Founder Views

There are very few things that can make me lose sleep at night. One of those things are negative reviews. Although negative reviews in our company are very rare, they always sting- really, really bad. Each negative review is even worse than the last. Reading a bad review feels like getting punched in the gut. Negative reviews suck, and they always will. However, negative reviews are inevitable. As much as you strive to be the best at what you do, and consistently improve the level of service to your clients, you will never be able to make every person happy. No matter what, you will come across a client who simply can’t be satisfied. Studies show that 85% of shoppers form their buying decisions based on online reviews. Too often, companies don’t take online reviews as seriously as they should. Nowadays, people prefer to trust their friends, peers, colleagues, or even recommendations from people they don’t even know, to form buying decisions. Each review, whether positive or negative, is a huge opportunity to

A common question I get asked is “what do you do at work every day?”. What is a very simple response for most people, is actually one of the most difficult questions for me to answer. I get asked that question often because we’re a remote company and I work from home, which is a new concept to most people. From an outside perspective, it probably appears like I do nothing all day, and that I’m living the life, which couldn’t be further from the truth. I try and answer the question by processing what my last few days looked like, and I almost always have a tough time mustering up a decent response, because my work days are always different. Operating a growing business includes a lot of moving parts, involves a lot of unexpectedness, and wearing of multiple hats. Although you’ll certainly have a plan for each day, it’s not too often that those plans follow through in the precise way that you envisioned. This is why organization and discipline are very important traits to have. I’m responsible for the operation

When you’re several years deep into your startup and becoming more mature as a company, it’s very easy to lose sight of what got you to where you are – your early clients. The clients you acquire in the first two years of business, are all taking a chance on you. They know you’re a startup and anticipating issues, yet for some reason, they’re giving you their business. They’re investing their time and resources into your service, and hoping you succeed to see a return on their investment. Those early clients are also more than likely your main advocates. They are the ones referring their colleagues, spreading the word, and constantly rooting for your success. Not to mention, they’re also the ones financing your business (especially if you’re bootstrapped). As you grow, especially in a high volume SaaS business, efficiency becomes very important, both in internal processes, and how you manage customers. In the early days, it’s more than likely that the CEO was doing sales, customer support, and everything in b

2018 has definitely been our most active year in terms of hiring, by far. An important metric to look at as your company scales, is revenue per employee (how much money you make per employee). This is a great indicator to show how efficiently your company is growing. Total Revenue / # of Employees = Revenue per Employee A good employee should be an asset to your company. Just like any asset, they should be making you money (or saving you time, which is also money). If your team is growing, and your revenue per employee is also growing, that means your company is scaling efficiently and utilizing resources optimally. Of course, as with any investment, it could take a while to see any return. Don’t expect to hire a new team member and see revenue per employee increase right away. Ideally, you should see slow and steady increases in revenue per employee. It’s important to keep in mind that revenue per employee is a broad benchmark for general growth efficiency, and is not really something you can optimize for, a

Throughout the years of managing a growing team, there are a number of observations you start to make and situations that arise that get you thinking about people, in general. When your company‘s headcount starts growing, you naturally start observing character traits, mindset, and psychology of people, among many other things. One of those thoughts is the question of work ethic versus skill. When you’re in a dynamic startup-type environment, there are several ups and downs which can expose the true character in a lot of people. One of the first things you look for when filling positions to grow your team, is if the person is qualified and has the skills to perform the job well. That goes without saying. Work ethic on the other hand, while very important, is a pretty hard character trait to judge during the hiring process. That involves a lot of intuition and gut. It’s only in turbulent times, where the true character traits of individuals are brought to the forefront. Now, the question is, who would you rath

A topic that has gathered my attention a lot lately, is marketing. Marketing is a much more diverse and complex subject than people realize, and all ties back to understanding human behaviour. One can argue that humans have changed more in the last 10-15 years than in any other time in history. The simple reason for this change is the invention of the smartphone. Mobile devices have changed the way people communicate, connect with each other, create relationships, and consume information. A recent study I read shows that the average person spends about 5 hours on their phone per day! And I actually saw other studies that show this number as a lot higher, but I’m using the lower number to be conservative. So, Assuming the average person sleeps for 7 hours, that means that a person will spend nearly 30% of their waking hours on their mobile device! You can bet your mortgage that that, number is almost guaranteed to increase over time. Today, successful marketers have to really understand human behaviour if they

