Startups For the Rest of Us
485 episodes - English - Latest episode: 27 days ago - ★★★★★ - 675 ratingsThe original podcast for bootstrapped and mostly bootstrapped startups, this show follow the stories of founders as they start, acquire, and grow SaaS companies. Hear when they fail, struggle, succeed, and take you with them through the tumultuous life of a SaaS founder. If you like Mixergy, This Week in Startups, or SaaStr, you’ll enjoy Startup for the Rest of Us.
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Episodes
Episode 628 | The 5 PM Pre-Validation Framework
October 04, 2022 10:00 - 29 minutes - 31.1 MBIn episode 628, join Rob Walling on a solo adventure where he dives into his newest framework. The 5 PM Pre-Validation Framework is a helpful way to evaluate different startup ideas through a set of criteria to gauge the size of the opportunity. Want to download the PDF version the the 5 PM Pre-Validation Framework? Join the Startups For The Rest Us Mailing List, and we'll send you the link in the first email. Look for the orange email opt-in widget on the page. Topics we cover: 3:37 - W...
Episode 628 | The 5 P.M. Idea Validation Framework
October 04, 2022 10:00 - 29 minutes - 31.1 MBIn episode 628, join Rob Walling on a solo adventure where he dives into his newest framework. The 5 P.M. Idea Validation Framework is a helpful way to evaluate different startup ideas through a set of criteria to gauge the size of the opportunity. Want to download the PDF version the the 5 p.M. Idea Evaluation Framework? Join the Startups For The Rest Us Mailing List, and we'll send you the link in the first email. Look for the orange email opt-in widget on the page. Topics we cover: 3:...
Episode 627 | TinySeed Tales s3e5: Meeting the Co-Founder
September 29, 2022 10:00 - 24 minutes - 23.1 MBIn the penultimate episode of TinySeed Tales Season 3, Rob Walling checks in with Tony Chan of CloudForecast. Tony shares some recent big wins, including hiring a senior engineer. We also meet Tony’s cofounder, Francois Lagier, for the first time. Topics we cover: 1:49 - The story of how Tony and Francois first met 2:14 - Hiring a senior engineer at CloudForecast 8:51 - Tony shares two recent big wins at CloudForecast 14:31 - The paradox of choice that all startup founders face 16:30...
Episode 626 | Scratching an Itch, Launching a Free SEO Tool, and Growing to $18k MRR
September 27, 2022 10:00 - 40 minutes - 37.6 MBIn episode 626, Rob Walling chats with Nick Swan, the founder of SEOTesting.com. SEOTesting helps SEO professionals and agencies automate the reporting of page updates and changes. Nick originally launched it as a free tool under a different name. In this episode, we cover when Nick decided to charge for it, renaming the tool, rewriting the codebase, and the journey to growing to $18,000 MRR. Topics we cover: 3:17 - Growing SEOTesting.com to $18,000 MRR 4:53 - What kinds of businesses u...
Episode 625 | TinySeed Tales s3e4: Doubling MRR
September 22, 2022 10:00 - 21 minutes - 19.7 MBIn the fourth episode of TinySeed Tales Season 3, Rob Walling checks back in with Tony Chan of CloudForecast. Tony shares that they’ve doubled their MRR in the last couple of months, and it feels like he has unlocked a cheat code. Topics we cover: 2:02 - What’s changed since the last episode? 3:14 - Winning a huge enterprise deal that nearly doubled their MRR 5:21 - Deploying capital 12:31 - A key mindset shift that Tony had to make 13:33 - Tony’s experience at a recent TinySeed retr...
Episode 624 | Moving from Free to Paid, Prioritizing Marketing vs. Development, and More Listener Questions
September 20, 2022 10:00 - 26 minutes - 24.5 MBIn episode 624, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure as he answers some listener questions on topics ranging from customer interviews to transitioning from a free to a paid product and prioritizing marketing vs. development. Topics we cover: 2:11 - What episodes should I start with to get up to speed? 3:27 - When to transition from a free to a paid product 11:37 - Customer interviews as a service 15:03 - Making the jump from software to manufacturing 19:32 - Prioritizing marketing vs...
