that in which they are not the target market.

So this can be a considerable advantage and it can also help you gain access to more people. Within that target market. That is if you are also inside that target market, most of the time you probably know other folks like you, which makes it probably easier or at least closer to your current network to gain access to more of those folks, to better understand the context around how they want their problem to be solved, making it a bit easier for you to get the information you need to determine ultimately what to build and what the product should be.

Now, the other advantage to leveraging the strategy is, You're, you may be talking about turning it into a SaaS application, but once the product itself is available, if it does in fact, solve a problem of yours, It's immediately going to be providing you with value, as in you're gonna start to get a return right away.

It's not necessarily gonna be dependent upon your ability to sell this product super effectively in order for it to turn into something that's valuable for you. Cause you're using it to solve your own problem. It's gonna produce value for you immediately. That's what's happening in the instance where I'm building this podcasting application because I also have a podcasting agency.

What I'm choosing to do in the micro SAS businesses that I want to build is I'm first looking internally to the potential bottlenecks I have in my own processes for running that business. Saying, this is the biggest one, this is the most expensive one. This is the most, this one intrus is the most risk, or it has less of, uh, backup, consideration or redundancy involved.

As such, if I choose to automate that, I'm gonna get all that value back, and I'm already receiving that because my product is now available. Now I'm selling it externally as well too, to others that also may need it, and that's going to just increase the potential return that I get on it. But I'm getting value right away so the product isn't sitting there.

Then potentially not earning if I'm not ultimately making paid conversions. So I want you to consider this as an option when you're thinking, especially when you're thinking about building potentially your first SaaS application. Are there problems you need solved? Because number one, you know you can get value out of it right away once their product is available.

But number two, and probably more importantly, it's gonna give you greater context for the problem to be solved and. How people within that target market are probably thinking in terms of how they want it to be solved.

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The Value of Building with Others

Sean Boyce — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 07:09:00 -0400

Building your B2B SaaS in isolation can be not only harder, but more boring. It's fun and helpful to build with others. Let's talk about why I'd recommend you join a group of peers that are doing the same so you can help each other while you build.

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Email me if you'd like to join an online community while you build - sean@nxtstep.io

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is why you should find yourself kind of a peer advisor or mentor group to help you while you're building your B2B SaaS application. Now, I've worked with advisors, coaches, mentors, everything, pretty much all of the above at some point in my career to this.

But what I think has worked best by far and is something that I'm actively doing now while I'm building my latest B2B SaaS application is having a group of peers that are kind of at different, we're, we're technically, we have applications or businesses that are in different phases. Most of us have more than one.

That has really helped from the perspective of having folks to talk things out with, and we meet either virtually or in person to cover essentially anything that we are prioritizing and get each other's perspective on, which has been great. I would highly recommend that if you are in this process of building a B2B SaaS application, regardless of the.

And outside of what you might have as a coach or an executive coach even, I would recommend you find yourself a group, a peer group, or a group of kind of folks that are either slightly before where you are, slightly after, where you are progress wise, or just right where you are. Because in this world, there's not, you know, in today's world where we're always connected, it's easier to find online communities, which is great, but I would look to find one.

Has folks trying to do the same type of things that you were doing. Reason being is because you're both probably trying to solve certain challenges that are relatively similar, and you can kind of workshop those together and help each other. That has been really helpful because you may be already very well used to this.

In this world, while you're building something like this, you're often kind of expected to just figure it out, and especially if you are the one that's the founder or the operator, there isn't always a huge support group for you to kind of go to in order to get help from just kind of always falls on you.

Which if you've developed those skills, that's really important and you're gonna need that in order to continue to be successful. But it is also really helpful to learn from. And there isn't always a great opportunity to do that if you don't build it yourself. So I found a group of individuals that I've kind of just networked with over time and in my geographical area we all share similar interests.

We call come from somewhat of a similar background. You know, we took slightly different paths to get to where we are now, but we're all kind of trying to do the same thing and that's build successful B2B SaaS. You know, typically micro SaaS type businesses. And we meet usually monthly, at least once every other month, and we kind of just cover updates with each other.

And I call it sometimes kind of like roasting what each other's working on. And that is actually quite helpful because it could be difficult to get additional perspectives on what it is that you're doing. So it could be hard to talk about these things with like a spouse or a friend. You know, they might not completely understand the world.

They, they may not even understand what SaaS is so try to find others that are doing something similar and see if you can't, you know, develop relationships with them or help each other, uh, as you're making progress through this as well too. I've gotten so much value out of doing this this time around as opposed to when I was building these things essentially in isolation that I'm thinking about starting kind of an online community about this as well too.

So for any listeners out there that would have an interest, Joining something like that to try to replicate that experience while you're building, which could be like online coaching. We could help each other, I can help you, those types of things. Feel free to shoot me an email if you have an interest in that.

My email is sean@nxtstep.io to let me know.

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Basics of Ad Optimization

Sean Boyce — Wed, 12 Apr 2023 08:07:01 -0400

If ads are driving traffic to your B2B SaaS, you'll eventually want to make sure you are optimizing that channel to produce better results.

Let's talk about the basics to get you started here using the example from my latest product.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how to optimize for more conversions to your potentially relatively new B2B SaaS application. So after you've developed a channel for the early stage launch of your B2B SaaS application, You're gonna want to be measuring how effectively you're converting visitors into prospects, free trial users, paying customers, et cetera, and you're probably gonna be wanting to boost those conversions as much as possible.

Now, for me, when I'm starting out, especially evaluating an early stage B2B SaaS product that I've recently launched, what I'm looking for is how effectively I'm able to turn those visitors into paying customers. I ultimately want to be able to create what is my funnel, and then measure what. Ultimately success in converting from one stage to another actually looks like.

So from a visitor to a free trial user to a paying customer, for example. And if I know that, you know, a hundred goes to 10, goes to one or whatever, then I can work backwards from how many I want of the paying customers to know how many visitors I want, for example, and then anything, any dials that control the traffic that I need to send to ultimately convert into the first category.

If I know what my percentages are in terms of my conversion rate for the other categories, I should be able to work my way back towards that outcome that I'm looking for to hit ultimately that number that's going to mean the revenue number I want to hit or whatever. So what I'm trying to share with you here is that you want to build this through the channels that you've found to be the most effective.

And on the earlier. When the domain is new or the product is new, I am typically leaning pretty heavily on ads, typically Google search ads, but it really depends on your product. What matters more than anything is where are your users? Where's the persona that you've built this product for that has the specific problem that your product solves hanging out.

If that's Facebook, then go there. If that's LinkedIn, then go there. Wherever they're hanging out, that's where you want to get in front of them. And then, Any way that you can drive more traffic. And again, what I use pretty heavily, at least in the earlier, earlier days of launching a new B2B SaaS product, is on advertisements.

In order to generate the kind of traffic you want to measure the effectiveness of essentially your funnel and the conversion rate from getting from one category to the next. And then after you've determined not to be effective, as in, you know, Getting people to and through that funnel, as in you're able to get people from prospects to free trial, to users, to customers.

That's just what the stages are in my case, but yours may be slightly different, but regardless, I know I can get people to become paying customers for my product. Now I can work backwards from how many paying customers I want and I can. Turn the dial all the way up to a hundred if I want, for whatever I've been able to do for that channel thus far.

As in, for me, what that looks like is increasing the budget significantly for the ad campaigns that I may be running until I know where the diminishing return line is. As in where do I max out, where do I, where can I not show it anymore, or where will it not move the needle in terms of getting more prospects or visitors to the site to consider creating an account, for example.

That's the center, kind of like the first stage in optimization is you can move the relatively straightforward needles like that, like budget, and then you can get into really optimizing. I'm gonna talk more about that in the future episode as well too. And that's where you optimize around the keywords.

Make sure that if you're using ads that you're only displaying for the keywords that are relevant to what your product ultimately does. I'll talk more about that as well too, so you can continue to optimize your budget and your spend at this point if you're investing dollars into getting people into and on your platform.

So start thinking about that after you've launched your product for the channels that are able to send essentially those visitors or prospects to your product. And then from there, we're gonna do your future episodes where I'm gonna talk you more through how to continually optimize to make sure you're getting a better return on investment.

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Go Deep Instead of Wide with Your SaaS

Sean Boyce — Tue, 11 Apr 2023 07:26:35 -0400

After launch, I see many entrepreneurs want to go much wider with what they product can do. They always want to add more features that have yet to be requested by their early customers. This can be a huge mistake.

Instead of going wide, let's talk about what it looks like to go deep instead which can give you a leg up on your competition.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is why when you're looking to extend the capabilities of your B2B SaaS that you shouldn't go wide. You should go deep. Now, let me explain what I mean by that. So sometimes when you've got an early traction with your B2B SaaS, it's easy to think through and continually add to your backlog or your roadmap.

And extend what your product is capable of. Now, when a lot of people are doing this, especially in the beginning, they're thinking about how can I go far and wide with what my product can do? As in if it can do X, maybe it should also do Y and also Z. And I want to explain to you that I feel that that's a trap.

I've been there before. And the more that you go wide, the more you have a higher probability of building your product in a direction away from what your customer actually. Instead, my recommendation is that you go deep and that you become the best version of whatever it was you were originally setting out to solve for your customer.

So that top problem continue to be better and better at that. And if you continue to chase that, assuming that you've latched onto one of the top problems from the start, then it's gonna be almost impossible to. Which is gonna give you significant defensibility because your solution is gonna continue to be better and better.

Let me share with you with another example that may be relevant in another industry. So if you think through in terms of healthcare and receiving service there, you might need the help of a doctor or a particular surgeon at some point. If you have some kind of healthcare issue. Now, a lot of people have problem with their knees, so I'll focus there like over time, knees degrade, right?

So eventually people need to go see a specialist that works on knees, for example. Now, let's say instead you were choosing between multiple providers and they all had the ability to work on knees, but there was another one that also learned how to work on hands and necks and phases and all this other stuff.

They had specialties in all of these area. Which one would you be more likely to focus on? The one that focuses on a bunch of different areas, or the one that focuses on just the one that you need. So if you think about that from that concept, the specialist is always typically hiring demand because that's all that they do.

They focus all day every day solving that specific problem. And that happens to be the problem that you have. This concept we see all the time in software. People have a tendency to try to go far and wide with what their product can do. That can convolute the user experience, that can add potential solutions to problems that your users or customers may not have or may not be on their radar.

And if you are adding those things to your experience for which the users that you already had were pleased with what the original set of features were, then you're going to continue to make that experience worse because it doesn't provide value for them. So you really need to make. That whatever it is that you're adding to your product experience ultimately adds value for them.

And I've seen the concept and the strategy of going deeper into being the best solution for the specific problem that you originally set out to solve for that target market to be a much more successful strategy at doing that in the long run. Then instead, going wide and trying to solve multiple problems or extend functionality that way.

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Capturing Leads for your SaaS Concept

Sean Boyce — Mon, 10 Apr 2023 08:07:28 -0400

I've been getting more questions around what my lead capture process looks like on the early version of my landing page.

In this episode, I go into more detail about what's on my landing page and how I structure my process for capturing leads.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is a response to some questions I've been getting in terms of how I structure set up my landing page, and in particular, what my lead capture ultimately looks like. So the questions were around validating SaaS ideas or concepts, and I understand this to mean.

Something that we may or may not want to build, right? We've got an idea for a potential product or business we want to create, and we want to get a better understanding in validating that as best we can before we ultimately build it, which fits right into my wheelhouse for a process that I've built and the one that I'm using over and over again to test various SaaS business ideas of my own.

Now, ultimately what I do is I get clear about my variable. And the most important ones there are my icp, my IDO customer profile, and my uvp. My unique value proposition, as in how am I specifically gonna solve a specific problem for a specific persona? And I want that all to be communicated on a landing page.

So I've got different sections on the landing page and I could share various ones with you. If you're looking for some examples like that, that are, are mine that I've created to test these ideas, and they go in. Phases as well also. So I'll have multiple versions of them as I'm making progress along the way.

But on the earlier side of things, when I'm testing out a potential idea or SA concept, I'll be communicating the problem I'll be looking to solve and how we're looking to solve that for that target market persona. On that page, we'll also include various options around pricing if I wanna offer more than one potential.

Or I'm gonna do some testing in terms of what is the level of price sensitivity here to what it is I'm talking about offering, and ultimately, what prospects may be willing to pay. Then I try to have one call to action on the first version of the landing page throughout the entire page. And most of that is related to something along the lines of a button that says, sign up or gain access, or something.

Something like that. All the call to action buttons, for the most part on the first version of a landing page, are branded that way. Then when they click on it, where they go is typically to fill out a lead capture form, and that's pretty much it. My preferred system for how to manage that. Via Typeform. I love type forms, interface and experience and extensibility for their product.

That's what I use. And then in that form, which is what some of the questions were about as well, I capture something along the lines of contact information. At a minimum I grab email. That's the pretty much minimum requirement. I might grab a name as well. Also, then I'll ask potentially some additional questions along the lines.

If I'm advertising multiple tiers and testing price sensitivity, I'll ask them which tier they're interested in, and then I'll also maybe have one or two open-ended questions related to something along the lines of, what's the most valuable feature for you, or, which specific problem do you need solved?

Anything that might give me greater qualitative insight into the response that I'm getting as well. Also, which starts me to help me get into the mind of the persona that's signing up for the product so that I can better underst. How the current product can help solve their problems and what some of those future problems may be as well.

So that's how my process works from, uh, very early on when I want to validate a potential idea or concept that I have for a SaaS business, I create a landing page and it communicates the unique value proposition to the ideal customer profile. Then, All the call to actions are specifically to a lead capture form, and in that lead capture form, I, I ask several questions in order to get some feedback from them to test their level of interest in what it is that I'm building, price sensitivity, and any anything else that I think I can learn.

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A Feature as a Product

Sean Boyce — Sun, 09 Apr 2023 08:00:00 -0400

Historically you may have received feedback about your idea that goes something like this - 'that's not a product, that's probably just a feature'. This is often given as feedback to mean you aren't ready to create your product yet because maybe it doesn't do enough.

I want to challenge this narrative and share examples of how some product companies have been wildly successful build entire products around a single feature or idea.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here today. What I wanna talk to you about is the whole concept of feedback previously where people might say that your idea isn't a product, it's more likely a feature. Now, traditionally, this has been shared in the context of something somewhat negative or maybe feedback to the extent of you, just you're not quite there yet in terms of ready to move forward in building a product.

You don't almost have enough substance or value to offer someone in order to turn it into a product experience that people are going to pay for. I want to challenge that narrative, and I wanna challenge that because of the rise of this concept and the success of other products like it that I'm referring to as micro SaaS or touch, and in my world, particularly B2B SaaS products or applications, because in the studying that I've.

The more complicated your software product is, the harder it is to do just about everything. Build it, sell it, market it, gain traction, find product, market fit, whatever, right? All of those things are significantly more difficult, and I believe become exponentially more difficult, the more complicated your software product becomes.

Now, can that product do more? Yes. More often than not, that's the case. However, do most of your users want that product to do? That answer is a little bit harder to kind of figure out, and it takes a lot longer in order to determine. So long story short, here, what I'm trying to communicate is that if you've got an idea that could potentially be a successful quote unquote feature, or somebody who's less familiar with the low-touch product world is giving you feedback to the extent of that's not a product, it's a feature.

I want to tell you that I think that's potentially a good thing as. Products that are created around largely a feature create potential opportunities to be highly successful low-touch products, and I'll give you an example, if you've ever used a calendar booker before, those are all pretty good examples of low-touch products.

As in you and I want to meet, and we don't want to do the round robin via email in order to figure out what works for each of us. So instead, I create a link to my Cal. Enabling you to see the visibility in terms of when I'm available, and then you can compare that with when you're available. So in self-service format, you can put a meeting essentially on my calendar that works for both of us.

That's it. That's where that product stops, and that's what low touch products are all about. So if you had an idea for something like that, people might have given you feedback on that in the lines. That's just a feature that can't be a product oven in itself, but if you had built something like Calendly specifically that it is, that is what they do, and you would've been wildly successful.

So don't let that discourage you. And in fact, I believe features rather than an entire product is actually a potentially good differentiator for even what a micro SAS or a low-touch but successful product ultimately is.

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New Feature or New Product

Sean Boyce — Sat, 08 Apr 2023 11:25:31 -0400

Is that new idea of yours better served as a feature in your current product or a new product altogether?

Let's discuss the pros and cons here and allow me to recommend an approach for figuring this out.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is how to determine whether or not that next feature idea of yours should actually be a product of its own. Now, I've been talking about this in regards to what I'm considering to be micro sass, and it's also referred to as low-touch products.

Those are SaaS applications that don't require a lot of intervention from you in order to get your users onboarded to the platform to start receiving. In fact, in most cases, applications like these that I'm typically working on in a B2B area, selling business to business, they can be the full experience.

Your user can get the full experience without much training or intervention whatsoever on your behalf. Now, because of that, And because the more complicated those applications get, I have a tendency to wanna keep the experience as simple as possible, to make sure that it's as easy as possible for your users and customers to understand and know what to do, and then to be able to get value out of it themselves.

You know, onboard themselves, handle all of the steps and components themselves without getting lost. And the more complicated your product is, the harder it is to be to do that. Now when you're entertaining whether or not perhaps a new request or a new idea probably coming from you is, uh, something to extend based on the capability of your current.

Application or whether or not that should be a product of its own. And that's kind of where I'm at at the moment. I've got my podcasting B2B SaaS application in a good spot at the moment, feature wise, until I get a new wave of feedback. But I've got ways to potentially extend that capability and I can add that on to the current product, or I could turn that into a new product of its own.

And what I'm gonna tell you is that the best way to determine that, as in what's got the best. Opportunity to generate the most value for you is to better understand what the difference may look like in regard to your ICP and your target market. So your ideal customer profile and your target market.

How much do they overlap? Between what your product is currently capable of and what you might be considering adding to that product experience. And if there isn't enough overlap there, as in if they don't overlap almost one to one, then you're probably looking at an opportunity to turn your new idea into a new application of its own.

Now, I understand you're gonna need to replicate much of what you already have, but that should be. More cost effective than the first time around because you should be able to borrow quite a bit and then just switch out the internals in order to create this new experience, if you will. But if the overlap doesn't, isn't one-to-one, I would look at potentially turning that into a different product.

With AI tools and things like that, we can move a lot faster. These days in terms of what our products are capable of. But I wouldn't look to convolute the current product experience you have until you get a wave of feedback to understand whether or not that's the direction they want to go.

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Validating Assumptions After Launch

Sean Boyce — Fri, 07 Apr 2023 11:46:54 -0400

After you launch your B2B SaaS, you should start attracting new customers. An important exercise to complete is to monitor who is actually signing up for your product. Is it who you expected it to be or is there something different about these customers?

Let's talk about how to validate your assumptions based on who is actually signing up.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is validating your assumptions after you've launched your product. Now, when I've talked about building landing pages and who they're for and how, and what to communicate on them, there's a number of variables that we have to ultimately determine and then move forward with into that testing phase.

So two of them that are really important to get a better understanding of are what I refer to as your ICP. Your ideal client or customer profile and your UVP, your unique value proposition. Now, those are designed early on, likely from any of the discovery work that you've done in order to get a better understanding in what your target market needs.

However, they're still assumptions. So after you've launched and people are becoming onboarded to your platform, what I'm ultimately recommending that you do is more homework in terms. Who you are attracting to your B2B SaaS because there could be a difference between ultimately what we've designed and then what ends up actually playing out in practice.

So you have your essentially validations and what you want to do, you know, is validate those assumption. So you have the validations that you need to complete, and then what you're gonna find out is those are either close to how you design them or they may be a little bit further apart either way. What I want you to look for are the patterns.

As you start to find these patterns, you can start to update your assumptions, but with more accurate data that you're actually taking from practice. So as your product is out there, people are finding it, people are using it. The things that in addition to ultimately validating your value proposition, which is what your product does and the problems that it solves, that's part of what we need to validate.

I also want you to validate who you have determined ultimately is part of your target market. Are you attracting who you thought you would be attracting? Does your ideal customer profile need to be updated? If so, make sure to update that as the pattern becomes more clear or make modifications to it. If you need to attract someone slightly differently, updating that is gonna be important because it's gonna affect everything else that you're gonna be doing from here, as in how you're finding them, who you're attracting, and ultimately how you're going to attract them.

So understanding how that's changing when your product is out there in the wild. Is going to be important for future success from here. So I wanted to mention that after your launch, you want to get a better understanding of what are the assumptions that you've made and that now that you have real data, go back and reevaluate those assumptions and get a better understanding for, are those being validated based on how you design them or are they different?

And then ultimately make updates and changes to your strategy from there.

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Early Adopters: Friendlies vs Strangers

Sean Boyce — Thu, 06 Apr 2023 10:13:03 -0400

After you've launched your product, you're going to want to gather as much feedback as you can before you scale.

The first set of users could be friendlies (people in your network) or strangers (people who you don't really know) and perhaps both.

What's the best strategy here and why?

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is who you should be getting the initial set of feedback from, and what should that first wave of customers for your B2B SaaS product that you may have recently launched actually look like. Are we talking about friendlies or are we talking about strangers, or are we talking about some form of a mix?

Now, from my perspective, after you've launched your B2B SaaS product, And I'm assuming you've done some testing and if you've been following along with what I've been recommending you would have in order to get some type of an idea what the level of interest is in terms of your ICP or your ideal customer profiles, level of interest in your UVP or your unique value proposition, as well as.

Their motivation to pay for access to your product. Now, if you've done that once you are ultimately launching your product and then sharing with with those that have signed up, you've got essentially an initial set of folks that you can email because hopefully you've captured their email addresses.

And you can measure how many of them ultimately trying to access the product, how many of them convert into paying customers, and all of that is excellent testing. But without skipping steps here, my opinion, the most important first kind of big milestone to accomplish after you've launched your product is to.

Get a quote unquote wave of customers into the product experience and then be able to measure what their active usage looks like, what type of feedback you can receive from them. Has your product ultimately been able to solve their problem? That's really what we're trying to VA to verify and to validate as part of this phase.

If we can do that, we'll know that we can significantly de-risk the future potential success. Of this project because we'll have better understood how well we've achieved product market fit so far. So now from my perspective, I think there's good and bad with both of the cohorts that I mentioned in terms of friendlies, which I would, I usually refer to as people in your network or folks that know what you're working on or folks that may be able to use what it is you've.

And then strangers, people who you don't have a preexisting relationship with. The advantage of the friendlies is that it can be a little bit easier to try to get feedback, but the problem with the friendlies is oftentimes that might be you have to take that with a pretty heavy grain of salt unless you are really forcing them to give you direct feedback.

Now that's something that I've worked very hard at refining over the years, but that can be really hard to do, as in oftentimes that you know, people that fall into that category for you, they might be telling you what they think you want to hear as opposed to what you need to hear. So long story short, there is good, but you have to caveat that group.

Now, the strangers on the other, They're harder to get direct access to, but they're also more than likely to give you brutally honest feedback, which is what arguably matters most. At this point. You need people to tell you whether or not your baby is ugly, and sometimes your friends will not tell you that, uh, because if it is ugly or you do have problems with it, then.

That feedback can help you make that better, so that's important too. Long story short here, my best recommendation is a mixture of the two because I think you can learn something new from each and potentially something unique from each. As in, if you can't get one thing from one group, you might be able to get it from the other.

So I. I like to try to see if I can't get a wave of each as in share with my network, what it is I've built and produced, provide some access to it, see if I can get some feedback, and then email blast or you know, start messaging and developing a relationship with the folks that have previously signed up, which most of which should probably be strangers in terms of a level of interest in what it is that you've built.

That way you can measure activity across both of these cohorts to see what you can learn about evaluating how much value your product is providing for the folks that have expressed interest in it.

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Don't Ship Features Based On Feelings

Sean Boyce — Wed, 05 Apr 2023 11:38:30 -0400

Early into your B2B SaaS products life you're going to want to ship features based on what you 'feel' would be valuable. Let's talk about why that's a trap and what to focus that energy on instead.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I'm gonna talk to you about is how to avoid falling into the trap of shipping features based on feelings. Now, the reason why I bring this up is because this is very relevant and timely for me in terms of the product that I've recently shipped, and I'm working on growing.

I've come up with all kinds of ideas that I think users would get value out of. Now, the danger and risk there obviously is it's coming from me, and it's not at that moment coming from users that are engaged with the application that are paying customers, which is where this information realistically should come from.

So I need you to understand. If you're going to continue to make changes to your product without active, without feedback from active users that are paying for access, then you might be steering your product in a suboptimal direction, as in it might be going where you think it should go, but that may not be where your users and ultimately you're paying customers, feel like, get your go.

So there's a balance here that you need to strike effectively. From building and launching your MVP to onboarding a wave of customers, getting an initial round of feedback, and then leveraging that in order to figure out what the future direction of your product should be. So whenever possible, I want you to resist the urge to want to continually make changes.

Especially early on and before you've gotten that initial wave of feedback, it's really important to keep the experience consistent in the beginning so that you give the product and the users enough time to kind of onboard and provide you with that feedback. So if you are kind of getting a little itchy and you want to do more things and make changes, which I completely understand, I'm there myself.

What I would encourage you to do instead is channel that energy into the direction of figuring out how you can engage more with the users that you are hoping to get that feedback from. So if that engagement is low, start thinking through different strategies or communication channels that you can use.

To learn what some of that feedback might be or encourage folks to get, become more active with using your product at the moment. If you do that, that's going to help you ensure that you de-risk the potential future direction that you want to take your product and ensure that you are not steering it in a direction away from what ultimately you're paying customers are actually going to need.

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Using AI to Revolutionize Language Learning with Memrise’s Steve Toy

Sean Boyce — Tue, 04 Apr 2023 17:00:00 -0400

This episode, CEO of Memrise Steve Toy talks about the most important aspects of learning a language, the different ways AI can be used in language learning, and how Memrise differentiates itself from other language learning applications.

Steve Toy is a Senior Leader experienced in driving organizational change and managing high-growth agendas, who has spent his career bringing technology to life, leading digital strategy across multiple channels, transforming ideas that have led to multi-million-dollar businesses, and executing the profitable deployment of new technologies across multiple industries

Steve is currently the CEO of Memrise and has over 25 years of experience as CEO, General Manager, V.P, and board director in publicly traded and private companies with up to 250,000 staff and annual revenues of over $15 Billion. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The most important aspects of learning a language.
How Memrise differentiates itself from other language learning applications.
Different ways AI can be used to learn a language.
The key principles to learning a language.
Why you need a customized approach to learning another language.
The unique language learning problems AI can solve..
The impact scale can have on both a company and its users.
The global trends in language learning.
Important principles CEOs need to lead a company.

Resources:

Connecting with Steve Toy:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables:

03:27 - “Most people are kind of reluctant to speak when they’re learning a language because they’re worried they’re going to sound like a 5-year-old because they’re going to sound like a 5-year-old. That judgment that fear of judgment is what stops people but when you’re in a country if you want a sandwich if you want a beer if you want a train ticket, you’re going to have to use the language.”
15:48 - “Businesses that need to continually improve the English skills of their customer support group can actually have lessons made from the customer support videos that they have in their business and so now the users, their employees, will be learning the words and memorizing the words that they use in their day-to-day life, they will be hearing the words from the videos that talks about their very business, learning the product as well along the way and they can practice with a bot that is trained to be a customer that doesn’t know how to use the product that the company sells, that’s how tightly we can train these products.”
19:03 - “A taxi driver in Hungary makes more money when they speak English, a waiter in Caracas makes more money when they speak English.”

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Leveraging Email To Help Users Through Activation Points

Sean Boyce — Tue, 04 Apr 2023 10:22:58 -0400

Email is an often overlooked element of helping your users make their way through the activation points of onboarding with your B2B SaaS.

Let's talk about how and when you can leverage it to help them (and you) be more successful with your product.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is why you should not assume that using your product will be intuitive for your users and your customers. Now, of course, when we're designing the experience for how our product is going to solve the top problem or top problems that our customers supposedly have, We are trying our best to make sure we're doing so in a simple and straightforward way to make sure that the experience is rather easy for them to understand in terms of how to get value out of the product.

But that's not always going to be intuitive for your user. It's easy for us to overlook. What might not be obvious for them because we're building it. It's one of those can't see the forest through the trees type problems that we often experience. So if you keep this on the front of, keep this top of mind while you're building and while you're launching and while you're trying to grow your product, then it'll be easier for you to understand that people may be getting stuck at certain points in that.

Now analytics and tools like that can help you to better understand where your users and customers are getting stuck when it comes to your product experience. Your job is to then move them through those various steps and figure out the best way to do so. Now, that might be taking one step and making it into two, or taking two steps and making it into one.

There's different things that you can do in order to help your user. Through the process of onboarding so that they can continually get value out of using your product or that you can measure whether or not they're able to do so. If they can't, then you've got other things to fix. But for now, the focus of what I'm talking about is largely where I'm focusing with one of the products I just launched, and it's understanding these activation points, knowing where the user is at at certain points in the experience and figuring out how to get them beyond.

So that they get to the next step in the process. Now, one of the often overlooked elements here is how important it can be to leverage tools like email to communicate with your user in terms of what they can do in your product. It's like after they have filled out your lead capture, important thing to grab, of course, would be their email, and then keeping them informed along the way as your product is either under development or sharing with them.

