00:00.67
tylerking
We hit a kind of medium level milestone um medium medium level. We hit None air are which you know when you're small, you're like every you're like every time we ten x we'll celebrate and then you get bigger and you're like every time we double and now I'm like we added. Ah.

00:00.88
Rick
What's up this week Tyler um, media level. That's awesome.

00:20.19
tylerking
You know, 15% or whatever and that's we got to celebrate something right? Yeah balllthough you can change what around is is 3 point 5 really all that round. But anyway yeah, we're None error so I'm happy about that.

00:23.43
Rick
We we added. Ah, it's a round number we need to celebrate.

00:33.40
Rick
Ah, the um I was going to say like you're worth $35000000 now at 10 x multiples.

00:39.50
tylerking
Yeah, well maybe maybe according to yesterday's multiples I am I'm not sure that companies are going for that anymore. Yeah I this is going to sound so stupid. But I especially like I hate um, appearing like I am exaggerated. There's so much exaggeration in business.

00:46.76
Rick
Well, it's pretty cool.

00:59.00
tylerking
And then any what time I'm talking about revenue I always have to be like well we're like 3 point None ar because I don't want to say None and be technically wrong and now I can say None and all round down and that's much easier. Yeah, right? Yeah, um.

01:09.12
Rick
Until you hit 4 and then you'll go or 3.75 or something like that and yeah.

01:17.46
tylerking
We're we're having a big party as a company in August for we I kind of regret this. We celebrate user milestones instead of ah revenue milestones so we're celebrating Twenty Five Thousand users which we hit during the pandemic but we've got a big party coming up for that. Yeah.

01:30.42
Rick
Who who do people when you hit Milestones like this and you get excited about it. Do they also get excited about it or is this something that um is just sure like everyone's like and then moves all other day.

01:41.86
tylerking
No people. Ah so stuff if if I'm like post something in slack like I posted this none thing in slack and people give some emoji reactions and like that's the end of it. No one cared at all. Um I think you can signify you can get people to care by making it a big deal. So like. Ah, a minor version of this is like get swag for it like get a t-shirt or coffee mug or whatever that says like celebrates the milestone whether it's shipping a feature hitting a revenue goal people care about that more? Um, we make a point so we we have parties at our office twice a year maybe we make a point of when we're celebrating something doing it different like renting out a venue doing something different and that way it feels a little more special for people and they do respond to that I think yeah, yeah, and then I all are good. Oh thank you.

02:28.67
Rick
Um, that's awesome I mean ah I think I think you're always so good at celebrating I Just want to call you out for that I think you're really good at it. Um, and a lot of people who are driven are not.

02:41.50
tylerking
Let me ah, let me say something also that people might like None reason you might skip it over is because like you're you're on to the next thing your work and also like the celebration is often like a month and a half after you hit the milestone because like you need time to plan it and stuff. 1 of the coolest things about celebrations in my experience is years later when you're when you're hanging out with like None people and like only 3 were around for that old milestone. It's kind of like telling war stories sort of I do think most of the benefit of creating memories like that. Doesn't it's not in the moment but it like sets up long-term culture where then the new people are like wow I can't wait for the people talk so much about the None user party like literally Robert on our team met his like like life partner there. Like things happened at this event and like newer people like I can't wait for the 25 k party because like that everyone talks about the None k party. So fondly. So yeah, absolutely the the thing I regret though is we raise prices. So now. Our user growth is close to flat even though our revenue growth is still going up and so like.

03:40.21
Rick
That's awesome. Let's get let's go get more users.

03:51.44
tylerking
We're not going to be able to celebrate another year user milestone for a long long time. Yeah yeah, that's true. But I think probably the next party will be revenue based but like a None maybe that'd be nice. Ah yeah, what's going on with you.