Episode 623 | TinySeed Tales s3e3: Paternity Leave
September 15, 2022 10:00 - 27 minutes - 25.7 MBIn the third episode of season 3 of TinySeed Tales, Rob Walling checks in with Tony Chan of CloudForecast to see how he is faring since his co-founder is now on paternity leave. During this time, Tony shares a big win along with dealing with some hiring and growth setbacks. Topics we cover: 1:24 - How the business is doing while Francois is on paternity leave 2:36 - Tony’s perspective on being a solo founder for the past 6 weeks 5:04 - Managing your own founder psychology 7:49 - H...
Episode 622 | Making Hard Product Decisions & Growth vs. Profitability with Derrick Reimer
September 13, 2022 10:00 - 49 minutes - 46.1 MBIn episode 622, join Rob Walling and fan favorite Derrick Reimer, the founder of SavvyCal, as they discuss topics like balancing profitability versus growth and deciding which features to build and not. They chat about some specific features that Derek has decided to build, those he has not decided to build, and the thought process behind them. Topics we cover: 4:02 - Making product decisions 9:22 - Deciding on what features you are not going to build 19:12 - When to reply to debates ...
Episode 621 | TinySeed Tales s3e2: Onboarding Their First Hires
September 08, 2022 10:00 - 25 minutes - 23.3 MBIn this episode of TinySeed Tales, Rob chats with Tony Chan from CloudForecast about the progress his rapidly growing team has made over the previous few weeks. Tony is riding the roller coaster that is entrepreneurship and in this episode you get to follow along. Topics we cover: 1:47 - New full time engineering hire onboarding results 4:50 - Part time SDR hire onboarding results 7:31 - How hiring affects company culture 10:19 - Tony’s biggest wins in the last few weeks 14:30 - Growi...
Episode 620 | Finding SaaS Ideas, Customer Pain, SaaS Metrics, and More Listener Questions
September 06, 2022 10:00 - 29 minutes - 26.9 MBIn episode 620, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure as he answers some listener questions. These questions range from which SaaS business metrics to pay attention to and how to find good SaaS ideas to helping an employee transition from a task-level to a project-level thinker. Topics we cover: 1:44- What SaaS business metrics matter the most? 11:21- Do you have any general observations about building a SaaS for non-technical customers? 16:00- How do you find a good SaaS idea? 24:4...
Episode 619 | TinySeed Tales s3e1: Moving from Bootstrapped to Mostly Bootstrapped
September 01, 2022 10:00 - 24 minutes - 22.6 MBWelcome to Season 3 of TinySeed Tales, where we follow the founders of one SaaS startup throughout a year as they share their struggles, victories, and failures. On the first episode of Season 3, Rob introduces us to Tony Chan, the cofounder of CloudForecast. CloudForecast is a daily AWS cost monitoring service for busy engineering teams. Tony is one of 33 startup founders from TinySeed’s Spring 2021 accelerator batch. Topics we cover: 2:41- What’s CloudForecast? 4:09- How large is the...
Episode 618 | How to Achieve Financial Freedom
August 30, 2022 10:00 - 32 minutes - 30.1 MBIn episode 618, join Rob Walling as he chats with Sam Dogen, the founder of Financial Samurai, which is one of the longest-running and most popular personal finance blogs. Over the last 13 years, Sam has personally written over 2,500 essays along with a Wall Street Journal Bestselling book. We talk about achieving financial freedom, money mindsets, and relentless execution. Topics we cover: 3:12- The 4% Rule 4:40- Sam’s alternative approach to the 4% Rule 7:25- The FIRE Movement 10:...
Episode 617 | News Roundup: Profitwell $200M Exit, Spreadsheet Mentality, and Watching an Acquirer Ruin Your Company
August 23, 2022 10:00 - 40 minutes - 37.1 MBIn episode 617, Einar Vollset and Tracy Osborn join Rob Walling for a bootstrapper news roundup episode. They cover a wide range of topics from ProfitWell’s big 200 million exit, spreadsheet mentality, watching an acquirer ruin your company, and much more. Topics we cover: [3:06] What’s your take on ProfitWell’s acquisition? [5:52] Watching an acquirer ruin your company [14:03] The spreadsheet mentality [23:09] If you can’t buy it twice, don’t buy it [36:00] Balancing realism with...
