Top Founders

Latest Episodes:

790: Book in a Box Passes $11.3m in Revenue, 500+ Authors Sep 22, 2017

Show notes

JT McCormick. He's an American businessman, author and speaker. Most recently, he served as President of Technology company HeadSpring before his current role as president & CEO at Book in a Box.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Cyrus the Great
What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos
Favorite online tool? — Slack
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4.5
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – It's not about the high school diploma. It's about the work ethic and the sacrifice you're willing to put in to achieve greatness

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:47 – Nathan introduces JT to the show
02:08 – It is possible to buy a bestseller from Book in a Box
- 02:23 – The cost will depend on many factors
02:40 – One of Nathan's friends spent almost $250K on Book in a Box because he wanted to put out a book and increase his speaking fee
- 03:15 – There are many people who paid more than $250K to get a book out
03:21 – Nathan read his friend's book and thought it was trash, but his friend's speaking fee increased
- 03:33 – It's still a positive ROI
04:02 – Book in a Box specializes in ensuring the books are filled with valuable and meaningful content
05:11 – Book in a Box has made it possible for authors to publish their book
05:27 – JT just met a professional speaker who has been in the business for 22 years, but never had a book
- 05:34 – He never got the time to write a book
- 05:41 – Book in a Box will just interview him and write the book for him
- 05:52 – "Your book written in your tone, your voice"
06:09 – Nathan shares how Book in a Box makes you spill the beans
06:41 – Cost is $25K which is $5K a month for five months
06:58 – The quality of the books are the same as the ones from Barnes and Noble
07:13 – Nathan got a deal from Portfolio Random House
07:37 – Book in a Box provides proposals and manuscripts for their clients to bring to publishing houses
08:00 – Book in a Box has worked with a total of 500 authors
08:31 – Book in a Box launched in 2015
09:00 – Book in a Box is one of the unicorn companies in the startup world
09:13 – "We, as Book in a Box, have no debt, no private equity, no VC money and we are extremely profitable"
09:27 – Book in a Box has changed pricing a couple of times
- 09:38 – When JT met Tucker and Zach, the co-founders, he was actually looking for someone to write his book
- 10:14 – Tucker offered JT three pricing models, $10K, $18K and $30K and JT chose the latter because he wanted a high-quality book
- 10:51 – JT explained how the pricing turned out to be just one pricing model which is $25K
11:33 – Total revenue since 2015 is $11.3M
12:07 – Book in a Box currently averages 25-30 books a month which has continuously grown to 50-75 a month
12:29 – Team size is 30 full-timers with over 100 freelancers
13:13 – "We're a relationship company"
14:17 – Book in a Box treats their freelancers with respect and pays them on time
15:05 – Book in a Box helps with marketing and book sales
- 15:14 – Customers go to Book in a Box for one of three reasons; credibility, thought leadership or lead generation
- 15:48 – Book in a Box created Thought Leader Media
  - 16:01 – Pricing starts at $15K to up to $75K yearly
  - 16:17 – The pricing varies depending on the author needs
  - 16:51 – Thought Leader Media just rolled out in Q1
  - 16:58 – 35 out of 250 published books are in Thought Leader Media
- 17:10 – Total book sales from Book in a Box authors
- 18:50 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Those who want to have a book written, but can't manage to start can simply utilize companies such as Book in a Box.
Pricing is crucial in every business—it's either you make it big or lose everything.
Respect and an excellent work ethic are keys to success.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