Show notes, release notes, things like. In terms of what you are producing in terms of updated functionality or features within your application, as you are building new features, probably the most straightforward part of this experience that most of us are used to, you can share with them, Hey, fyi, we're making improvements.

Here's what we've improved recently. Here's what it is. Here's how it works. Here's an example perhaps of what that looks. And you conclude elements like that as well too, with links into the application and directions to help them understand where they can go to experience and for themselves. Other pieces can be figuring out and helping them learn what functionality is already in the product experience because again, it may not be obvious for them.

So as I do more usability testing with a new product and some early stage users, I get a better understanding in what's obvious for them or not obvious for them versus what was obvious or not obvious for me. So I'm trying to put myself in the perspective of someone new in the product experience whenever I'm doing testing, but that's much becomes more difficult to do as you become more familiar with your own application, especially if you've built it.

So in order to figure this out, you need to do more testing. Again, the analytics tools can help. But educating and training your customers and users along the way should help as well. And all of this is made significantly easier. Again, by keeping your product experience as simple as possible, as you're laser focusing on the top problem and you're looking to design into the product experience the simplest, but the most elegant way to ultimately solve that problem, that's gonna make your life end theirs a lot easier as well too.

So anyway, I wanted to talk to you more about how you can better leverage tools like Email to both educate your users. On how to use your product for something that might be obvious to you but not for them. As well as sharing with them any updates that you're making to the product experience so they can continually learn how to get more out of it and they see you managing it.

And then option optionally requesting feedback from them in terms of how can we make this even better for you? We want to engage with you. Please share and send us that feedback.

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Managing Free Trials for Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Mon, 03 Apr 2023 10:33:08 -0400

After you've launched your SaaS, they key will be to get people to use it so you can measure the strength of your value proposition.

So how do you do that? Well, a free trial is a great way to convert prospects into users. Let's talk about how to manage free trials to be able to do this.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is managing the process of getting people to access your product. Tested out, especially in the beginning through things like free trials, for example, and how in particular to organize that. So most users these days are familiar with being able to access products and try them out, especially on the earlier side, especially if they're going to be low touch micro SaaS type applications.

And most are looking for opportunities to kind of try before they buy, so to speak. So I would say a good rule of thumb is the more low touch your product is, the more likely users want to try to actually experience it before they ultimately pay for it. Now, that's not always the case. That's not a hard and fast rule, it's just a guide.

In this case, the product I'm working on for podcasters is something that I think people are looking for more of an opportunity to try out with a free trial. And the reason why I know that. When I launched version one, I knew I wanted to incorporate something like that, but once version one was out there, it was paid.

Essentially it was pay walled in order to gain access, and I had some people going to it but not converting right away. So that gave me a little bit of an indication. I did a few other things to learn a little bit more, but I wanted to implement a free. Set up regardless. So that's what I've done. Now, when it comes to your free trial and how you manage that, there's a couple different options to consider.

There's, do I just let people gain access to the product seemingly immediately, and then if so, do I take any payment information and or when do I try to convert them? So these are related to those activation points that we've talked about a little bit before as well. Also, you're gonna want to get to know.

Where these are and how to design them so that you can create the optimal effective conversion experience that you're looking for for your B2B SaaS application. So for me, in this case, what I set up is I gave them a couple of days free trial to essentially have un un. Obstructed access to the application so they can use it as much as they'd like for a fixed period of time.

And I didn't ask for any type of payment info. And that should also lower the barrier to getting people into the product, which again, at the moment is my primary objective. I want people using it so that I can measure how much value they're getting out of it. How sticky it is, things like this, and I'm gonna lower the bar as much as I can within reason, in order to get users to that point in the experience so that I can start measuring that now after I've gotten people into the product via that mechanism.

Then it's gonna be a matter of measuring how many people ultimately convert. And depending on where you land, as in, do you capture payment information up front or do you not? When you begin a free trial, if you're considering adding one, the percentages are likely to be different, as in more people, I believe percentage wise, are typically likely to convert if you take payment information up front.

But that also might lead to a lower volume of people using your product. So the barrier to entry is going to be higher. Regardless, I wanted to go into some of these options for you so that you can consider what those might be and what might make the most sense for you. But when you are launching your product, one of the key objectives here that I want you to focus on is we need to get people into that experience so that we can measure how valuable it is for them.

We wanna be able to measure the relative strength of your value proposition so that we know whether or not you're on the right track.

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How To Think About Competition

Sean Boyce — Sun, 02 Apr 2023 09:18:06 -0400

After you launch, chances are you're going to become more aware of competitive products. This is a good thing because it provides you with an opportunity to know how to respond and make your solution unique.

In this episode I also talk about how AI has changed the game and that more competition will be coming to market faster. Learn more about what this means for B2B SaaS founders everywhere.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is how you should be approaching responding when you find new competitive options to what it is you are trying to bring to the market as a solution, perhaps in the format of a B2B SaaS. So I've already talked to you about. The fact that I've recently launched a new product, it is essentially for those that are managing podcasts, it helps you create show notes and things like that, and it does it in an automated way.

So one of the things to note is that due to AI and how basically chat G P T and tools like that and how incredible the functionality is relatively, relatively easy to use. The amount of functionality that they can bring relatively quickly. We're seeing a lot of products pop up that can, that are leveraging these AI tools to try to solve certain problems.

So the first thing to note is that anyone out there with a product that especially is starting new, more than likely there's gonna be other people working on that same problem and bringing a version. Of a solution similar to what it is that you're building to market now, faster and more frequently than ever.

So you're gonna be seeing more competition and less time. That's what I'm expecting. I'm expecting the AI tools to be providing those options to entrepreneurs everywhere. Number two, your response to the competition. Essentially should be the same as it should have been before. Number one, it's a good thing if people are bringing products, similar products to market.

It means that there's more than likely a demand for what it is you are trying to solve, meaning that you probably have found a pretty good problem worth solving. So that is a huge hurdle to C to kind of clear number one. The second component is your response essentially should be the same, uh, as it was before, just because there's more products and they're coming to market faster.

Doesn't mean that your approach should change. You need to figure out essentially what those products are doing and how your approach is unique and if it. Isn't unique and you need to figure out how to make it unique. You need to better, you need to be able to understand how to answer the question as best as possible.

When someone asks you, how are you different than X? Or How are you different than Y? So that's what I'm doing now. Now that I'm finding these new competitive products, which is partly what I was expecting as I opened up the tool that I was using to my network and early adopters, then they started giving me feedback.

What about this tool? What about that tool, et cetera. So, They're helping me perform this research and find other options that are either currently being sold to them or other options they're considering and have found themselves. So that's number one. The other element of it too, is that in order to make what you are doing more unique, there's different levers that you can pull in order to do that, right?

You can go deeper into your target market. You can go wider in terms of the functionality that you're offering, right? You need to better understand what it is your target market. And as specialized as that can get needs, and then you need to try to address those needs better than the way the competition ultimately is tempting to today.

The other thing to consider as well is that just because there's other products on the market, typically us as entrepreneurs and B2B SaaS founders are much more aware of those tools out there. Then our target market ultimately is. So if your market is huge, and I'm dabbling in podcasting, which is ridiculously big and growing.

Kind of a lot of those products can, uh, be successful simultaneously. But important to note here is what I would say is that your target market may not be aware of the other products on the market, so whomever you're trying to sell to, they might be relatively new to this game or they may not be aware of the other products on the market.

So, The reason why I mentioned that is because your real competition is their existing solution. And their existing solution might be them. It might be a process, it might be a service, right? It, it's not necessarily another tool. So couple things I want you to take away from this is that the bar has been lowered considerably in terms of what it takes to get a product to market that is more capable and to bring those products to market faster and probably offer them more cost effective as well too.

So competition is gonna rise considerably. I'll see a lot more innovation, a lot more products to market, but your process shouldn't change. Do the homework. Figure out what they do, what they don't do, and figure out which direction you can take your product to make yours unique or ultimately a one of one, or competing in much smaller, uh, competing in a market where you are the obvious choice, essentially.

That's kind of your end result goal. But the other thing to keep in mind is what your target market is ultimately consider. Your competition, and that might not be one of these other products. It might just be a process or some type of steps that they're following.

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Know Your Activation Points For Your B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sat, 01 Apr 2023 07:56:23 -0400

After you launch, users may or may not convert at certain points in the process. These are called 'activation points'. You'll need to learn them as users are navigating the product experience. Once you learn them, you'll know what other information you'll need to improve the effectiveness at which they convert.

I'll share an example of what I'm doing currently for another product I just launched.

Hotjar - https://www.hotjar.com/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how to better understand your activation points and gather feedback in particularly around the why. I'll explain more, but what I mean by that, in order to figure out how to get your prospects and your users to become paying customers as efficiently as possible now, so I've launched another B2B SaaS application this past week.

There's some things that I probably would've really liked to have upon launching or with the launch, but didn't wanna slow down the launch, and I really wanted to see how effectively what I had built was converting as such. It didn't include like a free trial, which these days is pretty uncommon for a low-touch micro SaaS product.

However, upon launching it, I did get about 10%. Once I, once I launched, I had a, you know, built up an email list from the, from the inbound, uh, lead capture that I had set up. I blasted that list to let them know we launched products available. Here's where you can register for an account and get started.

About 10% of that list immediately went to the site and attempted to create an account. Most of them did not convert to paying customers. So that's what gave me the initial indication that probably not going to, most of them probably will not convert into paying customers without a free trial access to the product.

So I knew I needed to do that, but. I didn't know, you know, for sure I had suspicion, I should say, at least that was the assumption. Uh, from there it was doing what I needed to do to figure out why people potentially weren't making it past that activation point because they were getting to the product, they were registering the user.

Then I was looking for billing information to see if they would to using a ping to basically converting their count to paying right away. So I was really measuring the strength and the intensity of the pain of the problem. My product was intended to solve for them. So anyway, long story short, most people had not converted.

So I, I wanted to do multiple things. Number one, I wanted to figure out what it was gonna take in order to convert them. And number two, I wanted to try to find out why they weren't converting. Maybe that was the reason, maybe it wasn't. My suspicion was that they wanted access to test the product for themselves before they ultimately paid for it, which is again, become more common.

I leverage a tool called HotJar. If you're unfamiliar, you could find more out about it@hotjar.com. It's an analytics tool. I think it's great. It does everything from screen recording to heat maps, to allowing you to inject surveys right into your application and also at certain steps in the process.

And that's what I find to be really valuable is I can create a specific type of survey. In this case, I created a feedback survey. At that activation point where I was expecting to gather some billing information from the users, that's when they were expected to convert. If they would, in order to learn more about why they maybe were or were not converting.

So if they weren't converting, there's a possibility that I could start to collect feedback at that. At that point in the experience for them by including that survey there, and really what you're looking for is the qualitative feedback. Like people can click on buttons for surveys and stuff like that and answer the closed ended questions, but I really wanted the open-ended text and I'm looking to get some now in order to get a better understanding.

Why people at that point aren't converting. Now, either way, I'm implementing a free trial anyway, cuz I also wanna see whether or not that moves the needle here. But I wanted to share with you a couple things. Number one, upon launching, its figuring out where your activation points are, as in what gets your prospect perspective.

Customer end users moved from one stage to the next stage in the process. And you'll map it out in your head essentially in the beginning, but then you're gonna have. Measure the effectiveness of that and figure out if the process may be broken or not. Converting all that effectively at some point in that process.

And then you're gonna wanna focus in on that one just like you would a bottleneck and a process to figure out how to alleviate or eliminate it. So I'm sharing with you also some ideas in terms of how you can gather more information to try to find out why they are or are not converting. Uh, so I use both email with some of the users that I know had attempted.

Access the system as well as Hot Jar, which I think is a really great tool, and I'll include a link to it in the show notes as well.

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How To React To Discovering New Competition

Sean Boyce — Fri, 31 Mar 2023 07:22:04 -0400

You've worked so hard to launch and were excited to be the only product on the market, right?

Wrong. You will find competition all over the place. More will come and go. Finding competition is a GOOD thing. You just need to know how to react to use it to your advantage.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk about is basically the, the time when you ultimately launch your B2B SaaS and all the emotions that you might going through while managing that. So I've launched a B2B SaaS product this week and podcasting, and it, you know, was going well so far. I had a bunch of people that had originally signed up from my landing page that was communicating to my target market, my value proposition.

And confirming supposedly what they would pay once the product became available. So one of the first things I did once we launched V1 was to send a blast email to all them, Hey, heads up, we launched. You can get access to the product. Then I've watched, as people have attempted to onboard themselves, I've understood where the activation points, or I'm getting a better idea for where the activation points are, which essentially.

People moving from one stage to the next isn't a prospect to a paying customer or, uh, you know, an interested party to a user to get a better understanding in which levers I might move in order to move people along in the process and try to convert them into a paying customer. Ideally, a happy paying customer, one that's receiving value.

Long story short, these are always exciting weeks. I enjoy them very much, but there's a lot that goes through your head emotionally, and that's kind of what I wanna talk about because at the same time this week as I launched and as I am sharing my product with my network as well too, which is another great way to get feedback by the way, especially for an early stage product, is someone shared with me feedback on my product after they tried it and used.

And they said it's better than so-and-so product. So this week I learned about another competitive product in the same space that someone in my network was using, and they gave me, they gave me props for mine being better, which is great. But I also found out about a competitor, which I want to talk to you about how you should feel about that as well too.

That is also great. But in the moment it's easy to have a reaction along the lines. Oh no. Like someone beat me to the punch or someone has a head start or someone has a better product, or someone is offering more than I am, right? That's a natural reaction that's gonna happen to you, especially after you've worked hard to build what it is you've built.

Launched your SaaS product and found out there's another one out there that does something similar, if not the same thing. I want to tell you why that's not the end of the world. Number one. Competition is almost always a good thing. rising tide raises all ships, as they say. It also validates a market. So if you, depending on how, where you are in the innovation curve, as in how innovative your product is, finding out that there are other solutions to solve the problems that you're trying to solve for your target market is a good thing, especially if you know they have traction, because that indicates the, that the opportunity is there and the demand as well.

So that should help you ultimately. everything you're trying to do. So in the end of the, at the end, at the end of the day, that's definitely a good thing. But I could understand if your reaction is one of surprise, you know, you get a little bit, feel, maybe a little bit intimidated, that's all natural. But when you boil it down to brass tacks, ultimately that's a good thing.

And it also provides an opportunity for you to learn what are they doing? How are they marketing? What, what are they communicating? Who are they marketing themselves? And then you get into a routine and a process of understanding those things and then incorporating them into your process from the perspective of how are we differentiated, right?

How do we make sure that what we're doing is better, faster, cheaper, et cetera. It's the same thing. , as I talk about when we're doing the discovery work that you should do when you find out about competitors, you just need to figure out who your target market is and how you are solving their problems better than any other product out there.

And that should always be what you're striving for. But over time, inevitably you're gonna find other competitive products, some that you may have been aware of, some that you may not have, and new ones are gonna come, and old ones are gonna go. So this change is just gonna happen. Only, the only thing you really need to worry about is to incorporate that into part of your routine of continuously figuring out how to make your product better for your target market.

So anyway, I just wanted to share with you some of the emotional reactions you might go through during launch week, especially as you start to learn more about. What your market looks like, because once you put a product out there and you're getting feedback, especially from friendlies and early adapters, they're gonna be sharing these things with you, and it's gonna be really great insight for you to know, and it can help you learn and make your product that much better.

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Stop Obsessing and Launch Already

Sean Boyce — Thu, 30 Mar 2023 07:25:27 -0400

It's easy to get stuck in the trap of 'perfecting' your product and delaying your launch.

I almost fell into that trap this week with the launch of my new B2B SaaS. Instead, saner heads prevailed and I launched.

Here's the story and why it's important to understand this concept.

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Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is how to get yourself out of your own way so that you can launch, stop obsessing over the little minor details, get your product out there into the hands of users and customers, and start testing it for real. So I mentioned this because I've launched a new SaaS this week, and while there are a billion things that I would love to change already and before I launched, I resisted the urge to want to do that because at this point I should know better.

You would think then, you know, I still had a place to track all those things. We're using a project management system. Trello got all the things that I think might be worthwhile to change about the product experience, but I didn't let the vast majority of those stop the process of us actually launching.

So the question is, the reason for this is because it's very easy to get caught in this as a trap. This is like the perfectionist trap, as I typically refer to it as in my product experience is never ready. It has to be perfect, has to be tested a billion times, has to throw zero errors, or has the potential to throw zero errors.

Nothing needs to be wrong with this thing By the time that I'm launch now, I get it. If you've been here, I've been here. And it is still something you always have to do your best to try to keep in check. Having said that, anything that goes beyond what I typically call launching at 75%, like we always ship at 75%, is to try to avoid falling into the strap because you can be stuck here forever, as in perfecting a product is not really a thing that's even theoretically possible in my mind.

So you can continually. Adding features and making tweaks and changing the user experience indefinitely. And that what that's gonna mean is that you never launch your product, you never get feedback, and you're not unable to move past that step. So having done that this week with a recent product that I launched, I'm gonna share with you what happened.

Probably relatively obviously, some things broke, right? But we didn't panic. What did we do? We triaged it, we figured out what wasn't working and we fixed it. That was literally all that happened. But the good news is that we launched and we figured out what was broken, and some of that stuff that was broken past the testing that we had already done, we probably wouldn't have caught it had we not launched the product.

So ultimately we got to where we wanted to go faster because we launched. So I'm always an advocate for launching sooner than you feel comfortable. If you feel comfortable about launching, you're probably launching too late, and I want you to leverage these strategies and keep these things in the back of your mind when you're thinking about launching your product.

Because you can get stuck in these traps. You can get stuck in these loops forever. . Ultimately, all that matters is you're gonna pay attention, you're gonna learn things, and you're gonna figure out it isn't perfect. It's not expected to be, it's never going to be. So try to temper your expectations when it comes to your product experience and realize that for the best of your product and your customers and users, you want to get it in their hands as soon as possible.

because number one, ultimately the goal here is to validate whether or not it's providing with the kind of value that you think that it can, and the longer you wait to do. The greater the risk of failure for your overall entire project. But number two, and potentially more importantly related to this lesson, you're gonna figure out what isn't working and you're gonna fix it because that's exactly what you're planning to do as you're building and managing your product along the way.

So that's a lesson than I want you to take away from this today. I've done it myself. It's an easy trap to fall into, but don't let yourself fall into it. Just think through methodically the fact. You wanna get your product out there and enhance the customers so you can start performing validation and the fact that you're gonna pay attention and the stuff that you find you're gonna fix.

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AI Tools Are Making This Bad Problem Worse

Sean Boyce — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 07:39:31 -0400

AI tools are great for building a product that can do more even faster, but the BIGGEST problem in B2B SaaS remains and are actually getting worse.

People are shipping products that don't offer value at a faster pace now because they aren't doing the most important step first - finding problems worth solving.

Free email course on product-market fit - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey everyone, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is how AI tools are taking one particular problem of designing, building, launching a B2B SaaS product and actually making it worse. So a lot, there's a lot of buzz about what the AI tools are capable of and how remarkable that is, and that's all great.

I think one of the strengths of these AI tools is that it gives us. The ability to do a lot more with a lot less because the tools are so capable themselves. However, it doesn't fix what ultimately, I believe, to be the biggest problem with people who want to design and build a successful B2B SaaS business.

And to me, that's the finding a problem worth solving challenge. Many people are still struggling with that, and the problem with these AI tools is it's easier to move faster and to design a product with even better capabilities, but it's not solving that problem's worth solving challenge for you. So what people are doing, what I'm seeing more of on online communities like Reddit and things like that, that I'm subscribed to, I'm seeing people shipping new product ideas faster, but with worse or just as bad product market.

As they had before. So I'm, what I'm largely seeing is a higher frequency of people rushing potential products to market that don't address a need. They don't address an obvious unmet need. They don't address a problem worth solving. They're just ideas without any validation. So the AI tools are not doing that step for you, and in my opinion, that step is the most important step that people are still continuing.

So just because you can build a product faster doesn't mean that that necessarily is gonna increase your odds of success in my. , if you were gonna invest time into any part of this process. It's the upfront component. It's always the upfront component. Doing that research and discovery to make sure that you're solving a problem that has a real need, and many of these products just don't.

So for folks that are posting on these communities about these products that they've just built, they're getting a lot of feedback along the lines of, I don't understand this. This doesn't really seem to. Kind of value or I don't get it. I don't know what this product does, or there's this other product which is cheaper, fast, or better or free even.

So those things tell me that people are not doing the, just the basics in research before they're rushing these products to market. Because probably the fact that the AI tools are just making that much easier. Build stuff, right? And just because you can build something quickly again doesn't mean that it's going to be valuable.

You really need to focus on this value component in order to kind of have the success that I'm sure you're really looking for. So now, if you're just experimenting and learning the AI tools, I get it. But what I'd really rather you do is I'd rather you continue to search for something with more potential that can address an obvious unmet.

That can provide a solution to a problem worth solving, and then leverage the right tools as you move forward with figuring out how you can bring a better solution to market. Ideally, leveraging something I talk about a lot as well too, which is the 10 x effect. How can you, how can your solution be 10 times better, faster, cheaper?

One or more of those categories, that's going to give you a significant leg up on the competition as well, which will enable you to grow with a little bit more virality. So anyway, I just wanted to get that message out there because I'm seeing a lot of that online. I think it's making a bad problem worse, and I think a lot more people should be focusing on problems or solving than just rushing products to market because they can do so faster now.

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The New Gold Rush in B2B SaaS

Sean Boyce — Tue, 28 Mar 2023 07:30:22 -0400

There's been a TON of buzz around AI tools since ChatGPT has taken the world by storm, but what I want to focus on is the wave of innovation this is going to bring as more innovators incorporate AI tools into their B2B SaaS products.

The new gold rush is on, are you going to be able to keep up?

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Episode Transcript
Okay folks, Sean here, and today what I'm gonna talk to you about is the new Cold Rush, and of course this topic is gonna involve ai, but I promise you it's not only going to focus exclusively on open AI's chat, G P T. What I want you to focus on is the fact that the bar has been raised. And what I mean by that is minimum level of requirements in terms of getting into and building B2B SaaS products has essentially been lowered considerably.

Uh, in terms of being able to build something rather complicated, significantly faster because of these AI tools. And what I mean by the bar has been raised, it's the expectations, the level of competition, and in particular the time to market that these tools are capable of now, based on what these AI components can enable you to do.

So I'm leveraging it to build several products, seemingly at once at the moment. Several of which are essentially related to one another. But the point remains that with the AI tools, we're able to create significant progress in a really short period of time because of its capabilities. So I just read something recently that said that Y Combinator, the current class for Y Combinator, about half or maybe even more than half of the companies that are participating in this cohort are building tools around open ai.

Or AI-based tools like Chat, G P T, which is pretty significant. It's been a while since essentially cohorts like that have been focused around a single piece of technology in order to do what they're doing. So there's been some pretty dramatic changes happening here, and this is all happening very quickly.

I saw another statistic today which said that open AI in, in their chat, G P T tool, essentially is not just one of the. biggest, like most revolutionary developments, and quite a while, at least the latest generation of these tools. But in terms of how quickly it's growing, it's growing at an exponential rate when compared with previous other leap forwards in progress.

I've been tracking how long it's taken for user for it to get to a certain threshold of active usage, and I saw the statistic recently that. ChatGPT's tool reached 1 million users in five days, which is just crazy. It's hard for me to fathom that number. The next closest was Instagram more than 10 years ago, and it took two and a half months to do the same thing.

The latest threshold of information that I've seen is related to reaching a hundred million users worldwide. Chat GPT has been able to accomplish that in two. Less than what it took Instagram to get to 1 million users, got to a hundred times more, which is just maddening. Um, this is like crazy numbers.

The next closest in that list was the Apple App Store, and that took two years. So what I really want you to focus on as part of what I'm talking about here is that the new Gold Rush is on. We're gonna see wave after wave of new innovative products come to market as these tools become even more accessible and people are able to accelerate their development.

So if you're not thinking about incorporating these tools into your product at the moment, you really should be, especially if they can help you do more with less, move faster in product development. That's the idea, right? I don't want people to rush into product development. You need to still properly validate that you have a problem worth solving, but when the time comes to be able to do.

Whatever your product and solution needs to offer these Open A, these AI tools are gonna give you a significant ability to have an advantage over not having access to them, because you should be able to enable your tool to be capable of more in significantly less development time, which should also reduce your costs and time to market.

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The Most Important B2B SaaS Skill Of The Future

Sean Boyce — Mon, 27 Mar 2023 08:02:15 -0400

AI are developing at light speed. They provide us with a HUGE opportunity to build more powerful B2B SaaS products faster than ever.

One skill in particular will be critically important to continually develop to prepare you as best as possible to succeed in building B2B SaaS products. Let's talk about it.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is what I feel will be the single most important skill to master if you want to continually succeed in B2B SaaS, and in particular, leveraging the micro SaaS strategy. I've been talking a lot more about recently, so I'm sure you're overwhelmed with information in terms of AI and especially chat g p t.

But obviously the rest of some of the larger competitors out there are scrambling to try to get their AI tools to market like Google, for example. Regardless, we're gonna continue to see a lot of innovation here, which I think is exciting and I think really important for those of us out there looking to build more B2B SaaS products.

Having said that, I feel like the most important skill to master for now, and something I'm working pretty diligently on at the moment is what was referred to as prompt engineering. It's a concept of essentially how I would describe it, getting good at asking these tools the right question to get the answer that you're looking for as consistently and most effectively.

So prompt engineering is all about figuring out what to ask, chat, G P T in order to get essentially the best version of the information that you're looking for. Because of the capabilities of these tools, they can help you. quite a bit of progress very early on in whatever it is that you're building. So if you're thinking of building a product with these AI tools built in, and I've been doing a lot of this most recently.

In fact, I might continue to specialize on it in in it moving forward because, It just has pretty dramatic capabilities, then you're gonna need to get good at figuring out how to interact with it in order to get the information that you need. So over the weekend, I watched a few really interesting YouTube videos, and one of the ways that they recommended you refine these skills is actually to use the tool itself.

the technical version of this is referred to as recursion, where basically a program calls itself over and over again to help you with whatever it is you're trying to do. The movie version of this might be Inception, , but either way you get the idea, right? Using the tool to get better at using the tool.

It's pretty cool. So you would issue a series of commands to chat C B T to tell, tell it that you're going to be conducting an exercise with it, as in. I want you to continually provide me with feedback or ask me questions to learn more about what I'm trying to achieve, and then make recommendations for how the prompt should be updated in order to continually make the result that I'm looking for better.

It was a really interesting exercise. I'm gonna go through it probably today, but definitely this week in order to improve some of the tools that I'm. that have the chat, G P T and other AI tools integrated in them. But I wanted to share that with you because I think it's a great way to develop a process or a routine for yourself to figure out how to get better at leveraging these tools and in particular, how to continually develop what I feel will be coming increasingly important skillset moving forward.

That being prompt engineering.

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Defining Micro SaaS

Sean Boyce — Sun, 26 Mar 2023 07:50:01 -0400

Micro SaaS is my favorite design pattern. I want to talk about why it's so powerful by first defining it for you.

Free email course on product-market fit - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is defining what micro sass is. So in a few episodes ago, I talked to you about why micro SaaS is one of my new favorite strategies, and I'm working on building multiple micro sass businesses simultaneously at the moment. And I'm gonna continue to keep you posted as I'm building.

Because I'm putting a process together that I want you to be able to follow as well to achieve success building B2B SaaS using this micro SaaS essentially design pattern, right where your SAS is gonna fit into this mold. But first question is, what is the mold? How do you define micro saas? Well, there's some other content on the web out there about this topic, but I don't love it.

So I'm gonna work on my own version and hopefully that is easy for you to understand. If you have any questions about that, of course you can always reach out to me. To me, what Micros is, is looking at a, and I'm gonna compare it to what most people are typically doing today with SaaS, in that they're building more complicated, fully featured software applications available over mobile or the web or whatever.

But it's a typical software as a service, and B2B is a real common one. So that's, Now. There's a lot of problems with that though, and that's why I think micro SaaS is so exciting because it simplifies everything. If you simplify everything, you can speed everything up. And in today's world where everything moves at light speed, especially with what we've seen from the world of AI now, and open AI and chat G P T and all these developments coming out and all the other bigger players getting involved, that process I feel is only going to accelerate.

I want you to be able to be more agile in responding to the changes in the market. That way you can get out ahead of the competition. That can give you a leg up when you're competing against some of these larger companies, these other startups that have a ton of funding and a lot of resources. The one thing that you will always have over them if you are a smaller, more agile organization, is that flexibility, the ability to respond.

You're going to be able to be faster than them. There's a simple analogy there. It's like a tugboat versus a cruise ship, right? Which one can turn faster? Well, the tugboat can turn on a dime, and that's what's gonna give you the advantage. Now we need to lean into those advantages, uh, because trying to compete against a, a cruise ship in pretty much every other category, it's gonna be really difficult to say the least.