Remote companies and company culture usually don’t go hand in hand. When you think company culture, the thoughts usually consist of an open office environment, daily huddles, a nice lunch area to hang with your co-workers, cool boardrooms, and of course the company ping-pong table. When we took our company remote, we didn’t really know what to expect. As with most of our business decisions, we usually use our instinct and do what feels right. This decision was no different. Going remote definitely felt right, but we weren’t entirely clear how it would all play out. Two years into being a fully remote company, and with team members spread across seven countries, I can proudly say that our company’s culture is realer than ever, positive, and much better than it was in a physical office. As surprising as that may seem for a remote company, here are the reasons why: MORE COMMUNICATION Yes, that’s right. We communicate with each other much more than we did in the office. Effective communication quickly becomes ver

Some people are born with certain skills and intuitions that come naturally. There are no guides, rules, or courses for managing cash flows in a small business. Although there are certain things anyone can do to help with cash flow, the majority of it is through intuition and deep understanding of the business. I also believe it would be very difficult to train someone to manage cash flow successfully. Below are 10 tips on how to better manage cash flow, in no particular order. Keep in mind, that these tips are coming from the perspective of a bootstrapped founder, whose company is 100% revenue-financed. A funded company with more cash to burn will most definitely have alternative views on spending. Go freemium for as long as possible When starting out, you’re going to need a few necessary apps to manage your business. The good news is that most come in freemium plans. You should be able to get away with freemium versions while your company is still young. Only pay for apps when you can truly see the value

Since day one, we’ve always preached that our company’s bread-and-butter was our customer support. That sentiment holds true, nearly eight years later. The evolution of our company’s support department has been one of the most challenging to execute, and the most rewarding. In a very competitive industry, one of the differentiating factors you can provide your clients is amazing customer service. If it’s relatively easy for clients to move to another provider, going above and beyond and providing that extra personal touch will make clients think twice before churning. Throughout the years, we’ve tried and tested dozens of support desks, knowledgebases and live chats, in an effort to make our support process more efficient. I’m proud to say, that I think we’ve finally nailed our support process, which has resulted in a consistently near perfect CSAT, hundreds of organic reviews from happy clients on social media, and a steady stream of referrals. Here are 5 tips that have worked for us to help maintain our nea

I’m sure everyone knows about the classic 3:1 LTV CAC ratio that all SaaS folks should strive for. Just a reminder, LTV is the lifetime value of a client (the amount of money a client will pay you in their lifetime). CAC is the customer acquisition cost (the amount of money you spend to acquire a new customer). You can read more about these SaaS metrics and more, here. Let’s use a very simple example to put this ratio into perspective. Take the data below: —– Current LTV: $1000, New customers in the month = 50 Monthly Expenses: Sales & Marketing = $16,650, Support Costs = $6,000, Hosting = $3000, Other Personnel = $3000, Rent = $2000, Supplies = $1000, Total Expenses = $31,650 —– With this data, your CAC is $333 ($16,650 / 50 = $333). This would give you an approximate LTV CAC ratio of 3:1 ($1000:$333 = 3:1). From my experience in SaaS, sales and marketing expenses, which are used to calculate CAC, account for about 20-30% of total operating expenses. If you take into account all other necessary operating

The lifeline of nearly any business starts and ends with those who pay your bills – your clients. Unfortunately, most people view client support as an entry-level and basic part of a company process. That sentiment couldn’t be further from the truth. As a startup founder, having your nose to the ground and listening to your clients, will tell you how your business is doing, foresee where it’s heading, learn what your clients want, and understand how you’re perceived as a company. Client support does more than just make clients happy. On a macro-level, it does a heck of a lot more: Revenue generating opportunities Quick support leads to higher Lifetime Value per Client (LTV) Building client advocates Music by sifer2424

Think about the effort and thought you put into your sales and marketing process. From refining your sales pitch, creating sales material, content marketing, social media, etc. As important as it is to be able to effectively market and sell your product/service to potential clients, it’s equally as important to be able to sell your company to potential new team members. It’s very tough for a new company to attract and retain quality talent. Unless you’re a big name like Facebook, Google or Amazon, who have no problem getting quality applicants, most companies have to go above and beyond, and do an extraordinary job of selling themselves to compete for that same pool of talent as the big players. Being able to communicate your company’s story and vision to a potential candidate in an enticing way is critical. And believe me, every startup has a story, you just have to figure out a good way to tell it. Most of the time, the candidate has never heard of you or your company. If they decide to work with you, they’

If you were looking for some secret sauce to starting a SaaS with no money, I hate to break it to you, but that doesn’t exist. If you aren’t ready to hustle, put in the time and work, make sacrifices, and be fully dedicated, than you should probably take the conventional route and seek funding right away. We started and grew our SaaS with $0. No angel money, no seed rounds, no money from parents/family, no bank loans. Nothing. Just a few bucks in savings, and good old fashioned revenue financing. Seven years later, thousands of clients attained, dozens of employees hired, and we still haven’t taken a penny from anyone. How did we pull it off? Discipline and frugality No plan B's Focus on sales and only sales Keep costs low Sell your story Music by sifer2424