Episode 616 | An 8-Figure SaaS Founder's Approach to Remote Work
August 16, 2022 10:00 - 33 minutes - 31 MBIn episode 616, Rob Walling chats with Liam Martin, the co-founder of Time Doctor and author of the new book, “Running Remote: Master the Lessons from the World’s Most Successful Remote Work Pioneers.” We dig into the fundamentals of asynchronous communication, how to do remote work better, and some surprises they saw during the pandemic. Episode Sponsor Hiring developers has been tough for years, but it is even tougher these days. Lemon.io is on a mission to make the process of hiring an ...
Episode 616 | An 8-Figure SaaS Founder’s Approach to Remote Work
August 16, 2022 10:00 - 31 MBIn episode 616, Rob Walling chats with Liam Martin, the co-founder of Time Doctor and author of the new book, “Running Remote: Master the Lessons from the World’s Most Successful Remote Work Pioneers.” We dig into the fundamentals of asynchronous communication, how to do remote work better, and some surprises they saw during the pandemic. Episode Sponsor Hiring developers has been tough for years, but it is even tougher these days. Lemon.io is on a mission to make the process of hiring an...
Episode 615 | Bootstrappable Businesses, Cargo Culting, and How Pricing Affects Growth (A Rob Solo Adventure)
August 09, 2022 10:00 - 27 minutes - 25 MBIn episode 615, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he covers what makes a business bootstrappable (and things to avoid), cargo culting, and how large of a business you can build at different customer lifetime value levels. Episode Sponsor: Hiring developers has been tough for years, but it is even tougher these days. Lemon.io is on a mission to make the process of hiring an experienced developer or even an entire team easier. They only have experienced developers on their marketpl...
Episode 614 | Deciding When to Quit Your Day Job, Founder Anxiety, and More Listener Questions
August 02, 2022 10:00 - 42 minutes - 39.3 MBIn episode 614, Rob Walling chats with fan favorite Derrick Reimer. They start out by talking about Derrick’s decision to take a sabbatical from The Art of Product podcast after co-hosting it with Ben Orenstein for more than 5 years. Then, they answer a handful of listener questions, including when to quit your day job to focus on your startup full-time, coping with anxiety as a second-time founder, and choosing a domain name. Episode Sponsor: Hiring developers has been tough for years, bu...
Episode 613 | Hacking Your Founder Psychology
July 26, 2022 10:00 - 30 minutes - 28 MBIn episode 613, Rob Walling chats with Dr. Sherry Walling about the release of her new book, Touching Two Worlds: A guide for finding hope in the landscape of loss. They cover a lot in this episode, including the hustle of launching a book, the behind the scenes of how Sherry has hacked her own psychology to help promote the book, and grief in entrepreneurship. Episode Sponsor: Hiring developers has been tough for years, but it is even tougher these days. Lemon.io is on a mission to make t...
Episode 612 | Balancing a Side Project and Going Full-time on Your Product
July 19, 2022 10:00 - 37 minutes - 34.7 MBIn episode 612, Rob Walling chats with longtime friend and repeat podcast guest Dave Rodenbaugh. Dave was even at the very first MicroConf back in 2011. In this episode, we have a candid conversation on our experiences balancing side projects with a day job, struggling with the decision in our own different ways of when to quit, and the surprising habits you have to unlearn once you are finally independent of the day job and consulting work. Topics we cover: [1:27] Dave’s thought process...
Episode 611 | Bootstrapping ProfitWell to a $200M Exit (with Patrick Campbell)
July 12, 2022 10:00 - 47 minutes - 43.7 MBIn episode 611, join Rob Walling as he chats with Patrick Campbell, the cofounder of ProfitWell, on how he and his co-founders bootstrapped ProfitWell to a $200 million exit. Profitwell was acquired by Paddle earlier this year. We dive into a bunch of topics you have not heard elsewhere, including details about the actual transaction, what was the stock vs. cash split, the revenue breakdown of consulting versus SaaS when they sold as well as talking through his thought process as they were ...