But let me get back to my original point in defining what micro SAS is, how I see it. It's comparing those typical B2B SaaS products and businesses against. A much simpler version of that. So what do I mean by that? I mean, in a typical B2B SaaS product, you have a whole multitude of features and workflows and all kinds of things being managed in there.

The micro SaaS variation of that is to take the key feature out of an application like that and turn that into the application. So that's how I define micro saas. Micro SAS is built around one feature or one work. and from the perspective of your customer, your user, your buyer, whomever, right? Whatever problem you're solving for them, you offer one solution and that is your entire application, right?

You can. Now, that doesn't mean you don't have other things like authentication and billing and all that kind of stuff. You still have those, right? But I'm not considering those core pieces of unique functionality that doesn't really go into your value proposition. So your unique value pro. Is focused around this one key feature or this one key workflow that you're helping your customer or your user with.

That's micro saas. And if you're going beyond that, you're not leveraging the strategy correctly. And I can't tell you that despite how direct I'm being about what this is and what it isn't, people still are going way beyond that. It's like, well, what if we had this or what if we had that? Wouldn't it be nice to have this as well?

You. , you are taking away all of the advantages of this model and this design pattern. And I'll tell you, in most of those instances, people are thinking about it in those terms for relatively obvious reasons, because we are natural innovators, right? We want to provide and add as much value as possible.

The problem is you've probably yet to validate even the key feature. As such, you need to focus on keeping your experiment really. because if you're adding to that, it's gonna make it more difficult to validate. It's gonna convolute the user experience. It's gonna, again, you're getting in the direction of the cruise ship again, and that's not where we compete, right?

We compete on a much smaller level because we're faster, more flexible, more agile. So don't give away your competitive advantage. Leverage the Micros design pattern in order to succeed in B2B SaaS.

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Why You Should ALWAYS Sell Before You Build

Sean Boyce — Sat, 25 Mar 2023 07:00:26 -0400

The biggest mistake I see often is building BEFORE you try to sell your B2B SaaS concept.

Let's talk about why this is a huge mistake and I'll share an example with you from the consumers perspective to prove to you that YOU are already doing this so you know that it works.

Free product-market fit course -

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about is if you want to be successful building a B2B SaaS business, you have to get comfortable with something that most people are uncomfortable with, and that's selling, in particular, selling before you build, which adds potentially another layer of insecurity for folks who are afraid to find out that their baby is ugly.

Now, I understand that that sounds harsh, but this is really important information for you to know. It can create this unstoppable snowball effect if you wind up building something that ends up being a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. And that's what I see a lot with people who want to get involved in SaaS.

They build a product based on idea. They have not a validated concept or a problem worth solving. Before you know it, you are continually chasing your tail. Find someone to give this software away to, and that's not what you're trying to do. So you need to get comfortable with this concept of selling, in particular, selling very early on, which is one of the first most important tests you can run to measure the relative strength of your proposed value proposition.

Right now, a lot of that. Should lead you to understand that this is very early days, so that's why we're doing the testing. If we're doing that testing early on, then we'll have an idea whether or not you're onto something, because I don't want you enter those later stages, which suck up so much time, energy, resources, and putting you on a path that's hard to get off if you begin building.

Before you do any of that or make any of those investments, I want you to have a better understanding in the direction that you're thinking of heading into potential that it has. So, What is an example of doing something like that? Well, I'm gonna skip over entirely what it looks like doing for an actual assessed business, and I'm gonna share something that's probably more relatable for you.

Think about it in terms of going to a restaurant with friends or family, right? One of the pushbacks that I get whenever I am telling people that they need to do this is I can't sell my product unless I have my product. How's anyone gonna believe me or someone needs to experience it in order to really understand.

And I wanna tell you that's a hundred percent wrong. And trust me, I've been there. But having done this time and time again, I know that that's wrong. And let me explain it to you. I'm gonna explain it to you in a way that will help you understand that it's wrong as well, because you don't do it either.

In fact, from the other side, right? As the consumer is someone who's making purchasing decisions, you don't need to see access to the product either. So here's the concept that I've come up with most recently, and it's in a restaurant setting. . So if you're with your friends, family, a date, whatever, and you're getting ready to order, right?

What do you have in order to make that purchasing decision? When you're talking to the waiter or the waitress and you're getting ready to order whatever, lasagna, spaghetti, sometime, some type of food, right? A burger. It doesn't matter what it is, right? You're getting ready to order. What do you have available at your disposal to make that purchasing?

Do you ask the waiter or waitress to wheel out for you the completed meal so that you can see it and then decide whether or not you wanna buy it? No. Right. That sound, that concept almost sounds ridiculous. That's just not how it works. You look at a menu, you interpret the description for what it is that you want to.

Potentially purchase what you want to have for dinner. You optionally see a price there as well too, right? More commonly. So we, we know that as well, so that we understand like what's within our budget, right? What do we wanna spend? What are we gonna buy? What do we wanna spend? And based on the description, does that sound like something that we want to have?

And that is all the information that you need in order to make a purchase decision. And you might have a question or two, right? How does that get handled? Well, a waiter or waitress is right there to answer your questions for you, right? And the equivalent of that can be. . Basically customer service for your SaaS application or an FAQ on a landing page, right?

Regardless if you have more questions before you need to make a decision, most of them are not, let me see the food before I buy it. , right? So you are more than capable and you do this all the time. That isn't the only example. Everyone does this all the time, making purchasing decisions based on something that they want to or need without actually experiencing or seeing the product for themselves.

as such. I want you to think about that in terms of how you can leverage that strategy to potentially sell your SaaS product idea and do some early stage testing, which will help you validate the respective strength of that early stage value proposition to know whether or not you should ultimately move forward with potentially building it.

If you can't sell it, then you shouldn't build it.

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Why Micro SaaS is my New Favorite B2B SaaS Strategy

Sean Boyce — Fri, 24 Mar 2023 07:53:52 -0400

I'm borderline obsessed with the Micro-SaaS strategy for B2B. Allow me to explain why that includes a story about how I struggled to use my refrigerators water dispenser.

Free product-market fit course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to talk to you about is this new topic or strategy that I'm borderline obsessed with, that I've been referring to as micro SaaS. Now, if you haven't heard this terminology before, how I describe it is not thinking of your B2B SaaS product as a fully featured application.

That can get complicated or heavy at times. It's thinking of the most important feature in your B2B SaaS application and then turning that into the application itself. Let me explain a little bit more. So, in my opinion and in what I've observed out in the wild. Software just gets way too complicated, usually way too fast before you know it.

I see a lot of software out there turn into basically Salesforce, if you've ever used Salesforce before or experienced it, you know what I mean? They have so much going on. It's hard to tell anymore what Salesforce does or doesn't do because it seems to me that they have something for everything, in my opinion.

If you have, if trying to beat all things to all people, you're nothing to. And what I mean by that is it becomes so overwhelming for people to figure out what it is your software does that they get frustrated or quit, they become overwhelmed and they really just don't have the they, they don't have the ability to kind of continually figure that out, so they give up.

So that's why, I mean, it ends up becoming nothing for anyone because a lot of people quit. So that. Has become ever more present in the B2B SaaS world as well, too. As products evolve, software becomes more mature, features become more intense and overwhelming, and I think that is a risk to the success of B2B SaaS companies at scale.

So what I've dove deep into in recent weeks and months, and in fact at the moment, I'm actually building multiple micro SaaS products, which has. Really exciting and I wanna share those details with you moving forward as I continue to record these episodes so that you can learn from what it is I've been doing, what is working, what isn't working.

I could share those strategies with you and you can incorporate them into whatever process you may be investing in at the moment. Perhaps it's a product of your own that you'd like to build or are currently building, or maybe you're even working at a company with a more complicated piece of software.

Regardless of which of those buckets you may fall. This is a strategy I feel like has benefit for everyone cuz I've been in all those positions myself. Right now I'm building Micros applications, but I've worked on heavy, complicated, big software product teams. In fact, I consult to them still now and the strategies that I'm learning and I'm deploying.

Using this concept of micros would help even the most complicated software products. Because the, the universal philosophy that I've adopted and I continue to pursue and push the boundaries of is software can never be too simple. You can't make software too simple if you continuously work to make your software simpler, but effective.

I often experience some of the, some of the best experiences that I have with software are the simplest but most effective pieces. because again, I feel like too many people are trying to do too many things with their software, and before you know it, you lose people. , there's an interesting story I'll share with you,

So my wife and I just moved into a new apartment, essentially in Philly and in it we, a new refrigerator came with the unit. Great, right? So w. Simultaneously, we're both trying to figure out how the water dispenser on the refrigerator works , and you'd think because of how many years I've spent in usability that things like this would just be intuitive for me at this point, but you'd be wrong trying to use this thing.

We both got it wrong and she's much brighter than I am. She is a PhD, so it's the obvious when you approach the fridge, what's obvious is that there's one lever and if you put the a glass against that, It dispenses ice. So if you're not expecting ice and you're expecting water, it's sprays ice everywhere,

So I think we've all had kind of that experience, but the, the trick that came into play was like there's a touch screen on the fridge, for example, and I am on there and I'm looking for like, how do I switch this to water? Because that's the ingrained experience. That's what I'm used to with these products.

But there isn't an option for that. Why? Because there's a second dispenser. Or second lever that dispenses water. They've separated the water dispenser and the ice dispenser levers in terms of where you press the glass against. And the water one is like almost camouflaged, like it's like built in to the extent where you almost don't notice it, but what you can notice is the ice dispenser lever

So I simultaneously made the mistake myself and then witnessed her do the same and then had to explain it for her. So anyway, my point is like something simple like. , it causes tons of usability issues if it's not intuitive or you've made it overly complicated, and I see this with software all the time.

So anyway, I encourage you to do a little bit of digging on micro SaaS. I'm gonna be creating a lot more content around it, and I'm hoping it's gonna help you be more successful in B2B SaaS.

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B2B SaaS Growth On A Unit Economic Level

Sean Boyce — Thu, 23 Mar 2023 08:21:42 -0400

If you really want to bootstrap your way to success then you're going to have to understand unit economics.

Let's talk about measuring growth for B2B SaaS and the various traps to avoid.

Free product-market fit email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is growth for B2B SaaS companies and how to measure it. Now, I'm sure you're familiar ish with the concept of measuring growth at a B2B SaaS company. relative to your LTV and your CAC or your lifetime value, your customer and your customer acquisition cost.

If you take your LTV and you divide it by your CAC, you should get a number around three, or at least greater than three, but not too much greater because that can spell trouble, and if it's significantly under three, you have a problem as well. Now, that is a fundamental concept for B2B SaaS companies to understand because it's valuable, however, Something I think is arguably more important is really having a fundamental understanding of unit economics in general, because it's easy to get obsessed with measuring quantitative things when you're trying to run a successful B2B SaaS company, and I don't want you to fall into that trap.

Unit economics, on the other hand, speaks more to solid fundamental business principles because at the end of the day, my opinion, what you're trying to do is run a profitable business, and that doesn't get talked about enough when it comes to building and growing a healthy B2B SaaS company. I think I know why, but I want to try to do whatever I can to try to change that because there are a lot of successful B2B SaaS companies out there that don't get a ton of credit or press not talked about as much because they're not in the so-called kind of VC or investment ecosystem, because they haven't really needed to do that.

So I'm sure you're familiar with bootstrapping, which is really where you're funding your own growth. I'm a huge fan of this concept, at least until you're in a position to be able to negotiate from power. But the way to get you there, first and foremost, is understand that what you're doing is setting yourself up for running a healthy business.

And in particular, with regard to growth, I wanna talk about unit economics, which is. , the concepts here, and again, people can get lost and it can get really detailed really quickly. I don't want you to fall into that trap. I really want you to try your best to keep things relatively simple, especially in the beginning.

And if you understand solid business economics at a fundamental level, unit economics is about as foundational as it. . Basically, you need to take in more money than you spend. And if that's the case, then ultimately you should have a really solid shot at being profitable, which does any number of things.

It provides a lot of benefits. Number one, it gives you that financial freedom and flexibility, gives you control, enables you to keep most of what you're building, so on and so forth. So if you don't, if you're not forced to go down the investment route, running a healthy business is advantage. For any number of different reasons, but from a unit economics perspective, I want you to focus on making sure that your numbers make sense very, very early on.

Why is that? Because if you don't, you will fall victim to the age old saying, which is you're going to lose a little bit on every sale, make it up in volume, , which obviously doesn't work, right. That makes it pretty straightforward in terms of can't see that working, but. I see this pattern all the time, and especially with venture backed or investment backed B2B SaaS businesses because there's this obsession with growth for growth sake, and I think that is a really dangerous trap if you're going for a unicorn status, if you're reinvesting every single dollar you have back into growth to try to someday in the future, however many months or years from now, exit for a ridiculous.

I think that's a trap. If you take a closer look at the statistics on that, it's around 1% ever actually achieved something like that. So people, people talk about that part, but they never positioned it the other way. , which is 99% approximate failure rate. So I don't like those odds for you. That's why I don't take that approach myself.

I'd rather see you build your B2B SaaS business with solid fundamental economics, and that starts with understanding these concepts at a unit economic level.

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Growing Your Business Without Any Additional Funding with GrowthMentor’s Foti Panagio

Sean Boyce — Tue, 21 Mar 2023 17:00:00 -0400

In this episode, Founder of GrowthMentor Foti Panagio talks about the importance of having a mentor, the difference between a mentor and a consultant, and how to grow a business without any additional funding.

Foti Panagio is a full-stack growth marketer with over a decade of experience in growth with a unique overlap into the world of InfraOps.

Foti is the Founder of GrowthMentor where he provides Founders and Marketers one on one advice from vetted startup mentors. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How GrowthMentor helps Founders and Marketers.
Why having a mentor is so important.
The difference between a mentor and a consultant.
How the amount of content you consume affects your productivity.
The value of verbalizing your thought process.
The difference between passively consuming media and personalized coaching.
How to tackle imposter syndrome.
The dangers of following vanity metrics.
How to grow a business without raising funds.

Resources:

Connecting with Foti Panagio:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables:

04:05 - “There’s certain mistakes and failures you need to make to grow my favorite analogy here is you go to the gym and how do you grow muscle you break it first and it rebuilds but go with the wrong form into the squat rack you put way too much weight and you’re going to be out of action indefinitely and it’s these sort of mistakes that are really unnecessary and that’s where mentorship can come into play just learning from other peoples fuckups.”
09:01 - “As awesome as it is to ingest content via podcast at the end of the day everybody's situation is completely unique, so I have my industry I have my specific situation going on it’s so nuanced so the advice I’m going to give to you is completely different to somebody else based on the context and that’s lost when you’re just consuming content.”
10:54 - “The way I describe mentorship is it helps you connect the dots that you didn’t even know existed so many times I’ll talk to somebody hey I need some help with my Facebook ads or SEO or whatever and zoom back and there’s another channel potentially they want to look at or another approach or a slight little tweak it’s like a chiropractor in a sense you go that little snap and you see things differently or the neurons transmit in a more efficient way.”
14:59 - “A lot of people shy away from that what do you mean a lifestyle business don’t you want to get rich? And I’m like well it’s nothing to be ashamed of you want to life your life and style it the way you want so it’s a lifestyle business.”
20:34 - “If you want the most efficient honest-to-God truth of how to avoid funding just learn how to do more jobs yourself and then you don’t have to hire other people, it’s pretty simple.”

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Return on Product Development Investment

Sean Boyce — Tue, 07 Mar 2023 07:10:52 -0500

If you don't know what type of return you are receiving then how do you know if it's a good investment?

This is the million dollar question I ask my B2B SaaS clients to which I usually either don't get a response or they tell me that it's a good question that should be answered.

Do you know what your return is on product development investment?

Related Article - https://nxtstep.io/daily/product-development-return/

Find Product-Market Fit Faster - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about is the return that you're getting on your investment into product development. Now, when I first start working with my B2B SaaS clients, they almost never have any context for this, which is always surprising to me. The reason why this is so surprising to me is because this is consistently their largest expense as.

Time, effort, resources, capital, largest number of all of those categories is can typically be found in a B2B SaaS organization as investment into product development. So the question when I ask it of the clients that I work with, when I simply propose, you know, what type of return are you getting from all of this investment and all of this activity, I usually get either crickets as a no response or a response along the lines of something.

that's a great question, but no one has asked it before, so that is always surprising to me for obvious reasons. But the, one of the other reasons why this is, I say, kind of alarming to me is because if you don't know what type of return you're receiving, then how do you know whether or not it's a good investment?

If you're not sure whether or. , the dollars that you're placing into something significant like that is producing a return, then you don't know whether or not it's a good investment. So we end up having a lot of dialogue around this, and that is really the catalyst for figuring out how to fix this in dialogue with my B2B SaaS clients.

So, we'll, that will open up the possibility of taking a closer look and as we. Closer into where that money is going and what type of return it's producing the, you kind of, you start to like peel back the onion and the information that you find can be pretty surprising for those that I work with, as in just how much of those resources are going into something that isn't producing a return.

I've shared this in a couple of recent pieces of content that I produced, but there's a feature adoption report out there from a company called Pendo. That they did a few years back where they found that nearly 80% of the investment into product development is essentially wasted because, and the way that they measured that was that 80% of that investment goes towards features that are either never or rarely used, indicating that all of the effort that led to that feature winding up in the.

essentially was wasted because no one ever used it. So now I find this as to be a systemic problem throughout product development organizations for B2B SaaS companies. So if you haven't looked inwardly at your process, I would encourage you to do so sooner rather than later. This is usually where I start, and there is a ton of opportunity to make improvements if you look closer and you find problems elsewhere.

there's a lot of time, effort, resources that is not producing a return, so that's why I'd encourage you to kind of look first.

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Virtualization Changed Everything

Sean Boyce — Thu, 02 Mar 2023 07:30:59 -0500

Back in the mid 2000s we were panicked that data centers would run out of capacity to run applications.

Then technology called virtualization was invented that changed everything (including the teams that managed it).

Let's talk about how this story may help us predict how technical teams may change due to the advancement of AI in product development.

Related Article - https://nxtstep.io/daily/data-center-capacity-problem/

Find Product-Market Fit Faster - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to tell you about is the story of how a technology called virtual. eliminated a entire crisis that we were expecting back in the mid two thousands. So back then I was working in data centers, and if you're unfamiliar with the concept, data centers are where all the server infrastructure lives.

It manages and runs the applications we use every day. So back then technology was a little bit more static and required a lot more management. Now what we were worried about was that we were running outta capacity in that we didn't have enough servers. We didn't have enough air conditioning to cool those servers.

We also didn't have enough space to physically put those servers. We had all these capacity constraints and we were really concerned that we weren't gonna solve this problem. Didn't seem to have a very straightforward or easy solution, so we were a little panicked there. We couldn't rack mount servers fast enough in order to keep up with the demand for infrastructure to run the applications that we needed to run for our customers.

So ultimately, what happened? Well, along the way, technology was invented around that timeframe, referred to as virtualization, which enabled us to go from. , the physical construct that was each server to creating this concept of a virtual server, which you may or may not be familiar with, which is basically like you can pull together the resources from the infrastructure, and then you can create virtual instances of the server.

So from one physical server you can make. Theoretically an unlimited number of virtual servers. It really just depends on the amount of resources the server itself has, which enabled us to then consolidate the hardware and the infrastructure. And ultimately what this led to was a reversal of this trend of just consuming more resources and requiring expansion and.

All this crazy investment and new building and construction and all that kind of stuff. It don't, it didn't just slow down. It actually reversed itself and data centers started to shrink. So what was wild was where we thought we were gonna be needing new buildings and stuff like that. We ended up having empty rows where servers used to be

We were able to literally take them out because we didn't need them anymore. The software was that efficient. It was an exponential improvement and an evolution technologically. So why am I telling you this story? . The point of this story was really about how teams change that were expected to manage all of this operation.

The skills that were in demand previously, which was managing all of the hardware, ultimately became commoditized and fell out of favor, and in became a significantly higher demand for folks to better understand how to manage the software so we could figure out how to leverage these new tools and resources to the best of their capabilities.

As such, the demand really shifted there in terms. what we needed skills-wise and how those teams changed. Now, the reason why that's relevant is because I believe. should. It provides a good example of something we're on the precipice of, again, which is the invention of new technology and a new wave that's about to change technical teams, that being AI with the invention of tools like chat, G p T from open ai now.

Because of what these tools are capable of, it's going to eliminate significant bottlenecks in product development, in my opinion, and significantly speed up our ability to build features, create applications, even spin up entire companies. It's gonna be a real game changer, and that's gonna change how technical teams evolve.

So whether your team is ready for it or not, these changes are coming and they're gonna make big changes to how product development is managed and what those teams look like. So you need to be ready.

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ChatGPT Could Work At Google

Sean Boyce — Tue, 28 Feb 2023 09:59:31 -0500

ChatGPT has passed the Google level 3 software engineering interview.

What does this mean?

Well it means BIG changes are coming to your product development team (at least they should).

So let's talk about what you should be doing to prepare.

Find Product-Market Fit Faster - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Okay folks, Sean here and today what I wanna talk to you about are the AI tools that are coming for software engineering jobs. Now, I know this is a hot topic recently, especially with ChatGPT and Codex component and all the things that it's capable of. I've been producing a lot of content talking about this because I'm excited for.

The evolution in product development software engineering for a while now has been one of the bigger bottlenecks to the process of producing software features applications more efficiently. As such, that has cannibalized a lot of the resources that have invested into product development and prevented investment elsewhere.

in particular with discovery and research, which are typically underutilized in a lot of product organizations, especially the B2B SaaS ones that I consult for. So that's often a huge area of opportunity for additional investment to make a greater impact. However, not withstanding still the limitation being the bottleneck and software engineering often prevents set investment.

So what I wanna talk about today, what I would consider to be rather exciting development in chat GB T's capability of being able to pass technical interviews for some companies like Google. Now, there's been quite a bit written about this one, but chat G P T was evaluated by the Google team and was able to pass.

A level three technical interview for our software engineering role. And while that may be relatively entry level at Google, it comes with an impressive salary of about $183,000 a year. So now we could talk for a while about the tools capabilities and using an actual human engineer versus the AI tool and go back and forth there, but I don't think that's the.

Interesting element here, and really the one that's likely to be the most impactful for your team and your B2B SaaS company. I think instead, what we need to consider is the fact. This technology is here and it's already doing that work. Companies are already replacing software engineers, especially on the junior side, with tools like ChatGPT because of what they can do and how much faster they can do it.

As such, that cat is out of the bag. So for anyone thinking. Well, this tool doesn't have certain capabilities or it can't do creative problem solving. Like I get that right. And I'm not saying you're wrong about that, at least for now, but chances are that's gonna change as well too. What you do know is that the tool has considerable capabilities right now, and it's on its infancy, so as that continues to develop, it's only gonna get better at being able to perform in this area.

For those of us thinking of becoming anywhere near territorial about these positions or these roles, I think that's a mistake. And historically, as technology has evolved, we've seen that taking a stance like that which is almost adverse to the evolving technology doesn't put you in a best position to be successful.

Instead, what I would encourage you to do is think about how these new capabilities are likely to enable your team to be able to evolve with it and do more. Particularly giving you time back, and I want you to think about why are you're going to invest that time that you're going to get back. I'm gonna encourage you to try to do so with discovery and research because I feel that's a great area to create a greater impact for now what you're working on and why that's important.

But in terms of the actual how of getting it done and moving faster, I think you really need to be prepared for enabling your product development teams, especially in the software engineering side to. By using these tools. I think that's one of the biggest opportunities that's coming a long time.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Building Software MUCH Faster

Sean Boyce — Thu, 23 Feb 2023 07:16:14 -0500

Software engineering is the biggest bottleneck to progress in product development for B2B SaaS companies.

This is all going to change QUICKLY. ChatGPT can now write code for us and provide building blocks which will make it MUCH faster to build software.

Video Demonstration - https://youtube.com/shorts/SOmN0AbTD5w

Find Product-Market Fit Faster for Your B2B SaaS - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to talk to you about is not just why technology evolves, but how it evolves. I think we're all relatively familiar and probably very comfortable with the fact that technology appears to be evolving all around us at all times at this point, which can be anywhere from exciting to frustrating, depending on what role you play in whatever it is that you do.

But there is a distinct pattern if you look closely enough in terms. when we might expect technology to evolve and in particular wear, and that is around, what I'm often referring to is the bottleneck, which is, you can think of it as the slowest step in the process, whatever the process is, but along that critical path, whatever step is the slowest, that's where the vast majority of the resources are being invested in order to figure out how to eliminate that step as the bottleneck.

As such, you can expect. Innovation to come in or around that area eventually, because that investment is eventually gonna lead to leap forward in progress, meaning that that bottleneck is going to be eliminated. Now, couple things to note here. When the bottleneck is ultimately eliminated, that doesn't mean that it disappears.

A bottleneck never disappears. A bottleneck seemingly just moves as in whatever was the slowest step in the process that isn't any longer. Somewhere along that critical path, there's another step that is now the slowest. And as such, if you follow along there, you can look backwards historically to see seemingly a pro relatively predictable path of ultimately what has become an evolution in technology.

Now, the one that is of particular concern right now where I'm doing most of the research, most of my research is focused on, I should say, is what these AI tools are capable of and how they're gonna impact product development teams. In particular at B2B SaaS companies, which is where I do the majority of my consulting.

in looking at where the bottlenecks are there. The biggest ones at the moment are related to product development, and as such, how long it takes software engineering to build features and applications. So with the innovation around these AI tools like Chat G P T for example, what they're ultimately planning to do is eliminate software engineering as the bottleneck in the process.

I even created a video to demonstrate the capabilities of ChatGPT to write the code for you, which like I said, has been the biggest bottleneck on these product development teams in creating a sub-routine for me and node js to swap variables around, which is a relatively straightforward request, but you can ask it whatever you would like and in mere seconds it's able to produce the code that is

production ready, like you can copy and paste it, drop it right into your application and start using it immediately. That is dramatically faster than how that process has been being completed up until now. So my question for you is, is your team exploring this and are you ready for these changes?

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

80 Percent Of Product Development Is Wasted

Sean Boyce — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 08:13:34 -0500

Pendo's feature adoption report tells us that 80% of product development is wasted.

This means product development processes everywhere have a long way to go to becoming more effective.

When's the last time your team evaluated how many of your customers are using those latest features?

Find Product-Market Fit Faster with my free 5 day email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is a rather shocking statistic as it pertains to product development and its level of effectiveness. So as a B2B SaaS consultant, I help a lot of my clients with getting more out of their product development process. . My long suspicion was that a significant portion of product development was not particularly effective.

What I mean by that is the process of figuring out what we're planning to build next, building it, shipping it, and then measuring its effectiveness probably was missing. Most of the time upon doing a little bit more research from a company called Pendo, who does essentially feature adoption work, so they have software that helps you solve this as a challenge for SaaS companies.

They released what they call their feature adoption report, and in it they explain that up to 80% of SaaS product features are either rarely or never used. Which is shocking to me. Well, maybe not that shocking because I see this work all the time, but it's, when you put it in perspective in terms of the effectiveness of the process, that's pretty poor level of performance and seemingly on average for a lot of product development companies, for a lot of SaaS companies, that the vast majority of their efforts are.

So I want to try to interpret what I think this statistic really means, to put it in context for you if you're on a product development team, and that to me, what that looks like in terms of what's actually happening at your company is that 80% of what you're investing into product development, which includes a lot, product teams, engineering teams, design testing, all of that effort is essentially a total.

So from a financial perspective, it's a pretty poor investment and very low rate of return. Secondly, 80% of your backlog, which is a lot of what we are all managing from in terms of where we're going next with the product, essentially amounts to useless or very low value add feature set. If 80% of what's ultimately being shipped into these products.

Rarely or never used. That means your backlog is full of junk, essentially, and that's not gonna make your product any better. In fact, quite the opposite, eight outta 10 features that you ship are more than likely to make your product experience worse. I talk about this a lot as well too, because if most of what you're shipping is not making your product experience better, whatever you ship, that doesn't make your product experience better.

It makes it worse because you're adding functionality that people are not using. So you're cluttering their experience up. You keep adding features that don't add value for them sooner rather than later. They're gonna wind up with a feature set that isn't really offering them a ton of value, and it's definitely getting worse.

So you end up ruining your product experience. So anyway, I wanted to share this statistic with you because I think it's pretty alarming and I think this should cause product teams everywhere to look more inward. as it pertains to what is the level of effectiveness of your product development process, because none of this, to me, sounds particularly effective.

In fact, this sounds awfully wasteful and ineffective. So my question for you, and what I wanna challenge you or leave you with today is that I want you to ask yourself, when's the last time you evaluated? The latest set of product features that you shipped into your SaaS or whatever type of product you're building to measure its level of effectiveness, as in how many of your customers are using it and how frequently are they using it.

That should give you an idea whether or not they're getting value out of it. If they're not, you need to make some big changes to your product development process.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

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Building ROI Into Your B2B SaaS Pricing Model

Sean Boyce — Thu, 16 Feb 2023 07:47:05 -0500

Absolute numbers are almost irrelevant when it comes to your customer.

What really matters are relative numbers to what your SaaS product is saving them.