We started our SaaS near the beginning of a tech-craze in 2008-09, where a lot of big companies and apps were popping up that were starting to kill it. These companies included Airbnb, Tumblr, Spotify and Groupon, to name a few. During these years, I noticed a peculiar trend that was happening. There were several companies who weren’t focusing on making money and being profitable. Instead, their focus was on pitching to investors and securing that seed or venture round. At that time, it was almost as if the only way to validate your business was to get funding. Securing investor funds was considered a huge win in the tech world, and young entrepreneurs were seeing that as a road to riches. Instead of focusing on matters such as profit margins, keeping costs low, and being cash flow positive, many of these companies were focused on metrics such as runways and burn rates. These companies were so fixated on spending as much money to grow their businesses and trying to secure that next round of funding, where the

It’s very easy to get complacent in any business, especially when things are going smoothly. When you’re getting a nice stable paycheck, business is growing steadily and you’re living a good lifestyle, it’s very easy to take a back seat and get comfortable. If you’re ever feeling too much of this, you should be very worried. This is when you should snap out of it, and get in serious grind mode. These are the moments when you have to start thinking about escalating your business, breaking into that next threshold, and setting new goals. Whether it’s breaking a revenue benchmark (ie. going from $1M to $5M), growing your team, or investing in more resources, it’s usually these moments of comfort where you know it’s time to start plotting and executing your next move. Too much comfort is usually a bad thing. It’s those feelings of uncomfort that usually mean you’re trying to move the needle and grow the business. Business is very competitive and cutthroat. If you aren’t thinking about how to reach the next level,

I’ve been having quite a few conversations about being a remote company lately, so I thought i’d continue on the topic. Running a software company certainly has its lifestyle advantages, I must admit. Being able to work from literally anywhere in the world is pretty awesome. Mostly I work from my home office, but sometimes I like to get out and work from a coffee shop. If I’m away or on vacation, all I need is my laptop and an internet connection, and I can be plugged in, with absolutely no impact to the company or any of our team members. So that part, is definitely pretty cool. In this episode I lay out 4 main benefits of working remote. Number 3 is definitely my favourite! ;) Music by sifer2424

One of the most common questions I get is regarding how Web4Realty came to be a remote company. Something that’s so normal from my perspective, is very uncommon from the average person’s viewpoint, which will certainly change over time, as more companies realize the benefits of going remote. About three years ago, I began to read a lot of content about remote companies like Chargify, Buffer and Zapier. To this day, I’m very thankful that more and more companies are opening up and becoming transparent. I think that transparency has such a positive ROI in the overall business and startup ecosystem. That’s one of the main reasons I started opening up and sharing my experiences. So, as I started reading and learning from other successful remote companies, we started applying some of their ideas into our business. We started implementing a lot of similar tools and apps that they were using, which made our operations more and more efficient. Slowly but surely, we were setting ourselves up to being a remote company,

Bootstrapping is one of my favourite topics to discuss. Probably due to the fact that Web4Realty is 100% bootstrapped and revenue financed, and has been since we launched. That alone is one of my proudest achievements thus far. I have so much respect and admiration for other bootstrapped companies, because I can relate to how difficult it is, and the sacrifices that have to be made. In my opinion, bootstrapping is one of those terms that get thrown around loosely, and means different things to different people. My definition of bootstrapping has four components: Starting a company with very little to no initial capital Giving away no equity in your business Staying LEAN Being able to create your own company processes In this episode, I break down what bootstrapping means to me. Music by sifer2424

One thing I’ve learned while managing a growing company, is that hiring the right people isn’t easy. My hiring and interviewing process has evolved quite drastically over the years. I’ve learned that hiring is a true skill that gets better over time and with experience. In the last 12 months, I've hired 6 team members, so I thought I’d document my hiring process into 10 steps: Write out your Job Post Post the Job Organize and Vet Qualified Applicants Make Your Initial Contact Scheduling the First Phone/Skype Conversation Create a Shortlist Second Call with Shortlist Applicants Third Call with the Department Manager Send a Test/Scenario to Top Candidates Send the Job Offer! 10 Steps to Making Your Next Hire: http://www.founderviews.com/the-hiring-process-in-10-steps/ Music by sifer2424

A metric often overlooked, which is extremely important to the health and growth of a SaaS business, is expansion revenue. Most SaaS folks are fixated on the basic top-line metrics such as new business MRR revenue, and MRR revenue churn. Tucked in between these figures is a very important metric called Expansion Revenue. There are a lot of tremendous benefits of expansion revenue, which I will list off. SaaS Metrics for Dummies: http://www.founderviews.com/saas-metrics-for-dummies/ Expansion Revenue: http://www.founderviews.com/dont-sleep-on-expansion-revenue/ Music by sifer2424