03:53.61
Rick
Until you're you crack the code on some of your marketing stuff. Nice, nice. Um I am ramping up sort sort of my ah. Last time we updated I was sort of refocusing my energy on leg up hell to things that actually helped Jd grow the business versus like worrying about things that don't matter and so since then I have started ramping up even more activity in that regard. So I've signed up for several um in-person networking events in Utah. Um, in July and August and these kind of serve two purposes I can go there and you know develop opportunities for windfall I can go there and develop opportunities for leg of Health New opportunities may present themselves and so it's like ah None of the best uses of time for me and the situation I'm in. So.

04:47.73
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.

04:49.91
Rick
I'm I'm got None of networking stuff planned who knows what it'll lead to but it's great. Um, and then um, we are evaluating chambers of commerce we actually made a decision on this today. So I put this on here and then of course our meetings on Thursdays and so we made a decision.

05:07.65
tylerking
It's too late. It's too late to talk about it. Okay, cool.

05:08.62
Rick
But I'm not going to tell you the decision and we're going to talk about this as if I hadn't made the decision and then we'll see whether you agreed with me or not so um, we are you member of any chambers of commerce. Okay have you ever joined a chambers of commerce.

05:20.00
tylerking
No I'm not I never have I ah, we've kind of like so Alex on our team who's very like schmoozy and likes to like work with people on stuff. He is.

05:25.74
Rick
With less snowing serium.

05:34.78
Rick
This guy is a normal person who is somewhat salesy. He is not. He's a business. He's their only salesperson at let us no zero he he he's.

05:38.38
tylerking
He no, but but he's like on boards of nonprofits and stuff like that like he he gets it. He likes to have his fingers and lots of different things. He has a lot of involvement with our various local chambers and he's actually got like a I Forget what the title is but like a.

05:54.78
Rick
Do you pay for that or does he like sort of volunteer his time in exchange for it.

05:55.51
tylerking
He's on like the board of some regional. I think it's most I think we pay like a very very small amount because we are not a member of the chamber that it what it is. It's a a coalition of so St Louis is a very fragmented area and so there's like 15 chambers of commerce and so it's not actually a chamber but it's like they're trying to unite everybody. Anyway, yeah right? I'm of the opinion though I don't understand what the fuck chambers of commerce are for. They seem totally worthless to me.

06:19.28
Rick
It's some sort of membership association with some purpose to drive business for it. Okay.

06:26.67
Rick
Okay, so that's what I thought you'd say um so generally like if you go to a chamber of commerce website. The value proposition is pay some fee per month at a base level. You'll get access to um, an inepperson networking events virtual events. Um, you'll get access to a member. Directory. Um, you'll they'll you know use that money to ah work towards general business initiatives either public policy initiatives or whatever to help you succeed as a business owner. Um, so think of it as like a place where business owners come together to help each other. Um i. Since like a pelt started started like a pelt I've not joined any chambers of commerce um, but we started talking about it as a source of of sort of networking and we started looking into chambers of commerce. There are lots of chambers of commerce and Utah there's this Salt Lake city chamber of commerce there's the draper chamber of commerce there are the. South Valley I don't know what they call it. But there's the provo one. There's the park city one. There's the north up north one. There's the down south one like we have a list of 10 yeah and they range in price from like none a year to like the most expensive 1 is $1500 a year to join as a member.

07:31.13
tylerking
Okay, same as St Louis then yeah

07:44.98
Rick
And so we were going through and like how do we test this like you know like is this a good use of of resources like joining um like all of the ones in like our major msa like areas like major population pockets would have been like it's like $4000 and so um, the question becomes like what do we do like should we join these chambers of commerce. Or should we not? um and you kind of start having these conversations around you know what's the math like how many clients do we need to get to ah roi and you know it's roughly $100 like we want to spend less than hundred dollars in marketing to get you know 1 client so 48 $ 4000 divided by one hundred forty clients do we believe we can do that we have no idea like.

08:22.39
tylerking
Right? what.

08:24.35
Rick
Um, but but you know I want to know what like you would do in this situation where you've got this marketing potential marketing Channel. There's like it's $4000 like I don't know if that's expensive or not. It doesn't seem that expensive. Um, but it's a lot of money. Um. For your commitment.. What would you? How would you evaluate this.