789: Google Bought Their Beacons to Distribute Free Wifi in India Sep 21, 2017

Show notes

Sharat Potharaju and Ravi Pratap Maddimsetty, co-founders of MobStac.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Traction
What CEO do you follow? – Ed Catmull who wrote Creativity Inc for Ravi
Favorite online tool? — Rapportive
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "That entrepreneurship is a very, very painful journey"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:07 – Nathan introduces Sharat and Ravi to the show
02:23 – Sharat and Ravi were classmates since fifth grade and were roommates in college
02:53 – MobStac is trying to solve the problem of online to offline device connections
- 03:04 – They use the technology of WiFi, bluetooth and beacons in mobile devices
03:17 – Beaconstac is one of MobStac's products
- 03:22 – It is a SaaS-based product that uses Bluetooth beacon technology
- 03:29 – It allows businesses to gather analytics
- 03:34 – It charges monthly
03:47 – Beaconstac is MobStac's main revenue stream
04:08 – Businesses use bluetooth beacons that can be deployed to physical stores
- 04:18 – Beaconstac's platform can then be used to track marketing and analytics
04:27 – Pricing starts at $49 to $99 monthly
- 04:34 – The price will vary depending on the number of beacons deployed in any physical location
- 04:45 – Average cost per beacon is $5 monthly which is on top of the starting price
05:25 – Beaconstac has a mixed group of customers, from mom and pop stores to enterprises
- 05:57 – Some would pay $50 a month and $5000 a month for others
06:04 – There are currently around 10K beacons deployed in total
06:27 – MobStac is a software company
- 07:03 – MobStac has partnered with a Chinese OEM who makes the hardware
07:35 – The pay for the hardware is a one-time cost
- 07:40 – "You own the beacons once you pay for the beacons"
- 07:43 – Charge per beacon is $22
- 07:50 – The margin is very small
08:07 – They make revenue mostly from the software and not from the hardware
08:15 – MobStac was launched in 2010
- 08:24 – It was focused in building products in the mobile space
09:20 – After pivoting, first year revenue was not zero but it was small
09:35 – 2014 revenue was less than $250K with 10-15 people on the team
- 09:54 – Current team size is 20
10:00 – The company is based in Bangalore, India but Sharat goes to New York as well
10:17 – Last month total MRR is close to $25K
- 10:22 – Target ARR by the end of 2017 is 500K
- 10:37 – Which was only from the Beaconstac product
10:56 – Beaconstac currently has 100 customers
11:12 – One of Beaconstac's biggest customer is Google India
- 11:14 – Google has deployed over 2000 beacons at 117 train stations
- 11:28 – It is the largest public Wi-Fi project in the world
- 11:32 – The beacons are used to send notifications and awareness to people who are waiting at the stations
- 11:46 – Sample notification
12:20 – MobStac has raised $3.5M
13:07 – The strangest customer acquisition strategy they've done
14:10 – Google has made the beacon technology compliant with the chrome browser
- 14:23 – Someone who is near a beacon can receive a notification as long as he has a chrome browser and bluetooth on; no need to download an app
15:15 – One of their customers is a freelancer who bought a beacon so whenever he goes to an event, the beacon will send a notification to other attendees to market his services
15:56 – MobStac isn't spending anything on paid marketing
- 16:01 – Ravi does some content marketing for the company
16:37 – Cap table
- 17:31 – Sharat and Ravi still own more than half of the company
19:00 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Don't be scared to pivot if it is for the betterment of your company.
The easiest and cheapest way to market your product is by using it.
Entrepreneurship is definitely not an easy route—prepare your mindset for a rough (but worth it) journey.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

788: Ad Tech Agency Does $17m Gross Profit 2016, $30m VC Raised Sep 20, 2017

Show notes

Patrik Fagerlund. He's been working with mobile internet since the 90s. He's an engineer by training and now, he's the CEO and founder of Widespace, a mobile adtech company. Outside of work, he loves spending time with his family with his four kids and his wife along with many activities and sports.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Business Insider
What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk
Favorite online tool? — Slack and Flatly
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "Be what you want to be"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:00 – Nathan introduces Patrik to the show
02:36 – Widespace is a mobile advertising campaign
- 02:40 – It was spun out in 2007 from what Patrik thought was a great media channel
03:04 – Patrik sold media fueled by their technology
- 03:10 – Selling media per CPM which is $10 per impression
- 03:31 – This was the business model in 2009
04:00 – $2M was the total ad spend for the previous model and 40% went to the company
- 04:26 – Team size was 9
04:38 – Widespace's current business model spent $30M for ads
04:40 – Team size is 130
04:41 – "We're moving into selling technology at a rapid space"
04:49 – Widespace extends their tools and technology for both the supply and demand
05:09 – Widespace focuses more on selling their technology
05:28 – The model is close to SaaS, but the pricing depends on the volume and usage
06:11 – Of the top 50 global advertisers, Widespace serves 70% of them
- 06:24 – Widespace works with most of the umbrella agency companies in the world
06:51 – The tech of Widespace is a full-stack offering
- 07:01 – The algorithm is based on interests
- 07:18 – If Widespace goes against other legacy technologies in adtech, Widespace will outperform them
07:46 – A customer pays 50% of their ad spend to make use of Widespace's technology
- 07:54 – It's a volume game, the more a customer pays, the less Widespace charges
08:04 – If a customer puts $20M into Widespace's system, it will go down to below $10M
08:53 – Average ARR is around $4M
09:06 – Since Widespace is a full-stack, they service both demand and supply
09:11 – There's a cap on the demand side and a supply cap to serve the supply
- 09:26 – The suppliers are the top publishers in the world
09:45 – Widespace takes a cut from the demand and supply side
09:56 – Widespace charges on the extended version of the algorithm as well
10:11 – Last year's processed ad spend is shy of $40M
10:49 – 2016 total revenue is around $17M
11:04 – Widespace was initially bootstrapped
11:16 – Widespace has raised close to $30M
- 11:33 – Over the years, Widespace had propositions from strategics but they turned them down
12:08 –Widespace is currently working with 500 suppliers/publications
- 12:17 – Widespace keeps control of their supply and has deeper integration
13:07 – A few years ago, Widespace was the only one who was servicing the publishers
13:40 – Widespace doesn't have any exclusivity
15:02 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Adjust your technology depending on the needs of your target market.
Find the right partners with whom you can grow your business.
Be what you want to be!