Related Article - https://nxtstep.io/daily/is-10k-expensive/

Get started with finding product-market fit faster with my free 5 day email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to talk to you about is the fact that absolute numbers are almost irrelevant when it comes to your B2B SaaS. And why I want to talk to you about relativity here is what really matters. Your numbers need to be relative to something, and more importantly, anchor to something.

Otherwise, you're gonna be missing the right context you need in order to build a effective pricing strategy for your B2B SaaS product. Now, this is all in terms of a concept, which to. Is by far one of the most important and critical success factors for your B2B SaaS, and that's building ROI and a path to profitability into what it is, what you're doing, and trying to grow and scale your B2B SaaS product.

But from your customer's perspective, that return on investment is what really matters for every dollar they invest. How many dollars are they getting back? That's what I mean when I say return on investment, whatever they're contributing toward. , whatever they need to pay in order to gain access to your product, what are they getting back in return?

It should be time or money. And time is money. You just need to figure out how much of their time translates to how much money. Now when I say relative numbers are much more important than absolute numbers, that's because you need the context in order to be able to determine and calculate the return on investment.

For example, if I asked you whether or not $10 is expensive, well, it's gonna depend. Who I'm speaking about, right? For a working professional with a high paying job? No, probably not For a child, yes. Probably. I mean, I guess it depends on the kid, but still you take my point, right? So the relative numbers on the other hand are where you're going to be able to build ROI into a pricing strategy for your product.

Now, there's other factors as well too, but for the sake of this conversation. It depends on how much you're saving your customer. If you're saving your customer a hundred dollars, then $10 is gonna look like a solid investment to them, and that's the relative numbers. But if you're saving your customer a thousand dollars, a hundred dollars by the same token, is gonna also look very attractive to them.

Both of these instances, there's a 10X return kind of designed into this experience from a pricing strategy perspective. So that's what I mean when I say relative numbers. And absolute numbers taken outta context really don't. So I want you to think about this as you're figuring out how to design, return, a positive, strong return on investment into the pricing strategy for your B2B SaaS product so that your customer receives the kind of return that they're looking for for your product to go viral.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

B2B SaaS Missing Critical Success Factor

Sean Boyce — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 07:40:03 -0500

Most B2B SaaS companies I consult with are missing a critical success factor that I call a problem worth solving.

Let's discuss what it is so you can determine whether or not it's missing for your B2B SaaS.

Episode Transcript

Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is the missing critical success factor that most unsuccessful B2B SaaS companies have yet to figure out. Now, when I consult to various B2B SaaS companies that need my help because they're stuck somewhere, most of the time, the biggest missing factor is what I refer to is a problem worth solving.

These companies have not figured out essentially what that. That's terminology that I use rather frequently to mean a couple of key components that are really critical for your B2B SaaS company in order to be successful. So I want to talk about first, ultimately, what it looks like if you've found one.

So, if you're in a position where you have identified a problem we're solving for your B2B SaaS, to me what that means is, number one, you know exactly who has the. A very specific persona. You can identify, set individual at a target market, customer, you know the title, you know what they do, and more importantly, you know, the problems and challenges they have trying to accomplish what it is they're trying to do.

So that's number one. Number two, you know the impact that this problem causes, this specific person. And when I say that, what I mean is, you know, how expensive it. And expensive can be in the terms of lost time and lost money, and lost time is lost money. So you know those details as well too. You can measure them, you can quantify them.

They're pretty impactful to your target market. Customers operation is a big problem that they need solved. So that's number two. The third one, this is a critical factor as well, is you know, how ineffective the existing solution that they're trying to leverage to solve this problem is, You know what they're trying to do to try to solve that big problem, and you know how well it isn't working, meaning there is opportunity for you to solve that problem in a better way.

If you have achieved these things, I would say you have found a, what I prefer to as a problem, or solving, but not before that. So if you haven't uncovered that for your B2B SaaS and you're stuck or you're unhappy with where you're at or you're trying to scale, and it isn't. I would evaluate this criteria first because this is a really critical, important factor to achieve first before you're able to get to where you ultimately want to go.

And whatever your B2B SaaS product can do or can't do at the moment is really irrelevant. Any success that you're gonna have before you've identified what I've just referred to as a problem we're solving is simply gonna be cause of dumb luck.

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Profitability And The 10X Effect

Sean Boyce — Thu, 09 Feb 2023 09:03:18 -0500

Let's talk about how to get your B2B SaaS business on a path to profitability ASAP.

Deeper Dive on SaaS Economics - https://nxtstep.io/blog/how-the-world-of-saas-economics-is-changing/

For help with reaching product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks. Sean here and today. What I wanna talk to you. Is the level of importance in designing a path to profitability for your B2B SaaS business? Now, being profitable has any number of different advantages, but there are many startups out there not following this strategy and getting themselves in trouble.

We've talked a lot about Uber and how. When they came to their ipo, they were pretty direct about the fact that they may never have a path to profitability. Economically. That model just doesn't make any sense to me, and for a million reasons, I recommend you stay away from it. We see what that can become with companies also like WeWork, whose IPO was ultimately canceled because they ultimately were trying to do the same thing.

So why one was able to move forward and the other wasn't auto. I can't answer that question, but regardless, I think that points to the fact that that strategy's not great. So why do you want to be profitable? . Some of the most obvious reasons and important ones are, number one, you can ultimately fund your own growth, so you can move at your own pace.

You can grow as fast or as conservatively as you would like to, but. two and three are that you can maintain maximum control as well as you can stand a benefit from the majority of the rewards of your efforts because you aren't making a mess of your cap table by bringing in a ton of investors trying to figure things out, especially on the earlier side, right?

I'd rather you have a lot of that mapped out before you might need something to grow from there, and that's akin to like starting the fire and then looking for gasoline if you want to. Larger, generate more heat, whatever, right? Not necessarily to start the fire from the beginning. I think you can do that yourself by getting a strong value proposition designed around an ideal target market.

Now, I wanna talk to you about a tactic that I've used several times rather successfully in order to get my software businesses to profitability as soon as possible, and it's something that I call the 10 x effect. Now, the gist here is, . Leveraging the 10 x effect means that for your target market customer, you're going to figure out how to improve upon the solution that they're using today by a factor of 10.

Now, when I say solution today, that can be another piece of software that can be done by people, that can be a services business, whatever it is they're using to solve their problem. That's what you gotta be better then, and through discovery, you can figure that out. So if you find. Their top problem, how they're trying to solve that today and how effectively that works.

You can figure out whether or not you can do that better by a factor of. . Now, some examples of what category that might fall into could be something like faster, cheaper, better. In that if you can do it 10 times faster, 10 times cheaper, or 10 times better, you've successfully achieved the 10 x effect, and that puts you on a strong path to profitability because there's gonna be plenty of room there in order for you to offer the service design and build the solution, deliver it in a way.

Makes your customer extremely happy because you're providing with a very strong return, which means there's gonna be enough room in there for you to be able to generate and build a highly profitable and successful SaaS business.

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Addressing The Time and Money Bottlenecks

Sean Boyce — Tue, 07 Feb 2023 08:11:01 -0500

The bottlenecks that sink most SaaS products are running out of time or money. Let's talk about how to solve for those to increase your odds of success.

Deeper Dive on SaaS Economics - https://nxtstep.io/blog/how-the-world-of-saas-economics-is-changing/

For help with reaching product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I wanna talk to you about is a better, more sustainable path to building a successful SaaS product that can ultimately turn into a healthy business. I've been talking a lot about SaaS economics lately. And I've been beating up quite a bit, the sassy unicorn model that's startups that are trying to vie for ultimately a valuation of greater than a billion dollars.

I've talked about the ridiculously low odds of being able to do that successfully and why I think people should not vie for that or attempt that strategy. But one I wanna talk about today instead is essentially what you should do in place of a strategy like that. Cause that is so ineffective.

essentially, what's the better way to do it? And I wanna talk more about that and my coming episodes are gonna dive in even deeper as well too. But before I do, I wanna talk about ultimately what are the biggest bottlenecks to success here, and ultimately why the majority of those startups that are trying to vie for that unicorn status ultimately fail.

And it's two particular bottlenecks. It's time, it's money, or it can be both, as in most of. Either run out of time money, or both of those two de limiting factors in terms of being able to achieve success with their SaaS product or their startup company as such. I really think those are what we need to treat like those are at the root of ultimately what prevents those attempts from being successful.

I've been there many times with the study and the research that I've done around how many, just how many of these companies have. actually relatively close to reaching product market fit when they run out of one or both of these resources, which is super unfortunate. This timer starts if you go down the traditional path of raising through the investor community where you need to figure it out by a period of time.

And I think that pressure is both unhealthy and also leads to significantly worse outcomes for these projects. So I've made that point. What I wanna talk about now is what's a better way to do that? Well, first and foremost, I wanna put control. I wanna take control out of the hands of the investor community indirectly through what they're providing you with in order to run your company.

Because in my opinion, there's so much wrong with that model. But I want to give that control back to you. I want you to have the time that you need, and I want you to have the budget that you need to invest successfully and build a SaaS product. Or this as a business, but with you in control essentially the whole time.

So I wanna share a strategy that I know works because I've leveraged it myself to build several of my own product companies, and that's, I recommend folks work in the industry for which they're intending to build their SaaS or the product in this question. In this case, this gives you the opportunity to continually learn more about the.

So you'll be regularly doing research and getting greater context around the problems worth solving as I like to refer to them. But at the same time, you're solving for these elder bottlenecks because you will be earning what you need to essentially earmark what you can invest into your project. as well as enabling your lifestyle.

You don't have to put your life entirely on hold and eat only ramen noodles every night for however long until you crash and burn, which is what happens to most of the companies trying this model. It will be much more sustainable. Right. So that solves for kind of the money element. Let's talk about the time piece as well too.

Now, a certain amount of discovery. A really critically important factor when you're starting a project like this. So working in industry is gonna give you an opportunity to gather some of that naturally as you're doing the work that that job essentially requires. But at the same time, you are gonna have a balance of time and the choice in terms of what you want to do with it.

So with that balance of time that you. Outside of working in industry, you can invest that in your project as little or as much as you want over time. So this essentially stops the clock on the time limit as well as it puts you in control of the funding source that goes into your project until you can reach a certain level of scale or progress, and then ultimately decide whether or not you want to shift the balance of working in industry and working on your SaaS product and building that into a successful.

I think this transition and this strategy makes a lot more sense, and like I said earlier, I've leveraged it to build my product companies, both staff geek and podcast chef, using this very same model with much greater success and bonus points. I've also done it without any outside investment from the investor community.

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Unicorn Startups Provide Worse Odds Than A Casino

Sean Boyce — Thu, 02 Feb 2023 08:10:04 -0500

A study done by CBInsights tells us that as little as 1.3% of startups might reach so called unicorn ($1B+) status.

Let's talk about why anyone would ever take these odds when you do do WAY better at a casino and what you should probably do instead.

Study - https://www.cbinsights.com/research/venture-capital-funnel-2/

Related Article on SaaS Economics - https://nxtstep.io/blog/how-the-world-of-saas-economics-is-changing/

Free 5 Day Email Course on How to Reach Product-Market Fit Faster - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here, and today what I want to talk to you about are the economics of SaaS startups that try to reach unicorn status and why. If that is an approach that you're taking, you really shouldn't because statistically speaking, trying to reach unicorn status as a startup is not only worse than gambling, actually considerably worse than gambling.

It's about as bad as playing the lottery, so it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense to dedicate all of your time, effort, and. To try to reach something that essentially is borderline unattainable. So let me share a little bit more detail. Before we go into that though. I wanna be on the same page about what I mean by unicorn status startup, and the definition, loosely speaking, is usually referred to as a privately held startup company with a value that reaches at least 1 billion.

That's usually what people mean when they're referring to unicorn status for a startup. . Now, the question I had beyond that is just how difficult is that? So ultimately, I was able to track down a study done by CB Insights that found that of a study done from over a thousand US seed tech companies, or 1,119 in fact.

only 15 ever reached that level of status. And if you look at that from a statistical perspective, it winds up being about 1.3%, which is ridiculously low numbers. now looking at that, another way of failure rate of 98.7%, which are pretty ridiculously low odds to try to reach a level like that. Now, something else you might be thinking as well.

98.7% of those companies never reached $1 billion startup status, but they might have exited for a lower number than that, which is still impressive and agreed, right? Some of the balance of that number did reach an exit, a successful exit that didn't quite reach that level of status, but it's probably a way lower number than you're thinking, like less than 10.

I added up the numbers from that research article, and ultimately the numbers are probably a lot lower than you're expecting now, just for kicks by comparison, uh, because I wanted to actually look at some statistics of winning at different games if you were literally gambling at a casino . And the one that I looked at is the one that I've played from time to time, and that's blackjack.

Now, blackjack, if you are familiar with this as a concept, Plenty of people refer to it as essentially having the best odds in a casino, so to speak. But even at that, the odds of winning at a blackjack hand any given hand, are typically reported to be over 40%. So now if you compare those two numbers, that's a pretty wide margin, right?

Even if we're considering startups that have a successful exit and don't reach billion dollar startup or unicorn, Gambling looks way more attractive by comparison if you just look at the numbers, which is just bonkers . So anyway, my question for you and what I wanted to talk about here today is really why anyone would want to try to do business if your odds of success were that low.

There's a better way to approach this, in my opinion, and that's really to vie for profitability, right outta. For your SaaS business or your product company. Now, it doesn't mean you're gonna reach it immediately, and it also might mean you need one or more rounds of funding, which I think is totally understandable.

But you really should be vying for profitability sooner rather than later, and not reinvesting literally everything, meaning that your company is gonna have continuous negative earnings until you reach this like mythological status that almost no one ever reaches.

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SaaS Unicorns and Ponzi Schemes

Sean Boyce — Tue, 31 Jan 2023 09:57:01 -0500

What do SaaS unicorns like Uber and Twitter have in common with Ponzi schemes? Turns out quite a bit.

I want to do a deeper dive on SaaS economic models and why designing a path to profitability is critical for the long-term success of your SaaS product.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

What you need to know before Scaling your Product with Mike Benson

Sean Boyce — Wed, 25 Jan 2023 12:00:00 -0500

Mike Benson built and grew Warmup Inbox from the ground up, a product that is used by thousands of companies and was acquired by private equity for millions of dollars.

Following his successful exit, Mike now searches for gaps in markets that venture capitalists won’t touch and builds sustainable profitable businesses within them. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The process of bootstrapping a SaaS company.
How to know if a product is scaleable.
The biggest challenges in the SaaS industry.
How to find out if your product will succeed online.
Early signals that a SaaS website will be succesful.
How to know which search words to rank in.

Resources:

Connecting with Mike Benson:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables

08:24 - “I said ok can I make the product better, just like a checkbox of is this product better? And then can I make it 10 times cheaper and one thing that I didn’t realize people would write in for Warmup Inbox and be like why is this so cheap is this legit? And that would be a customer support question that would come in a lot and I’m realizing that if you can actually get people to ask that question you are on to something.”
09:02 - “One of the biggest issues in SaaS right now is it’s truly a race to the bottom like you might see on Twitter people saying hey you copied my idea or I can’t believe there are so many copycats it’s really because these products are so simple to make.”
11:54 - “If you make it a goal for someone to ask you why this is so cheap, you’re clearly onto something because without probably knowing it what they’re giving away is that basically, I need this and I can only find it elsewhere much more expensive so they’re almost underscoring for you, there’s a huge opportunity here I just need a quick sanity check before I dive in.”
21:34 - “It can’t hurt to try to start a company for a couple of weeks and just see what roadblocks you run into.”

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why Software Engineering Will Become More Commoditized

Sean Boyce — Thu, 19 Jan 2023 08:02:18 -0500

No and low code tools continue their explosion of growth. They are becoming more specialized and capable.

I believe this to be because software engineering has been the bottleneck on development teams for some time.

While custom engineering isn't going anywhere, the future of the role is likely to change. Let's talk about the opportunities that might create for product teams.

If you want to find product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to

talk to you about is why I think software engineering

as a skill set is becoming slightly more commoditized and

what that might mean for product teams everywhere.

So I'm sure my product teams are

fairly familiar with this, but for the

longest time now, the biggest bottleneck product

development has typically been the engineering component.

As in it takes the longest amount of

time in order to go from our designs

and our required experiments to actually getting those

features and functionality into the application itself.

As such, over time, a significant amount of

resources have been placed here trying to figure

out how to do so faster.

And there's been all kinds of invented models and

new tools that have come to market, enabling us

to be able to speed this process up.

Here everything from the Lean Startup kind of revolution

all the way to and through what is commonly

referred to as no code or low code platforms,

which I've dived into and pretty significantly as well.

Also I've leveraged them for a number

of my client projects and we've built

some pretty comprehensive and impressive products using

some of these platforms like Bubble. Bubble.

IO is kind of an ecosystem, if you will, of

being able to build almost an entire application, if not

an entire application, that has the look and feel of

being able to be pretty significantly customized, but is largely

a no code or low code platform, meaning that you

don't really need to write significant amount or really any

code at all in order to create the kind of

experience that you're looking for.

Which again, if you are heavy with tuning into

some of my content, you'll understand how important I

feel that that is for us and our role

as product leaders to make sure that the experience

that our product ultimately delivers is optimal and matches

essentially solving the customer's top problems and pain points.

So because that's the area of focus, it's really

important if we have an opportunity to place most

of our resources and focus there because that's ultimately

what we're doing on the back end in terms

of how the technology works.

And self admittedly, I'm an engineer myself and I have

a lot of respect for the work that engineers do.

However, having said that, recognizing the fact that

it has been the bottleneck, these applications have

grown significantly in that their popularity has grown

pretty aggressively because this has continued to be

a challenge for product teams, especially when looking

to do something new or create new features

and functionality and want to speed up the

product development production process.

These tools have enabled us to be able

to do that and that pattern continues.

Very recently, I've read about a product

called cumul.io, which has raised Series A

over $10 million very recently.

And that is a tool that enables

you to incorporate some essentially more advanced

analytics and bi type tools for business

intelligence capabilities into SaaS platforms.

But to do so yet again as a low code platform,

which is pretty advanced capabilities as it pertains to low code

or no code platforms, but an all important one because still

yet a bottleneck on the demand side is how do we

process and get the best type of information out of all

of the data that we have now?

Because there's an overwhelming amount of data in

the world and not enough processing power or

capabilities to really better understand and extract information

from it, which is typically the desire.

So products like Familio which are specialized,

and bubble which are more generic, are

providing us with essentially an ecosystem worth

of options when it comes to building.

Now, there's still a place

obviously for custom engineering, right?

If you need a product to scale as aggressively as

something heavy like a salesforce or a HubSpot or something

like that, your NoCode platform is not typically going to

be able to handle that type of volume, at least

not yet, and may be able to do so eventually

if this pattern and trend continues.

But for now, your custom engineering will enable

you to benefit from operational efficiency at scale.

However, before you get there, when you're trying

to experiment and you're trying to test new

products and things like that, if you want

to speed up the product development process.

So far the trend has been no code and

low code platforms seem to be here to stay.

They continue to be able to raise money,

they continue to be adopted by product development

teams and they continue to enable teams to

move faster in the development cycles.

So what I'm trying to explain for you here is

that how I see this pattern developing over the past

few years and where I think that it's going and

then I want to talk more about what I think

that means for developing product teams and the changes that

might become so if this trend continues.

What it will mean for product teams, in my opinion,

is that as I've thought about how it gets broken

down before in terms of responsibilities on a product team,

I usually do so in three different ways.

I would put the what we are intending to build and

why we are intending to build it into the product category.

So product managers and product people

who are interacting with customers and

users to do research and discovery.

It's our responsibility to figure out what the priority

is, to build what the problems we're solving are,

where the obvious unmet needs are those types of

things, and then work with our engineering or development

teams in order to prioritize those for development, which

I would consider to be the how.

As in how are we going to capitalize on that

opportunity, how are we actually going to build that, how

are we going to bring that experience to market?

So that's where I draw the line most of the

times, the what and the why lives on the product

side, the how lives on the engineering side.

What I'm continuing to see more of, especially

in the early stages of this work, is

that the how is becoming more commoditized.

And I think that is happening because it's, for

quite a while now, continue to be the bottleneck,

as in folks have wanted to move faster.

Everything else is accelerating, yet that's

what's taking the most time.

So much of the innovation has gone into that space

in terms of figuring out how to speed it up.

And I think that's where we're seeing a

lot of this development come fro...

The Importance Of Vision And Mission Statements For Your Product

Sean Boyce — Wed, 18 Jan 2023 03:00:00 -0500

Without a clear vision for your organization and a mission for your product, your team will get confused.

Let's talk about how to set them and see some popular examples so you can better understand the value here.

To find product market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course – https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want to talk

to you about is how to realize your product vision.

So more recently, I've been working with a few clients

and helping them realize a vision for their product.

Now there's a number of variables here.

There's vision statements, there's mission statements.

I want to talk about subtle difference

between the two of those and those

can be set at the organization level.

They can also be set for your product.

Now the way I typically like to see it

done is setting the vision statement for for the

organization and a mission statement for the product.

And I like the two to support one

another, as in if you are making progress

towards the mission for your product, that should

support the vision for your organization.

That's the way I like to see them connected.

I think they're really important for keeping your team on

the same page about what you should be doing and

how you should be making the world a better place

with what it is essentially the purpose that you've set

for your product and then the vision for your organization.

Now this isn't always set and when I run into

some issues with the clients that I help building and

scaling product companies, I end up finding that this is

one of the problems that I run into fairly consistently,

as in the vision is somewhat unclear.

There's also some confusion back and forth between what

is the vision of the organization versus what is

the mission of the product or vice versa.

So I want to talk about some examples of those

and then how you should leverage each when you're going

about making positive change at your product organization.

To help with my research on this topic,

I've had a number of conversations with Chat

GPT, which has been very helpful.

I've incorporating that more and more into my routine

and I'd encourage you to do the same.

But as part of that, I started focusing on

some of the largest, more popular organizations out there

that are relatively well known, like Google and Microsoft.

And I started researching both their vision mission

statements for both the organization and their products.

As such, I want to describe kind of each

for you as an example which would help you

figure out what yours should be for your product.

And then I want to talk about how you should

ultimately realize progress towards them because it's not just important

to have them, it's important to understand how to leverage

them and how to realize them and when they should

come into play when you're going about trying to improve

your product and succeed at your organization.

So when I looked up for Google how it

would define essentially Google's vision statement, the example that

I came back with is create a world where

every person has access to the information and the

opportunities they need to succeed.

So that's the vision statement and if you realize

from that example, it's a pretty lofty goal, right?

And it's one that isn't

necessarily all that obtainable.

Like we might want to cure world hunger

or end homelessness or something like that.

These are characteristics, I would say, of a solid vision

statement as and it may not be something that is

easily achievable, but it is a lofty but a monumental

goal if it's something that you can achieve.

So it's a future state that you

want to desire to make progress towards.

I know Lexus at one point had

the passionate pursuit of perfection, right?

So if you think about that or you're breaking that one

down, lexus may be desiring to build the perfect car.

Are they ever going to build a perfect car?

Probably not.

How would we even know someone

had built a perfect car, right?

But I like the idea and the

concept of that being the goal, right?

If you're trying to achieve or you have the

passion pursuit of perfection in mind at all times

in the work that you do, then that means

that if you come anywhere near that, you're probably

going to produce some pretty impressive results.

Now that's the vision statement.

Now again, I recommend a vision statement being set

largely at the organization level and I think the

members of your organization should understand what that is

and then be willing to support it.

It should be something that makes sense and much of

the work, if not all of the work that you

do at your organization to support progress towards that vision.

So at the same time, I wanted to dive

a little bit deeper and specifically talk about an

example of what might be a mission statement.

But mission statement I would recommend kind

of being set at that product level.

So not necessarily the organization, but again at the

product and then the product in particular I'm going

to share with you, since I shared that as

a vision statement is Google Search.

So from the search engine, the mission I would

say for the Google search product, as I found

in the research that I did, is to provide

the most relevant and useful information to users.

There are different variations of that but you

kind of get the idea there, right?

And what I find particularly helpful about

the mission statement set at a particular

product level is it more specific to

what you're doing and managing that product.

And if you are continuously making

that product better, it should enable

you to continuously fulfill that mission.

As in, you know, at a static point

in time, you may currently have the best

product that's capable of doing that.

But as technology evolves, as things in the

market change, as more products become available, you

will need to continuously be making progress in

order to be realizing and fulfilling that mission,

right, to support that grander vision.

Now that's some examples of each.

What I want to talk to you about as well

too, is how to leverage these in the work that

you're doing with your team on a daily basis, how

that can help clear up confusion and what it looks

like when you're able to achieve those results.

So having a vision and mission statement for both

your organization and your product will be critical for

ensuring that your team remains on the same page

as you're, trying to make your product better and

enable your organization to become more successful.

If you don't have those, you're likely to introduce

additional confusion into what it is you're doing on

a daily basis and the progress that you're trying

to build towards in the long term.

So if you haven't set these, set

them, but set them as a team.

It should be a collaborative effort because you want

to ensure that your team can get inspired and

get behind both of these concepts as well too.

If you ...

How To Select The Next Feature

Sean Boyce — Tue, 17 Jan 2023 07:21:49 -0500

I've worked on many products where many teams ship most features that make their products worse.

The problem here is we get caught in these build loops or traps because we're not following a process to help us first identify what our customers really need. Let's talk about how to solve this problem.

To find product market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course - https://nxtstep.io/fit

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you about

is how to know which feature to design and build

next into your product that's going to offer maximum value

for both your customer and your organization.

Far too often I work with clients that

ultimately get caught in what's commonly referred to

as the build trap, which means that you're

continuously building and shipping features without a whole

lot of understanding in terms of why.

Oftentimes this can be referred to

as well as feature factories.

Your product development organization just kind of becomes a

feature factory in that you're just constantly building and

shipping things without a whole lot of understanding in

terms of the impact that ultimately that's going to

have on your product and its experience.

Now, the problem here is if you don't know

why you're building those features in particular, and that's

not commonly understood by your entire product development team,

then ultimately you are more likely to make your

product experience worse rather than better.

And I often see this being a part of

the problem in terms of not really knowing which

process to follow instead, as it just kind of

feels like you should be doing something.

And oftentimes the incentives for product development teams

are misaligned with making the product experience better

and adding more value for your customers, which

makes this problem worse as well as and

you may be being held accountable for ultimately

building and shipping more features, which isn't necessarily

the objective here.

In fact, that, like I said before, can

actually make the whole product experience worse.

So if you're building, I want to talk to

you about why this can make it worse.

If you're building and shipping features for which you don't

have great direction in terms of the impact that's going

to have and how that's going to make the product

experience better, then more than likely your customers and your

users aren't going to need it.

And if your customer users don't need it, then when

they see that feature in your product and they don't

use it, it's going to continue to make the product

experience more confusing for them, more clumsy for them.

That's why I say it

makes your product experience worse.

It's because it's not a need that they have.

And you building those features is not

grounded in anything that is particularly relevant

to solving problems for your customers.

So I want to talk to you now that you

have a better understanding from that perspective in terms of

that trap and why people fall into it.

If any of this sounds common to you in terms of

you've been there before, I want to talk to you about

the approach we should be taking instead to ensure that we

don't fall into one of these common traps.

So what I've shared so far might sound

great, but your next most pressing question might

be, okay, well, what do we do instead?

How do we know if we're shipping a

feature or we're going to ultimately build a

feature or what we should prioritize that's going

to make the product experience better, not worse.

And that comes from discovery,

discovery and also research.

If it's on the earlier stage side of

your product or we're interacting with someone who's

new to your product, I refer to as

discovery that's conversations essentially with prospects who don't

have prior experience with your product.

And if it's on the later stage side, I

refer to that as research in terms of a

customer or user that you may already have.

Now, I want to talk to you about

the objectives when having conversations with each.

But I'm going to use a framework that I call

Buckets and Marbles in terms of figuring out essentially from

the opportunities that we identify from investing in the research

and the discovery, how do we know which one to

pick and how do we continuously prioritize as more of

those opportunities are coming available.

So from the discovery perspective, that helps you

track your market to making sure that you

have a better understanding of not just where

the market is, but where it's going.

And if you're talking to prospects that are

having only a very little, if none experience

at all with your product, they will be

telling you what is most important for them.

So if you are gathering this information and you're

tracking this information, you'll have an idea and you

could create sort of like a trend line in

terms of where it's going, which features are most

popular that they're requesting, which problems are the most

common ones that they're experiencing.

You'll be able to track that.

Now, on the other side, for your existing customers

and users, if you're interacting with them, what you're

trying to do is you're trying to figure out

how to make your product better.

So theoretically here your product

is already offering the value.

That's why they're using it.

But in order for them to continue to

use it, it may need you to prioritize

continuing to make that experience better because their

needs are likely to change over time, right?

The product and the market and product

market fit are both dynamic concepts.

I'm talking about tracking the market so that ultimately

we can continue to upgrade and improve your product.

So that's where that's the process you

need to connect to product development and

that's where all of this should begin.

That's the catalyst for everything that gets

invested in the product development process.

And if you're not investing in either one or both

of those, you need to stop what you're doing now.

Especially stop writing code.

Because like I said before, you're

likely making the product experience better.

