This week, Jon and Justin celebrate 100 episodes: Jon was on the Cody Story podcast awhile back. Justin, on the other hand, loves writing testimonials: Jack McDade's new course Tailwind UI Fathom Analytics "We are in our mid-life crisis of SaaS building. I think, for me, the problem is not quite knowing what's next." Is this the time we hire a business coach? Where does your personal motivation for work come from? What difference are we trying to make in the world? Derek Sivers : "You've got to ...
Mar 10, 2020•46 min•Ep 100•Transcript available on Metacast This week, Justin is joined by Michele Hansen (co-founder of Geocodi o). We explore a bunch of questions: What it's like to bootstrap with your spouse 6:30 – where Michele and Mathias found the idea for their company 7:00 – when you have kids you need diapers at 1am Why people start companies 7:55 – how getting pregnant motivated them to build a product 10:15 – Matthias initially built a really basic geocoder for their purposes 11:30 – a lot of bootstrappers get motivated to start a business aft...
Mar 03, 2020•53 min•Ep 99•Transcript available on Metacast This week, Justin is joined by Ward Sandler from MemberSpace (launched in 2015). We explore a bunch of questions: How do you find a cofounder? Ward explains to Justin (a Canadian) what a fraternity is. What it's like doing enterprise sales. How two sales guys ended up learning design and programming. "Everybody needs to build a website for Uncle Larry" Justin and Ward go through a sample sales phone call. How they found the idea for MemberSpace through their consulting company. How Ward knew the...
Feb 25, 2020•59 min•Ep 98•Transcript available on Metacast This week, Jon and Justin discuss: Justin's office is under construction 🛠️. How to talk about things that are hard. A review exercise from the book: The Great CEO Within (as recommended by Ben on Art of Product ). It gives each founder the ability to say: "This bugs me." We've hired Helen ( NamesAce ) as a part-time contractor. Switching out our UI framework: Jon is rebuilding the Transistor app with Tailwind. How do you move to V2 of your app? Should you rebuild? Joel on Software: Things you ...
Feb 18, 2020•40 min•Ep 97•Transcript available on Metacast This week, Jon and Justin discuss: What makes a good podcast for product people? New American Dream: building, owning, selling a SaaS ( Tyler Tringas ) What do you worry about when you own your own software company? How would we handle an economic downturn? Why do software founders not sleep well at night? You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas , @mijustin , @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt ; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Leave a comment on Breaker , the podcast app...
Feb 11, 2020•36 min•Ep 96•Transcript available on Metacast This week, Jon and Justin discuss: Repeating calendar item: "Jan 5th, GTFO." How are you doing with the winter blue? The Transistor Volkswagen bus, surfboards, and snowboards. Monolithic vs mico-services https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1222966700913479681 https://changelog.com/posts/monoliths-are-the-future Pushing ahead with our “switch from Semantic UI to Tailwind CSS" cycle. "Retargeting is like squeezing the last drop of juice out of the lemon. Is it worth it?" "We were adding more and more t...
Feb 04, 2020•32 min•Ep 95•Transcript available on Metacast Jon is back! This week, we discuss: This book, The Timeless Way of Building , that Justin is reading. When you work for yourself, there can be sense of not being grounded. What do you do? What's better than meditating? Why co-founders should have a weekly phone call. How the environment we're in influences our actions. Jon's been rebuilding our dashboard using Tailwind CSS + Alpine JS . Tutorial: Rails and Tailwind People complaining about Webpack "What's that Rails gem that everyone buys?" " Si...
Jan 28, 2020•41 min•Ep 94•Transcript available on Metacast Justin is interviewed by Nathan Baschez to talk about business strategy: "Every strategy is really just a theory: “We bet if we do x, then y will happen. In business, the 'y' that people are usually aiming for is some sort of sustainable competitive advantage." – Nathan Baschez This is a long episode, but it's a good one! What made Jon and Justin feel like they had an advantage in podcasting? Original hypothesis: "Maybe we could be to podcasting, what WPengine was to WordPress hosting. Or what W...
Jan 21, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep 93•Transcript available on Metacast Justin is joined by podcast producer Chris Enns to talk about: How do you get Alexis Ohanian (cofounder of Reddit, married to Serena Williams) as a client? Getting out of the wrong business, into something better. Why you should get out of your comfort zone (and your town!) "We're all running the same race; how come that person is so far ahead of me?" Links: Hire Chris to edit your podcast: www.lemonproductions.ca Alexis Ohanian's podcast: businessdad.initialized.com When to move on: justinjacks...
Jan 14, 2020•52 min•Ep 92•Transcript available on Metacast Justin does a solo New Year's Eve episode where he shares: Then (Jan 1, 2019) vs now (Jan 1, 2020) Justin's tweet : "Going all-in on Transistor in 2019!" Advice for new founders: "What products get bought every day?" Every day, millions of people wake up and buy a cup of coffee. Every day, there are people who wake up and sign up for web hosting. Will there be people lining up tomorrow morning to buy your product? And the next day? What's still going to be true tomorrow, six months from now, thr...