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

787: Crypto: With $163m Raised, He Launched the #1 ICO Sep 19, 2017

Show notes

Eyal Hertzog. He's been a venture-backed technology entrepreneur for over 20 years. He's the founder of Metacafe, Israel's fastest growing video sharing site which has reached over 15M uniques at its peak. Previously, he founded Contact Networks which was one of the first social networks in 1999. He's now at Bancor Network and has been an outspoken thought leader on cryptocurrency in Israel and is a talented piano and bass musician.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – The Spider and the Starfish
What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk
Favorite online tool? — Google Keep
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 4
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "You never stop evolving"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:49 – Nathan introduces Eyal to the show
02:40 – Bancor is a non-profit organization which is in a new model that has been rising recently
03:36 – Similarly to Etherium, Bancor is also a token that is solving the problem of liquidity
04:00 – Eyal talks about any kind of liquidity that works today with crypto tokens
- 04:14 – There is a token that represents gold and a token that represents a dollar which you can convert back to gold and dollars
- 04:24 – "Real assets from the real world are already represented in the blockchain"
04:47 – Bancor provides a different way that doesn't require traders to bid for an asset; it automatically finds a market trait according to a certain formula
05:09 – Nathan shares about his interview with Joe Zhou who is the founder of Firstblood
05:56 – The pricing of ether and other cryptocurrencies is always changing
- 06:25 – Bancor provides a much better solution than cryptocurrencies exchanges, like what Coinbase is doing, for liquidity
- 06:46 – Bancor is an alternative way to convert cryptocurrencies
- 06:52 – The exchanges that are based on smart contracts are automated so they won't require central services
07:14 – Bancor did their own ICO for their token which is BNT or banking network token that will be used in Bancor's network of token conversion
07:26 – Within three hours, Bancor raised $153M
- 07:44 – It was in June 12, 2017
08:03 – Bancor was very open during their ICO and told people that everyone who will invest in 2 hours will have an opportunity and they will get exactly the same rate
09:11 – There are currently 20 people involved in Bancor's operation
- 09:31 – Bancor liquidates as little as possible which is less than 10%
10:11 – Bancor currently has 12445 token holders
10:22 – Eyal has worked with VCs for a long time prior to Bancor
12:05 – People who hold a lot of cryptocurrencies are called "whales"
12:29 – The goal of people in the crypto world is to build a new financial ecosystem
13:14 – The foundation where the proceeds from the crowdsale go is called V Protocol
- 13:27 – The foundation sold 50% of the tokens and the other 50% went to different buckets
14:07 – Bancor runs on the ethereum blockchain so they already have miners and won't need miners for their own tokens
15:18 – Nathan summarizes Bancor's figures
16:40 – Eyal had a dream to build something that will have a cultural effect or something that will change how we do things
- 17:07 – When Eyal learned about bitcoin, he thought that it would be a huge, cultural evolution one day
17:55 – In terms of completed ICOs, Bancor ranks number one
18:28 – Eyal shares where the demand for Bancor came from
20:34 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

There are better ways to do cryptocurrency exchanges that benefit the token holder more.
Be open to your investors, so you can earn their trust.
You are always learning and evolving.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

786: How This Ad Tech Company Used $1m+ In Mezzanine Debt to Grow Profitably Sep 18, 2017