And instead, invest in both of these

opportunities to perform discovery and research to

find a source of those problems and

opportunities worth building into your product experience.

Now, the last question I want to talk

about today is once you have identified a

number of those problems from prospects, from customers,

how do you prioritize them for development?

Well, that's where this framework that I

developed called Buckets and Marbles comes from.

Essentially when I'm having these interviews, what I do is

I create a bucket every time I've heard about a

unique instance of a problem that a prospect or a

customer or an existing user has or needs solved.

Every time I hear about something unique, I

create a new bucket to store ultimately future

instances of me hearing about that same problem.

So, if the first prospect I speak with mentions two

proble...

How To Best Leverage Disruptive Technology

Sean Boyce — Mon, 16 Jan 2023 07:58:57 -0500

When disruptive technology is invented we sometimes freakout that it may send shockwaves through our industry or render our product obsolete.

Here's why that fear is often overblown and how you should respond instead.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here and today what I want

to talk to you about is the approach you

should be taking if and when any new technology

is ever developed which is looking like it may

severely disrupt either your product or your industry.

Now, my motivation for wanting to talk about this topic

comes from all of the buzz surrounding Chat GPT.

And a lot of conversation and dialogue is

about how it's going to change things dramatically.

What is it going to make obsolete?

Our author is no longer going to be a thing.

Our artists no longer going to be a thing.

There's all kinds of dialogue going on

about the major hugely disruptive changes that

may take place because of this technology.

Now, the first thing I'll say

is that technology isn't technically new.

It's been around for years, they've been

working on refining it for years.

But more recently, I would argue that the adoption

is significantly more widespread because people are really starting

to adopt it and come up with creative new

use cases in terms of how they may leverage

it in order to make their lives better, create

more value, save more time, whatever it is.

People are figuring out what those use cases

are and OpenAI company that owns Chat GPT

is really studying and evaluating that.

They're doing the research and putting in the

time to figure out how they're going to

ultimately position it in order to figure out

where it generates the most value for the

most people, because that speaks to opportunity.

But having said that, the sentiment that I'm hearing in a

lot of ways is some of it's doom and gloom, right?

And I get it right, video killed

the radio star or whatever, right?

A bunch of examples like that.

The thing that's often not told is how any

of the individuals that were in, for example, radio,

in that example that I just shared, had evolved

from there as the new technology became available.

And there was plenty of that.

And that's really what I want to speak to in

terms of the strategy that you should be leveraging in

order to ensure that what it is you're working on

can be preserved or ultimately upgrade it in a significant way

with the help of this new technology.

So you shouldn't see it necessarily as

a foe in all these instances.

What I'd rather have you do is study it

so that you can better understand how you may

be able to incorporate it in whatever it is

that you're working on because it may speak to

an opportunity to actually improve your value proposition.

And in order to make this strategy sound even

a little bit more convincing, what I want to

do is I want to share with you an

example from one of my own product companies, which

is called Podcast Chef, how we leverage this strategy

in order to improve our value proposition as the

industry evolved, as new technology became available.

So, if you're unfamiliar, my product company, Podcast Chef, which

is a productized service, essentially helps people that are selling

higher ticket services in the B to B world open

doors with who ultimately could become a major client by

instead of going directly at them with a pitch, which

no one likes to be sold to, especially in that

way if you don't have some form of existing relationship,

but instead invite them to be a guest on your

podcast, because that's a great way to kind of open

a door and start building a relationship.

Plus you've got the opportunity to invest in it

and create a bunch of organic content at the

same time, a whole bunch of value, specifically speaking

to the Podcast Chef current value proposition.

However, having said that, at the time when digital shorts

like some of the content that I've been creating and

sharing on YouTube as well too, and across other platforms,

really started to become very popular and start to gain

a lot of traction in the mainstream.

A lot of these platforms like YouTube were

really promoting this short form digital video content.

We didn't originally have that as part of

our core process and we were wondering, is

that something that's going to disrupt podcasting?

Like what's going to happen to podcasting?

So we had some of the same questions that you

may have now in terms of how chat GPT may

be disrupting your product, making it obsolete or whatever.

Is the technology going to disrupt your product?

Is the technology going to disrupt your

industry, and if so, how severely? Right?

So we were having the same type of

conversations about what digital shorts were going to

do to our productized service, Podcast Chef.

Now, instead of freaking out and panicking and doing

anything pretty significantly that was potentially irrational or whatever,

what we did was we studied digital shorts to

better understand what value they could add and if

they could actually be incorporated in what we were

already doing to even make it better.

Did that make sense?

And long story short, it did.

So what we were doing at the time was we

were encouraging people when they were recording podcasts to do

so in video, and then when they had an opportunity

to ultimately promote the video in addition to the audio,

we would do that for them as well too.

So that was already making its way to YouTube,

but we weren't really focusing on it so much.

So now when digital shorts gained a lot of

popularity and traction, we saw that as a potential

lever we could incorporate in order to help our

clients shows grow more significantly, and that's pretty much

what we looked to do.

So we figured out how to take the

video content, chop it up into a bunch

of shorts and share it across the world.

Now, that isn't something that's

particularly unique right now.

That's something we've been doing for quite a while,

but that's how we handled a major disruption to

our industry based on what was going on social

media wise and content wise, and what was being

promoted at the time, and to potentially figure out

how it might disrupt what we were doing.

A podcast, Chef.

So, having said that, that's really the approach that I

want you to take is I want you to look

at new technology from the perspective of what is it,

how do I better understand it, how do I and

then how might you be able to leverage it?

As in, can your product incorporate any new

technology into your process to receive some of

the benefits of the faster, cheaper, easier stuff

that new technology often provides in order to

actually strengthen your value proposition?

If you take that approach, then all of

a sudden, any new technology or any major

disruptive changes really aren't all that scary, and

in fact, they become more exciting.

What is exciting...

AI Replacing Humans As Authors

Sean Boyce — Sun, 15 Jan 2023 08:41:08 -0500

People are using ChatGPT to write everything from poetry to entire books.

So far it seems like it's doing it very well and ridiculously fast. I want to talk about what this means for the future of writing.

Related article - https://thespectator.com/book-and-art/artificial-intelligence-ai-destroy-writing-chatgpt/

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I want

to talk to you about is with the latest

developments tool Chat GPT from OpenAI, how I think

AI may ultimately replace humans as authors.

So my friends and I have been spending quite a

bit of time with Chat GPT and in particular from

my perspective, I'm most interested in the unique use cases

people are coming up with in terms of how to

leverage this technology to generate value.

And I'm using that for the most part to

create content, content like this so I can share

what I'm learning with you so that it helps

you figure out how to make your products better.

But of all the other folks in my network,

they're using it for different reasons as well too.

And I wanted to learn more about that.

So I have a bunch of content that I

want to produce, right, and that includes email courses,

ebooks, even books and things like that about this

type of content specifically and all the various other

subjects that I usually cover.

Now, one of the biggest bottlenecks to

doing that is it's time consuming.

It takes quite a bit of time for me to

have to sit down, plan it out, create outlines and

then ultimately write everything, proofread it, get the grammar correct,

which is definitely not a strength of mine.

I'm an engineer by trade, which means for the

most part I can't spell in almost any language.

But as I'm learning about some of these other

use cases and what folks have been using it

for, I'm hearing everything from people are writing remarkable

poetry that's indistinguishable from some of the greatest artists

all the way to and through.

People are leveraging it to create entire books for

which they may have already been publishing on Amazon

of different categories and things like that.

So that really sent me down a rabbit hole of figuring

out and really asking the question what is an author?

Because where this came from was when I was speaking

with some of my colleagues, I was trying to figure

out for what Chat GPT has been producing in terms

of the questions we ask and the help that we

want, the information we're trying to gain access to.

When it's asked sometimes for sources, that's kind of the

question that came up is like when you're asking it

to cite where it's got that information from.

Because I know attribution is a big thing that a

lot of people in particular authors are concerned about and

in some instances, in terms of at least from what

I've heard, I still need to do more testing.

Sometimes it will list the sources, but sometimes it's

pulling it from so many different locations that sometimes

I think there's a little bit of pushback there.

So this part is at least unclear.

But that made me think about yet another question

in terms of, well, what makes an author?

What would the difference be in terms of what a human

may be doing versus what the AI may be doing?

Because as I started to think about it, I

was thinking that I think the AI or the

tech is essentially following the same, if not a

similar process as a human would, but just at

a remarkably faster and more efficient pace.

It can be more effective as well too, because

you can apply different types of rules like grammar

and spelling and all that kind of stuff in

order to make sure that it's essentially as perfect

as it's going to be and you can introduce

different styles and all kinds of things like that.

So anyway, that's the question that I'm posing here.

I want to dive into some detail from an

article that I read which really painted a very

particular picture about what the future of writing looks

like with the advent of this technology.

Now, from one of the enlightening articles that I

found, which paints somewhat of a gloomy picture here

in terms of what the future looks like for

authors, it makes two specific key points which I

think are very relevant in this context.

And that's the fact that, number one, the prediction

from this writer with decades of experience is that

writing is essentially over and that authors should drop

it or switch almost entirely because rather soon the

computers will be here too.

And their words quote, do it better, which I can

understand and has kind of been the plot for a

ton of sci-fi movies for decades at this point.

And the second, which is even more interesting to me

because I'm not sure I completely, 100% agree and I

want to talk about what I mean by that, but

I do see where they're coming from, is that if

you break writing down to a formula, so to speak,

it essentially is an algorithm.

And this is where I would agree

with this author as well too.

Is that's kind of where I was when I was

thinking through citing sources and pulling information from where?

And is AI essentially an author?

Can it become an author like chat GPT?

What's the difference between Chat GPT

writing something and me writing something?

Chances are we're going through a similar process.

We're going to do research, we're going

to create outlines, that type of thing.

The difference is the technology is doing

it ridiculously faster than I am.

So that's really what it broke down to for me.

It's pulling information from different sources.

It's arguably learning.

Like when I was going to school a million

years ago, what they would talk to you about

is you needed to paraphrase, you couldn't just plagiarize

and all this other type of stuff.

You got to cite your sources and whatnot.

And I understand all of that, but the thing

that always was questionable for me was like, well,

what's the difference between me just reading and learning

and kind of like paraphrasing, so to speak, versus

taking that information and sharing it.

It seemed very similar to me.

So to me there appeared to be quite a bit of gray area.

So if you look at it at a fundamental

level in terms of what writing is, I would

100% completely agree that it's an algorithm and the

process that's followed by humans probably very similar to

these language models like Chad GPT.

As such, the results that are produced probably

are of equal, if not greater quality and

done remarkably faster and more efficiently than a

human who could ever do it.

So that brings me to the next question,

which is, if that's the case, then what

does the future of writing actually look like?

So as I asked myself this question and started

doing research down another rabbit hole here in terms

of what does the future of writing look like,

I realized that ultimately what it really boils down

into is will writers in the current format in

w...

The ChatGPT Pricing Model Research

Sean Boyce — Sat, 14 Jan 2023 19:58:49 -0500

The OpenAI team shared a survey on their Discord server to gather data on building a pricing model for ChatGPT.

I want to talk about the questions they're asking related to pricing and how it might help you perform research for figuring out how to best price your product.

Survey - https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScwuQEWBkxsNftEkvUgFx2Ov7pKcrOx8IUlZ241lvet7ziXCQ/viewform

Article - https://www.techradar.com/news/chatgpt-could-soon-start-charging-you-for-its-ai-skills

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you

about is that OpenAI is actively doing research, trying

to figure out how to monetize ChatGPT.

And I want to talk to you about the research

that they're doing, some of the details of it, and

what we can learn from it to help you figuring

out how to design pricing for your product.

Now, I don't know about you, but I've

heard some really impressive use cases that people

have come up with in getting very creative

with how to leverage this technology.

Terms of generating a ton of value.

I've heard of everything from people leveraging Chat GPT

to write code, all the way to creating poetry

and writing books and everything in between.

It's pretty wild.

In fact, one of the most interesting things for me

about all of this so far is outside the technology,

hearing about the use cases and how people get really

creative in figuring out how to generate value.

Now, the common theme in terms of what I've

been paying particularly close attention to, in terms of

what people are figuring out what to do with

this technology, is how much value it's generating.

When I say value, what I mean

is it's providing them time back.

It's helping them become more efficient or generate even more

effective results in terms of I can start to quantify

some of this, which helps me get closer to this

concept that I talk about a lot as well, too.

In ROI or return on investment, as in

for the customer, they're receiving time back.

If they're getting more value, we can start

to figure out how to quantify that.

And if we've got a better understanding in terms of

what type of return on investment they're getting, that can

end up being a direct line for us to figure

out where the product should appropriately be priced.

As in you want to make sure you're

not charging too little and leaving a bunch

of money on the table because you're providing

a lot of value and you're under charging.

That can cause positioning problems and require people

to kind of lose confidence in your product.

Or you might be charging too

much and chasing people away.

Or there might not be enough value in your product.

And if you set that price a little

bit more appropriately, that will help you gain

more traction and as such, generate that much

more revenue because it's priced appropriately relative to

the value it's providing for your customer.

So what I want to do next is I want to

talk to you more about the process that OpenAI and the

folks at Chat GPT are doing in terms of figuring out

how to develop a pricing model for this product.

Now, they've shared a survey through Google Forms,

which is super straightforward and easy to use

through their Discord server, which is asking a

ton of questions about pricing.

And there's two questions in particular that I'd like

to focus on because I feel like they're really

insightful for those of us out there are trying

to figure out how do we better understand whether

or not our products are priced appropriately?

So let's take a look at that survey

and in particular those specific two questions.

The first thing I'll mention is I

love the simplicity of the survey.

It's just Google Forms.

It doesn't need to be all that advanced.

And it's pretty interesting when you think about how

advanced the technology is that powers Chat GPT, but

for this specific purpose, it works great.

It's a great way to get feedback from the users that

are getting a lot of value out of the tool.

Now, the two questions in particular that I want to

pay particularly close attention to are related to the upper

and lower bounds of what they ultimately might charge for

the product, which I think is a great way to

gain context around how do we figure out whether or

not the product is priced appropriately.

And one other thing I'll mention before I speak

specifically to these questions is this tool has provided

so much value for so many people, the use

cases are all over the place.

As I mentioned already, there is a lot of

value that this product has provided a lot of

people, meaning that they have almost unlimited potential to

figure out how to price this product.

But even so, even the fact that that is

the case and they know that is the case,

they're still figuring out how to price it appropriately

and they're using techniques and strategies that I've leveraged

to help people with their products as well too.

In terms of figuring out the right pricing model, that

could be a really key component for strong product market

fit and figuring out what it is, I've worked on

products that had almost everything else relatively well buttoned up

with the exception of their pricing, and pricing mistakes can

be made too low or too high.

Now, the two questions in particular that I want

to talk about, they're helpful in terms of providing

context in terms of whether or not you might

be charging too much or too little.

And figuring out that right balance means that you're

going to have the opportunity to create the best

experience for the customer as in you're going to

be providing them with more than enough value in

the form of this return on investment, which is

then going to in turn enable your product company

to be able to generate maximum value as well. Too.

So getting it right is really important.

Now, like I said before, the two questions

in particular are about exploring these bounds.

And the first, which explores kind of the upper bound,

is framed in a way to kind of get at

whether or not to get more context around what the

top end of that spectrum might look like.

As in where would the product be priced at and what

would that level look like to the extent where it would

be too expensive, to the point where you wouldn't consider buying

it, as in what's too high for this product.

Essentially, give me a little

bit more context around that.

Now, on the other end of the spectrum, in order

to figure out the bound on the lower end, the

question is at what point would the product be priced

in terms of that price being too low?

To the point where you would question the

value that you would get from the product.

And this speaks to positioning.

So if you have a product that provides a

ton of value, but it is charging too little,

that can actually impact your customer's perception of the

value that the product is going to provide.

It's almost ...

Why Mastodon Has Failed To Scale

Sean Boyce — Fri, 13 Jan 2023 07:29:24 -0500

The turmoil at Twitter has created a huge opportunity for Mastodon to fill the vacuum. Despite some aggressive growth, it has failed to scale.

I want to talk about why and what this means for your product in terms of being ready for opportunities to scale.

Related Article - https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2023/jan/08/elon-musk-drove-more-than-a-million-people-to-mastodon-but-many-arent-sticking-around

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you about is

why Mastodon has failed to scale, despite the fact that Twitter

has done everything in its power to send as many of

their users as possible over to that platform.

Just in case you're unaware, there's been quite a bit

of turmoil going on over Twitter, and every time something

major hits the news, a new wave of users goes

from Twitter over to a platform called Mastodon.

Now, if you're unfamiliar with what Mastodon is,

it's essentially an open source equivalent to Twitter.

It's got a relatively similar user experience,

or it's considered by many to be

the most similar product on the market.

And as such, many were expecting it to

kind of fill the vacuum that Twitter seems

to have been creating all on its own.

But despite that fact, and despite the fact

that in a single day when it was

at its peak growth rate from converting users

from Twitter over to mastodon, those numbers where

over 100,000 users per day are leaving Twitter.

And joining mastodon.

Not only have they failed to continue to scale

at that rate, that trend has since somewhat reversed

itself almost as aggressively as it was once growing.

So the question here is why?

Why has Mastodon failed to scale despite having

this tremendous opportunity, it seems, to kind of

fill the vacuum that Twitter has been creating.

Like I said, all on its own.

In fact, there's a great chart and article from

the Guardian about this event that has taken place,

and it's overlaid essentially in a series of a

timeline where there is a chart reflecting the growth

of Mastodon and when new waves of users have

spiked joining their platform.

And that timeline of events is also mapped

to when controversial things have happened at Twitter,

or just things like Elon Musk taking over,

but him announcing massive layoffs, him doing really

questionable things, or Twitter doing very questionable things

like banning journalists and things like that.

Every time any one of these controversial things have

taken place, mastodon has seen a massive spike in

user activity and people joining the platform.

But despite the fact that that's been happening in

almost rapid succession over time, giving macedon time and

time again opportunities to capitalize or benefit from this

level of scale, not only has that growth kind

of stalled or stopped, it's reversed itself and almost

aggressively as it was once growing.

So ultimately, what looks like is happening now

is people aren't adopting the Mastodon platform.

In fact, many of them are probably actually going

back to Twitter, which is really interesting trend, despite

the fact that the motivation was probably pretty high

given the fact of what has taken place more

recently over at Twitter for them to join really

any other platform that can meet that need.

And that's what I want to talk about now.

Probably the biggest reason why Mastodon has really failed

to continue their aggressive growth and scale is for

something that I talked about before, which is very

important in order to really nail a product experience,

and that's the user experience.

The usability of Mastodon is very

different than that of Twitter.

It is much harder to use, quite a bit

more complex, and requires the user to have to

do things that they really don't have to do

to get the same experience out of Twitter.

In addition to that, the feature set which is

prominent over Twitter, is not really all there when

it comes to the Mastodon experience as such, because

it's been hard to make that transition for users.

They're not sticking around.

I think what they were probably all hoping for

was a relatively similar experience to that of Twitter.

They were looking to kind of fill the void

in the value that they were getting from the

feature set that's been popularized over at Twitter.

But Macedon largely just doesn't offer it, or doesn't offer

it in the way that the users have yet found

to satisfy what their need was from before.

And this is why they're either quitting social media or

many of them are flocking back over to Twitter.

So this really underscores the level of

importance of nailing the product experience.

And what's interesting here is that Twitter

doesn't really have dramatically complicated tech.

In fact, there are many programming languages like

starter courses like Ruby on Rails, which is

something that I took many years ago.

That part of one of the larger but earlier projects

that they actually have you do to really get familiarized

with the language is building a Twitter clone.

I mean, if you think about the

tech that goes into making the Twitter

experience, it's really not all that complicated.

As such, I'm surprised that another platform has yet to

kind of take the reins here because this is a

golden opportunity to satisfy a bunch of users who are

frustrated by what's going on at that social media company.

Yet it really still has yet to happen.

And I would point to the largest reason for

that not happening is that user experience, the usability.

So this really underscores the level of importance.

There something that might not seem as important from

time to time, but when we see lessons like

these, it really underscores its level of importance.

So this is why, to me, the aesthetic

or the user interface is not as important

anywhere near so as the user experience.

Because despite this golden opportunity, right,

mastodon has yet to capitalize it.

And largely I feel it's because of

the difference in the user experience, because

Mastodon's is significantly more complicated.

So I know the two of those

concepts are often talked about together.

People often refer to them as UI UX.

In fact, there's usually slash in between

them whenever either one is mentioned.

And I feel like they are dramatically they're

significantly different enough to the point where they

largely probably shouldn't be lumped together in the

same category because I've seen great UIs with

terrible UX's and vice versa.

So it's really important to nail UX and

in the way that they reflect that.

UI is always mentioned first, and

I feel like that's a mistake.

It always should be user experience first because

you're creating the right type of user experience.

Something like this would not happen.

In fact, Mastodon had every opportunity in

the world to scale here really aggressively,

yet it's failed to happen.

I think l...

Paying For Features Your Car Already Has

Sean Boyce — Thu, 12 Jan 2023 07:40:07 -0500

Car manufacturers like BMW and Mercedes are getting aggressive in charging customers subscriptions for features that are already built into the car itself.

I want to talk about the outrage this has caused and where the line actually should be from a product pricing perspective. We'll also talk about the history of where it came from.

Related article - https://adguard.com/en/blog/subscriptions-cars-mercedes-netflix.html

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you

about is a developing trend in pricing in the

automotive industry, where car manufacturers are charging you for

features that your car already has via subscription and

the outrage that that's causing.

So if you're unfamiliar with what's going on here, automotive

manufacturers like BMW are charging people for heated seats to

the tune of $18 a month, an extra $10 a

month to access the heated seats steering wheel.

Again, both of those features already in the car.

And car manufacturers like Mercedes are charging well over

$1,000 in order to make the car faster.

Now, these transactions are relatively

new for the automotive industry.

Previously, especially when it comes to features

and hardware your car already had, you

would be charged extra for that.

I mean, they might be in the base

price, so the pricing might be handled differently.

But car prices also haven't gone down.

What they're doing is they're still increasing

the prices of the base vehicle itself,

plus all the features, and then they're

adding subscription fees on top of that.

And that's really adding some serious insult to

industry, especially given the current economic conditions.

So I want to talk about how this is

a strategy has led to pretty significant backlash from

consumers thus far, but at the same time, people

still appear to be paying it.

I want to talk about the history in terms of

where this came from, what this means for the future

of the industry and what we can learn from it

from a product pricing perspective, in terms of what's fair.

Like, where would we draw the line

when it comes to something like this.

Because in certain instances, I might be able to

see it, but in others it seems pretty outrageous.

Like charging you for features your car already has.

Plus we can talk about the history

in terms of where it came from.

I know I've been beating them up a lot in a

number of my videos, but Tesla in the early 2010s created

an infrastructure and network for Ota, which is an acronym that

stands for over the Air updates, which actually add quite a

bit of convenience to the consumer experience.

And a lot of people rave about this.

It's where they have the ability to

essentially kind of update your vehicle.

But over the air, as in receiving an update

like your phone or your computer might, doesn't require

you have to take the car to the dealership,

which I would argue improves the consumer ownership experience.

Now, I might be willing to pay

more for that, but in reality, that's

something they're doing to upgrade their fleet.

So perhaps that should just

be built into the experience.

Now, in addition to that, and around that time frame,

tesla was also providing people with the opportunity to purchase

extended range for several of their models, which meant that

you'd be able to drive further in a tesla model

because you've unlocked some additional range.

Now, similarly so to what I've already described about what

BMW and Mercedes and other companies like that are doing,

the car already had that functionality, but you needed to

unlock it in order to access it.

So this has been going on for a while,

and I should say Tesla somewhat kind of popularized

this model, or tested it, if you will, and

other manufacturers have taken note of that.

Plus, add to that the advantage from a

financial perspective in terms of setting up and

establishing recurring revenue has been very attractive and

made popular by SaaS applications and a number

of other largely successful businesses well tooth.

And these manufacturers have taken note of that, tried

to figure out how they can leverage it into

their model and add it to their world.

This is where this stuff has come

from, and that's the history on it.

Now, despite the fact that

it works for certain businesses.

The question here for me is really, does

it apply in this industry or should it?

Because there's been a lot of backlash from consumers

talking about, I'll never buy BMW, I'll never buy

a Mercedes, because they are doing these things.

Unfortunately for them at the moment, people are paying

a number of these different fees to these manufacturers,

which is likely to mean that they're going to

continue with them, at least to a certain extent.

But what I want to talk about is what the future

of that might look like and how they may be able

to modify it to a certain extent and figure out a

better line in terms of what's fair and what isn't.

I'm also curious to get feedback

from you on it as well.

So I want to talk a little bit about where the line

is here in terms of what might be fair and what isn't.

Now, when it comes to certain research and development

that these automotive manufacturers have had to incorporate in

terms of improving the ownership experience and giving your

car advanced functionality, I could understand in certain instances

what that might look like.

And I'll give you an example from mine.

So I own a Jeep, and there's two ways in which

you can actually start the Jeep, some Jeep vehicles remotely.

There is the ability to do so from your

key fob as, and you've just pressed the mechanical

button on your key fob that will start it.

But you need to be in physical proximity

of the vehicle, probably like up to 100ft

away, probably no more than that.

And in addition to that, they have a you connect

application that I can operate from my smartphone, which sends

a signal over the telecom network, which ultimately will go

to my vehicle as well, too, meaning that I can

start it from much further away.

So if I was a mile away from my

car, I can start it via that technology.

Now, in the case of Jeep, they're charging

you for the latter, not the former.

So my key fob will work.

I can use the remote start, but I need to be

in certain proximity with my vehicle if I want to use

that You Connect app, I have to pay for that.

That comes as an annual subscription.

And remote start is not the only thing that it offers.

Now, in this case, I had

it when I purchased my vehicle.

It came with it as an incentive, but it expired and

I haven't renewed it because I haven't really needed it.

It's not something that I use all that regularly.

As such, I didn't see a

need to spend that additional fee.

And also because if I need remote start,

I'm probably in close enough proximity to the

extent where I can just use the Fob.
...

How NOT To Manage Product Pricing Discounts

Sean Boyce — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 07:58:47 -0500

You need to be careful with how you handle product pricing discounts. If you aren't, you could create a PR nightmare like Tesla has recently.

Let's talk about how they created this mess so you can avoid it. Plus we'll get into how you should manage it instead to avoid this situation altogether.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, Folks. Sean Here.

And today, what I want to talk about is

how NOT to manage price discounts for your product,

with an example provided by Tesla and the recent

discounts that they've provided and the PR nightmare that

that's caused, especially in China.

So if you're unfamiliar with this story,

Tesla has more recently been steeply discounting.

Several of the models that they offer all over

the world to the tune of thousands of dollars

in some markets, and in particular, customers that have

paid need for the tesla vehicles before these price

discounts went into place are very upset. Why?

Well, because the discounts are not applying to them

in any form of refund or anything like that.

So, as you can imagine, if you were one

of these people that purchased a tesla at its

previously higher price, in some markets, considerably higher price,

you probably wouldn't be very happy to learn that

all of a sudden, they produced that price by

thousands of dollars, and it doesn't apply to you.

Now, in certain areas of the world, in particular

in China, this has become a total PR.

Nightmare where their customers that have

paid that higher price have been

storming their stores and vandalizing them.

Because how Tesla has treated this situation and

the fact that they're not offering them anything,

in fact, it all feels pretty poorly planned.

And the execution does as well.

So this is among some of the risk

that you can experience if you're going to

start offering discounts for your product.

And that's why I say it really

is important with how you manage it.

Because if you don't, it can turn into a PR.

Nightmare like this one.

This is the last thing that you want to see. Right?

I understand that they're trying to incentivize

selling more vehicles, but they didn't execute

that plan well, especially in China.

Now I want to talk a little bit about

the difference in the markets as well, too, because

the Chinese market is different than the American market.

And what I mean by that is,

in China, they leverage a different model. In China.

They Have A Direct Sales model, which We

Don't yet have here in The United States.

But it seems like things are

kind of pushing in that direction.

Although it's undetermined when something like that

might apply in the United States.

But in China they have a direct sales

model, meaning that price transparency is very high.

So everyone could see where your

price is and where it's been.

That means that you need to treat how you manage

your price differently in the Chinese market than you do

in the American market, where there's a dealership network.

The dealership network is kind of like the

wholesale retail model, where the dealer, the manufacturers

provide the vehicles for a price to the

dealership, and then the dealership has some price

flexibility in terms of what they want to

charge from there based on market conditions.

And they can manage incentives and

all that type of stuff.

So American consumers are accustomed to there

being some of these incentives that come

and go, incentivizing them to purchase at

different times and things like that.

So the way you manage the process in

the American market should not be the same

as how you manage in the Chinese market.

And that appears to be what Tesla essentially has

done here, where they kind of just rolled out

the same strategy in both markets and no previous

customers are happy anywhere but in China.

They're particularly upset because

it's very, very uncommon.

So you really need to be careful how

you manage price discounts for your product.

In fact, I would really never would like to see

you offer price discounts, but if you are going to

do it, you really shouldn't have to do it if

the value is high and the value is strong.