Episode 610 | How I Would Start Over Today, Bad Habits of Solopreneurs, and the Benefits of a Day Job (A Rob Solo Adventure)
July 05, 2022 10:00 - 29 minutes - 27 MBIn episode 610, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure where he talks about the benefits of working a day job before launching your company, some bad habits he picked up in the early days, why the college dropout narrative is annoying, and what he would do if he was starting over today. Topics we cover: [1:08] The benefits of working a day job [6:20] Some bad habits Rob learned as a solopreneur in the early days [9:45] Why the college dropout narrative is bs [12:51] What would Rob do ...
Episode 609 | Building Your MVP, the Bug Fix Hamster Wheel, and More Listener Questions
June 28, 2022 10:00 - 26 minutes - 24.4 MBIn episode 609, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure as he answers a handful of listener questions ranging from when it makes sense to have multiple LLCs and hiring task-level vs. project-level thinkers to planning for large projects. He also shares his thought process behind ways you can build a complex mobile app prototype in a capital efficient manner. Topics we cover: [1:56] Is it worth it to create multiple LLCs? [6:10] Do you have any tips for how to find the time to work on futu...
Episode 608 | Bootstrapping (and Exiting) a 7-Figure Info Product
June 21, 2022 10:00 - 50 minutes - 46.7 MBIn episode 608, Rob Walling chats with Adrian Rosebrock, who bootstrapped and successfully exited his seven-figure info product company, PyImageSearch, in 2021. PyImageSearch provided digital courses around visual image detection and image classification in Python. Adrian wasn’t always an entrepreneur. He graduated with a PhD in computer science, got a day job, realized early on that he hated it, and just stair-stepped his way up to running a successful business. In this episode, we cover a...
Episode 607 | Overcoming Plateaus, Stealth Launches, Founder-Driven Sales, and More Listener Questions
June 14, 2022 10:00 - 34 minutes - 32 MBIn episode 607, Rob Walling chats with Asia Orangio, and they answer listener questions about customer onboarding videos, overcoming revenue plateaus, stealth launches, and founder-driven sales. Topics we cover: [1:12] Where’s the best place to put customer onboarding videos? [5:37] How to scale a content business [15:36] What to do if revenue has plateaued? [21:41] When to do a stealth launch [26:30] Is it possible for a SaaS product to sell to the enterprise without a dedicated...
Episode 606 | The Podcasting Landscape, Keeping Your Saw Sharpened, and Scaling Your Team with Craig Hewitt
June 07, 2022 10:00 - 34 minutes - 32.2 MBIn episode 606, Rob Walling chats with Craig Hewitt, the founder of Castos. They talk about company building, staying up to speed when you are no longer doing the day-to-day tasks as well as their thoughts on a recent string of acquisitions happening in the podcast ecosystem. Topics we cover: [1:24] 2 MicroConf Local events happening in Chicago and Denver [3:50] The pros and cons of Spotify acquiring a couple of podcast analytics platforms [7:51] The specific challenges with podcast ...
Episode 605 | Building a SaaS with Little Dev Experience, Using No Code for Your MVP, Bootstrapping a Two-Sided Marketplace, and More Listener Questions
May 31, 2022 10:00 - 42 minutes - 38.9 MBIn episode 605, Rob Walling is joined by Ruben Gamez, and they dig into a handful of listener questions. Topics range from building a SaaS with little development experience and using no-code tools to build your MVP to stair-stepping bootstrapping a two-sided marketplace. Topics we cover: [0:55] Selling to the enterprise [4:31] What level of development expertise would you say the founders of a B2B SaaS should have in order to create a successful product? [13:26] Should you launch a p...
Episode 604 | How to Decide Which Features to Build (with Derrick Reimer)
May 24, 2022 10:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBIn episode 604, Rob Walling talks with Derrick Reimer and gets the latest update on SavvyCal, how he makes product decisions, and they also share the best things they’ve bought for $100 and $1000 that have added much more value to their lives than the price point. Topics we cover: [4:50] Apple’s influence on startup founders [8:52] SavvyCal’s new Squadcast integration [12:51] Some upcoming features in the works for SavvyCal [14:05] Experimenting with a freemium feature—meeting polls ...