Show notes

Mitchell Reichgut. He's the CEO and co-founder of Jun Group. Prior to founding Jun Group in 2005, he led Bates Interactive, the online unit of Bates Worldwide Advertising which is now owned by WPP. As general manager and creative director, he helped grow Bates Interactive into a 70-person integrated unit with clients such as EDS, Warner-Lambert and many others. Before joining Bates, he was the creative director at Think New Ideas. He began his career as Art Director at Grey Advertising where he created print and TV ads for clients. Throughout his career, he's worked with major brands in the industry including Procter and Gamble, Parker Brothers, Reebok and others.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Anything written by Seth Godin
What CEO do you follow? – Jack Welch
Favorite online tool? — Google Calendar
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Mitchell wished he knew the kind of discipline it took to make things work

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:05 – Nathan introduces Mitchell to the show
03:08 – The "Jun" in Jun Group means truth
03:11 – Mitchell founded his company believing that advertising can be transparent, honest and deliver tangible results
03:19 – Jun Group's job is to get millions of people to engage with videos and visit websites of the Fortune 500 brands
03:38 – Nathan reads Jun Group's website line
03:52 – Mitchell gives an example of a spaghetti sauce brand that targets Hispanic mothers who are 35 and up, in the USA
- 04:01 – Jun Group will use the video of the brand to connect with their target market on their phone, tablets and computers
- 04:16 – Customers can opt-in in exchange for something like rewards points
04:38 – Jun Group is an in-app solution
05:37 – Jun Group only charges when someone chooses to engage and the client gets the value of what they're paying for
06:06 – When you don't interrupt people, they tend to watch to the end
- 06:08 – Jun Group gets 90% of people to watch a 30-second ad until the very end
- 06:13 – 3-5% of the viewers are visiting the brand's website
06:50 – From the publisher, the brand will appear in a mobile app
- 07:29 – Each app integration creates an interaction depending on the app user's behavior
07:46 – In web environment, app developers pay CPI
07:52 – Jun Group never had a pop-up and they never interrupt
08:14 – Jun Group has a sophisticated tech platform that works well with app developers
08:21 – "Apps are complex business"
08:41 – Jun Group was bootstrapped until 2015
- 08:47 – Then they had a private equity deal with Howard Capital
- 08:58 – They've raised $28M
- 09:09 – They've decided to raise because they found the right partner
09:55 – Growing an adtech business is quite unusual and requires hard work
10:02 – Jun Group has brands, app publishers and consumers that they need to take care of
10:27 – Jun Group is an adtech platform and not really an agency
10:30 – Most adtech platforms lose money and want to grow fast
10:49 – Jun Group has been growing slowly, but steadily and profitably
11:13 – The revenue comes from commitments from brands and media buying platforms, some are per project and some are per annual commitment
12:00 – Jun Group's pricing model varies depending on what the ad is
12:34 – A CPM (cost per thousand) in the industry usually costs $8 up
12:40 – Jun Group charges cost per engagement which is more than the average CPM
13:22 – Mitchell left Bates and started Jun Group at home
13:31 – Mitchell didn't really plan to be an entrepreneur
13:53 – Mitchell get into the adtech industry with his partner when it was just starting
14:12 – By 2008 and 2009, Jun Group was earning $1-2M in revenue
- 15:08 – Jun Group usually take a percentage from the sales they make
15:39 – Most of the money goes back to the campaign
16:05 – Jun Group had debt with WTI or Western Technology Investment that helped the company grow
- 16:34 – The debt was in millions
17:05 – The media spent through Jun Group's system
17:18 – Jun Group is still cash flow positive
17:53 – Jun Group really had a strategic partnership with their seed round
18:44 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Have the right partners who will not just provide the funds but help the company grow.
Adtech isn't an easy industry with fast growth; it takes time and the right model to thrive in it.
It takes firm, hard discipline to make things work.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

785: He Makes $500k+ From Udemy Helping You Code Sep 17, 2017

Show notes

Evan Leong. He's the VP of Product at Devslopes, a learn-to-code platform focused on taking beginners to paid professionals to curated project-based videos. He's always been involved with startups since 2015, when he took the leap from a corporate job to join the startup world full-time.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Good to Great
What CEO do you follow? – Jeff Bezos
Favorite online tool? — Trello
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 5
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Follow your instincts, follow your gut, and don't let age stop you from what you want to do

