Startups For the Rest of Us

In episode 708, Rob Walling and Derrick Reimer tackle listener questions about building development skills vs. business skills and strategies for entering competitive markets. They also chat about building on top of AI services, addressing the risks of platform dependency and the importance of managing infrastructure costs.  Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.  Your elite squ

In episode 707, Rob Walling, alongside guests Tracy Osborn and Einar Vollset, give their hot takes on some recent news in the world of SaaS. They discuss Once.com’s launch, liquidation preference nuances in startup buyouts, with moving from open source to full time income and more.  Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers w

In episode 706.5, join Rob Walling as he reconsiders some of his most common advice. He explores why lowering prices might make sense and discusses the benefits of a B2C business model. Rob also walks back his prior advice on bootstrapping two-sided marketplaces and launching multiple products to see what sticks.  Topics we cover:  1:04 – What would happen if you lowered prices? 3:56 – Benefits of a B2C approach 7:05 – Two-sided marketplaces allow to reach two audiences 8:47 – Launch a bunch of products to see what sticks 10:52 – This episode was released April 1, 2024 Links from the Show:  The SaaS Playbook Rob Walling (@robwalling) | X If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

MicroConf US in Atlanta is here in just a couple weeks, and this is your last call to buy tickets. We've sold more than 90% of the tickets, and we will sell this event out as we have for many years. The event is April 21st through the 23rd in Atlanta, Georgia at the amazing Starling Atlanta. There are going to be 200-ish of your closest bootstrapped and mostly bootstrapped founder friends who are showing up to hear talks from folks like Rand Fishkin of SparkToro, Asia Orangio of DemandMaven. I'm giving a talk as well, and Dr. Sherry Walling will be talking about staying motivated as an entrepreneur. We have a special guest MC, Lianna Patch, and we'll have a very special guest who has never appeared on the MicroConf stage before- Ben Chestnut, the co-founder of MailChimp. Get all the details and secure your ticket before they run out at microconf.com/americas.

In episode 706, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he discusses a variety of topics. He starts with why it’s important to both consider and credit “prior art” in business. Rob outlines his 2/20/200 idea validation framework used to repeatedly evaluate ideas. He also covers why, though there are some advantages, designing by committee has some significant downsides.  Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed wit

In episode 705, Rob Walling interviews Braden Dennis, co-founder and CEO of FinChat. They discuss Braden’s journey going from fully bootstrapped, all the way to taking venture capital as FinChat scaled. Braden shares his experience in initially launching to an audience, how they successfully launched a second product, and how FinChat operates well with multiple co-founders. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, y

In episode 704, join Rob Walling for another solo adventure where he answers listener questions. He weighs in on buying a SaaS, how to validate ideas using landing pages, and what tech stack to choose. Rob also provides guidance for those considering leaving their comfortable day jobs in favor of being a founder. Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.  Your elite squad will incl

In episode 703, Rob Walling interviews Jordan Hansen, founder of Cobalt Intelligence. They dive into Jordan's unexpected journey into SaaS and the growth of his company, which specializes in business verification through API. Jordan reflects on quitting his job to pursue his startup and the benefits of community and mentorship he has received from TinySeed.  Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut

In episode 702, join Rob Walling for another solo adventure where he answers listener questions. He answers how to introduce friends to bootstrapping, when to lower your prices, and addresses the difference in revenue and profit multiple valuations. Rob also offers advice when weighing a career move versus building side projects and scaling your MVP. Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin Americ

In episode 701, Rob Walling interviews Matt Wensing, founder of Summit, a SaaS platform for lead scoring and qualification. Matt shares insights on finding product-market fit, the importance of following customer workflows to get there, and the challenges of marketing and positioning. Rob asks about his choice to raise venture capital, and how keeping a lean team maximizes that opportunity. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months.