Episode 603 | Bootstrapping HotJar to $40M ARR Using D2C Marketing
May 17, 2022 10:00 - 44 minutes - 40.6 MBIn episode 603, Rob Walling chats with David Darmanin, one of the founders of Hotjar. Hotjar was bootstrapped to $40 million ARR with a fully distributed team of 170 employees. David and his cofounders sold the company for a 9-figure exit in 2021. From their incredible launch story and their unique DTC approach to sales and marketing in a B2B SaaS business to David’s mental models and the thought process behind selling the business, there is no shortage of key insights in this episode. Top...
Episode 602 | Explaining SaaS Metrics to a Child
May 10, 2022 10:00 - 29 minutes - 27.4 MBIn episode 602, Rob Walling explains SaaS metrics to his kid. This is a great episode to listen to if you are unfamiliar or not well-versed in SaaS because we dig into from first principles, starting with dollars, revenue, and the purpose of businesses, all the way to SaaS metrics like MRR, ACV, and LTV. And, even if you are well-versed in SaaS metrics, you’ll likely learn a few things from this conversation. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is o...
Episode 601 | Bootstrapping B2B vs. B2C
May 03, 2022 10:00 - 39 minutes - 36.1 MBIn episode 601, Rob Walling chats with Nick Fogle of ChurnKey. Nick previously cofounded Wavve which was acquired in early 2021. In this conversation, they chat about how the idea for Churnkey came from his other business, decision to sell Wavve, and some of the key differences between bootstrapping a B2C vs a B2B SaaS. Topics we cover: [2:11] Tips for reducing churn [3:26] Asking for feedback at the point of cancellation via feedback surveys [8:09] When he knew it was the right time ...
Episode 600 | When to Hire Your First Manager + What You Should Be Focused On (A Rob Solo Adventure)
April 26, 2022 10:00 - 30 minutes - 27.8 MBIn episode 600, join Rob Walling for a solo adventure as he dives into topics ranging from when to hire your first manager to a mental framework for deciding which things to work on vs. what to delegate to your team. He also shares his thought process behind when things take multiple iterations and how to know whether or not you are on the right track. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is on a mission to help all founders innovate and grow no matt...
Episode 599 | Finding the Bootstrapper Hockey Stick
April 19, 2022 10:00 - 33 minutes - 30.8 MBIn episode 599, Rob Walling chats with Dominic “Dom” and Tracy Phillips of CodeSubmit. CodeSubmit provides a library of real-world, take-home tasks in more than 60 coding languages. Some of their customers are Audi, Netflix, Carbon Health, 3M, and Apple. Dom and Tracy were also a part of the spring 2020 batch of TinySeed. During that year, they managed to 25x their MRR. In this episode, we’re digging into how they did that, what led to their bootstrapped hockey stick growth moment, what it ...
Episode 598 | Diversity, Mission & Values, How to Start, and More Listener Questions
April 12, 2022 10:00 - 26 minutes - 24.7 MBIn episode 598, join Rob Walling as he answers listener emails. Topics range from diversity in the startup ecosystem and when’s the right time to write your company’s mission, philosophy, and values to how to find good business ideas and the different approaches for developing features for a new app. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is on a mission to help all founders innovate and grow no matter their background, location, or progress. Microsoft ...
Episode 597 | The Challenge of Building a Business in a Regulated Industry
April 05, 2022 10:00 - 37 minutes - 34.4 MBIn episode 597, Rob Walling chats with Ashley Baxter, the founder of With Jack. With Jack gives peace of mind and protection for UK freelancers through insurance, professional indemnity, public liability, contracts, legal expenses, etc. We dig into the lessons Ashley learned from a failed insurance business she inherited from her father, how she used her freelance photography to fund With Jack in the early days, along with sharing many of the successes and failures she has had on her entrep...
Episode 596 | News Round-Up: Google Ends WFH, Founder Salaries, How to Use Email
March 29, 2022 10:00 - 40 minutes - 37.1 MBIn episode 596, Rob Walling is joined by Einar Vollset and Tracy Osborn for a bootstrapper news roundup episode. They cover a wide range of topics from Google’s decision to bring employees back into the office (and the potential implications for bootstrapped companies), founder salary data trends, email management strategies, and much more. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is on a mission to help all founders innovate and grow no matter their bac...
Episode 595 | TinySeed Tales Season 2: Where Are They Now?