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:05 – Nathan introduces Evan to the show
02:31 – Devslopes is a learn-to-code platform for iOs, MacOS and TvOs
- 02:39 – A version for Windows will be available soon too
02:48 – Devslopes is similar to Treehouse
03:00 – Devslopes has been around for a year and a half
03:10 – Devslopes has just converted to SaaS
- 03:22 – They garnered 130 subscriptions just after the launch
03:33 – Average pay per customer is a little over $20 a month
04:05 – Devslopes was funded through Kickstarter and an investor
- 04:15 – They raised $190K in Kickstarter
04:35 – Devslopes' CEO is a good salesperson and they had a strong community even before Kickstarter
05:04 – The Kickstarter campaign was blasted around
05:11 – The community size is around 10K
05:22 – Devslopes has raised an additional of $300K from Redfoo of LMFAO
05:42 – Devslopes was launched in March 2016
05:53 – First year revenue was $600K
06:04 – 2017 goal is to reach a million
06:39 – Devslopes has large courses that will take people more time to stick with them
06:48 – Devslopes is pumping out target topics which are 2-3 hour courses
07:13 – Team size is 8
07:48 – The CEO started in e-learning marketplaces
08:05 – By the time Devslopes started, the CEO already had 40K students on Udemy
08:33 – Devslopes gets students from affiliates too
09:12 – Devslopes want to fully dive into the learning experience
- 09:32 – They liked the idea of having everything in one program so they created the SaaS model
10:17 – Devslopes publishes to affiliates the content that the affiliates want to promote
10:26 – Udemy likes to promote 30-60 hour courses
10:43 – Devslopes is also on Skillshare, Learnability and Inkydeals
- 10:58 – 90% of the content goes to Udemy and the rest are spread out to the rest
11:08 – 90% of the revenue is from Udemy, too
11:30 – Devslopes is just starting to use Facebook ads which is their only paid marketing
12:05 – CAC
- 12:11 – Most of what Devslopes gets from Facebook ads is social presence but no paid leads yet
12:44 – The charge of Udemy fluctuates depending on how they promote their content
13:21 – Evan focuses on the product and handles the team
13:37 – Devslopes currently have 5K iOs downloads and a couple of thousand from Mac
15:30 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

With the advancement in technology, more people are opting to learn from the comfort of their own home.
Target your market so it will be easier for the company to adapt a new business model.
Customers will stick with your product if it is of value to them.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

784: Crypto: How ICO Companies Turn Money Raised Into Cash-In-Bank To Fund Growth Sep 16, 2017

Show notes

Joe Zhou. He's the founder and CEO of FirstBlood, an eSports startup that recently broke the speed record for crowdfunding, specifically in the crypto world. Prior to founding FirstBlood, Joe co-founded Alt-Options, a Boston based fintech or financial technology startup that built the first American style option trading platform for digital currencies. Joe holds a BSBA from Boston University Questrom School of Business and an entrepreneur residence at Babson College.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Lean Startup
What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk
Favorite online tool? — Slack
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 6
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Joe wished he was less concerned about how he was perceived in school