08:41.85
tylerking
Um, yeah, So first of all I I It's all relative but I don't think $4000 and no one can think it's that expensive, especially because like there's no reason you need to do these all at once right like I don't think there's a benefit. Ah, if anything the opposite might be true that like you you that this is a networking play right? You go you talk to people you shake hands and that's how you get the clients here like you don't get to like send an email blast. All the members right? well.

09:09.30
Rick
I don't know I think that's possible like with Pando we we do have potentially that opportunity. But we're a sponsor at Pando not just a member.

09:14.66
tylerking
Okay, so it's always the case I would say like start small and give it a shot and see how it goes and I I think that's especially the case here because it kind of feels like you can't be an authentic member of 10 different chambers of commerce at the same time. Ah. So I think my instinct is pick one and see how it goes what where'd you end up, you're doing all of them where you were.

09:35.61
Rick
All of them all of them. Um I started where you were and by the time I was talking to Jd I was like we are overcomplicating this It's time to go and let's just throw all our eggs into this thing for like and go and some of some of them will work some of them won't You're going to develop a relationship somewhere that's going to get you in the door. We don't know which one that is maybe they'll all work. Maybe they all. We're probably not going to attend many meetings. But what we what we discovered was one. Our business is Utah focused so like any avenue that provides.

09:57.70
tylerking
But he can't he can't attend all of these meetings. Can he.

10:12.77
Rick
Local marketing like localized like Utah targeted marketing is like a special one for us because most of like if you go to like? let's say we go to a payroll company. Want to partner with like paychecks like they're a national company like we can't serve them like most of like the really good part. It's really hard to find like pockets of local marketing groups. 2

10:13.72
tylerking
Like yeah like.

10:23.41
tylerking
Is what.

10:31.54
Rick
Um, we aren't We don't necessarily need to attend events to get value out of the chambers when when you're reaching out to consumers or small business Owners Affinity is actually a really important thing to differentiate yourself So like being a member of something with someone.

10:48.22
tylerking
Someone.

10:49.95
Rick
Actually like creates some persuasion that um because I I am one of you so this has already worked at Pando where it's like hi I am you know Rick Linquist I'm a member of Pando. You're a member of Pando we have that in common. We're also you know this we should talk you know and get to know each other. Um, and so we we do believe that we'll increase um the response rates like we're going to reach out to these people without being a chamber of commerce member versus being a being a member like the the response rate will go up. That's one hypo out thissis 2 um is we get access to the member directories. And and so it's effectively like I don't know how many members they all have but like it's like $4000 for um, one supporting local businesses I can get behind that 2 ah a you know list of people to reach out to and build relationships with and 3 in-person. Um ah other opportunities like in-person events. To attend for $4000 so I just pulled the trigger and said let's do all of them.

11:50.22
tylerking
So okay, that seems fine again I don't think $4000 is that big of a bet to place but like in what way was it complicating things to only do half of them.

11:59.45
Rick
Thinking about it too much instead of just going after going after it. Oh let's think about how to make this precise and experiment and then it's like oh how we going to know if it's successful like you don't know like at the end of the sure.

12:11.78
tylerking
We yeah but couldn't you have just gone after it with 1 of them and then like like a week later do the next one? yeah yeah I guess panda I wasn't thinking that pando you you already had some validation that this works but um.

12:19.80
Rick
Sure sure we could have we've already done that with Pando I know.

12:31.22
tylerking
Because I yeah I think generally there's also benefit with marketing to start small to to be focused right? So you're not spreading yourself too thin.

12:38.10
Rick
Yeah, and this in this case, it's like listen like if if our business works and we're growing. It's this stuff this will work and it will be ah the base level of our marketing budget will be joining membership associations that are you tough focus like if if our business works this will work if this.

12:45.31
tylerking
This board? yeah.