March 22, 2022 10:00 - 25 minutes - 23.9 MBIn episode 595, Rob Walling catches up with Brian and Scottie Elliott, the husband and wife co-founders of Gather, an interior design project management SaaS. This husband and wife duo shared their victories, challenges, and failures, including a cash crunch, moving upmarket, and managing to double revenue over their nine episodes of TinySeed Tales Season 2. It’s been over a year since they were last on the podcast and wanted to see how the company is doing. It turns out Gather is on track ...
Episode 594 | Starting Over with the TropicalMBA’s Dan & Ian
March 15, 2022 10:00 - 41.1 MBIn Episode 594, Rob Walling chats with Dan Andrews and Ian Schoen, the founders of Dynamite Jobs and the TropicalMBA podcast. We talk about how they started over. They started a new business, Dynamite Jobs, a couple of years after selling their physical products company back in 2015. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is on a mission to help all founders innovate and grow no matter their background, location, or progress. Microsoft for Startups Found...
Episode 594 | Starting Over with the TropicalMBA's Dan & Ian
March 15, 2022 10:00 - 46 minutes - 42.4 MBIn Episode 594, Rob Walling chats with Dan Andrews and Ian Schoen, the founders of Dynamite Jobs and the TropicalMBA podcast. We talk about how they started over. They started a new business, Dynamite Jobs, a couple of years after selling their physical products company back in 2015. Episode Sponsor: Microsoft for Startups Founder Hub Microsoft for Startups is on a mission to help all founders innovate and grow no matter their background, location, or progress. Microsoft for Startups Fou...
Episode 593 | Retaining Employees + The Ideal SaaS Business (A Rob Solo Adventure)
March 08, 2022 10:00 - 25 minutes - 23.3 MBIn Episode 593, join Rob Walling for a Solo Adventure as he chats about accidentally deleting all of his old tweets, retaining talent, the ideal market for a SaaS business, and more. The topics we cover [3:10] Deleting old tweets [8:43] Retaining talent [12:39] Ideal market for a SaaS business 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 & R...
Episode 592 | Nine Tactics for Amazing Customer Support
March 01, 2022 10:00 - 30 minutes - 27.8 MBIn Episode 592, Rob Walling is joined again by Cody Duval for a technical conversation about the dos and don'ts for amazing customer support. The topics we cover [2:00] Customer success vs customer support [5:10] Response time [8:59] Post-support surveys [10:58] When to hire first customer support person [13:02] Chat widgets [17:09] Doing customer support early on as a founder [18:01] Training customer support to ask a question [19:00] Dealing with abusive customers [21:10] Custome...
Episode 591 | Acquiring and Scaling in a Crowded Space
February 22, 2022 10:00 - 34 minutes - 31.8 MBIn Episode 591, Rob Walling chats with Cody Duvall about his story of acquiring and growing Keeping in a really crowded space of help desk and customer support tools. The topics we cover [4:34] Launching into a crowded market [8:00] Keeping's sales process [10:01] Background on acquiring Keeping [14:53] Outsourcing a team to rewrite the codebase [20:03] Migrating customers [24;01] Challenges with building in a established category [26:09] Hitting product-market fit [28:30] Applying ...
Episode 590 | Buying vs Building, Zombie Companies, and More Listener Questions with Craig Hewitt
February 15, 2022 10:00 - 37 minutes - 34.1 MBIn Episode 590, Rob Walling chats with Craig Hewitt about building versus buying internal tools, how to compete in a competitive space, accounting software, a founder who has a zombie company where investors want their money back, and more. The topics we cover [5:03] Finding a co-founder as a non-technical founder [11:20] Balancing priorities between day job and a SaaS idea [17:35] Zombie company where investors want their money back [26:00] Accounting software for startups [28:10] Bui...
Episode 589 | Finding a SaaS Idea Through 70 Cold Calls
February 08, 2022 10:00 - 34 minutes - 31.9 MBIn Episode 589, Rob Walling chats with Jason Buckingham about how he found a startup idea from making more than 70 cold calls. It's a great story about staying focused, putting in the time and doing the hard work. The topics we cover [7:14] Finding a problem via cold calls [13:07] Identifying a problem and deciding what to do next [22:32] Getting spouses on board with entrepreneur journey [25:06] Working day jobs while building the product [30:09] Getting into Tiny Seed right before CO...
