boeing767

"wOrKiNg oN"

Just regular SaaS businesses.

1 is a Shopify-like app, the other is a Twitter scheduler.

However, some of my customers have been filing friendly fraud claims.

I'm just wondering if I should be concerned.

The value of Gumroad is certainly the software for the end-users.

End-users don't care about validating uploads.

But validating uploads is a necessary evil in order to sustain the business.

All user input is evil, but especially so when they have a free-for-all "upload" field.

Yeah, and I need a way to screen for people who upload stuff that isn't theirs and selling it.

I think that's a huge legal liability.

Maybe for this business I finally need to set up an LLC.

I heard Gumroad has tons of outsourced workers in India literally manually going through uploads to check for this.

I'm not sure what I have to do, but I hope it won't come down to that.

Yeah, you're absolutely right.

Even merely listing them on my site is a huge liability.

And I'd be in deep trouble if someone uploaded child porn or something.

Okay, what happens if there are bad actors among my users who use my service to send Nigerian prince emails or boner pill ads?

How will that affect my relationship with Sendgrid?

Oh, seems strange for them not to spin up their own mail-sending server.

Why not do that?

They're funded to the gills.

I don't want to sound stupid, but I don't know what you mean.

What's sendemail?

Also I don't know anything about badges.

But I think you've pointed me in the right direction.

Why can't I just build my own onboarding sequence? It's really not that hard. Plus it's free if I DIY, and I have full control over it. Data goes straight to my database instead of being collected through a third-party form.

I'm not sure if you examined the material, but his material looked extremely legit, from my perspective as a SaaS founder. His knowledge of sales and marketing for mid-ticket b2b SaaS is just right on the money.

If it doesn't work out, I'll just get another job. Considering that I quit a shit job to get to where I am (it's not like I quit a $150k tech job), I'll get another shit job to replace it. It's really not that hard where I live.

It's just that mentally 2 months of runway is insane.

Also they provide a 90-day "action-based" money-back guarantee. Where if I followed their instructions to the letter, and I still didn't see results, they're happy to grant me a refund. Sales rep: "If you got to a point where you're contemplating a refund, we'll give you extra attention and see how we can really get you out of your rut, because the last thing we need is chargebacks on our Stripe and get our account closed."

Their demo is based on how they help/guide early-stage B2B SaaS by testing multiple offers using outbound prospecting, lead magnets, tripwire marketing (specifically, Zoom demos), and then closing on the demo asking for payment upfront, where we would then charge the card manually on Stripe.

Once the product-market fit (they call it "market-message resonance") is nailed down, they'll use paid Facebook ads to generate leads at scale and book my calendar full with demos, where I should close them on the phone. They also teach us how to hire a remote inside sales rep or two to repeat the model at scale.

In short, they help b2b SaaS startups to build out their sales funnel, test it relentlessly, track conversion at each stage, ensure customer success, and then gather case studies to further fine-tune the conversion mechanisms at each stage of the funnel.

It sounded legit to me, and while the alternative is for me to just try to do all the above on my own anyway, I'd much rather have some guidance from someone who knows what he's doing.

I'm on mobile. At first I didn't get what it did. Ordinarily I'd just close the tab, but I decided to read About. And then I got it.

So I went back to the app. Clicked on the END time button. Nothing happened. Weird.

Ohhhh... I had to drag that pie chart on top. Okay fine.

Then it started planning a route for me. Not bad! But how am I supposed to get from point A to point B? Point B to point C? Uber? Subway? Walk?

I like the concept. It needs massive UI/UX improvements though.

Wow. I'm very glad you persisted and kept going. How do you keep your morale so high? The thing about cold-calling is, I've done it before in the past -- I mean, who hasn't worked at a call center before?

But it doesn't feel the same when you're selling YOUR own product. Where every rejection feels like you're a failure, you're failing, and everything you've invested into your company doesn't matter.

I'm still struggling to get my first customer, but just like you and the other comment suggested, I'm definitely working on my SEO, content marketing, inbound marketing.

Do you have any tips besides just optimizing SEO? That feels a bit like a crapshoot based on luck.

I don't know anyone in my network who could test it out, hell at this point I'm willing to pay someone just to earnestly test it out and provide feedback that I'm so hungry for.

I'm definitely looking into industry events/trade shows, I don't have the resources for a booth, but I can probably walk around with a tablet demoing my product to prospects. I'm also part of an industrial online community, but I can't just spam my app there, as it's invite-only and I don't want to get banned.

My link is https://rebrand.ly/dr6a8h.

Sorry for the shortened URL, I'm trying my best for my site not to be indexed by Google in case prospects search for my site.

Absolutely. I'm already starting a blog and pumping it up with content, hopefully I can capture some leads with a MailChimp form too.

I'm not sure it is, I think we have an easier UI (less-steep learning curve) and better pricing structure (competitors have high setup fees + high monthly, we have a results-based revenue model).

I'm trying to get there. I have direct competitors who love and need their solutions, so these people definitely exist, I just need to reach them. And perhaps differentiate even more to get them to switch.

Thanks. I'll refuel my morale for now and get back into it soon. I'll make more calls. I use Mailgun to track my email opens/clicks, so I'll also keep doing that.

What went wrong during your first go at it?

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I got to ramen profitability within 6 months in my previous SaaS startup. I'm not saying it wasn't hard, but it isn't this super-impossible thing everyone makes it out to be.

Well my day job deteriorated to a state where the stress of staying on far exceeded the anxiety of leaving it, so the only rational thing to do is to cut it off.

As for customer development, there are already multiple healthily-growing startups doing what I'm doing; there is a market, no doubt. It's a matter of reaching them now. It's an MVP, not a full-fledged product.

Worst comes to worse, I'll do a major pivot or shelve it.