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:11 – Nathan introduces Joe to the show
03:00 – FirstBlood is a platform that allows players to play games, not just for fun but for money
03:23 – FirstBlood charges money for each game or tournament played
03:49 – FirstBlood was launched in April 2016
- 03:55 – Joe's co-founder, Anik, is also a big gamer
- 04:08 – They were both fans of League of Legends
- 04:14 – They attended a Hackathon where they were challenged to build an application that has never existed before
05:00 – Joe co-founded Alt-Options while he was still in college
- 05:15 – The technology was built from scratch
- 05:18 – There were about 2K users during the testing phase
- 05:50 – It was bootstrapped and $50K was raised from families and friends
- 06:02 – There were a group people who wanted to get into the space and Joe worked with them as a consultant for half a year
06:44 – Joe decided to do the token issuance because of the support they were getting
- 06:55 – DAO was successful until hackers were able to get into it due to a bug
- 07:19 – FirstBlood was one of the most promising projects that was going to DAO
- 07:26 – DAO or Decentralized Autonomous Organization is like a decentralized venture capital firm; it was managed by every person who has a token in it
- 07:52 – FirstBlood was operating under Project Tron in the DAO community
- 08:15 – After the bug, FirstBlood started building what was needed to run a successful crowdfunding campaign
- 08:52 – Joe and Anik gave talks and presented multiple ethereum meetups regarding their project
- 09:37 – Joe came home with a budget of 3-5 years runway for the entire team
- 09:46 – They've raised $5M in funding
- 09:52 – Team had 6 people and now they have 15 people
- 11:14 – They've calculated the ethereum's pricing and deployed the contract to the network
- 11:51 – FirstBlood raised the money in just the first four blocks and processed in just 7 minutes
- 12:41 – FirstBlood has sold 465,313 ether tokens
13:10 – Joe shares why they released their own FirstBlood tokens
- 13:16 – Ethereum has some limitations
- 13:34 – The FirstBlood tokens are given unique utilities that are crucial to making the network work
- 13:42 – First layer is the transactional level utility where both ether and FirstBlood tokens work
- 14:20 – Witness program utility can only be run by FirstBlood tokens
14:52 – DotA is the first mobile strategy game and now is a stand alone
- 15:53 – When a game is settled, a set of information is sent to a network of witness nodes
- 16:02 – Witness nodes will then run tests using computational power to fetch the data and cross reference the data to make sure that it is valid
- 16:14 – The data then gets published into the blockchain and smart contract
- 16:32 – The winner of the games will pay a small percentage fee to the network
17:40 – The token price isn't that important for the team
18:14 – The ratio of the token is arbitrary
19:24 – A lot of Dapps don't have a real money function yet
19:39 – FirstBlood is closed to launching the beta
19:59 – Currently, there are 1592 people who have FirstBlood tokens
20:51 – Joe doesn't think that it's risky for them to have a lot of people handling the network
- 21:06 – The selection process has a cap rate on how one will get selected
- 21:19 – "We did cap at 1% for a maximum impact"
22:20 – Joe can't disclose the amount he owns from FirstBlood tokens
- 22:50 – The allocation for founders is around 10% of the tokens
23:24 – Nathan asks Joe if it's possible to cash out a million tokens into real dollars if he ever needs it
24:35 – FirstBlood made the headlines because they raised a $5M equivalent to ether
- 26:38 – The fund is owned by the project
- 27:08 – The ether can be used to keep buying the project
27:30 – Some of the money from the funds are used to pay the team
28:03 – FirstBlood liquidates 80% of the ether post cross-sales and 20% remains in the smart contract
28:39 – FirstBlood has around $4M in the bank that pays salaries and other company expenses
29:55 – The technology of FirstBlood has made people more interested in the project
31:00 – The decision to raise $5M was from the advice they've received regarding what it takes to increase network profitability
31:51 – Ether was valued when Joe liquidated the 372K shares at $11 per share
32:38 – Joe didn't wait for the share value to increase because they needed the money to get the project running
34:25 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

In crypto, startups create their own currency if they think their network will be better of with it.
Listen to your advisory board—if it's time to raise for specific purpose, your business might be better of because of that decision.
People will become interested in your project if it's first in the space and they believe in your technology.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

783: SaaS: Here's How RFP Scout 3x YoY to $1.2m+ in MRR Sep 15, 2017

Show notes

Alex Yakubovich. He's the co-founder and CEO of Scout RFP. Prior to Scout, he was a co-founder of another startup which was acquired by LivingSocial in 2012. At that company, he led the operations team and helped the company become the largest online ordering providers in the country. He attended Case Western Reserve University where he studied mechanical engineering.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Shoe Dog
What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff
Favorite online tool? — Salesforce
How many hours of sleep do you get?— 7
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Take big risks

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:25 – Nathan introduces Alex to the show
02:58 – Scout RFP helps companies make online purchases by finding suppliers and the best deals
03:14 – One of their newest customer's is Beam Suntory who makes Jim Beam bourbon
- 03:56 – They use Scout RFP to source for the best deals on raw materials that they use to make their liquor
04:15 – Scout RFP is a SaaS model
04:20 – Scout RFP charges per user basis
- 04:47 – They charge only the buyers who are making the purchase and not the suppliers
05:00 – Scout RFP also has different tools that they offer depending on the plans
05:34 – Average per seat is $5K annually
- 05:53 – All contracts are annual contract
05:59 – Scout RFP has raised capital: $27.5M in total
06:27 – Alex's last company just raised $500K and it had a great exit
07:00 – Alex has thought about what it's like to have big companies involved in your company
07:30 – The capital allowed them to not skim and invest on growth upfront
07:49 – Current team size is 50
- 07:59 – Half is the engineering and product side and half is for the sales side
08:29 – The exit price of the first company was in the tens of millions
09:37 – Alex has co-founders who were with him in the first company
10:43 – There are over 100 companies that use the platform
11:10 – The number of seats per company depends on the company
11:54 – Scout RFP has overall users and paid users
- 12:12 – Paid users is more than 3K
13:05 – Scout RFP is part of Silicon Valley Sourcing Leaders Group
- 13:31 – The group is about networking and sharing information and knowledge
- 13:49 – There are now sourcing leaders programs in New York
- 14:00 – The group helped Scout RFP to acquire new customers
- 14:30 – The organization hosts their companies
15:18 – Gross customer churn
15:31 – Logo churn is not that high
16:00 – Scout RFP has 17% net negative churn
16:58 – Scout RFP has a customer success team, a sales team, ADPR team and management team
17:38 – As a business grows with Scout RFP, the LTV grows as well
- 18:22 – The average deal size per business is quite consistent, about 10
19:09 – CAC to LTV ratio is 3
19:25 – Payback period is around 15 months
20:17 – Paid acquisition costs are around $40K a month
- 20:49 – They do LinkedIn ads, some Facebook and Google, and a lot of tradeshows
21:23 – Gross margin is 85-90%
21:44 – Target ARR this 2017
- 22:14 – Scout RFP is currently over $1.2M in MRR
23:54 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

