Build Your SaaS

Philippe Lehoux and his two co-founders started working on Missive around 2015, and just passed $2 million in annual recurring revenue.

• 0:00 – Getting to know Philippe, and what it's like living in Quebec
• 3:09 – How Missive got started: "how can we quickly collaborate on an email as a team?"
• 8:15 – How they get most of their customers
• 10:30 – How their first product (Conference Badge), funded the development of Missive
• 13:55 – How the market dictates most of your success
• 16:30 – How they deal with competitors
• 28:00 – Another example: Crisp is competing head-to-head with Intercom
• 30:25 – Why indie startups should compete on price

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jsonpearl, and @helenryles
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: support@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

1. Jason Charnes
2. Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
3. Marcel Fahle, ​​wearebold.af
4. Alex Payne
5. Bill Condo
6. Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
7. Mitch
8. Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
9. Oleg Kulyk
10. Ethan Gunderson
11. Chris Willow
12. Ward Sandler, Memberspace
13. Russell Brown, Photivo.com
14. Noah Prail
15. Colin Gray
16. Austin Loveless
17. Michael Sitver
18. Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, Fathom
19. Dan Buda
20. Darby Frey
21. Brad from Canada
22. Adam DuVander
23. Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
24. Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Taylor Otwell, is the founder of Laravel, a programming framework for PHP. But he's also one of the most successful indie SaaS operators I know. In this episode we discuss:

• 0:30 – Taylor is changing how he hires and manages people at Laravel
• 6:01 – How Taylor is finding new employees to work on Forge, Vapor, and his other products
• 7:34 – The Laravel ecosystem has incubated incredible talent: Miguel Piedrafita, Caleb Porzio, Adam Wathan, Aaron Francis, Jack Ellis...
• 10:03 – More and more indie SaaS apps are being built in Laravel
• 10:48 – When is the next Laracon conference?
• 13:11 – Taylor Otwell has the classic bootstrap success story
• 14:28 – Laravel has been running too lean
• 17:00 – What's it like to work as a developer at Laravel? (pair programming)
• 18:33 – How Taylor does product development
• 22:08 – "I haven't told anyone this yet, but I actually considered selling Laravel this past year." Here's why Taylor decided not to sell.
• 26:30 – How do you deal with internet fame, and being a "known person?" 
• 28:59 – Dealing with haters on Twitter
• 31:50 – What is the future of web development, and the full-stack developer? What is the future of Ruby on Rails and Laravel?
• 35:53 – Building excitement around PHP and Laravel with young people.
• 42:13 – What inspires kids to get into programming? When it's fun, easy, accessible. This is why so many people started with Hypercard, Microsoft Access, PHP, Adobe Flash...

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jsonpearl, and @helenryles
• Email us: support@transistor.fm

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Helen and Justin talk about the importance of customer support for indie SaaS companies.

• 1:08 The hardest part about podcasting is doing it every week
• 1:38 We just launched the new podcast website themes feature.
• 2:24 Getting feedback, or seeing people use your product, is fuel for indie makers
• 6:08 Helen's experience doing Customer Success for other companies: education, ConvertKit, MakerPad.
• 8:53 Justin's tweet: "Customer Support is the most under-appreciated role in SaaS."
• 10:00 The different forms of customer support: pre-sales, in-depth bug fixing, answering questions.
• 12:45 How does the Transistor team differ when we do support?
• 14:39 What Justin's learned from Helen in terms of giving better customer service
• 17:25 People expect us to be bots
• 17:45 The number of tickets we get each week: it's about ~100 conversations per week:
  • 60-70% of those are new conversations,
  • 30-40% is us responding to existing threads.
• 18:55 How we manage live chat so we can answer people fairly quickly
• 29:10 More tips for indie hackers who are doing customer support

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jsonpearl, and @helenryles
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: support@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

1. Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
2. Marcel Fahle, ​​wearebold.af
3. Alex Payne
4. Bill Condo
5. Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
6. Mitch
7. Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
8. Oleg Kulyk
9. Ethan Gunderson
10. Chris Willow
11. Ward Sandler, Memberspace
12. Russell Brown, Photivo.com
13. Noah Prail
14. Colin Gray
15. Austin Loveless
16. Michael Sitver
17. Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, Fathom
18. Dan Buda
19. Darby Frey
20. Brad from Canada
21. Adam DuVander
22. Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
23. Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

We got the whole band together: Helen and Jason join Jon and Justin to talk about what it's really like to work at Transistor

Helen, Jason, Jon, Justin, all squeezed into the podcasting closet to make an episode