12:57.86
Rick
Doesn't work our business probably doesn't work and like we need to like stop doing this so like let's go. It was so that was like the logic and it's like let's just like you have this resource. Let's use it and maximize it and in a year we'll evaluate what we want to pay whether we want to pay $4000 again but

13:11.19
tylerking
All right fair enough reality. Yeah.

13:13.77
Rick
But the reality is like if like we get anything from this and it leads to like 1 relationship 2 relationships 10 relationships I don't know it's probably going to be worth the four thousand dollars spend just to because of what that ping pong's into.

13:23.26
tylerking
Yeah, if the if the choice was spend the $4000 or spend 0 There's no question. It's worth the bet I still I don't think I'm convinced that like you shouldn't have just started with a smaller subset. But I I don't think it matters much so I'm not like well.

13:36.88
Rick
We are spark like the 4000 is a smaller subset of all chambers in Utah it is a targeted list of chambers. But the difference between like how do you pick between Salt Lake cities chamber and park cities chambers like we won't both like go. Let's just do both like stop like overcomplicating this and we'll see what happens.

13:41.63
tylerking
Oh.

13:48.15
tylerking
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, cool. Well ah what?? How long do you think it'll be before we like like J D's going after it right away like might we got updates on this soon.

13:55.73
Rick
So it felt good to do that make that decision.

14:03.82
Rick
That's a good question. Um, we have so many plates spinning right now in terms of experiments. This is just another one. We're adding um so it'll be interesting to see sort of how fast we move on this but I anticipate probably in None to either the next episode or the episode after that we'll probably have. Some insight into whether this was you know you know leading to immediate opportunity or more of a long haul but we are but like like brand I need leg up health to be a brand like something that has brand awareness with small businesses. Um Jd does too and it's like let's.

14:24.20
tylerking
Yeah, cool like.

14:37.39
Rick
Let's spend money to do that, Especially when it's like multifaceted and has multiple opportunities of success.

14:40.92
tylerking
Yeah, that may like kind of my version of this is we have we we list ourselves on all these like online marketplaces like G 2 and kept terra and it's actually a pretty big part of our marketing and ever anytime someone comes along and it's like this podunk little. Marketing directory thing. We're like yep, let's go put our profile up on there like we want to be everywhere like.

14:59.90
Rick
Yes, it's It's like it's like a cost of doing business the way you're doing but like where we want to do business So that's that's how that's how I got to it. That's a great analogy is the G two stuff in the software space. Um, anyway I thought that was interesting. Um maybe I just wasted money but I don't think I did.

15:06.18
tylerking
Yeah, right now. Cool. Yeah I I want to hear more. Um, another update here. We've got a new searm coach just started so we actually had 3 so see as a reminder to people seam coaches are kind of our customer service position. Um, we for. Went like two and a half years with no one leaving the team and just kind of very experienced team and then this year a couple people left and then None person wanted to switch to a dev roll so we ended up hiring 3 new ah serum coaches this year and this is the third so the team.

15:43.79
Rick
Nice.

15:46.77
tylerking
Yeah I mean like not the the team has not grown. It's the same number of people. But ah, it's kind of fun to it sucks losing people obviously but it's it You know brings a new energy in and and we kind of keep getting better at hiring and so always fun onboarding a new person and this also means one of the old cm coaches is about to start training to be a deaf which is.

16:04.26
Rick
That is so man that is such a cool man I Always forget like you have this story of hey come join us as a so customer service person get paid a lot of money and then if you want to start a career as ah as a software developer like how many other companies have that pathway.

16:06.90
tylerking
Exciting.

16:14.34
tylerking
Um, yeah, we we actually have limited it a little so serum coaches get 20% time one day a week they can work on other projects. It used to be like if you want to learn to code during that one day a week go for it. We have changed it a little where it's like you can work on any project you want but it has to actually be a project for the company. It can't just be pure personal development. Um, but this person went and did launch code which is kind of like a boot camp type of thing so she kind of got the basics there. We gave her a. You know, not like a super hard interview but enough to be like do you know how loops work and if statements like do you get the basics of programming. She did great on it and so we're like all right like you did enough on your own that now we can take you from here.