An acquisition is an opportunity to build a bigger and better business.
Being in a group with your target market is a big opportunity for you to acquire new leads.
Let your big questions guide you in growing your business.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

782: Crypto: With $50k MRR, He's Buildling Crypto Database To Track Accuracy Sep 14, 2017

Show notes

Bruce Pon. He's the CEO and founder of BigchainDB and he's been playing in the crypto world.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Mungerisms by Charlie Munger
What CEO do you follow? – Vitalik Buterin
Favorite online tool? — Streak CRM
How many hours of sleep do you get?— At least 8
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "Buy bitcoin earlier"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

02:03 – Nathan introduces Bruce to the show
02:44 – Bruce built BigchainDB to manage data
02:55 – Bitcoin is a payments cryptocurrency in a global network while Ethereum is a business logic in a global network
03:11 – People pass trusted data over the blockchain network for enterprise use cases and consumer applications
- 03:32 – From the business logic, you can exchange bitcoin and other types of value
03:42 – The problem with the use case on top of the bitcoin blockchain 3 years ago was it didn't scale
04:04 – Bruce was building io which is putting intellectual property into the blockchain
- 04:25 – You can sell your intellectual property over the network
- 04:48 – It was built over the bitcoin blockchain and got difficult to develop over time
- 04:54 – Ascribe.io needed meta data about the creative work, author and licensing model
- 05:04 - Ascribe.io isn't just built for bitcoin—it's like trying to using a Lamborghini to move your house
- 05:49 - Ascribe.io had AI, scientists and other PhDs who told them that building Ascribe.io wasn't worth it
06:09 – Team size is around 20 and is based in Berlin
06:24 – BigchainDB has raised $6M in price round series A
06:41 – Open source software is traditionally a dual license model
06:53 – BigchainDB is looking at an enterprise model
- 07:00 – They're looking into the ICO craze too
07:21 – BigchainDB is like a SaaS model
- 07:27 – They're looking at per transaction charges but it may not work for the long-run
07:54 – BigchainDB just released their 1.0
- 08:08 – They give premium support
08:27 – Bruce is looking into 5-6 figures per month for their starting price point
08:58 – One-third of the work in businesses happen in the back office
09:13 – Blockchain allows you to have a single source of truth
09:29 – BigchainDB unlocks the opportunity for different organizations to have a single source of truth
09:48 – When you can make IoT, AI and blockchain tools, you can track the product from the inception until it gets to the customer's hand
- 10:01 – The customer will now understand how the product is made
- 10:03 – The regulators will know that the product followed the guideline
- 10:07 – The company will know if there's a recall or quality issue and they will know where exactly the product is
10:40 – BigchainDB can work with different kinds of products
11:20 – Blockchain is definitely auditable
- 11:30 – Before the product comes to you, it will be signed by entities with a cryptographic key in every process
- 12:00 – With AI, you can also see who is in the very process of making your product
12:34 – The key metric Bruce is measuring is the number of people that are building upon them
12:56 – Target MRR is $100K by end of 2017
13:03 – BigchainDB is currently at $50-60K MRR
13:19 – Number of customers
13:44 – There are 300 developers in BigchainDB's channels and there are 5K clones of their software
13:54 – BigchainDB has 1K monthly downloads of their whitepaper
14:45 – The ratio of developer to clone is the 300 developers to 5K clone requests
16:05 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Data that is passed over the blockchain network can be used for enterprise use case and consumer applications.
The beauty of blockchain is that it is auditable and has accountability capabilities.
Some tools that are built over the bitcoin network won't always work; even if you have the best people in the industry.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

781: Crypto: What AirBnB Looks Like In Digital Currency World Sep 13, 2017

Show notes

Christoph Jentzsch. His background is in Theoretical Physics and he's been part of the Ethereum project since 2014 as a lead tester. At the end of 2015, he co-founded Slock.it, working on decentralized sharing economy through the connection of blockchain and IoT (Internet of Things). One of the more famous projects that he was part of was the DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization).