In episode 700, Rob goes solo to celebrate another milestone of Startups For the Rest of Us. He reflects on playing the long game and doing so publicly enough to create larger luck surface area. He also emphasizes building skills in the process, and highlights several founders who have done this well. Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.  Your elite squad will include between

In episode 699, Rob Walling chats with fan favorite Derrick Reimer, the founder of SavvyCal, about scaling products tastefully. Derrick offers his perspective on maintaining a tidy UX and deciding which features to implement. They also cover best practices for maintaining knowledge bases, changelogs, and documentation. As a bonus, Rob and Derrick offer podcasting advice to their past selves. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months

In episode 698, Rob Walling interviews Noah Kagan, CEO of AppSumo. They discuss the importance of eliminating distractions, cover strategies that led to growth in Noah’s businesses, and share insights from growing YouTube channels. Noah also shares why he decided to write his new book, Million Dollar Weekend. Episode Sponsor: Is your outsourced development team dropping the ball? Maybe you’ve worked with a team that just couldn't grasp your vision and needed constant oversight because they weren’t thinking strategically. Or maybe you ended up wasting hours micromanaging, often needing to jump on late-night calls across massive time zone differences to get alignment. And in the end, they delivered a sluggish app with a frustrating UI that didn’t come close to the solution you had envisioned. If any of that sounds familiar, you need to reach out to our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.  Your elite squad will include

In episode 697, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he makes predictions for SaaS in 2024. His predictions focus on Vertical SaaS, emerging markets, the professionalization of No-Code, subscription fatigue,  AI and more. At the end of the episode, he evaluates predictions he made over the past 10 years to see if they held up. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that tim

In episode 696, Rob Walling and Ruben Gamez cover a variety of topics. They discuss how product market fit is achieved across customer segments and use cases, not simply broadly. Ruben shares how he approaches effective decision making and sales as an introvert. They wrap up by sharing how they evaluate candidates when hiring to build their teams. Topics we cover:  4:47 – Product market fit, increasing average revenue per customer 7:58 – When did you know you had product market fit? 11:03 – Product market fit is a continuum, and use case specific 14:27 – Making hard decisions around product market fit 19:01 – Getting better at prioritizing and making hard decisions 27:38 – Doing sales as an introvert 33:09 – Building a functional team that gets stuff done 40:10 – Evaluating potential hires Links from the Show:  MicroConf Sponsorships Microconf Connect Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X SignWell Episode 695 | Ideal Customers, Moving from B2C to

In episode 695, Rob Walling and Asia Orangio answer listener questions. They take questions about ideal target customers, moving from B2C to B2B, and how to advertise for a product in a new space. They wrap up discussing the challenges of making freemium work while bootstrapping. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers who can g

In episode 694, join Rob Walling as he recaps 2023. He reflects on growing TinySeed, MicroConf, the YouTube channel and this podcast. Rob also addresses his struggle with "arrival fallacy" and the continuous journey of success. Alongside the growth, he describes seeing burnout on the horizon, emphasizes the importances of addressing that early, and what it means for him and his team in 2024. Episode Sponsor: Going from an idea sketched on the back of a napkin to a robust, stable product requires a wide range of skills. You can spend ages looking for a one-in-a-million developer who can do it all, or you can quickly ramp up an entire product team to help you build and launch your product with our sponsor - DevSquad. DevSquad provides an entire development team packed with top talent from Latin America.  Your elite squad will include between 2 to 6 Full Stack Developers, a technical product manager, plus experts in product strategy, UI/UX design, DevOps, and QA - all working together to make

In episode 693, Rob Walling interviews Grant McConnaughey, founder of Postpone, a social media scheduling tool. They discuss the app's growth from inception to mid six figures, early growth tactics, a successful price increase, and platform risks with Reddit and Twitter. Grant also shares his experience going all-in on one idea, joining TinySeed, and reveals what he can still improve upon. Topics we cover:  2:04 – Postpone starts off as part of a New Year’s resolution 4:13 – Validating and building the MVP to schedule content for Reddit  6:44 – Launching lean to slow growth in the beginning 9:10 – Doing things that don’t scale  10:53 – What were the reasons for joining TinySeed 13:06 – Full time focus and pricing changes enabled strong growth for Postpone 17:15 – Initial hesitation for raising prices at first 22:08 – Experiencing and overcoming Reddit platform risk 26:00 – What could Grant be doing better? Links from the Show:  MicroConf Con

In episode 692, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he addresses a variety of topics. He stresses revisiting your onboarding to evaluate your product’s “minimum path to awesome” and warns of conducting “mirror research” instead of market research. Rob also tackles why being the cheapest option is not always the best positioning. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time

In episode 691, join Rob Walling for another solo adventure where he answers listener questions. He evaluates freemium as it relates to paying by the “honor system”, competing  against big incumbents, and whether to sell using high-touch vs. low-touch strategies. Rob also recommends books for introverts looking for sales advice.   Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of t