17:01.81
Rick
So cool. Um, and who like does she report into like Rob Robert um and to see like does he get excited about stuff like this or is it like work for him and okay, yeah, cool.

17:05.43
tylerking
Robert yeah, um, oh yeah, no, he's great. But so I have taught because I run the fellowship which is where we teach people to code I have taught a lot of people how to code he's the manager of the dev team. So we're going to do is. This new person who's joining the team I'm going to handle the first I don't know if it'll be a month or a couple months I'm kind of going to be the like you're in training mode I'm going to teach you how to code and then hand her off to Robert to be like now you get to learn how to code like a professional. Ah. Because I don't know how anymore.

17:43.16
Rick
That's smart because then like Rob Robert doesn't get distracted. He can stay focused on the day-to day and then once that person is sort of productive take them onto the team and that's cool. You also get to inject your sort of personal employer brand approach to it.

17:50.19
tylerking
Yeah.

17:55.48
tylerking
It helps me too because like I don't want to control what the Dev team like if they're like are we going to use react or vue as our frontend Framework I don't want to make that like you got you guys do what you want but I do kind of want a certain attitude of the developers which is like. Get shit Done. Don't fixate too much on technical purity that type of thing and I like getting to leave my mark on people before they go because the reality is professional software engineers tend to do a lot of navel gazing and get a little too into that Stuff. So I like having the first part.

18:28.31
Rick
Yeah, you want to ingest you want to you want to like basically brainwash them into your culture. Yeah, it's good. Yeah, but it's so it's yeah yeah I want to hear about this next one.

18:33.65
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, exactly brainwashing is an ugly term but like as a startup founder. You're constantly brainwashing people. Absolutely um, Okay, yeah, so I feel like in in the last number of episodes. Ah I haven't brought great topics and when I do I'm always like. I don't have anything interesting to say about this I commented on this last time that I keep saying that. Yeah I guess but but but I was like I didn't used to come in thinking that and I was trying to figure out why and the the best answer I could come up with is I'm kind of in a.

18:54.31
Rick
Yeah, and people then people go like I'm super interested in what you had to say Tyler. So I just I don't think. Ah yeah.

19:11.96
tylerking
I'm I'm in a manager mode right now because of summer we have a bunch of interns I'm running the fellowship I'm going on vacation a bunch which means the weeks I am working I'm stuff's piling up so the economy is crashing I just spend 50% of my day looking at the price of bitcoin ah hoping it goes down to be clear.

19:19.92
Rick
The economy's crashing.

19:30.97
tylerking
Um, more on that later. Ah yeah I think I'm just not diving deeply into much work right now and so I come here and all I can do is talk about what other people are doing and as a result I don't have anything to say about it I'm just like here's an update someone did a thing. I have nothing else to say about it whereas I feel like when you're deep into something you come across all these little insights right? You're designing something and you're like why isn't this design working. Oh It's because this interaction of things doesn't work and then you abstract it to some bigger lesson and then like that becomes a podcast topic I don't have that type of work going on right now now.

20:04.78
Rick
Um.

20:08.23
tylerking
I was about to say I don't have anything interesting to say about that. But I think I do but um, yeah, well so so here's my thought on this is a thing I've been battling with my whole career at less annoying and we've talked about it before is.

20:11.63
Rick
Ah, so at your reflection on why you don't have good updates turned into a good update. Ah.

20:26.33
tylerking
I want more growth than we have now like revenue growth but do I like how big do I really want the team to get because I think this is foreshadowing what it would be like to be the Ceo of a say 50 person company is I'd come on this podcast because the thing is what what normal ceos do is they talk about all that stuff the chamber of commerce bullshit. They're not not like what you're doing but like what Alex is doing right? They like oh yeah, I've been meeting with people and shaking hands and form in partnerships and like that's so boring to me and the fact that I don't have interesting work to talk about when we have all these interns makes me kind of nervous about like would I enjoy my job if we had. 50 employees.