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Zero to One
What CEO do you follow? – God
Favorite online tool? — GIthub
How many hours of sleep do you get? — 8
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "Avoid the bug in the DAO"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:50 – Nathan introduces Christoph to the show
02:20 – DAO stands for Decentralized Autonomous Organization
- 02:26 – It is a smart contract on the Ethereum blockchain which aims at connecting people to pull their funds together and run small contracts
- 02:45 – It failed and all the people got refunded
03:10 – Christoph believes that Anthony Di Iorio is one of the founders of Ethereum
03:24 – As a lead tester for Ethereum in 2014, Christoph was responsible for driving tests
- 03:39 – Consensus tests are for client implementation
04:10 – Nathan's analogy of cryptocurrency using railroad tracks
04:55 – Augur has launched their own token on top of Ethereum
- 05:18 – They created their own token of value in exchange of the virtual currency of ether
05:47 – There has been a lot of ICOs (Initial Coin Offering) lately and there has been opinions around them
06:03 – Bitcoin was always meant for virtual currency
- 06:09 – While Etherium has a virtual currency too called ether, its actual purpose is to be an open source platform to build decentralized applications or Dapps
- 06:22 – People now create simple Dapps issuing a token on the Ethereum blockchain to fund Dapps projects
- 06:32 – People thought DAO was an ICO but it wasn't
- 06:35 – DAO has collected a hundred million dollars in ether
- 06:44 – After that, many ICOs have gone out
07:40 – There are only a few hundred people who send ether into their contract
08:11 – There was an article Nathan had read regarding Bitcoin's current problem
- 08:28 – The main problem is public blockchains are not scaling
- 08:38 – In the protocol, one blockchain can only have 1 megabyte
- 09:04 – There is now a high demand that leads to a higher price
10:33 – Everybody can take part in the cryptocurrency game
- 11:45 – People can create their own blockchain but they're missing the network effect
- 12:18 – There are some minors who control the network
- 12:48 – As long as there are users in the system, they don't mind the minors
- 12:54 – Minors serve the blockchain, but Christoph believes the users are the ones in-charge
- 13:21 – After the DAO failed, there was a discussion of how things should be done
- 13:27 – Some are saying to split the blockchain into 2 versions: the new version is where people get refunded and the old version is the hackers who have the money
- 14:58 – There are now 2 Ethereum classes: ethereum classic and ethereum
15:19 – Christoph's focus is now on Slock.it where they've built a decentralized sharing economy
- 16:02 – It is built over the public ethereum and they don't have tokens
- 16:17 – They're using ether as a payment
- 16:33 – Most startups are called ICOs and make their own tokens to fund themselves
16:40 – Slock.it is VC funded with a seed funding of $2M
18:06 – Slock.it isn't currently getting any payment but they will in the future
18:38 – Slock.it collaborates with Innogy
- 18:51 – Innogy allows electric charging stations to connect with smart contracts in the blockchain
- 19:00 – A user can charge his car, making him enter the smart contract
- 19:10 – If you're the owner of a charging station and you have an electric car, you can set the price for the station and offer it to public
20:05 – Noke padlocks can now be open and closed through Bluetooth and Slock.it has added a payment option where it can be opened by paying
20:34 – Slock.it can be integrated into the device and it is different from Airbnb
- 21:28 – As long as the ethereum blockchain is alive, the Noke padlock can be used through Slock.it
22:10 – Christoph currently resides in Germany
22:45 – "As of now, crypto is not a very good currency"
23:23 – Ether is as volatile as bitcoin
23:45 – You can definitely exchange your tokens for real dollars, but it's not an efficient system
24:03 – Paying people with ether isn't that easy at the moment
24:12 – Currency is the least interesting aspect
- 24:19 – There's a limitation in scalability and in privacy
24:40 – Christoph thinks ethereum, smart contracts and blockchains own up as programmable money
25:55 – Slock.it is currently integrated into an existing hardware
- 26:20 – There are currently thousands of charging stations under Slock.it
26:36 – Team member is currently 14
26:48 – The seed round was in February 2017
28:02 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Some startups are coming out as an ICO to fund themselves, but not all of them are legal.
Cryptocurrency still isn't very stable so as a business owner, paying your people with this currency isn't efficient.
Public blockchains are not scaling and there's a protocol that needs to be followed.

Resources Mentioned:

Simplero – The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Hotjar – Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you're doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

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