Dec 31, 2019•15 min•Ep 91•Transcript available on Metacast Justin and Jon talk about: What's happened this year. "You shouldn't be worried about that, but you should be worried about THIS." The SaaS gold rush: “Building, Owning (& possibly Selling) a profitable remote SaaS business is the new American Dream.” – Tyler Tringas It’s harder to get the American Dream these days. “Productivity has increased by 80 per cent, but median compensation (that's wages plus benefits) has risen by just 11 per cent during that time. The middle-income jobs of the nat...
Dec 24, 2019•39 min•Ep 90•Transcript available on Metacast Justin is interviewed by Noah and Ben from the Product Journey podcast : Should you build an audience first? Why finding the right market is the first filter you should use on your idea. Justin also shares some stuff he's changed his mind about this past year. ★ Thanks to our sponsors: Postmark . Postmark delivers your transactional email to customers on time, every time. You'll love their lightning-fast email delivery and developer-friendly features. Get one month free when you use coupon code ...
Dec 17, 2019•43 min•Ep 89•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk about: The new corporate condo in the french alps, Crazy to think about where we were last year when we recorded this episode . Spotify's growing market share What happened to our dynamic content feature? A big rant about Apple Podcasts ★ Thanks to our sponsors: Postmark . Postmark delivers your transactional email to customers on time, every time. You'll love their lightning-fast email delivery and developer-friendly features. Get one month free when you use coupon code BUIL...
Dec 10, 2019•45 min•Ep 88•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk about: American Thanksgiving Is it better for a product to be simple? The benefits of having a "smaller menu." Why we started a private podcast for our advisors and trusted friends "My opinion is you need to grow fast and become THE platform for managing your podcast. Consider raising venture money." But, if we add investment money and a bunch of employees, and then our company is no longer simple. Tired before the holidays; a break will be good. What should we do with this s...
Dec 03, 2019•39 min•Ep 87•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk about: New albums from DJ Shadow and Beck Why we aren't sharing our revenue metrics publicly anymore "Sometimes, you can worry more about your public image, more than actually focusing on the problem in a safe place." Why did Buffer stop sharing their revenue numbers? Three questions we ask: Who is this for? What is it for? How will we evaluate success? New podcast analytics features "The numbers on their own don't really mean anything." ★ Thanks to our sponsors: Postmark . P...
Nov 26, 2019•40 min•Ep 86•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk about: A stressful Rails 6 upgrade (and how it broke the app). We often use data to make decisions, but we don't often examine the underlying data we're using to make decisions. How do we know if our marketing efforts are effective? "What's happened to your data since last quarter?" "If a billion people are listening, but not reacting, does it matter?" ★ Thanks to our sponsors: Postmark . Postmark delivers your transactional email to customers on time, every time. You'll love...
Nov 19, 2019•42 min•Ep 85•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk about: The launch of the new marketing site: transistor.fm Built using Statamic CMS and with Tailwind CSS Got tons of help from Jack McDade, Adam Wathan, Ben Furfie "Tailwind is really nice. I have to hand it to Adam." Why working in tandem is better than working independently. DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME. NO. What's the next thing we're going to focus on? ★ Thanks to our sponsors: New: Postmark . Postmark delivers your transactional email to customers on time, every time. You'll l...
Nov 12, 2019•41 min•Ep 84•Transcript available on Metacast What's new with the Transistor team? Justin has a Halloween candy hangover. Desktops vs laptops for dev work. Transitioning from your personal equipment and software to stuff the business pays for. Where are we in our Shape-Up cycles? Our new marketing website is suffering because it's "un-shaped work." The benefits of working with a partner. "I'm realizing how single-threaded human beings are." What does Jon think of Tailwind CSS? At what stage of a customer's business lifecycle should you get ...
Nov 05, 2019•43 min•Ep 83•Transcript available on Metacast This is a heavy one! Let us know at @buildyoursaas if you listen to the whole thing. On a micro-scale many folks believe "how much MRR is enough?" is a silly question, because, in our current global economic model, your business has to keep growing (or it will eventually die). (CHURN will kill you) But on a macro-scale, our economic system relies on perpetually increasing: resource extraction population growth energy usage (Not sustainable) As founders, it's hard enough to wrestle with the "norm...
Oct 29, 2019•56 min•Ep 82•Transcript available on Metacast We shipped our new feature! American Express called Justin twice at 5am The new enhanced podcasts feed is live. Pete Marcano: “I’ll be honest, when I listened to the Build Your SaaS episode on this feature being launched, I didn’t really think much of it. Listening to this episode connected the dots. This is awesomely game changing.” Now we’re technically in a “cool down” cycle” - is this how this should feel? When should you push back on customers' feature requests? We're looking into SSO - wha...