21:08.50
Rick
That is an interesting question. Ah my general gut like you don't you could design I feel like the Ceo Founder Ceo role of choice like that you were happy with with more employees I just I think you could do that? um.

21:09.99
tylerking
This is.

21:24.44
tylerking
That's true. It'd be kind of a nontraditional. It's not what like people think of as a Ceo though right.

21:28.20
Rick
Yeah, yeah, but I do think like when you own your own company. You can build. Ah, you can kind of build a rollout how you want to spend your time. Um and but you have to hire someone to do the stuff that you don't want to do.

21:39.98
tylerking
Right? So let's dive into this a little a kind of classic thing I shouldn't say classic. It's it's not the most the most common path is the Ceo is a classic tall handsome man with a full head of hair type Ceo you know, um Rick over here with all his hair while I'm over here balding.

21:56.68
Rick
Without tall without the tall and or the hands apart.

21:58.82
tylerking
Ah, well, you're taller than me. But um, but like what like the most common thing is that but we have seen a ah number of times where this the founder wants to stay being the Ceo but doesn't want to do classic Ceo stuff so they hire a Ceo. That kind of does the classic Ceo stuff like I feel like Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg are probably the highest profile version of this. Um, so I've got to follow but like that's what you're saying basically and that seems fine to you.

22:29.64
Rick
Yeah I would say that um I don't yeah yeah, generally yes.

22:34.62
tylerking
Um, so like why not make Sheryl Sandberg the Ceo I really she's leaving so this I mean like the Sheryl Sandberg of five years ago but like ah why not hire someone else to be Ceo and just like it. It feels like a ah bit disingenuous to me I guess.

22:49.71
Rick
I Mean you're still like the ultimate decision maker. You're still responsible for making sure there's money in the bank. You're still responsible for like driving clarity of the organization and all the important things you're just not actively managing the day-to-day I think that's I don't know that.

22:52.68
tylerking
Um, yeah.

23:07.29
Rick
That's I think the important role of a Ceo is not managing people day-to-day. Um I guess is what I'm trying to say.

23:12.70
tylerking
Um, got you? Okay, that makes sense and then there's other versions like wp engine with Jason Cohen where or or lucid with our our friend Ben Dilts who ah just hired a different Ceo and kind of steps down from doing that.

23:26.52
Rick
Um, stays on the board.

23:31.54
tylerking
Yeah, and like I mean tech like the Ceo reports to the owner. So technically you still get to make whatever decisions you want if you hire a Ceo it's just what's the what's the breakdown of yeah I don't know your involvement in all that.

23:41.69
Rick
Yeah I guess this could kind of gets into semantics of titles is like who cares like call them. Whatever you want to call the person. Whatever you want to call them give them clear roles and responsibilities but ultimately Shareholders make the decisions and that's how it works at you know any company.

23:53.23
tylerking
Yeah, so we probably don't have this situation I don't have a decision to make because we're not growing that fast so like unless we were growing really fast. This isn't this won't come up but I would have a decision to make if we ever get growth back like on track of. Would I rather be the Ceo like a real Ceo and have the company become that next level up but I'm not sure if I would like it maybe I would maybe I'd grow into it but maybe not or would I rather hire either a Ceo or like whatever I would be a Ceo and name only but like actually create a different role and be like the. Head of product or something. Um, yeah I don't have to figure that out but that's just like a thing in the back of my head.

24:35.51
Rick
Ah, a different vantage point of this. Um, what what this conversation got me thinking about is like would you if do you look at lack of growth as ah as a threat to the the ability for the for your company to last. And and if so like would you regret not investing in growth as a result of like maybe being dead one day. Yeah.