I think that's really some of the underlying fundamental

issues that are going on here at Tesla.

But if you are going to manage it, you

need to make sure that you manage it well.

Otherwise you could create one of

these PR nightmares for yourself.

So I want to talk to you about how

you can manage this process much better than Tesla

has to avoid this PR nightmare that you might

experience yourself as well, too, if you want to

get creative with your pricing for your products.

And in particular, this applies when you're talking about

discounting your product and how it applies with managing

relationships with your previous customers, who you should be

taken care of as well too, because they should

be brand ambassadors for you not going around telling

everybody about how they got shafted by you, which

is probably what these Tesla customers are going to

be doing. And it's going to cause

untold brand and reputation damage.

So that is not worth it at any price.

But if you do want to get creative with

how you're managing your pricing, in particular, you want

to offer discounts, but you want to do them

in a creative way, in a way that works

for everybody, you've got to get more creative with

how you manage your relationship with your previous customers.

Now, I've seen other product companies try to do this as

well, too, and it always creates a form of backlash.

So you have to expect that because people have

paid a higher price, then you're all of a

sudden charging for the product right now.

So you need a story to be able to share

with them or something to provide for them that's going

to make them feel okay with the situation, like grandfathering

them in for whatever they had paid previously.

Like, for example, if you wanted to offer

additional services or you wanted to switch to

a subscription model or whatever it is, however

you're changing your pricing model, right?

If you want to do that, then you need to

manage the process with your existing customers in a different

way than you're managing it for everybody else.

That's completely new to your product.

That's where you can make a clean break.

So whatever they've paid before, if that was

expected to include whatever features and upgrades you

were going to add to your product moving

forward, you should manage it that way.

So you have to bifurcate how you're managing this basically

subset of customers in order to minimize the backlash that

you're going to get from making these changes.

Now, everybody understands and expects there to be changes

to products and product companies along the way.

That's something customers, for the most part, are

relatively familiar with, but they're not looking for

you to take advantage of them.

That's going t...

Why Tesla Is Suddenly Struggling

Sean Boyce — Tue, 10 Jan 2023 07:32:48 -0500

Tesla has dominated the electric car space in recent years, but recently their performance has gotten worse, much worse.

Let's talk about what's changed and what we can learn from their story about how to avoid a similar situation they find themselves in currently.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks. Sean here.

And today, what I want to talk to

you about are the reasons behind Tesla's meteoric

rise and subsequent fall in recent years.

From a product company perspective, So if

you're unaware, things haven't been going well

for Tesla as of recently.

They've been steeply discounting.

Their vehicles and their stock prices have been on a

long, slow slide for the greater part of a year.

Now, I want to talk about the reasons for that.

And this might come as a surprise, because we're all

kind of used to seeing a lot of news about

all the successful things Tesla has been doing.

So I want to dive into some of the things

that have been, I think, leading indicators into where they've

wound up performance wise at this point, because most people

are expecting Tesla just to continue to rise.

Now, there are any number of factors for that, but

I've read a number of recent articles like one from

Business Insider, which in my opinion, essentially knocks Tesla in

an area which is the most damning.

If you ask someone like myself and that's

they're considering Tesla to be essentially just another

car company, I think that's the most insulting

thing you can say to Tesla.

Or I should say the most damning thing you can

say to them and probably the worst case scenario for

them and everything that they've been trying to avoid.

And I'll explain what I mean.

I think Tesla's original,

essentially value proposition.

And A Key Part Of It wasn't as Much

Of Being A Car Company, it Was More Of

Being A Tech Company as and they Were promising

features you really Couldn't Get anywhere else.

And that was part of the value

and why consumers were buying it.

They weren't just buying it because

it was an electric car.

You could still get electric cars from other companies.

But the rise of Tesla was nowhere near

like some of the other major automotive manufacturers.

But where else were you going to get the

cool self driving tech and things like that?

Where else were you going to get an electric

car that performed better than a gas vehicle?

These were things that Tesla had done and figured

out that made their value proposition, in my opinion,

a lot stronger, which enabled them to bring the

electric vehicle as a viable option to the mass

market, which is something that, in my opinion, previously

had not been done.

So Tesla gets a lot of credit for that.

And I would consider them to have first mover

advantage in this case, which is a huge deal

if you make the commitment and the investment there.

From a product company perspective, that

can be very rewarding for you.

And thus far it has been for Tesla.

Although recently they've continued aside.

So I want to talk about what's changed since

then because things seem to be going particularly well.

I Think There Are Two Key Things That Have Changed

in terms of Tesla's trajectory, which has led to their

more recent slide and why they fall off.

And the first is that major automotive manufacturers have

figured out how to become a tech company before

Tesla's figured out how to become a car company.

They want to talk more about this one first,

and that is that Tesla gets beat up by

things like Consumer Reports all the time.

People are constantly tearing apart their build

quality, what the service experience is like,

and a number of other things.

Consumers complain about it a lot

on the web as well too. So if you do a little bit of

research on what Tesla ownership is actually like,

it's not all sunshine and roses.

That's a big difference and a real problem

for Tesla because that means they're losing essentially

what once was their competitive advantage.

Other automotive manufacturers have seen the fact that the

electric vehicle essentially is somewhat established on the mass

market at this point, and they see an opportunity

to capitalize on that because they have most of

these other things figured out that Tesla still has

yet to really figure out.

So the second thing that I want to mention is

that Tesla in many ways has over promised and underdelivered

on some of the key features that made them so

attractive, like, for example, self driving technology.

Now, most of their customers would probably say that

the self driving technology has experience, is nowhere near

what it was once promised to be, and it's

been continually promised over and over again.

And the can kind of keeps getting kicked in terms

of when that experience has ultimately come available for the

people that have invested in it already, and they've invested

real dollars and a lot of money.

It's been an expensive proposition for a

while now, but yet that experience really

hasn't been delivered upon as such.

That creates another frustrating experience.

And at the same time, just like I mentioned

previously, other automotive manufacturers are making big waves and

a lot of progress in this area as well. Too.

So Tesla seems to have kind of gotten out over its

skis a bit in terms of what it thinks it was

going to be capable of versus what it actually is.

So what can we take away from this case study

thus far for those of us involved in building product

companies to make sure we don't fall into similar traps?

Well, the first is be

careful over promising and underdelivering.

If you're promising something from a product experience perspective

to your customers that ultimately you're going to struggle

to deliver on or you aren't sure whether or

not you can, don't make that promise.

You need to keep that until, from a

solution design perspective, you have the level of

confidence to state that it is something that

you're ultimately going to be able to provide.

And by a certain period of time, because if

your customers are expecting it and they don't get

it, especially if you're charging for it, which is

something Tesla has been doing, that's going to put

you in a really bad situation.

And that's where Tesla finds itself today.

And the second is if you are lucky

enough to have benefited from first mover advantage,

you have to continue to innovate.

Because if you aren't, other people are going

to have the opportunity to catch up.

And that's exactly what's happened to Tesla.

So far, ford, GM and others have had the opportunity

to catch them in the market because they've been able

to figure out problems tesla has yet to conquer.

As such, that's made Tesla's life a lot more

difficult and the competition that much more fierce.

People have been educated and trained by Tesla because

they've had this first mover advantage, which is expensive

and ti...

Improve The ROI Of Your Product Development Process

Sean Boyce — Mon, 09 Jan 2023 07:42:16 -0500

Most product development processes don't consider ROI, but it's probably the best way to improve the effectiveness of this process for your product company.

Let's talk about how to find your customer's bottleneck and what that means for providing them and your company with more value.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you

about is my favorite way to get more of

an ROI out of your product development process.

And it starts with finding what

I refer to as the bottleneck.

So if you're unfamiliar with this as a concept, you

can think of a bottleneck almost if you're like, going

over a bridge and you have to go through a

toll, usually it goes from many lanes down to a

few lanes as you go over said bridge.

Now, that is kind of visually how you can

think of of what is a bottleneck, right?

It goes from high traffic area to a low traffic

area or vice versa, as in slowing the process down

considerably because you are funneling what was moving much more

quickly or in higher volume into what's ultimately going to

move a lot more slowly or much lower volume.

Now, that is a good visual kind

of understanding of what a bottleneck is.

But to understand what it means from a process

perspective, the same thing happens when your customer may

be trying to do something much more quickly, but

something in that process, any given step, like going

through a toll of a bridge, for example, is

slowing that process down.

They may want to get from A

to B much faster, but they can't

because something's preventing them from doing that.

And that thing that's preventing them

from doing that is the bottleneck.

So if you're trying to level up your product

development process, a great way to be able to

do that would be to, through research with your

customer, better understand and find these bottlenecks in their

process that are slowing them down.

Now, in order to be able to do that,

as I mentioned, you need to do the research.

So you need to speak with them and you

need to talk to them about not what they

want necessarily in the future, but what's preventing them

from getting what they want right now.

Focus on historically what they've tried to

do, what's worked and what hasn't worked.

That'll give you a much better idea for where

they need the most help and what may be

the biggest bottleneck in their process to date.

So if you start with that approach, it's going to

enable you to find areas of opportunity to turn.

What I refer to is problems

worth solving into solutions worth building.

So let's talk more detail about what happens

when you help them make this transformation.

Now, to me, by far the most exciting part about

following a process like this is it enables you to

calculate the return on investment built into the process.

And that's something that doesn't happen a whole lot.

In terms of the clients that I work with trying

to help them level up their product development processes, what

gets built is often not based on ROI or customer

value or even value for the business, which sounds weird,

but it happens a whole lot.

So what I love about this process is it's

straightforward in going from the customer's problem, looking for

the best area of opportunity to try to improve

their situation and quantify it along the way.

That's going to be important as

we figure out how much value.

Ultimately, building that solution to eliminate said

bottleneck is going to provide for them.

Because if that number is high enough, that's going to

enable your product or your company or both to be

able to generate more value as well too.

In terms of if your customer is getting a

high enough return on investment, in terms of that

new solution that you're providing for them in the

form of your product by eliminating this bottleneck, that

may give you the ability to generate more revenue

through your product, which is going to increase the

value of the product and the company as well.

So that's the most exciting aspect of

this and that's essentially how it happens.

So if you go from understanding what the bottleneck

is, which again, just to summarize, is figuring out

the type of progress your customer is trying to

make, understanding what is specifically slowing them down and

trying to make that progress, as in they want

to move faster, but they can't. Why can't they?

You need to figure out what that is

and that's where you're going to laser focus.

But you also at the same time need to understand what

the impact of them not being able to move faster is.

This is where you start to get

into the ability to quantify it.

So if they tell you, well, we could move ten

times faster if we eliminated this step or solved something

related to this step, that's great, but what outcome is

that going to enable them to achieve?

If you can ultimately figure out what that outcome

is going to enable them to be able to

achieve, like, are they going to reduce how much

time gets invested into this process across an entire

team or the organization by 90%?

If so, that leads to a huge number.

As you start to quantify how much we're talking about in

terms of what you would need to pay that team in

order to do and how much time they're going to get

back, or maybe it enables them to charge more, right?

Whatever it is you want to drive towards

the successful outcome, eliminating that bottleneck is going

to enable them to be able to achieve.

So if you've found one, that's

great, but don't stop there.

You have to keep going until you get greater context

for understanding what eliminating that bottleneck is going to mean

for them, as in what transformation are you going to

help them be able to make once you know that

you have a better understanding for the value that they

will get if you prioritize building this solution.

So, like I said before, if you move from

what we've uncovered in eliminating this bottleneck is a

problem worth solving into a solution worth building.

You want to understand what type of outcome

that's going to enable them to achieve and

what type of return on investment they're going

to get as part of this process.

And if you understand that, you understand how to quantify

the value the customer is going to receive if you

provide them with that solution through your product.

And if you do that as well too, and that

number is high enough, that may give you an opportunity

to generate more revenue through your product because of how

much value you're providing them, which makes your product more

value and your company more valuable.

So this is one strategy that I use on a

regular basis which can provide pretty immediate results in terms

of how to level up your product development process and

build return on investment into the process itself.

Free Email Course - https://b...

Why Your Product Doesn't Need To Look Great

Sean Boyce — Sun, 08 Jan 2023 08:36:03 -0500

Prioritizing design over function for your product can actually make it harder to validate your value proposition.

Let's talk about why design isn't critically important and why you should focus on experience more than anything.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcription
Hey folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you

about is something I call the beauty trap.

And that's where people prioritize the design of

their product over the function of the product.

Now, why I consider this to be a trap

is because if you make your product look great,

that can actually motivate people to gravitate towards it.

As in they'll start using it because it looks

great, it's attractive, but ultimately a lot of people

might stop using it because your product isn't providing

them with kind of value that they need.

And that could be misleading in the beginning because

if people are using your product but ultimately stop

using your product, or worse, if you're not paying

close attention to how consistently people are using your

product, you might not know that ultimately it's not

performing all that well.

Even though people are using it, they're

not getting value out of it.

And that's what really matters.

That's why we always prioritize the function over the

aesthetic, but that can be misleading in the beginning.

Let me talk about this in a little bit more

detail and compare the two and also share an example.

Now in the beginning, what I actually recommend people

do, especially with early stage products, is almost focus

on not making the product look great.

That sounds weird, but let me explain as in

not prioritize the design, but instead prioritize the function.

The reason why I recommend this is because prioritizing

the design can be tricky and can enable you

to fall into what I call this beauty trap.

As in if people are gravitating to your

product for the wrong reasons, that's actually going

to be misleading for you, cause trouble.

Further down the road, we see this

strategy leveraged successfully in other industries.

For example, some logo design or web design companies

will present early stage designs but do so in

grayscale or not add photos so that they can

make it easier for their customers to focus on

basically the function that they've created first, the type

of experience that they're going for.

Because if they put beautiful photos up

there, beautiful colors and all that type

of stuff, it can be misleading.

As if people can see it be like, oh this looks great.

But they might be only evaluating it from

the perspective of the design, not the experience.

And ultimately what matters most is the experience.

That's how you really avoid

falling into the beauty trap.

So in the beginning when you're creating the

early stage versions of your product, I would

actually recommend you stay further away from particularly

advanced or beautifully aesthetic design elements and instead

focused almost exclusively on the function.

As in instead of making it look great, just

make sure it does what it needs to do

and it's okay if it's rough around the edges.

In fact, in the beginning I would almost recommend

that you make it that way on purpose.

Why because if your customers are willing to

jump through extra hoops to use your product,

even if it doesn't look great, that means

a whole lot for the longevity of your

product and ultimately how successful it can become.

Because that means your customers are willing to put up

with a little bit more trouble now, because that pain

that they need solved by your product is that important

for them, giving you really good long term indicators that

your product can reach really great success at scale as

you are trying to figure out product market fit.

So if you remove the design elements in the beginning,

that can prevent you from falling into the beauty trap.

It also enables you to be able to

ship a product faster, because you don't need

to worry about it looking great.

You just need to make sure it does what

it needs to do in terms of whatever painful

problem your customer has, they need solved.

Make sure that the function for

your product ultimately solves that problem.

And it's okay for it to be a little rough

around the edges, especially in the beginning, because, again, we

don't want it to be misleading, and we don't want

people using it for the wrong reasons.

We want them to have to jump through an

extra hoop if they need to in order to

get that problem solved and be able to measure

whether or not they're actually doing that.

If they do, that's a really good long term indicator.

Now, let me show you an example of a

really successful product that has, in my opinion, really

never looked great, giving you a little bit more

confidence that a strategy like this could be successful.

And the site that I'm going to use as my example,

which I'm also going to pick on but complement at the

same time as Craigslist, if you're unfamiliar, it's one of the

most successful ecommerce websites out there to date, and I'm going

to share with you some performance statistics for the site as

well, too, to back up my claim.

But have you ever seen craigslist or used it before?

There's not a whole lot going on.

It's pretty basic.

In fact, it almost looks like to me, a site

that was designed and built in the 1990s, but the

site still looks like that today, I promise you that.

But it's very easy to use, and for its

hardware market customers, it solves their problem very effectively.

I've used it many times myself.

If you need to sell anything to anyone, and

relatively quickly, without needing to jump through a whole

lot of hoops in order to get that listing

online so that you can get down to business

relatively quickly, craigslist is undoubtedly your site.

So let's talk a little bit more about the

performance statistics and success that craigslist has had.

So I can prove to you through the

numbers that they really haven't needed at a

very beautiful design and really highly prioritized aesthetic

in order to achieve this level of success.

Now, according to statistics about Craigslist from similar web,

they generate hundreds of millions of visits each month,

at least hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue

every year, and are still considered to be one

of the most successful, if not the most successful,

ecommerce website of all time.

So despite the fact that this website still looks like

it was designed and built in the 1990s and really

does not have a lot going on from a design

and aesthetic perspective, it has been ridiculously successful and still

continues to do so to this date without having updated

to really change the design all that much.

Still very simple, still very basic, does what

its target market customers need to do and

because of that, it's been hugely successful.

So let this be an example that your product does

not need ...

ChatGPT Will Change The Game

Sean Boyce — Sat, 07 Jan 2023 08:50:29 -0500

Accessing information will never be the same.

Let's talk about what ChatGPT has the potential to change with its disruptive technological capabilities.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey, folks, Sean here and I am

so geeking out about ChatGPT.

I want to talk to you about what I think

are the most disruptive potential use cases and how it

could change the way we access information forever.

So if you don't know what ChatGPT is, it's

essentially an AI bot, but one you can have a

conversation with and access information in a completely new way.

Comes from the folks at OpenAI, and they've been

working on this for years, training this thing over

and over again and releasing multiple versions of it

over time, as they've been testing in order to

make the results better and better.

And their most recent release, which came out around

the November time frame, is starting to make its

rounds around the world and it is leaving a

dramatic impression on everybody who's experienced it so far,

especially as techies like me, that we're just geeking

out thinking about the possibilities.

I have heard so many cool different stories

from so many different people about what they've

used it for that has made a dramatic

impact to the way that they do things.

So I want to talk about what some of

those are because I've been reading articles and hearing

the stories and all that kind of stuff, but

I want to talk about what I think ChatGPT

has in terms of potential to majorly disrupt.

The way we access information, which I think is by

far the coolest use case, or at least the one

that has the potential to be the most disruptive.

Now, for me, what I think is the problem

ultimately that I will solve, which could be the

biggest problem experienced by the largest number of people,

because that's usually where I'm focused.

I'm always looking for what I call

these problems worth solving, or using different

frameworks, like jobs to be done.

If you're familiar, as in what's

the obvious unmet need here?

How can we apply technology to solve a problem that

is the largest problem experienced by the largest number of

people that will provide the strongest ROI and the most

value and all that kind of stuff, right?

That is the potential to help the

most people and generate the most value

for a company that's providing the technology

that's ultimately going to solve that problem.

And for me, I think it's the way we access information.

So if we think about the way this happens

for most people today, myself, for example, I go

to search engines, I go to Google to try

to access whatever it is I'm trying to find.

However, most of the time I'm

left frustrated with that experience.

And I'll give you my use case.

If I want to find something through Google, I've got to

get the exact key phrase in terms of whatever it is

I'm looking for exactly correct, or else I'm not going to

wind up finding what it is I was looking for.

And what I think is so frustrating about that

experience is if I don't get that key phrase

exactly correct, I have to start all over again.

That's what's frustrating to me is like, it's not more of

a conversation and that's really what Chat GPT is, which I

think so far has been the coolest experience with it for

me, as I can start with a conversation about I live

in the Philly area and I'm a bit of a sports

buff, so I follow the Philadelphia Eagles.

But I was on a group call with

a number of my friends recently and we

were geeking out about it and its potential.

So we're asking it questions like, tell us about who

the top players on the Eagles were, then just kind

of stop there and see what it comes up with.

And we wondered, is it going to fill in the gaps?

Is it going to know what we mean by Eagles?

And short answer is yes, it did.

It filled in the gaps there and it

listed what was the top players based on

certain categories for the Philadelphia Eagles football team.

So it inserted some information that we

didn't feel the need to specify or

we wouldn't have in conversation format.

And I think that is the coolest thing of it that

it provides so far is it enables us to access information

in a way that we naturally would want to as humans,

as opposed to thinking like a search engine.

I get to think like a person, which sounds weird

to say, but it is a much more pleasant experience.

And the results thus far are also more effective, as

in I don't have to guess and think like a

robot, like, figure out what the keywords are, Philadelphia Eagles,

best player, so on and so forth, and then see

what might come up in terms of results.

I can ask a question like I would

to a person who might be super knowledgeable

on the topic and then get the kind

of information that I'm looking for almost immediately.

That's what's super exciting about it as well too.

And most of the people that I'm talking

with are talking about the time save that

the technology is providing them for the use

cases that they're attempting to solve problems with.

So that, I think is really exciting about Chat GPT

and what it can do in that it enables us

to access this information in a different way conversation format,

which is how we think and act naturally as humans.

As opposed to trying to figure out how to kind

of game or work a different system, which today the

leading one for most people is probably the search engine.

But the use cases are unlimited here.

And that's where I'd love some feedback from you in

terms of, like, what you think are the coolest ways

this technology has the potential to disrupt the way we

do things, because the possibilities are seemingly endless.

And I think that's one of the other

coolest things about researching this technology right now

is you're figuring out all the cool things.

People are figuring out how to use it

or leverage it in order to move entire

industries forward, starting with solving small problems.

But those problems are getting bigger and bigger as

I learn about how people are leveraging this technology.

And I've seen everything from writing code, writing poems

about what different types of wild stories and stuff

like that, to actually writing code for folks.

I know people that are pretty advanced engineers that are

saying that it's saving them a tremendous amount of time

because whatever it is they want to whip up in

code chat, GPT is able to do it for them.

In like, seconds or minutes or it may not be perfect,

so it may not be, like, the exact code that you

would design perfectly or whatever, but how often do we really

need that in order to move things like that forward?

Right.

More often than not, there's a balance between efficiency and

effectiveness where if we can get what we need to

be effective sooner rather than later, that probably is going

to provide us with even more value than if we

were designed to perfectly from the ...

Low-Touch VS High-Touch Products

Sean Boyce — Fri, 06 Jan 2023 07:53:36 -0500

The type of product you choose to build has implications on everything from the customer experience to the pricing model.

Let's talk about the differences and why you might choose one or the other.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript
Hey folks, Sean here and today what I

want to talk to you about are the

different type of product companies you might build.

When I say different type, what I

mean is low touch versus high touch.

There are some key differences between the type of

experience that you might create for both your customer

and the type of product company that you're going

to build for both yourself and your team.

And I'm going to start by kind of categorizing each

in terms of what are some of the more important

or typical characteristics you might see in each of these

and then sharing some examples with you.

I also want to talk about how you can become

more of one or the other as and you don't

have to remain in either of those categories indefinitely.

So when I say low touch product

company, typically from a strategic perspective, what

that means is you're creating a customer

experience that is typically product led.

And when I say product led, what

I mean is your customer's first experience

with your product is typically the product.

As in they will go right into using

the software and that's kind of their first

experience with your product and your company.

Also from a pricing model perspective, low touch products often

leverage simpler models as in customers might pay the same

amount on a given month or year in order to

gain and maintain access to your product.

Now, an example of a low touch product I would

like to use is Calendly, something I've used for years.

I get a lot of value out

of it and it's relatively simple.

Calendly, if you're unfamiliar, helps you with essentially that

what can become a merry go round of trying

to figure out how to get everybody synced up

so they can meet at a time that's mutually

available for both of them.

So it helps you with managing your calendar but

the use of the calendar product is rather simple.

As such it fits well into

the low touch product category.

Now, on the other hand, a high touch

product from a strategic perspective, you're usually leveraging

a model similar to being Sales lead as

in your customers first experience with your product

is actually through your team.

So they will meet with sales team or

someone to figure out what onboarding them might

look like or qualifying them as a prospect.

Because a high touch product is typically

more complex, it's got more moving parts.

The whole experience is difficult to kind of

just dump a customer into and enable them

to be able to figure it out.

Also the product itself isn't the

only thing that's more complex.

Almost everything is the pricing model as well

as in gaining and maintaining access to a

high touch product typically involves multiple components.

Maybe an implementation fee may be ongoing costs.

There may be contracts with commitments

that may go beyond a year.

So the contracts may be

relatively inflexible and rigid.

So those characteristics typically speak to what we

consider to be a high touch product.

An example of a high touch product in

this instance might be something like Salesforce.

If you've never used Salesforce before,

it's a heavy duty CRM.

But they as a company own a

ton of other products as well too.

So navigating kind of their

environment gets complex fast.

As such, some of your early contact with a

company like Salesforce, if you're interested in a product

like that, is usually with someone on their team.

Now, like I said earlier, just because your

product is delivering one or the other of

these type of experiences or falls into either

category, either low touch or high touch today,

doesn't mean it necessarily needs to stay there.

I've seen products make a successful transition from

one to the other and you'll often see

products trying to do that as they are

kind of figuring out product market fit.

So the most straightforward way to think about

it, if you would like to be one

or the other that's why I described those

characteristics and some examples of each first, because

depending upon your experience with those products or

your ability to familiarize yourself with them.

That may or may not be.

It might become clearer for you in terms of

the type of product you'd prefer to build versus

the customer experience that you're looking for and the

experience that you'd like for yourself and your team.

There are different implications depending upon which of

these two paths that you choose and you

don't need to wait to choose this.

I think more often than that makes

the most sense to think about this

almost essentially right out of the gate.

But let's assume you have some traction and you have

an established product with paying customers as well too.

Transitioning from one to the other or taking advantage

of the respective strengths of each is also possible.

Now, the easiest way that I typically think about

how to do that really is the core component

of that is the product experience, as in how

complex is it to use your product.

In order for a high touch product to

become more of a low touch product, you're

going to have to simplify the experience.

So you might need to do things like cut way back

on in terms of what your product is capable of.

That might mean removing features or building

a new version of your product that's

actually dramatically simpler than it was before.

This isn't necessarily a bad strategy.

There's obviously some engineering involved here.

But what you can do is if you kind

of got out of the gate with more functionality

than you were expecting to and you have some

early traction, what I'd recommend you take a closer

look at is where are you having that traction?

As in where are your customers the most active with

using your product and what are they getting the most

value out of soft, circle those features and essentially do

a quick mental calculation in terms of what percentage of

what your product is capable of.

Are those features where they're getting the

most value and using the most frequently?

And can you create a simpler

product experience around just those features?

If you can, that's where you have

great potential to convert essentially a high

touch product into a low touch product. I know that.

On the other hand, if you have a low touch

product and you kind of want to go beyond where

you are, some often may want to do that.

Depending upon if they want to raise their prices

or they want to scale their product company, things

like that, low touch products are less likely to

go further in that direction, so to speak.

If that's the case, then you want

to have a better understanding for how

you want to contin...

Joyriding In A Stolen Hyundai

Sean Boyce — Thu, 05 Jan 2023 07:52:43 -0500

Hyundai and Kia have decided to leave out a key anti-theft device from their vehicles. As such, there's now a growing social media trend where people are joying in recently stolen vehicles.

This is a great lesson in what can happen if your product doesn't include key features that your customer is expecting.

Article - https://fortune.com/2022/09/22/hyundai-kia-cars-stealing-hack-thieves/

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Episode Transcript

Hey, folks, Sean here.

And today what I want to talk to you about

is how to ensure that your product is meeting minimum

expectations with your customers to deliver the right experience.

And this is a story that comes from

a growing social media trend where Kias and

Hyundai vehicles are being stolen and joyrided because

they're missing a key antitheft device.

The antitheft device that's missing from Hyundai and

Kias is referred to as an immobilizer.

It's essentially a chip that matches your

car, is key to your ignition.

If you don't have it, it makes

your car ridiculously easy to steal.

Now, this is super embarrassing for Honda and Kia,

and one of the most embarrassing elements is that

most immobilizers were rolled out to most passionate vehicles

back in the 1990s, nearly 30 years ago.

And what this means is that Kia and Hyundai

owners were expecting it to be included as well.

Pretty important feature, you might add.

Really changes the experience if you don't have it.

So, in terms of what the usage and the

inclusion of this feature looks like across other vehicles

and essentially who Hyundai and Kia are competing with,

over 96% of passenger vehicles have this immobilizer installed.

The vast majority of Hyundai and

Kias do not, dramatically changing the

ownership experience, as you might imagine.

So let's talk about the impact that missing.

This key feature causes owners of these

vehicles and the company as well.

So, from the ownership experience, it's probably

relatively obvious because this key antitheft device

is not included in these vehicles.

They're being stolen at nearly twice the rate of

the national average, and it's all over social media.

So the problem will probably continue to get worse.

Making matters worse, it's not really an

easy thing to retrofit because they've missed

this key feature and include some hardware.

So you've got tons of vehicles out on the

road that all need to be fixed and are

all subject to being stolen at the moment.

So the whole thing has just become such a mess.

Now, I'm sure that some part of the

decision was in terms of cost savings, right?

However that's led to this disaster.

So was it really worth it?

More than likely, no.

And I'm sure if they could take

that decision back now, they would.

But that's not you don't really

get credit for that, right.

What you should be doing instead.

And this is me getting around to talking about

what this might mean for you and your product

company and make sure you don't wind up being

or experiencing some equivalent of this disaster than Honda

and Kia is going through.