• 0:55 Jason's first podcast ever
• 1:12 Helen's been on other podcasts: Startups for the Rest of Us, Indie Bites, Indie Worldwide
• 3:06 Should we invest in the "auto publish to YouTube" feature?
  • Tom Webster: why would people listen to podcasts on YouTube?
• 13:32 The best features the ones that feel like "magic" when a customer uses them
• 18:46 The "wait and see" product development philosophy
• 20:15 A new podcast website builder CMS and website designs
• 23:34 Writing a new templating language in Liquid (Shopify)
• 26:23 Our new CLI tool: receiver (built with Go)
• 31:30 Making a few new podcast website themes
• 31:57 Adding language localization for podcast websites (English, French, Spanish)
• 34:30 How we run our weekly team meetings
• 35:44 New podcast website themes are out! (YouTube demo)
• 40:39 For next week: what questions do you have for @jsonpearl and @helenryles?
• 42:16 Patreon shout outs

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jsonpearl, and @helenryles
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: support@transistor.fm

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Jon and Justin recorded this episode sitting on the same couch!

• Photo of the Coeur de Boeuf
• The last time we were together in person: April 30, 2019 [Photo]
• 2022 roadmap planning. We're exploring what we'd like to accomplish this year. 
  • Update and improve the podcast website builder
  • Build new podcast website templates based on Liquid
  • Add tools that help podcasters promote their show
  • Continue to improve our Dynamic Audio Insertion features
  • Create new features that help podcasters monetize their show
• Sales/marketing planning:
  • Reaching out to major affiliates to see how we can better partner with them
  • Looking at ways of rewarding our customers for referring through Rewardful
  • Freemium?
• Employees/company stuff 
  • Options: Carta
  • Benefits
  • Possible hiring
• Future:
  • Long-term, we’re looking at an acquisition: what do we need to do to build up to that?

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

1. Marcel Fahle, ​​wearebold.af
2. Alex Payne
3. Bill Condo
4. Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
5. Mitch
6. Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
7. Oleg Kulyk
8. Ethan Gunderson
9. Chris Willow
10. Ward Sandler, Memberspace
11. Russell Brown, Photivo.com
12. Noah Prail
13. Colin Gray
14. Austin Loveless
15. Michael Sitver
16. Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, Fathom
17. Dan Buda
18. Darby Frey
19. Brad from Canada
20. Adam DuVander
21. Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
22. Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Jon and Justin reflect on 2021 and get excited about 2022:

• Rework podcast episode: the word "startup"
• Should we rename the show "Maintain your SaaS"? ;)
• Biggest highlights: hiring Helen and Jason
• Giving employees generous bonuses
• Justin's list of non-alcoholic drinks
• Captivate (one of our competitors) was just acquired
• Different types of founder stress
• Should we sell our company? Our friends at Rewardful were just acquired
• Plans and features for 2022

What happened in 2021?

• January: Clubhouse got popular
• March 2021: send private podcast episodes by email
• April 2021: we hired Helen
• April-May: new API updates (analytics)
• July: new podcast analytics charts + compare episodes
• July: add transcripts to episodes
• August 2021: we hired Jason
• Sept: first release of DAI
• Oct: Descript integration
• Nov: DAI mid-rolls
• Black Friday. Worth it?
• Riverside integration

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Marcel Fahle, ​​wearebold.af
• Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler, Memberspace
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

In this guest episode, Justin chats with Brian Casel.

• Bootstrapped Web podcast
• ZipMessage
• Brian's other projects

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler, Memberspace
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

In this bonus episode, Justin interviews his 18-year-old daughter, Sadie, about:

• A Gen Z perspective on podcasting
• Why women are the future of podcasting: Edison Research
  • "Now, look at the rookies – 47% are men, but the majority, 53% are women."
  • "Most women get their podcast recommendations from Spotify, social media, or their friends."
• We talk a lot about podcast advertising, podcast ads, and how the adtech industry should think differently about how they target women.
  • "Most podcast ads are just men talking to men."

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler, Memberspace
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week Jon and Justin discussed:

• Tweet: what should we talk about?
• Justin's daughter wrote an article for the Transistor blog: https://transistor.fm/gen-z/ 
• Customer case studies
• Dynamic audio insertion
• Integration with Descript
• Book: Range by David Epstein

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a review/comment on Podchaser; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler, Memberspace
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week Justin chats with Michele Hansen, founder of Geocodio. I got fired up about interviewing customers! 