Oct 22, 2019•44 min•Ep 81•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin talk turkey: "I'm not used to all this attention. it’s weird. not bad, just…not used to it." "If you're doing anything interesting out in the world, you're gonna have people get mad about something at some point." – Rob Walling "There's a bit of imposter syndrome; like, do we deserve this?" It's more about the way you orient yourself than setting a specific destination. Bootstrapping podcasts: Art of Product, Bootstrapping SaaS, Slow & Steady, Bright & Early, Build your Sa...
Oct 15, 2019•55 min•Ep 80•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin have a bunch of hot topics this week: Podcast advertising, user tracking, turning away customers? Basecamp switched their podcast (Rework) to us Why Marco Arment gave up on his #1 app $30k in MRR – how does this feel? Shape Up updates: “Small enough to wing it” ★ Thanks to our sponsors: ActiveCampaign . Get the world's most advanced marketing & sales automation platform. Use the code activecampaign.com/buildyoursaas and get two months free + 2 free One-on-Ones! Honeybadger . A...
Oct 08, 2019•52 min•Ep 79•Transcript available on Metacast Sleep. We never get enough: Justin consistently wakes up between 2am-4am and can’t get back to sleep. Jon woke up at 4am. Often reports bad sleeps. Justin asked on Twitter and got tips: Josh Pigford, Baremetrics, says: “CBD oil. Previously I was a very "active" sleeper...talking, getting up, etc. It'd also take me upwards of 30 minutes to get to sleep and I'd regularly wake up in the middle of the night and not be able to get back to sleep. Haven't had any of those issues since using CBD oil.” S...
Oct 01, 2019•47 min•Ep 78•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin discuss a variety of things. Warning: Justin says the f-word twice. 80s trampolines Jon's new microphone: mic + pop filter = $65 USD Transistor's history: 💻 March 2017: first-line of code ✍️ Feb 2018: signed partnership docs ✉️ March 2018: invited first paying (beta) customers 🎉 Aug 2018: official launch 👨💻 April 2019: I go full-time [kind of] ($10k MRR) 👨💻 July 2019: Jon goes full-time ($19k MRR) Bootstrapping loneliness. What do you do when you're independent and you're ...
Sep 24, 2019•39 min•Ep 77•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin discuss: Good mics for podcasters. Justin recommends the Samson Q2U and the ATR2100. Make sure you get a pop filter! Starting our 6-week cycle (based on Basecamp's Shape Up) Working through unknowns for software projects: "Where do we start?" What's it been like being a transparent startup? Is it still a good idea? "It feels less and less comfortable, and I don't know why." – Jon "All people see is the revenue numbers; they don't understand what's happening underneath those number...
Sep 17, 2019•45 min•Ep 76•Transcript available on Metacast This week Jon and Justin answer a few questions: From Jason Zook: "How much MRR is enough for Transistor?" From Yaz: "What do you think of this new Supercast thing that helps podcasters start a paid podcast?" How many people are really asking for this? Looking for evidence: "I just bought X." "I just started doing X." "I just switched from X to Y." "My friend uses X, so I tried it." "Using X, but want something like Y." "X is better than anything else I've tried." "It seems like everyone in my S...
Sep 10, 2019•45 min•Ep 75•Transcript available on Metacast Hear what's new from Jon and Justin on their bootstrapping journey: Nothing like throwing yourself down a mountain when you're tired We're seeing a big increase in support tickets here at the end of August Justin has a theory: more support tickets is leading indicator for an increase in revenue "When people have 'summer brain' they don't want to think about work." Jon's learned some things about how enterprise sales really work Listener Sarah McMullin gave us some great advice on enterprise sale...
Sep 03, 2019•48 min•Ep 74•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin share their SaaS journey: "There's so many great feature ideas, but we can't do them all." Jon's wondering about the constant feature request/release cycle “You’re doing a good job if you’re enjoying the journey” - Jason Cohen (on Art of Product) Tweet: “Any other SaaS companies seeing that revenue generally drops in the summer? I thought it was just me.” Nathan Barry: “The summer is historically really slow for us.” Justin is wondering: are enterprise customers worth it? (Des Tra...
Aug 27, 2019•42 min•Ep 73•Transcript available on Metacast Jon and Justin are tracking a bunch of stuff this week: We're moving from WordPress to Statamic CMS "I had no idea how to set up PHP on my laptop." We want to treat our marketing site the same way we work on our product We're trying to optimize our PageSpeed (our current mobile score is 63, we want to get over 90) "And then you came in a like a magician and lazyloaded the JavaScript" "Collaborative software work is egalitarian. It doesn’t matter who did what, as long as the team is collectively ...
Aug 20, 2019•45 min•Ep 72•Transcript available on Metacast Justin and Jon have started the process of implementing Shape Up . Lots of folks feel like it’d be hard to implement in their team "This would be hard at my agency." “What about feature requests? Is the idea that you also don't write those down?” “Hmm no backlogs? Maybe I am not understanding some backstory/context? Where do they put ideas, comments, quick bits that they might look at later on” Some backlash against the “cult of Basecamp” But the majority of folks were really interested in Jason...
Aug 13, 2019•37 min•Ep 71•Transcript available on Metacast 