Is to ensure that your product essentially has a key

set of features that your customers have come to expect.

Now, what do I mean when I say that?

Well, this is when they're obviously expecting.

Now, when people are searching whether or not to

purchase a particular vehicle, I'm sure they're not asking

whether or not the vehicle has an immobilizer included

or antitheft device as specific as that. Right.

They want to make sure that

the car isn't easy to steal.

That has become an expectation

over the course of decades.

As in, it's just assumed that it

will be included in most product experiences. Right.

So they would hope that they wouldn't necessarily need to

verify that, but apparently you still might because Honda's and

Kias for the most part don't include them.

But that should be incorporated in a minimum

set of expectations that your customer is going

to get when they're using your product.

Because like I shared already, greater

than 96% of vehicles have them.

So if yours doesn't, that causes a potentially huge

issue for you if and when that impact like

we're seeing now really starts to come to light.

So if your product is not including minimum set of

features like that, it could ruin the product experience and

it could cause untold amounts of brand and reputation damage

not to even include what it's going to cost them

from an insurance perspective if there's legal action and all

this other kind of stuff.

I mean, so what might this look like if you

have, for example, like a B2B SaaS software product?

This is the equivalent of not having

proper authentication, storing passwords and clear text.

Any of these things that can cause

you significant liability if they come to

light or you ultimately get exposed. Right.

There's a minimum set of expectations for the type of

experience you need to create for your users and your

customers and it's something that they've come to expect.

If you're not meeting those minimum expectations,

it could be glaringly obvious that they're

not going to be interested in doing

business with you or purchasing your product.

That's one problem that comes out of this.

Or if it ultimately comes to light that whatever it

is that you've left out of that experience ultimately has

caused major issues for customers and other users, then that

brand and reputation damage is potentially going to affect who

purchases your products in the future.

Like for example, here, which is a question I have for

you is would this issue with Hyundai and Kia prevent you

from purchasing one of their cars in the future?

I know it would affect my buying decision because and

immediately where my mind goes if they've left something like

this out to try to cut costs is what else

are they leaving out of the equation?

Do I have all my airbags?

Is the structural integrity of this

vehicle like sound and Safe?

I have other concerns if they're going

to leave out something so glaringly obvious.

So the lesson here is to make sure that

your product includes a minimum set of features to

meet expectations for your users and your customers.

Especially if those features are something that are

very important to your users and customers and

it's something they're going to use rather frequently.

Plus if it's offered by all of your competitors,

but you are missing it in your product, that's

going to cause a lot of trouble for you.

That could turn into a disaster that

it's been for Honda and Kia.

But more than that, is it's

ultimately going to potentially prevent them

from purchasing or using your product?

Because you don't have those key features.

So you don't want the brand reputation, you

don't want to incur anything anywhere near what

Hyundai and Kia are going through.

That risk is just too high.

So you need to ensure what those minimum expectatio...

Break Free From The Build Loop

Sean Boyce — Wed, 04 Jan 2023 04:00:00 -0500

Product companies that get caught in the build loop often get trapped in a death spiral.

Let's talk about what the build loop is so you know how to avoid it and the approach you should be taking instead.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Selling Multiple Businesses And Building A SaaS Company Async with Brian Casel

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 Jan 2023 12:00:00 -0500

Brian Casel is a software company owner and founder with a background in software product design and web design.

Brian has found, operated, and sold 4 different businesses and is now focused on his company ZipMessage, a tool for swapping video, audio, or text messages with clients and customers asynchronously.

Brian started out as a professional designer for the web, offering this as a consultant to a variety of businesses before leveraging these skills to design and build products that power businesses he starts up and operates.

Brian also regularly hosts podcasts where he shares notes about his work in the software and design industry, and hosts conversations with friends in this industry. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The decision process involved in selling a business.
How to work on multiple businesses at the same time.
The differences between working on multiple businesses compared to a single business.
The benefits of working on multiple different businesses.
How coaches can automate their workflows.
Different approaches to finding a product market fit.
How to research your ideal client profile.
The problems with real-time meetings.

Resources:

Connecting with Brian Casel:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Quotables

05:02 - “In 2021 I essentially sold 6 different businesses but some of them were tiny just a couple of thousands of dollars, others hundreds of thousands of dollars so that was over the course of 5 or 6 months there I exited everything other than ZipMessage.”
13:08 - “You’ll hear a lot of advice out there like yes you have to just focus on a single business and even though that’s what I’m doing today I don’t necessarily agree that’s the right advice for most people in their career especially if you’re earlier in your career I think you’re actually much better off doing multiple things whether they’re small products or service business, plugin products, SaaS products, courses you gain so much experience and just chops when it comes to copywriting, or putting up websites, or talking to customers, or doing sales, these are skills you’re going to need no matter what business you settle into.”
14:22 - “I’ve really enjoyed being able to experience working on multiple things because it enables me to make progress more quickly and figure out the right overlap of passion proficiency demand of what it is I really want to focus on so like you said as you get a little bit older and little bit more experience that stuff starts to become clear and then you can always focus from there but you’ve got that experience and a lot of these skills are really important in product.”
22:19 - “I do research in a number of different ways and sometimes it’s different at different phases of the business and I’ve launched multiple new businesses over the last 10 years and at the very beginning when it’s a brand new business may be in a pre-launch mode before the product is even ready I usually start with a landing page that has an email capture for an early access and after they enter their email it goes straight to a survey with a bunch of detailed questions where I’m asking them to freeform write and after reading every one of those survey responses I usually invite people to interviews based on their responses to the survey and that’s usually how I start with early market research for a new potential product.”
27:00 - “There’s a bigger benefit to using asynchronous, it’s not just that it’s more convenient and we can do it across time zones and things like that it’s also having space in between our messages gives us that space to prepare notes, I often put a list of talking points on the screen before I hit record, we have the ability to pause and continue, we have the ability to edit a message before sending it back, you can discard it and re-record it if you want to say it a little bit tighter, I’ll receive a customers question or some feedback and then I’ll go take a walk or maybe respond the next morning so I’m coming back to them with a much higher value response and I’m getting the same back from them.”

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Trouble at Salesforce

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 Jan 2023 08:11:27 -0500

Salesforce has avoided giving future revenue guidance which is rare for them.

They are blaming it on economic conditions, but are there bigger problems at the world's most successful SaaS company? Let's find out.

Techcrunch article - https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/18/salesforce-ends-2022-in-an-unusually-turbulent-position

Reddit thread - https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1001pd3/salesforce_ends_2022_in_an_unusually_turbulent/

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Southwest Airlines Software Failure

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Jan 2023 09:13:55 -0500

Southwest Airlines has just given us the perfect example of how not to manage technical debt.

Let's review what happened to see what we can learn from it.

NY Times Article - https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/31/opinion/southwest-airlines-computers.html

Open Letter From The Union - https://makeitrightswa.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/President-Remarks-March-2022-RH-ed.pdf

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why The Metaverse Is Likely To Fail

Sean Boyce — Sun, 01 Jan 2023 08:23:11 -0500

The Metaverse has had a rough go of it so far. The project has incurred more than $18B in losses and the company stock has fallen 70% in a year.

Besides that terrible performance on paper, I feel there's something obvious they are missing and if they don't fix it, I think the whole project is likely to fail.

Seeking Alpha article - https://seekingalpha.com/article/4547009-meta-why-the-metaverse-fail

Do you feel like the Metaverse solves a problem?

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Measuring Product-Market Fit

Sean Boyce — Sat, 31 Dec 2022 08:53:18 -0500

Product-Market Fit is often thought of as this elusive ambiguous concept, but I feel most people overthink it.

There are two important dimensions from which to measure Product-Market Fit: Qualitative and Quantitative.

Allow me to explain how I measure each using my own product company StaffGeek as an example.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

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Customer Discovery VS User Research

Sean Boyce — Fri, 30 Dec 2022 08:57:46 -0500

Customer Discovery and User Research both provide critical benefits to your product.

Let's talk about the impact and benefits of each so you can make sure you are doing everything you can to find and keep product-market fit as quickly as possible.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

My Great Product Experience from UPLIFT Desk

Sean Boyce — Thu, 29 Dec 2022 08:51:01 -0500

I needed to purchase a standing desk for someone as a gift.

I want to walk you through my experience from start to purchase to help you understand what I think UPLIFT Desk did well to get me to buy and what that might mean for making your own product experience better.

Here's a link to the New York Times article and the UPLIFT Desk website:

https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-standing-desk/
https://www.upliftdesk.com/

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why You Need To Stop Pushing Features

Sean Boyce — Wed, 28 Dec 2022 08:34:54 -0500

Pushing features is a big trap that I see most product companies fall into. It will prevent you from finding product-market fit.

You need to avoid what I call the 'field of dreams' trap because 'if you build it they will come' only works in the movies.

Let's talk about what you should do instead.

Credit to the late great Clayton Christensen and his incredible book Competing Against Luck.

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Surviving Product Budget Cuts

Sean Boyce — Tue, 27 Dec 2022 08:49:35 -0500

Customers are aggressively slashing their product budgets due to economic fears of a prolonged recession.

Let's talk about how they are going to decide so you can make sure your product makes the cut.

Here's a link to the article in the video - https://www.gartner.com/en/articles/trying-to-cut-software-and-cloud-costs-here-s-how

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Why The Amazon Alexa Is A Failed Product

Sean Boyce — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 09:15:46 -0500

What I talk about in this episode:

Why the Amazon Alexa failed
The HIPPO risk
Why products should be sold for profit (not break even)
The risk of passion projects
Why research and discovery are critical
Why you need to find the obvious unmet need

If you want to reach product-market fit faster, sign up for my free 5 day email course here - https://nxtstep.io/fit/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

When’s The Right Time to Launch Your Product with Ignite’s Derek Osgood

Sean Boyce — Mon, 04 Jul 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Derek Osgood is a trained brand marketer with an entrepreneur's mindset who is experienced in leading teams in the startup growth trenches.

Derek is both a marketing executive and consultant and has consistently delivered double-digit monthly growth across a variety of markets and business models. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How to define product marketing and why it’s in such high demand.
Different strategies for launching a product.
Common pitfalls companies fall into during their product launch.
How indirect and direct marketing complement each other.
How to know if you have a product that will be successful.
When you should start shipping a product.
When to start charging for your products and how to price them.

Resources:

Connecting with Derek Osgood:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Diving Deeper into Alternative Fee Arrangements with AltFee’s Scott & Digby Leigh

Sean Boyce — Mon, 23 May 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Scott Leigh is a lawyer by trade and an entrepreneur at heart, founding several businesses throughout the years while practicing law at the same time. After being involved in the legal industry for over 10 years, Scott leveraged his experience to buildAltFee. While Digby Leigh brings his 15 years of entrepreneurial and marketing background to the legal industry to provide a fresh strategic perspective to the traditional legal model. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode:

What AltFee is and how it helps law firms
The key features of AltFee that help law firms successfully transition away from hourly billing
The traction AltFee has experienced since launch
What a firm looks like before and after implementing fixed price and value based pricing models
How the industry is transitioning away from hourly billing

Resources:

Connecting with Scott Leigh:

Connecting with Digby Leigh Jr:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Importance of Feedback and How it Helped the founder of tilled.com’s Caleb Avery

Sean Boyce — Tue, 03 May 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Caleb Avery has worked in the payments industry for nearly a decade and with the problems that he encountered, he decided to build his own solution, thus the birth of tilled.com. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss in this episode:

Caleb discusses his background and how he got to where he is today.
What is PayFac-as-a-Service
What was life in the world like for tilled.com customers and how is that different today.
Tilled.com’s growth progress, where they were, where they’re at, and where they’re heading.
Strategy in scaling clients and moving upstream.

Resources:

Connecting with Caleb Avery:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Innovative Strategies to Scale with Springboard’s Rebecca Block

Sean Boyce — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Rebecca Block is an experienced leader focused on continuous learning and innovation grounded in meaningful measures of success, data-informed decision making, and appreciative inquiry practices.

Rebecca has built departments from scratch, managed small and large teams, and navigated a variety of environments from established institutions to the innovative chaos of social entrepreneurship.

Rebecca served as the VP of Research and Evaluation at The Future Project, founding their R&E department and launching new impact evaluation tools, before joining Springboard Collaborative as their Assistant Vice President of Innovation and Improvement. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Who Springboard Collaborative is and how they help children.
The innovative strategies Rebecca uses to scale Springboard's impact.
The role of software and technology in scaling accessibility.
The ways funding can limit innovation and how to reduce this.
How to present future forecasts while still leaving room for future innovation.

Resources:

Connecting with Rebecca Block:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Market Fit and UX with Lab’s Lindsay Tabas

Sean Boyce — Mon, 18 Apr 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Lindsay Tabas is a public speaker and workshop leader at Tabas Consulting and has worked with over 100 startups & investors over a span of more than 15 years. She has worked with both Fortune 500 firms and early-stage tech startup founders, where she assists organizations to work with software developers in the best possible way.

Lindsay also has experience working with investors, where she performs due diligence and provides industry insights so they make educated investments. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Lindsay helps startups bring in revenue without hiring software developers.
Common mistakes startup founders make.
The problem with the term UX and what user experience is really about.
How to know if your user experience fully compliments your product-market fit.
The importance of having an easy user experience.
The different UX for commonly used actions and advanced features.
How UX design has evolved over the years.

Resources:

Connecting with Lindsay Tabas:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Growing Fintech Organizations with Top Line Focus’s Linda Wittich

Sean Boyce — Mon, 11 Apr 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Linda Wittich has over 20 years of experience in the fintech industry and is currently the FinTech Advisor & Consultant at Top Line Focus where she helps B2B fintech CEOs focus on their top line activities, increasing sales into banks and wealth management firms and accelerating user adoption. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Linda helps B2B fintech organizations work out how they can grow faster.
Common challenges growing fintech organizations face.
The process Linda goes through when working with her clients.
The importance of focusing on the right metrics when optimizing your sales process.
Difficulties products have that aren’t positioned correctly in the market.
The power of carrying out analysis on your wins and losses.

Resources:

Connecting with Linda Wittich:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Apply UX to Receive the Best Outcomes with Tim Eulie

Sean Boyce — Mon, 04 Apr 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Tim Eulie is an experienced creative consulting partner working with businesses in wellness, lifestyle, culinary fields, and healthcare to strategically develop their visual assets.

Tim works at all stages of UX right from the conceptual stage, creating an idea, coordinating the hardware and talent, and overseeing production to its final stages. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Tim started working in UX.
What UX is and its purpose.
Why a company needs to have solid UX.
How to effectively apply UX to receive the best outcomes.
The difference between UI and UX.
How to react to user error issues.
What makes a good UX process.

Resources:

Connecting with Tim Eulie:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Connecting with Your Target Market and Generating Hype with Nick Yarnall

Sean Boyce — Mon, 28 Mar 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Nick Yarnall is a Univesity Professor, President and CEO of Potestiam, and a serial entrepreneur.

Nick is a big believer in incorporating your hobbies and your work life so that you’re working on something you love. Through doing this Nick was able to conceptualize, design, manufacture, and successfully launch a technology accessory in just 4 weeks. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Nick found his passion for 3D printing.
The unique docking stations Nick designed for retro handheld gaming devices.
How Nick engaged with his target market to gain discovery feedback.
The power of Reddit and how Nick used it to generate hype.
How to gain international status with a new product.
The advantage of working on a product that you’re really passionate about.

Resources:

Connecting with Nick Yarnall:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Productizing Life Insurance with Jason Pratt from Life Solutions Group

Sean Boyce — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Jason Pratt is an innovative leader with over 15 years of experience in Management, Operations, Marketing, Consulting and Talent Acquisition.

As President of the Life Solutions Group, Jason is responsible for the management of the firm’s carrier and strategic alliance partnerships and works closely with each one to ensure the best service and outcomes possible. Jason works closely with the firm's team of professionals and helps to mentor and manage their practice.

Jason also runs his own Financial practice with a focus on Retirement Planning and Tax Advantage Strategies. Jason is a member of GAMA International and is a 2016 Frontline Leader Award winner and 2011, 2012, and 2013 GAMA Recruiting Specialist Award winner. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The benefits of being a self-financed financial planning and business consulting firm.
The increasing popularity of Index Universal Life insurance policies.
How the revenue model for Jason’s productized services works.
The living benefits of having life insurance.
How life insurance can work as an alternative investment vehicle.
How organizations can use life insurance products to retain staff.
How Life Solutions Group is looking to expand over the next few years.

Resources:

Connecting with Jason Pratt:

LinkedIn
Phone (9786055204)
Email

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Scale Your Professional Services Firm Without Hiring

Sean Boyce — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 13:00:00 -0400

Sean Boyce has run his own consultancy firm NxtStep Consulting for over 10 years and has founded multiple other companies at the same time. He’s extremely experienced in working with B2B SaaS product businesses and is well-known for having a big impact on the businesses he’s worked with. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Creative ways to scale your company besides hiring.
Why you should map out your growth trajectory.
Common traps companies fall into when in a growth phase.
The ways problems can snowball.
Different types of growth.
Why not all growth is good growth.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Sean Boyce by Email

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Intrapreneurship as Product Strategy with UniFi’s RJ Grimshaw

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 13:00:00 -0400

RJ Grimshaw is the Chief Executive Officer and President of UniFi EF and a Board Member of the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association.

He is a Corporate Strategy & Development Specialist, with a consistent record of delivering extraordinary results in growth, revenue, operational performance, and profitability. Known for having a strong orientation in operations and finance, RJ drives operational initiatives, including infrastructure design, process reengineering, turnaround management, and reorganization. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Rob became the CEO of a financing company.
What intrapreneurship means and why it’s useful for locating new opportunities.
How an intrapreneurship mindset helps speed up product development.
The value proposition Rob has for his new app that he’s bringing to market.
The difficulty of measuring impact or ROI in online marketing.
The difference between vital and functional employees and why both are necessary.

Resources:

Connecting with RJ Grimshaw:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

How to Avoid the Growth Trap for Your Professional Services Firm

Sean Boyce — Wed, 09 Mar 2022 12:00:00 -0500

What a growth trap is and when it starts to affect businesses.
Why so many firms fall into a growth trap.
What a healthy growth trajectory looks like.
The issue of focusing on the wrong set of metrics.
Why profit is more important than revenue.
How to avoid your professional services firm falling into a growth trap.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Future of Finance and The Regulatory Process with RND Resources’s Dave Banerjee

Sean Boyce — Mon, 07 Mar 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Dave Banerjee has been the CEO of RND Resources for over 37 years, where he provides outsourced regulatory compliance consulting to Broker-Dealers, Registered Investment Advisers, FCM, Banks, and Insurance agencies. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How RND Resources helps financial service companies.
The fundamental basis of investment markets.
The increase in innovative activity in financial engineering products.
The different types of people involved in new digital elements.
How Bitcoin started and the validity of the idea behind it.
NFTs, digital autonomous organizations, and how financial service companies are innovating in this space.
The difference between regulations in the institutional and retail space.
The level of commitment required to pass the regulatory process.
Different policies around cross-currency transactions.
The difference between minimizing taxes and tax avoidance.
How the world of finance will change in the future.
The issues with blockchain technology.

Resources:

Connecting with Dave Banerjee:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Scaling Services by Improving Operational Efficiency

Sean Boyce — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 12:00:00 -0500

How to prepare your service firm to be ready for growth with scalable services.
Common ways people try to scale services.
Why hiring extra people is an inefficient way to scale your service.
The value of making your operations more efficient.
The importance of focusing on profit rather than revenue.
Why it’s necessary to chart your growth trajectory and how to do it.
What a value map is and what it needs to include.
How to identify bottlenecks in your growth trajectory.
How you can improve operational efficiency through creating repeatable processes.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building Momentum In Your Startup with Home.llc’s Nik Shah

Sean Boyce — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Nik Shah is an investor, entrepreneur, and Founder & CEO of Home.LLC where he helps people buy their first house and build wealth.

Nik sold his first startup in his freshman year of college and graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with a focus in Business & AI/ML. He has been a management consultant to Fortune-100 clients at Ernst & Young and built a $250M innovation fund as Chief of Staff at Ernst & Young. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

What Home.LLC is and how they help people buy their first home with minimal savings.
The huge amount of demand there is in the housing market.
What makes a business model sustainable.
How to identify pain points that people are willing to pay for.
How to get authentic feedback and reliable data.
How to measure product-market fit.
Ways to build more momentum in your startup.
Why the name of your company is not important.

Resources:

Connecting with Nik Shah:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Making Product Sales Repeatable

Sean Boyce — Wed, 23 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

How to avoid making assumptions in the sales process.
Why repeatability needs to come before scaleability.
How to create a hook in your sales process.
The power of running a podcast.
How podcasting can help you connect with new prospects.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Challenges of Fundraising with Bernstein Private Wealth Management’s Evan Linhardt

Sean Boyce — Mon, 21 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Evan Linhardt is a former nonprofit leader and public service executive and is now the Vice President and Financial Advisor for Bernstein Private Wealth Management. He now serves non-profits, foundations, and families to design investment strategies that align and allow them to fulfill their missions to maximize impact.

Evan is a Board Member and Treasurer at LiveWell Foundation, a Board Member at Sow Good Now, an Advisory Board Member at Community Foundation of South Jersey, and an Advisory Board Member at the Philanthropy Network Greater Philadelphia, as well as holding Corporate Responsibility at AllianceBernstein. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Evan went from working in nonprofits and charities to being VP in a Private Wealth Management firm.
How Evan helps individuals build investment portfolios that align with their goals and beliefs.
The challenges in growing and scaling nonprofits fundraising campaigns.
How nonprofits can combat the power imbalance they have with their key donors.
How donors and fundraisers can build strong trusting relationships with each other.
How investors can invest for impact as well as profit.

Resources:

Connecting with Evan Linhardt:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Hunting vs. Farming

Sean Boyce — Wed, 16 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

The difference between hunting and farming.
The pros and cons of both hunting and farming.
How to make your sales effort and your marketing effort complement each other.
The importance of making your product sales process repeatable.
Why you should build the product sales process before you start to leverage help from others.
When you should invest in market activities and what that can do for you.
The problem with random acts of marketing.
The dangers of delegating your marketing to others too early on.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Value of Customer Research with Rob Fitzpatrick

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Rob Fitzpatrick has been running small businesses for over 13 years and has written multiple books about what he’s learned along the way, including ‘The Mom Test’.

His first company was a scalable startup that went through the Y combinator accelerator and Rob is now building software to support indie nonfiction authors. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Rob found out what he was doing wrong in his sales pitch.
How Rob wrote his book ‘The Mom Test’.
Why any sales pitch needs to start with a problem.
Why you need to know your customer like you know your best friend.
The goals you should focus on in any customer conversation.
Why customer research is so important and when you should be doing it.
Common objections to doing customer research and why they’re not valid.

Resources:

Connecting with Rob Fitzpatrick:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building a Sales Process for Your Product

Sean Boyce — Fri, 11 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Why sales should be seen as a process.
The importance of repeatability when creating a sales process.
The steps you need to take to set yourself up for large scalability.
How to know when you’ve achieved a problem-solution fit.
Why building a product sales process in a repeatable way is the most cost-effective way to sell a product.
How to achieve scalability while maintaining quality.
How to help prepare a sales team and some assets that are helpful with this.
How to handle common objections.
How to measure the performance of your product sales process.

Resources:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn
Sean Boyce by Email

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Scaling Your Business with DreamSpring’s Francisco Lopez & Amber Kani

Sean Boyce — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Francisco Lopez has over 20 years of experience in financial institutions and is the Chief Operations and Innovation Officer at DreamSpring and is a Board Member at EBA Fund.

Amber Kani is the Director Of Communications at DreamSpring and has diverse experience in marketing, fundraising, corporate social responsibility, operations, employee engagement, project management, impact measurement, and strategic growth. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The products and services DreamSpring offers and how they help fund businesses.
The small businesses and entrepreneurs that DreamSpring tends to work with.
How DreamSpring was able to scale up and reach more clients.
The value of investing in your own technology and platforms.
How DreamSpring sources new clients.
What DreamSpring’s future goals are and how they determined these.

Resources:

Connecting with Francisco Lopez:

Connecting with Amber Kani:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building Productized Service Businesses with Audience Ops and Process Kit’s Brian Casel

Sean Boyce — Mon, 24 Jan 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Brian Casel is a web developer, freelancer, and founder of multiple productized services and internet-based businesses. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Brian transitioned from freelance web design to building internet-based businesses.
Why Brian got into freelancing and how he got the idea to start his own productized service business.
The value of building a productized service that can run without continuous input.
The challenges of building a productized service business.
The benefits of using a productized service business model.
Where your product ideas should come from to lead to a successful business.
How to determine where to dedicate your time while building your product business.
The importance of having deep knowledge of the niche you are working in.
What it takes to manage multiple businesses at the same time.

Resources:

Connecting with Brian Casel:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Marketers Are The New CMOs with Mary Sheehan

Sean Boyce — Mon, 17 Jan 2022 12:00:00 -0500

Mary Sheehan is the Head of Product Marketing at Adobe Advertising Cloud, the host of the Women in Product Marketing Podcast, and has been a product marketing leader focused on B2B tech and SaaS companies for over 12 years. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

How Mary became the Head of Product Marketing at Adobe Advertising Cloud.
The product marketing skills Mary has learned throughout her career.
What product marketing is and how it’s different from a traditional CMO.
How product marketing has changed in the last decade.
What effective product marketing looks like.
What’s next for product marketing and how aspiring PMM’s can make an impact.
Why Mary started her own product marketing podcast.
The importance and benefits of diversity.

Resources:

Connecting with Mary Sheehan:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Virtual Workers and The Benefits of Hiring Online with Onlinejobs.ph’s John Jonas

Sean Boyce — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 17:16:16 -0500

John Jonas is an outsourcing pioneer, virtual work guru, and Founder of onlinejobs.ph. He’s been helping small businesses outsource their tasks for over 15 years so they can focus on running their own company. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Why John made a job board for finding virtual workers in the Philippines.
The issues with outsourcing on platforms like Upwork.
What makes the talent pool in the Philippines so good.
How John has optimized his website to encourage organic growth.
John’s push to educate employers about the benefits of hiring online.
How to find problems that really need solving.
Why John focuses his work on automation.