• Get Michele's new book! Deploy Empathy
• Listen to Michele's podcast: Software Social
• "Empathy is a skill you can learn."
• Get Michele's newsletter
• "There's so much shame in the tech community."
• What are the boundaries for deploying empathy? When, and how, do we deliver critiques?
• Podcast: a respectful interview with a flat-earther 
• "This book isn't just about deploying empathy to customers, it's also about learning to be more empathetic to your family, friends, coworkers."
• 31:30 – we start discussing customer interviews
• "It was easier for me to learn how to have empathy for customers than it was to have empathy for myself."
• 42:27 – "how does empathy help businesses attract new customers, build better products?"
• 46:53 - "Why don't you bring Jon in on those interviews?"

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @mjwhansen
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Anton Zorin from ProdCamp.com
• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler, Memberspace
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week Jon and Justin discussed:

• Our values determine how we make decisions
• Hiring FT: we hired Jason Pearl!
• Summer SaaS slowdown
  • Tweet: worst month ever
  • ConvertKit’s public numbers

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week Spencer Fry, founder of Podia.com, joins Justin Jackson to talk about venture capital and bootstrapping.

• Spencer's tweet: "The hostility that the bootstrapper community has towards the VC community continues to perplex me."
• Justin's interview with Jason Calacanis (2013)
• VC brags
• Roy Bahat on Big Technology Podcast: Why VCs are mad
• 06:30 "Capital changes lots of dynamics in society. It's not neutral." – Justin Jackson
• Silicon Valley: No Revenue (video)
• Blog post: Podcasts and capital
• How venture capitalists make money
• The rise and fall of Quibi: from raising $1.75 billion before launch to shutting down just 6 months later
• Tweet: the negative effects of overcapitalization
• Tweet: Big-name VCs, and their hypocrisy, give VCs a bad name.
• Techcrunch: "The meeting that showed me the truth about VCs"
• Adii Pienaar on venture capital: Raising Anxiety
• Blog post: The hidden cost of bootstrapping

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @spencerfry
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week Jon and Justin discussed:

• Basecamp
  • Note: we recorded this before Casey Newton's second article on Basecamp came out.
  • Also: this article is a really thoughtful take on the whole situation.
  • Ruby/Rails open source world.
    • https://discuss.rubyonrails.org/t/effect-of-the-last-week-on-ruby-on-rails/77702 
• SO EXCITED: HELEN IS ON THE TEAM! 🎉
  • https://transistor.fm/helen/ 
• Cost/benefit analysis
  • It’s really difficult to make that calculation: should we commit to this? How do we know that the cost will be worth the benefit?
  • For example, we could invest $100k + 6 months of time into building a mobile app for private podcasts, under the assumption that it will increase the number of private podcast customers we get. But what you don’t see is:
    • How much time + energy does it really take to build it?
    • Does it attract the wrong customers?
    • How much time + energy does it take to support it?
    • How does it affect the fun + calm of running the app?
    • Is all that effort really worth it?
• Apple’s latest release is bad
  • So many bugs from Apple: https://transistor.fm/apple-podcasts-problem/ 
  • One bug in Spotify: https://transistor.fm/spotify-bug/ 

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Mitch
• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This we, we chatted about:

• Evil Crypto Teletubbies
• Voltswagon
• Fathom has acquired Google
• Jon is trying out a new private office, in a coworking space (Deskpass)
• Justin had a quick chat with Derrick Reimer, SavvyCal
• Tweet: Two years ago (March 2019), Justin posted a screenshot of our revenue numbers and we were just about to hit $10k in MRR.
  • Jason Fried: Your company history is a myth
  • Justin went full-time the next month (April 2019).
• Tweet: A mere six months after hitting $10k (April 2019), we hit $30k MRR (Oct 2019).
• This little business has given us more than we ever imagined. It’s changed our lives.
• Jon Youngfook is building Bannerbear
• Peter Suhm is building Reform
• Simon Bennett is building SnapShooter
• Tweet: There are so many productivity gurus, tips, hacks; lots of advice on how to "get more done in less time." 
  • "Not Tamagotchi. The tomato technique. Ack, what's that called?"
  • We're fine with getting a few good things done every day.
• "Gen Z is coming online now as potential customers. A whole new generation of kids is becoming adults."
• New releases on Transistor.fm:
  • Private podcasts can receive email + play on the web
  • Automatic tweet
  • Two-factor authentication
  • Import improvements

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast
• Oleg Kulyk
• Violette Du Geneville
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Diogo
• Chris Willow
• Borja Soler
• Ward Sandler
• Eric Lima
• James Sowers (like Flowers)
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Pradyumna Shembekar (PD)
• Noah Prail
• Colin Gray
• Josh Smith
• Ivan Curkovic
• Shane Smith
• Austin Loveless
• Simon Bennett
• Michael Sitver
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, 
• Dan Buda 
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto
• Dave Young
• Brad from Canada
• Sammy Schuckert
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Real humans making a business together:

• Taking the leap
• Why is Justin jealous of Ben?
• Pros and cons of building a remote company in 2021
• Limited exposure to your co-founder
• What would take to get Jon to move to Canada?
• Story: confronting a burglar with a crowbar
• The algorithm rewards you for being early
• Spending a lot of time on Clubhouse
  • Apple Podcasts going into subscription podcasts roundtable
  • “Podcasting needs better distribution”
  • “Podcasting needs better discoverability”
  • “There needs to be the Adwords for Podcasting.”
  • ☝️ BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR
• How are we going to scale our SaaS?
• How does investing $500,000 in the podcast ecosystem change the ecosystem?
• Justin's talk with Jason Calacanis

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Harris Kenny
• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Jon's back! He and Justin share their feelings/thoughts about the new year:

• Closing the door on the past
• Exciting revenue milestone
• Podcast companies losing money
  • https://podnews.net/update/pocket-casts-for-sale
  • https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/15/spotifys-big-bet-on-podcasts-is-failing-citi-says.html 
  • https://www.macrumors.com/2021/01/15/apple-podcast-subscription-service/
• Twitter's Trump ban
  • https://twitter.com/evan_greer/status/1347948903921045511
  • https://www.fastcompany.com/90592060/capitol-attack-fascism-surveillance-censorship 
  • https://medium.com/craft-ventures/section-230-mend-it-dont-end-it-e33799a43a5f 
  • https://twitter.com/Kasparov63/status/1348355023101685761
  • https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/how-big-tech-impeached-donald-trump/617643/

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week, Justin and Jason discuss the dynamics of market demand.

• Justin's original tweet
• Jason's response

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jasonfried
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

This week, Justin catches up with Simon Bennett of Snapshooter:

• Every once in a while, we highlight one of our listeners who are building their own SaaS.
• This week: Simon Bennett, comes back to tell us what's happened since he left his full-time job 7 months ago.
• Looking for automatic backups for Digital Ocean, AWS, WordPress, or Laravel? Check out https://snapshooter.io.
• Simon had just put his kids to bed (he's in the UK) and sat down in his office to have a chat with Justin.

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @MrSimonBennett
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

Justin is joined by everybody's favorite Twitter Uncle: Ian Landsman (founder of HelpSpot).

• Ian's encounter with his internet hero Joel Spolsky
• Do you get worried that this all going to go away?
• How scared should we be of the competition?
• How do you hedge your bets?
• We prognosticate about what our bootstrapper friends' blind spots are. 🤣
• We both ask for investors live, on air.
• How founders should manage their personal finances.
• How our past experience can make us blind to opportunities.
• How can devs connect with marketers?
• Which startups would we invest in.

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @ianlandsman
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Helmut Irle
• Colt Borg
• Marc Beinder
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Sofia Quintero
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”)
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin

We're back! 

• Justin's voice sounds terrible (sorry!)
• When is the next wave of economic despair going to happen?
• The maker/creator market is on 🔥 right now. How long will it last?
• How "soft" is the prosumer market? How fragile is it?
• A BUNCH OF NEW TRANSISTOR FEATURES:
  • Zapier integration
  • Podcast:locked
  • Easily submit your podcast to the major podcast directories.
  • Podcast distribution checklist
• How do you work on your startup when you're feeling down?
  • "There were weeks when I got almost nothing done because I was stressed out about the state of the world."
  • "It's hard to force yourself to do creative work if you're not feeling good emotionally."

What should we talk about next?

• Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda
• Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts.
• Email us: mail@transistor.fm

Thanks to our monthly supporters:

• Take It EV podcast
• Ethan Gunderson
• Helmut Irle
• Colt Borg
• Marc Beinder
• Anton Zorin
• Bill Condo
• Sofia Quintero
• Chris Willow
• Mason Hensley
• Borja Soler teami.io
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Travis Fischer
• Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io 
• Russell Brown
• Evandro Sasse
• Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com
• Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com
• Colin Gray alitu.com
• Josh Smith, hellosift.com
• Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”)
• Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co
• Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com 
• Dan Buda danbuda.com
• Darby Frey
• Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com
• Brad from Canada
• Mike Walker
• Adam DuVander
• Dave Giunta (JOOnta)
• Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com

• Pascal from sharpen.page
• Rewardful.com
• Greg Park
• Mitchell Davis from RecruitKit.com.au
• Marcel Fahle, wearebold.af
• Bill Condo (@mavrck)
• Ward from MemberSpace.com
• Evandro Sasse
• Austin Loveless
• Michael Sitver
• Dan Buda
• Colin Gray
• Dave Giunta

Want to start a podcast on Transistor? Justin has a special coupon for you: get 15% off your first year of hosting: transistor.fm/justin