Episode 588 | In Which Courtland Allen and I Cover a Lot of Startups Topics
February 01, 2022 10:00 - 1 hour - 59.6 MBIn Episode 588, Rob Walling chats with Courtland Allen about a wide range of bootstrapper and indie hacker topics including the struggles with motivation/depression, bootstrapping today, fighting the urge to quit, and frameworks for getting your first dollar. The topics we cover [3:43] Hiring a podcast producer [6:21] Letting go in business [7:09] Invite-only experiment on Indie Hackers [16:03] Thinking about the future [20:47] Financial freedom and starting a business [25:05] Depress...
Episode 587 | Renaming a Company, Revisiting Inflation, and Micropreneurship (Listener Email Edition)
January 25, 2022 10:00 - 26 minutes - 24.1 MBIn Episode 587, join Rob Walling as he answers listener emails including feedback and a critique about the podcast, the state of microentrepreneurship, and where to start with user growth. The topics we cover [2:22] The reason Rob continues to podcast [5:26] Renaming a company or podcast [8:40] Revisiting inflation [15:06] The state of microentrepreneurship [20:00] Where to start with user growth Links from the show Where to Publish Plugins Episode 581 | Inflation for Founders Star...
Episode 586 | Mastering Customer Interviews with Michele Hansen
January 18, 2022 10:00 - 27 minutes - 25 MBIn Episode 586, Rob Walling chats with Michele Hansen about her new book where she talks about how to master customer interviews as a startup founder. The topics we cover [5:00] User experience research for startup founders [11:20] Customer Interviews for developers [12:30] Feature requests as customer research springboard [19:55] Practicing customer interviews [23:37] Comparing to Jobs to Be Done framework Links from the show Deploy Empathy: A practical guide for talking to customer...
Episode 585 | Moving Outside Your Comfort Zone with Dr. Sherry Walling
January 11, 2022 10:00 - 30 minutes - 27.8 MBIn Episode 585, Rob Walling chats with Sherry Walling about moving outside your comfort zone, the power of relationships, psychedelic-assisted therapy, as well as her new book about grief launching later this year. The topics we cover [3:22] Deciding against self-publishing [12:00 ] Building an audience vs. a network [14:26] Psychedelic-assisted therapy [24:00] The power and importance of relationships Links from the show The Entrepreneur's Guide To Keeping Your Sh*t Together Touchin...
Episode 584 | Looking Back and Looking Ahead
January 04, 2022 10:00 - 17 minutes - 15.8 MBIn Episode 584, Join Rob Walling for a Happy New Year edition of the show where looks ahead to 2022 and evaluates what he wants to focus on. The things we choose not to do are just as important as the things we chose to do and Rob encourages you to think hard about what is and is not working for you today. The topics we cover [3:00] Founder's retreat [4:36] Estimating growth [9:23] Hiring a full-time content producer [15:32] The power of focus Links from the show The Zen Founder Guide...
Episode 583 | Finding Startup Ideas with Sam Parr
December 28, 2021 10:00 - 39 minutes - 36.4 MBIn Episode 583, Rob Walling chats with Sam Parr about about building an email list, selling to Hubspot, podcast growth, and how to spot business opportunities. The topics we cover [3:53] Building Hustle to 8 figures in revenue [5:52] Growing an email list [11:01] Selling to a B2B SaaS [19:00] My First Million and growing podcasts [23:45] TikTok marketing [27:30] Spotting interesting opportunities [34:70] Manifest cowboy Links from the show Sam Parr (@theSamParr) | Twitter If you h...
Episode 582 | Enterprise Sales, Crowdfunding, Replacing Yourself, and More Listener Questions
December 21, 2021 10:00 - 33 minutes - 30.6 MBIn Episode 582, Rob Walling is joined by Einar Vollset to answer listener questions about enterprise sales, crowdfunding, replacing yourself, and things that every B2B SaaS founder should know. The topics we cover [1:26] Investing with Reg CF [6:20] Enterprise plans and pricing [13:31] Finding your replacement [19:29] Best way to give software demos [21:55] What fundamental things should startup founders should know Links from the show Sales Funnel Optimization for Bootstrapped Found...