Resources:

Connecting with John Jonas:

Connecting with the host:

Sean Boyce on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Balancing Discipline and Agility in Product Management with Jama Software’s Jeremy Johnson

Sean Boyce — Mon, 18 Jan 2021 18:00:00 -0500

Jeremy Johnson is the VP of Product Management at Jama Software. He leads both product management and user experience teams, and has 12 years of experience in product management. On this episode of Product Launch, Sean and Jeremy discuss

The benefits of a non-technical background in being effective in product management
How understanding the functional areas of an organization will help you be a better product manager
How to perform product management effectively in a complex environment with a team
The importance of effective process in ensuring that product management is done well
How sharing responsibility on your product team can affect increase agility and consistency
The Jama Connect value proposition and how their customers benefit from using it
The importance of receiving feedback direct from customers
How to move faster in product development by being more thorough with your product design and testing process

Resources:

Jama Software website: https://www.jamasoftware.com/

Connecting with Jeremy:

Connect with Jeremy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-c-johnson/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Flexibility as a Growth Strategy with Agora’s SVP of Marketing Virginia Liu

Sean Boyce — Mon, 04 Jan 2021 18:00:00 -0500

Virginia is the SVP of Marketing and Ecosystems at Agora. On this episode of Product Launch, Sean and Virginia cover

How a platform as a service product is unique when compared with traditional SaaS products
How the demand for the Agora service has increased due to the pandemic
The creative applications Agora’s customers have developed with access to their tools and services
How to organize data and feedback from users to make your product better as a platform as a service company

Resources:

Agora on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/agora-lab-inc/
Agora on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AgoraIO

Connecting:

Connect with Virginia in LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/virginia-liu-3705004/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Pivoting your Product Business with Daniel Senyard from Shep

Sean Boyce — Tue, 22 Dec 2020 02:43:52 -0500

Daniel Senyard who is the Co-founder and CEO of Shep. On this episode of Product Launch, Daniel and Sean cover

The Shep value proposition
How Shep pivoted due to industry impact due to the pandemic
Framing you product as a hypothesis
Distinguishing between adjustments and pivots for your product
Pivoting from SMB to enterprise as a target market

Resources:

The Start-Up J Curve, by Howard Love - https://www.amazon.com/Start-Up-Curve-Steps-Entrepreneurial-Success/dp/162634292X
Obviously Awesome, by April Dunford - https://www.amazon.com/Obviously-Awesome-Product-Positioning-Customers/dp/1999023005
Shep Travel - https://sheptravel.com/
Get Shep - https://getshep.io/

Connecting with Daniel:

Connect with Daniel over Email at daniel@sheptravel.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Sales as the Key to Success for your Product Business with Lisa Peskin

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Dec 2020 20:00:00 -0500

Lisa is the Founder and CEO of Business Development University or BDU. On this episode of Product Launch, Lisa and Sean cover

The importance of passion and authenticity in communicating your value proposition to prospects
They 3 keys to business development and sales
Folding 30/60/90 day game plans into your annual plan
Building your prospecting process to deliver effective results
Why your initial conversations need to start with their problems (and not your solutions)
Putting together the pieces to tell an effective sales story
Why not everything can be done online

Resources:

Business Development University - https://businessdevelopmentuniversity.com/
BDU's Prospect Visit Checklist - https://businessdevelopmentuniversity.com/bdu-prospect-visit-checklist-pdf/
Fanatical Prospecting, by Jeb Blount - https://www.amazon.com/Fanatical-Prospecting-Conversations-Leveraging-Telephone-ebook/dp/B01617VD3I

Connecting with Lisa:

Connect with Lisa on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisapeskin/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Better Benefits with Lluna’s Jessica Podgajny

Sean Boyce — Mon, 16 Nov 2020 22:16:03 -0500

Jess Podgajny has spent her career in client service and management consulting, focused on the people side of projects. She is now the Founder and CEO of LLUNA a B2B platform that enables companies to design, manage, and analyze personalized employment arrangements. On this episode of the Product Launch podcast, Jess and Sean cover

The past, present, and future of LLuna
What Lluna offers their clients (that they can’t get elsewhere)
The growing demand for flexibility
The Lluna prototype build strategy through the use of ‘no-code’ tools
The Lluna team’s go-to-market (GTM) strategy
- Tight target market, build momentum and social proof to take to the bigger organizations

Resources:

Tools - Bubble - https://bubble.io/
The Mom Test - http://momtestbook.com

Connecting with Jess

https://lluna.io/ - Reach out to Jess to talk about personalized employer arrangements
Connect with Jess over email Jess@lluna.io

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Hyper-Automation Movement with Nividous’s Chris Hawn

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Nov 2020 20:00:00 -0500

Chris Hawn is the Managing Director at Nvidous. Chris’s background includes finance, technology and now hyper automation as he’s leading the charge in growth and scaling the business in the US. This week's topic is hyper-automation, and Sean and Chris specifically cover\

Hyper-automation vs Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
How companies interact with their software bot
Use cases for the technology
Industry applications for hyper-automation
Overcoming objections to hyper-automation
What the future of automation means for jobs done by people

Resources:

Nividious Website: https://nividous.com/

Connecting with Chris:

Connect with Chris over email: chris.hawn@nividous.com
Connect with Christ over LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-hawn-b222a582/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Positioning with Obviously Awesome Author April Dunford

Sean Boyce — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 19:44:18 -0400

April Dunford is the author of Obviously Awesome which is all about product positioning. Prior to that April was the VP of Marketing for 7 successful startups. This week, April and Sean cover

What is product positioning and how it can help you
"Jobs to be done" and the milkshake story
Integrating product positioning in a jobs to be done framework
The importance of competitive alternatives when it comes to positioning
Testing your positioning thesis and how to refine it based on your traction
April’s real-world example of the power of positioning
Finding the examples of best-fit customer use cases

Resources:

April's book, Obviously Awesome: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/45166937-obviously-awesome

Connecting with April:

Connect with April on Twitter: https://twitter.com/aprildunford?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
- Connect with April on her website: https://www.aprildunford.com/
- Connect with April over email: april@aprildunford.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Differentiating Yourself in a Sea of Competition with Habitat Logistics Trip O’Dell

Sean Boyce — Mon, 19 Oct 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Trip’s experience and product portfolio is diverse. It includes consumer hardware, software, cloud services, enterprise software, among others at solving complex problems at scale. Trip's grounded product experience combines a track record for envisioning, defining and shipping new ideas, products and technologies resulting in new products, services, intellectual property and driving business outcomes at companies like Amazon, MSFT and Adobe. He is the new CXO at the Y-combinator company Habitat in Philadelphia which deals with last mile delivery technology. On this week's episode of Product Launch, Sean and Trip discuss

What is a CXO (Chief Experience Officers) role all about
Why success is all about people, product, and process
East vs West coast approaches to building a tech company
The importance of a humanistic, experimental, future based mindset
“People don’t buy a drill, they buy a repeatable quarter inch hole”
Developing a customer obsession at your organization
The importance of failure

Resources:

Trade Off, by Kevin Maney: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6664826-trade-off
Brave New Workforce Podcast: https://www.thebraveworkforce.com/

Connecting with Trip

Connect with Trip through Twitter: https://twitter.com/tripodell?lang=en
Connect with Trip over Email: trip.odell@tryhabitat.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Industry Expertise as an Accelerator for your Product Career with Hazelcast’s David Brimley

Sean Boyce — Mon, 12 Oct 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Hazelcast delivers the in-memory computing platform that empowers Global 2000 enterprises to achieve ultra-fast application performance - at any scale. Built for low-latency data processing, Hazelcast’s cloud-native in-memory data store and event stream processing software technologies are trusted by leading companies such as JPMorgan Chase, Charter Communications, Ellie Mae and National Australia Bank to accelerate data-centric applications. On this weeks episode of the Product Launch podcast, Sean and David cover

Why industry subject matter expertise matters and how it differentiate you as a product professional
The advantages of building a product for yourself
How to keep your industry subject matter expertise to be better product professional
Going from a siloed world of being an individual contributor to more of a leadership role for the organization and various functional groups
Why product professionals need to maintain a healthy network of industry professionals
Getting to know your customers personally so they will feel comfortable opening up to you so you can help them

Resources:

Flash Boys, by Michael Lewis - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24724602-flash-boys
Automate This, by Christopher Steiner - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13542772-automate-this
Competing Against Luck, by Clayton M. Christensen - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28820024-competing-against-luck
Playing to Win, by A.G. Lafley - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13586928-playing-to-win
How to Lead in Product Management, by Roman Pichler - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13586928-playing-to-win
Hazelcast Websites - hazelcast.org , hazelcast.com

Connecting with David:

Connect with David on Twitter - https://twitter.com/dbrimley?lang=en

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Embracing the Pivot with Rhino Review’s Chelsea Craig

Sean Boyce — Mon, 05 Oct 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Chelsea is the founder of Rhino Reviews and they work with businesses to protect their online reputation by growing and leveraging their online customer reviews. They offer the only fully managed review generation and reputation management program on the market. Every client receives a unique strategy based on their current reputation, where they wish to go, and headwinds they might encounter. They work to improve both the external as well as internal reputation and take businesses from a reactive to a proactive position. On this episode, Sean and Chelsea cover

The success story behind Rhino Review and embracing the concept of the pivot
How measuring the customer experience helped Chelsea realize why Rhino was stuck
How leveling up their pricing actually helped them refine their value proposition
How your sales and go-to-market strategy needs to shift when you decide to pivot
How a lower price for your product or service can actually hurt your business
Chelsea’s philosophy on adding new services (or features) to their list of offerings

Resources:

Sandler Sales Training - https://www.thetrainingcenter.sandler.com/about
Rhino Reviews LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/rhino-reviews/?viewAsMember=true
Rhino Reviews Blog - https://rhino-reviews.com/blog-2-online-reviews-for-small-business/

Connecting with Chelsea:

Rhino Reviews website - https://rhino-reviews.com/
Connect with Chelsea over email - Chelsea@rhino-reviews.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building Data-Driven Products with Stephen Sklarew

Sean Boyce — Mon, 28 Sep 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Stephen is a product and technology executive with extensive experience building and growing companies both large and small. He is also the CEO of Synaptiq. Synaptiq provides strategic AI and data science services to information, technology, and product officers. On this week's episode, Sean and Stephen discuss

“There’s nothing more frustration than building software that no one will use”
Why software is more about understanding your customer than technology
How to be a conservative entrepreneur when it comes to financial risk
Why selling services is a great way to identify product opportunities
“It’s not worth getting others people’s money until you’ve proven your business model”
What it means to build a data-driven product
How to know when you have a product worth building
The critical importance of testing your value proposition early and often

Resources:

Good to Great, by James C. Collins - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/76865.Good_to_Great
Traction, by Gino Wickman - https://www.eosworldwide.com/traction-book
Scaling Up, by Verne Harnish - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22212880-scaling-up
3HAG Way, by Shannon Byrne Susko - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22212880-scaling-up
Synaptiq Website - https://www.synaptiq.ai/

Connecting with Stephen:

Connect with Stephen on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sklarew/
Connect with Stephen over Email - Stephen@synaptiq.ai

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Product Launch Journey of Everykey with Founder Chris Wentz

Sean Boyce — Mon, 21 Sep 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Chris Wentz is the founder of Everykey, the universal smart key that replaces all of your passwords and keys! Everykey can unlock your phone, laptop, tablet, and log you into your online accounts when you're around, then locks everything down when you walk away. Soon Everykey will also unlock your car, house and more! This week on the Product Launch Podcast, Sean and Chris discuss

The origins of Everykey
How Everykey identifies customers and improves their lives
Everykey's pricing structure and why it works
How the team has evolved through different phases of building the company
What's next for Everykey
Chris's best advice for aspiring product company founders

Resources:

Everykey.com - Use promo code PRODUCTLAUNCH20 for 20% off
The Hard Thing About Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18176747-the-hard-thing-about-hard-things

Connecting with Chris:

Connect with Chris over email at Chris.wentz@everykey.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Producing Awesome Content with AI Tools with MarketMuse’s Aki Balogh

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Sep 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Aki is the co-founder and CEO of MarketMuse. MarketMuse uses AI to optimize content for organic search. Their SaaS platform is in use by 200 enterprises and over 10K users. In this episode, Sean and Aki cover topics like

Using analytics to improve decision making
Approach big problems from a fresh perspective
Identifying powerful use cases within your target market for your product
Testing your value proposition
Measuring and describing the ROI of your product for your customer

Resources:

MarketMuse Blog - https://blog.marketmuse.com/
MarketMuse Content Strategy Crash Course - https://blog.marketmuse.com/content-strategy-crash-course/
Get started with their free version - https://app.marketmuse.com/welcome?phone-invisible=dHJ1ZQ%3D%3D
Slack community, the Content Strategy Collective - https://contentstrategycomm.slack.com/join/
Product Led Growth (PLG) - https://openviewpartners.com/blog/what-is-product-led-growth/
Openview Venture Partners - https://openviewpartners.com/
FirstRound Newsletter - https://firstround.com/review/
Pricing - Price Intelligently - https://www.priceintelligently.com/
Hubspot- Marketing - https://www.hubspot.com/products/marketing

Connecting with Aki:

Email Aki at Aki@marketmuse.com
Connect with Aki on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/akibalogh

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Telehealth Product Neeka with President Jared Sheehan

Sean Boyce — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Jared is the President of Neeka Health Intelligence, the econometric and digital arm of Neeka Enterprises. Neeka Enterprises spans the healthcare continuum by providing strategic, operational, and tactical support to leading healthcare organizations. Their team brings a blend of medical, economic, and startup experience to identify strategic margin improvement opportunities and deliver results through tech-enabled services. In this episode, Sean and Jared cover

The telehealth product they’ve built called Neeka
What econometrics means and how it applies to healthcare
The story behind Neeka and the problems they solve
The Neeka value proposition and how they identified their target audience
How Neeka is differentiated from the options on the market
What’s next for the future of telehealth and how they intended to innovate around these needs

Resources:

Pwrdby website - https://pwrdby.com/
Neeka - https://neekahealth.com/
Hospital Pandemic Preparation - https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/part-i-hospital-providers-should-prepare-for-two-years-of-pandemic.html
COVID-19 Elective Surgery Recommendations - https://www.cms.gov/files/document/covid-elective-surgery-recommendations.pdf
How Will COVID-19 Affect the Health Care Economy - https://jamanetwork.com/channels/health-forum/fullarticle/2764547

Connecting with Jared:

Connect with Jared on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sheehanjared/

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Trudge to the Bathroom Test with Neil Gordon

Sean Boyce — Mon, 31 Aug 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Neil Gordon helps experts become the face of a movement. He works with executives, influencers, and thought leaders and has helped them get six-figure book advances, be seen on shows like Ellen and Dr. Oz, and double their speaking fees. On this episode of Product Launch, Sean and Neil discuss

What the ‘trudge to the bathroom test’ is all about and why you need to run it
“Marketing is made or broken by how well we understand the problems experienced by our customers”
Why testing your product ideas are so important
Figuring out what problems people are hungry to solve
How he markets his products and what you can learn about how to market yours
Defining your marketing hooks and figuring out what your next product should be
Conducting the twitter test, (struggling with this problem and add a bitly link, spend a couple bucks on each and measure the results)
Figuring out the marketing hooks, landing page content, testing your messaging
Neil’s magic wand product for transforming webinars

Resources:

Visit Neil on the web at https://neilcanhelp.com/
Neil's Silver Bullet at https://neilcanhelp.com/silver-bullet/
A Prayer For Owen Meany at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4473.A_Prayer_for_Owen_Meany

Connecting with Neil:

Neil's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilcanhelp/
Email Neil at neil@neilcanhelp.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Effective product management done remotely with Internet Creations’ Howard Yermish

Sean Boyce — Mon, 24 Aug 2020 20:00:00 -0400

Howard is the Director of Product at Internet Creations which is a Salesforce AppExchange and Consulting partner that empowers organizations to operate efficiently and accelerate success by aligning people with technology. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

Being an effective product manager in a fully remote capacity
Managing a product that is a native component in an ecosystem
Aligning your product roadmaps
Balancing product experience and product recognition

Resources:

Salesforce learning platform Trailhead (https://trailhead.salesforce.com/en/home)
Internet Creations blog (https://blog.internetcreations.com/)

Connecting with Howard

Email Howard at howard.yermish@internetcreations.com
Connect with Howard on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/hyermish/)
Follow Howard on Twitter @hyermish (https://twitter.com/hyermish?lang=en)

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Building a Product Business Organically with Learnt's Eliza Nimmich

Sean Boyce — Sun, 16 Aug 2020 17:00:00 -0400

Eliza Nimmich is the COO of Learnt. Learnt is an online marketplace that allows students to seamlessly and instantly connect with highly vetted tutors online and in-person. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch:

The strategy of developing and growing an enterprise business on a limited budget
The importance of cultivating personal connections to customers as a form of investment
Crowdfunding as an effective means of fundraising
Understanding flexibility as a necessity for early growth

Resources:

Connect With Eliza:

Connect With Eliza Over Email
Connect with Eliza on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Management Advice from Product Coach and Mentor Timo Sturm

Sean Boyce — Thu, 30 Jul 2020 09:00:00 -0400

Timo Sturm is a freelance product coach and mentor who helps others achieve successful careers in product. He is also the Co-Founder of What a Location which is a data and analytics tool for the commercial real estate industry. Here are a few of the topics we’ll discuss on this episode of Product Launch.

The impact of local culture on the product management profession
What product managers from Europe and the U.S. can learn from each other
Why a product role requires effective process as well as, an understanding that the process can always be improved
Why product managers need to be decisive in their decision making
Why it’s so important for product managers to set explicit goals and drive towards them with conviction

Resources

Connecting with Timo

Connect with Timo on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Sharpening your Marketing Axe with Creative’s Ben LeDonni

Sean Boyce — Mon, 20 Jul 2020 22:00:00 -0400

Ben LeDonni is the Founder and CEO of Creative MMS based in Philly. Creative works as a partner to marketing execs and marketing directors who have had trouble reaching their audience with the same tactics that have worked in the past and help them innovate in reaching their audience and generating sales through digital channels. On this episode of Product Launch, here are some of that Ben and I will discuss.

What Abe Lincoln's famous quote about axe sharpening means for marketing your business
How to identify the personas relevant to your business
Stop focusing on features, focus on problems first
Find the pain and solve it
Share your ideas with anyone that will listen
Qualitative data is your friend, get as much of it as possible
Testing your following before building a product
Thinking about product marketing as dollar-cost averaging

Resources

Connecting with Ben

Anyone who is looking to build an audience or grow their business should email Ben at ben@creativemms.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Protecting your Team and Business when Working Remotely with Anthony Mongeluzo

Sean Boyce — Fri, 10 Apr 2020 11:00:00 -0400

Anthony Mongeluzo is the President of the IT Managed Service Provider company PCS. Anthony details for us what we can do to ensure we are keeping our team and company safe as we transition to working remotely. We’ll talk about what ‘zoom bombing’ is and what you can do to ensure it doesn’t happen to you and your team. In this episode, we’ll talk about everything from protecting your team, securing the tools you use, steps you can take to protect yourself and your company and more.

Resources

PCS Blog & Newsletter - https://www.pcs-ms.com/news
Productivity Tool - https://www.followupthen.com/

Getting in contact with Anthony

Connect with Anthony on LinkedIn
Email - anthony@helpmepcs.com
Phone - 877-596-4446

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Taking Action From User Research with Ralph Pierre-Louis

Sean Boyce — Tue, 10 Mar 2020 13:00:00 -0400

Ralph is the Head of Design at QuotaPath. On this episode of Product Launch, Ralph shares with us his insight into user research and maximizing the value to both your B2B SaaS company and the customer deploying valuable strategies such as product-led growth. Ralphs shares the progress he’s made throughout his career and what ultimately landed him as Head of Design at QuotaPath. Spoiler alert - it’s got something to do with being product-led!

Recommended Resources

https://growth.design/
https://www.reallygoodux.io/
Openview’s build podcast - https://podcast.openviewpartners.com/
Book - Product-led Growth by Wes Bush
Book - Inspired by Marty Cagan

Getting in touch with Ralph

Connect with Ralph on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Effectively Marketing Your SaaS Business with Raj Kapur

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Mar 2020 14:00:00 -0500

Raj Kapur is the Founder and Managing Director of &Marketing. Raj shares his insight for those of us looking to market and successfully grow our B2B SaaS businesses. Learn from him as he shares keys in the areas of prioritizing the problem you are solving to the most effective marketing strategies to date. Raj is also offering our listeners a free Initial Marketing Analysis where he and his team will review your marketing strategy and resources to provide you with valuable insight. Don’t forget to sign up for the upcoming Marketing Planning and Execution webinar through the link below.

Resources

Book Recommendation - Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller
Webinar - Marketing Planning Like a Pro
Initial Marketing Analysis - Free for Product Launch listeners!

Getting in touch with Raj

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Growing a Successful SaaS Business Without Venture Capital with Brendan Rice

Sean Boyce — Mon, 24 Feb 2020 18:00:00 -0500

Brendan Rice is the Chief Marketing Officer at Wodify. Wodify provides management software to the fitness industry. Brendan shares the Wodify story and shares lessons from staying lean to building an awesome company without having to raise capital in this episode of the product launch podcast powered by NxtStep.

Best SaaS advice from Brendan

Learn about building a product business by getting out there and talking to customers

Getting in touch with Brendan

Connect with Brendan on LinkedIn
Wodify is hiring!
Email Brendan at brendan@wodify.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Jim Paolino from LodeStar

Sean Boyce — Thu, 20 Feb 2020 09:00:00 -0500

Jim Paolino is the Founder and CEO of LodeStar. Join me as I interview him about the journey he took to bring LodeStar to market. Jim will share his expertise and advice for those looking to build and grow a SaaS business. We’ll discuss everything from startup life to raising capital and everything in between.

Resources

Get a coach and surround yourself with a support system that understands what you’re going through (other founders and CEOs)

Getting in contact with Jim

Connect with Jim on LinkedIn
Leverage the resources available on the LodeStar website

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Growing an EdTech SaaS Startup to more than 1000 paid customers with Nick Malekos

Sean Boyce — Mon, 17 Feb 2020 12:00:00 -0500

Nick Malekos is a marketing expert that is involved in building and selling the EdTech SaaS company Learn Worlds. Learn from him about how they have gained traction in the EdTech SaaS space by addressing the obvious unmet needs in their space. Nick’s speciality in marketing has helped him grow Learn Worlds aggressively in recent years. Learn from his successful strategies and tactics to help grow your SaaS business.

Resources

Getting in touch with Nick

Connect with Nick on LinkedIn
Email Nick at nick@learnworlds.com

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Ben Johnson from Freya Systems

Sean Boyce — Mon, 09 Dec 2019 22:00:00 -0500

Description: In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Ben from Freya Systems about building internal products for the enterprise. Ben and his team build products for large organizations in the aviation, transportation and manufacturing industry.

Show notes

00:30 - Background about Ben and more information about Freya Systems.

02:00 - What Freya Systems is doing to help their customers predict the future.

04:30 - What they do with all that data.

07:00 - What type or problems are you solving?

12:30 - Why elegant and simple solutions are ideal even for complicated problems faced by very large organizations.

17:00 - The advantages of specializing. Niche to get rich.

19:00 - How do you solve the problems of your customers and who is typically involved?

Product Resources

Training
Pluralsight
YouTube
Datacamp
Wireframing
Adobe XD

Getting in touch with Ben

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Sreeni Jakka from Tech O2

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Dec 2019 16:00:00 -0500

Sreeni Jakka from Tech O2Description: In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Sreeni from Tech O2 about all things software and startups. Learn how to make your software startup successful from a veteran of helping over 60 startups.

Show notes

01:00 - What is Tech O2?

03:00 - Sreeni’s experience working with startups.

05:00 - Advice for early stage companies

09:00 - How to scale back to your MVP.

14:30 - How do know when you’re ready to actually build the product.

20:00 - Being smart with your budget

21:00 - Why you should avoid ‘stealth mode’ for your startup

Product Resources

Blogs
Medium
Books
The Lean Startup (Eric Ries)

Getting in touch with Sreeni

LinkedIn
Tech O2 Website
Email - sreeni.jakka@techo2.com
Phone - 215.262.2633

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

SEO and Organic Content for SaaS Businesses with George

Sean Boyce — Mon, 25 Nov 2019 19:00:00 -0500

Description: In this episode we speak with an SEO and organic content expert in George. George has created SEO and content strategies for numerous SaaS businesses across the globe.

Show notes

01:00 - The type of companies George works with

03:00 - Knowing when a company has found product-market fit

05:30 - What’s the best way to drive organic growth for your SaaS business

08:00 - George’s 6 step process for organic content and SEO success

09:00 - What is important for SEO success today

11:30 - Why you’ll be fine if you stick to the script

12:00 - What is the best way to build a content strategy that delivers results?

15:00 - When to invest in these strategies for your SaaS business

17:30 - What is a reasonable budget for a project like this for a SaaS business?

Product Resources

Websites
SEO Tool - Ahrefs

Getting in touch with George

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Stuart Balcombe from Customer Discovery Sprints

Sean Boyce — Mon, 18 Nov 2019 22:00:00 -0500

Description: In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Stuart from Customer Discovery Sprints about everything from starting with problems to verifying solutions in the wide world of product for early stage companies.

Show notes

01:00 - What is Customer Discovery Sprints

03:30 - How to start with problems.

06:00 - Why you shouldn’t start with (just) an idea.

11:00 - Asking the right question - The Mom Test

12:00 - How to ask for real-world examples.

14:00 - How to have an effective customer interview.

16:00 - How do you validate your product ideas?

Product Resources

Books
The Mom Test by Rob Fitzpatrick
How to Create Tech Products Customers Love by Marty Cagan
Podcasts
Build by Drift
Courses
Customer Interviews Course
Blogs
Silicon Valley Product Group (Marty Cagan)

Getting in touch with Stuart

Email - Stuart@CustomerDiscoverySprints.com
Customer Discovery Sprints

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Zubin from LeagueSide

Sean Boyce — Mon, 11 Nov 2019 18:00:00 -0500

Description: In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Zubin who is the Co-Founder and COO of LeagueSide . Learn about how LeagueSide came to be and how they are ushering sponsorship of youth sports into a whole new era.

Show notes

00:00 - The story behind LeagueSide

03:00 - The problems LeagueSide solves

04:30 - “You have to sell the product to be able to execute it”

07:00 - How do your customers and users try to solve these problems today?

10:00 - How the LeagueSide product works.

13:00 - Company reaction to the LeagueSide product.

14:30 - Key metrics and how the LeagueSide team is measuring the effectiveness of the product.

15:30 - How does the revenue model work?

16:15 - Scaling the LeagueSide product and business.

20:30 - The game winning basketball shot heard around the world!

Product Resources

Books
Obviously Awesome by April Dunford

Getting in touch with Zubin and LeagueSide

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Being Data-Driven in Marketing with Jake from Pareto PPC

Sean Boyce — Mon, 14 Oct 2019 20:00:00 -0400

Description
In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Jake from Pareto PPC about the importance of being data-driven in your marketing approach. Learn more from a marketing expert about what you can do to market your product effectively.

Show notes

00:30 - Jake’s background and the Pareto story

02:00 - The importance of being data-driven

04:50 - How to know if you have the right data

08:00 - Finding product/market fit

12:30 - The cyclical nature of CPC

14:00 - The advantages of targeting a niche

15:00 - “The more general you are the weaker your value proposition will be.”

Product Resources

Getting in touch with Jake

Email - jake@paretoppc.com
LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

The Importance of User Research with Aggelos from Growth Sandwich.

Sean Boyce — Mon, 07 Oct 2019 11:00:00 -0400

Description: In this episode of the Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Aggelos from Growth Sandwich about the importance of user research in building great products. Learn everything from what an evidence-based decision making loop is and why you should use one to avoiding the hands off trap when it comes to product-market fit.

Show notes

01:00 - The story behind Growth Sandwich.

03:00 - Product vs Marketing.

04:00 - A story about what can go wrong when user research is missing.

07:30 - The impact of poor product management.

09:00 - The case of Ryan Air, ranked worst for 6 years running, but the highest selling. What gives?

11:00 - Getting feedback from users the right way.

15:00 - People don’t buy your product, they buy your value proposition.

18:00 - Aggelos on product-market fit and why what you measure matters.

20:00 - You can lose product-market fit more quickly than you found it.

24:00 - Why automation can jeopardize the strength of your value proposition.

Product Resources

Getting in touch with Aggelos

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Neil Gomes - Jefferson Health

Sean Boyce — Thu, 19 Sep 2019 17:00:00 -0400

In this episode of the product podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Chief Digital Officer and EVP of Consumer Experience at Jefferson Health - Neil Gomes. Listen in as Neil talks all about what it takes to achieve product success and all the exciting work him and his team is involved with at Jefferson Health.

Guest

Neil Gomes
Chief Digital Officer at Jefferson Health

Show Notes

00:30 - What Neil does and what his title really means.

04:00 - How Neil got to where he is today and the cool stuff he’s worked on throughout his career.

10:00 - How you can work like a startup without having to be a startup.

13:00 - What Neil’s team is made up of and how they get work done at Jeff.

15:00 - How Jeff does Lean and Agile.

29:00 - Resources recommended by Neil

36:00 - How to connect with Neil

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

John Waupsh - Kasasa

Sean Boyce — Sat, 14 Sep 2019 22:00:00 -0400

Product success and Bankruption in FinTech with John WaupshIn this episode of the product podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with Chief Innovation Officer at Kasasa - John Waupsh. Listen in as John talks all about what it takes to achieve product success. Hear more about John's popular book on the latest in FinTech called Bankruption.

Guest

John Waupsh
Chief Innovation Officer at Kasasa

Show Notes

1:00 - What is Kasasa?

5:00 - What does Chief Innovation Officer mean?

9:30 - Why market research matters.

11:00 - An example from John about how different what customers say can be from what they will actually do.

13:00 - John’s take on what makes a great product professional and what it has to do with 3D chess.

17:00 - Why product can be HARD.

23:00 - How do you find product-market fit?

28:00 - How quitting can be a key part of the path to winning.

30:00 - Why you should pay close attention to your customers voting with their money.

31:30 - Great resources by John.

Bankruption: How Community Banking Can Survive Fintech

36:00 - How to get in touch with John.

37:00 - Bonus product advice from John. Why you should focus on what you’re building and why.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Don Sandusky - Hamboards

Sean Boyce — Mon, 02 Sep 2019 11:00:00 -0400

In this episode of the product podcast powered by NxtStep, we talk with owner and general manager of Hamboards - Don Sandusky. Don walks us through what they did to achieve success at Hamboards, which is a product that creates a surfboard-like experience on land. Hear more about his path into product, working at NASA and other great product insights.

Guest

Don Sandusky
Owner and General Manager of Hamboards

Show Notes

1:00 - The Hamboard is a product that mimics the experience of surfing on land

3:10 - How Hamboards extended a great user experience to a new market segment through the use of their product.

8:35 - How Don originally got into product.

11:00 - Fixing problems for NASA

13:00 - Finding the obvious unmet need.

18:30 - Don’s take on finding product/market fit.

23:00 - Focusing on the problem.

24:00 - Product resource recommendations.

The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Management of Innovation and Change) - Clayton M. Christensen (Author)

How to connect with Don

Connect with Don on LinkedIn

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/

Product Launch Podcast powered by NxtStep

Sean Boyce — Sun, 01 Sep 2019 19:00:00 -0400

Hello and welcome to the Product Launch podcast where we talk all things product strategy. My name is Sean Boyce and I’m the host of the Product Launch podcast and the founder of the product strategy consulting company, NxtStep. On the product launch podcast, I interview guests involved at various stages of different product businesses. So whether you’re looking to launch a product and turn it into a business or you have a product business that has plenty of traction and your challenges are more specific related to product, you’ll find plenty of answers from both myself and the product experts we interview on our show. To learn more reach out to us at hello@nxtstep.io.

Free Email Course - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/course

Private Coaching - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/coaching

Bootstrapper's Paradise - https://bootstrappersparadise.com/