TMBA 632: A Journey From Productized to SaaS, Plus The Return Of ‘Donate a Business Idea’
Podcast 57:34 | Download | Spotify| Stitcher | iTunes | Comment
Productized or Software as a Service? A hot topic often discussed on TMBA. Of course, there’s no right or wrong answer but on today’s show Brian Casel talks to Dan about the factors that contributed to him changing from one to the other by selling Audience Ops and starting ZipMessage and also the different challenges of the two:
“With a productized service, it really was much more about the processes. And building a service that is highly repeatable … but in a SaaS, it's less about process, it's just much more about building. And every single month there's something new. It’s not only just building new features, but what's the next marketing channel that I can try to tap into and unlock a new pocket of customers.”
You’ll also hear about Brian’s decision to take funding this time around, having always bootstrapped before and selling Audience Ops without using a broker. Plus, And the return of one our favorite participation games - ‘donate a business idea’.
Listen to this week's show and learn:
Dan and Ian ‘donate’ three business ideas (09:08)
Why Dan would use a ‘Crypto Sherpa’ service (19:22)
The steps Brian took when he decided to sell Audience Ops (30:23)
Deciding to raise investment over bootstrapping (34:38)
Mentioned in the episode:
Before the Exit – Our New Book
Partner With Us
The Dynamite Circle
Dynamite Jobs
Post a Remote Job
Dynamite Deals
Tropical MBA on YouTube
Dynamite Jobs – Remote Recruiting Sales Page
Brian Casel
Audience Ops
ZipMessage
Rob Walling
JD Graffham
Tiny Seed
Calm Fund
Tyler Tringas
Matt Paulson
MarketBeat
Enjoyed this podcast? Check out these:
TMBA424: Three Scripts for Entrepreneurship
TMBA555: Are Productized Services Overrated?
TMBA566: Why Do SaaS Businesses Fail?
This week's sponsor:
This episode is brought to you by MailmanHQ.com. A Gmail plugin that lets you decide when and what emails land in your inbox.
Mailman allows you to set your own emailing schedule on all your Gmail accounts. Incoming emails are then collected and delivered to your inbox as per this schedule– in batches. Nothing drops in between.
But what about the urgent emails? Don’t worry, Mailman lets you configure your VIPs. Emails from any of these VIPs will land in your inbox immediately.
Sign up for a free account at MailmanHQ.com/TropicalMBA. And if you decide to upgrade to a paid plan, you’ll get 30% off for the first year via that link.
Listening options:
Subscribe via iTunes.
Listen on Stitcher Radio.
Android users can grab our RSS feed here.
Right-click and "save file as" for direct download.
Or click here to get sent to the top of the page where the on-site player is.
Have comments about the show?
Do you have ideas for things you'd like Dan and Ian to discuss on future episodes?
Our producer Jane would love to hear from you at jane@tropicalmba.com or leave us a voice message using the record button below.
Thanks for listening to our show! We'll be back next Thursday morning 8AM EST.
Cheers,
Dan & Ian