24:56.43
tylerking
Right? to to be clear. We are investing I'm not like deciding not to grow just it's happening to us. But um, so yeah, there's the financial side of like if we don't grow enough to like pay people and give people raises that wouldn't be good. Um I mentioned. Ah so. While we had our podcast hiatus and I was doing a podcast with Drew Riley from trends we did a book report on small giants which I think there are flaws to the book. But overall worth reading and one of the points that it made that I thought was interesting. Um, one of the companies in the book was. I forget the name of the parent company but the company that runs shake shack so when the book was written this restaurant group had decided to stay small since then obviously they changed right? They're like huge now and one of the I forget if it's in the book or if I read this separately. They did like they went back and they were like what the fuck you were a small giant. And now you're shake shack what happened and they basically said like you have to create the the main reason we wanted to grow is to create opportunities for employees to step into new levels of responsibility if you stop opening new restaurants if you stop expanding. Everyone is stuck where they are so I to. This is a long way of addressing your question of do I think that I don't think the company would die from an economic standpoint if our growth stalled but I do worry that it would affect who would want to work here and that maybe some of the current employees would feel like they're stagnating at the same time I've asked them if they want to work at a bigger company and they're all like. No like keep it below None or else this is going to lose all the stuff I like about it. So maybe just everyone can't get what they want? yeah.

26:33.72
Rick
Yeah, that's it's interesting things to think about like as you um, decide how much to care about certain things like growth versus ah something you know an internship program. Um.

26:45.33
tylerking
Yeah, for sure. So my next update's going to be long. So why don't we bounce back to you.

26:50.27
Rick
Ah, all right? cool. This is um, a quick one but early on I don't know if you remember this but I had this picture when I built like when we built like a pelt I like built it around an ideal customer journey that I had where I was like people are going to like this person is going to you know. Buy their end marketplace policy and then a year is going to go by and then they're going to try to get ahold of their agent or someone to help them and they're going to not be able to get a hold of anyone and they're going to get frustrated and they're going to go online and search Google and they're going to find legup health and they'll be like this is the perfect solution that's going to solve all my problems they're going to create an account. Add their policy. They're gonna make us their agent. They're going to get their question answered and they're going to be like telling their friends about it that happened last week and

27:38.59
tylerking
That's awesome. Talk like can you can you specific I know it it followed like you just said it but like specifically.

27:41.93
Rick
Yeah, so um, I'll try I feel always uncomfortable talking about specific medical issues. So like I want to talk about this in the context of ah ah, a made up medical issue versus the one that actually like started it but like basically this person um needed a ah service.

27:51.51
tylerking
Sure.

28:01.19
Rick
Um, and they weren't sure whether or not their policy covered it and at what level they had originally enrolled through ah in the market Utah marketplace through a agent who they called and emailed and wasn't responding. They started searching online. They found Legup Health they ah created they. They um, called or submitted a contact form jd answers the phone says what's up hey like I'm trying like I need to make it a a medical decision I cannot get the answer to this question. Can you please help me? um Jd goes. This is what we do. Um, here's how we can do to work with you. You please create an account so we can import your policy. Um, and we'll import your policy get you your questions answered and then you know if you want to you can make us your agent. Ah and then.

28:42.94
tylerking
Yeah, and sorry pause I I know you can't say the specifics but the question might be something like if I go to this hospital will this be covered something along those lines.

28:52.18
Rick
It was like 1 is this thing covered. It's a unique situation blah blah blah like like is this covered at all and then you know that leads to where and how much and all that kind of stuff. Um, and so you know but just like.

28:56.10
tylerking
Um.

29:02.15
tylerking
Yeah, okay, cool.

29:08.67
Rick
We entered the phone we started the text conversation after that. Um we continued the text conversation over the next week she's now our client. Yeah thrilled.

29:10.40
tylerking
That's awesome.

29:15.61
tylerking
That's so cool and happy right? Like there's a type of marketing and sales where you're like we badgered this person into giving us money even though they weren't sure but this is like the absolute kind of win win the like capitalism made the world better type of scenario. That's awesome.

29:30.24
Rick
Yep, and ah, yeah, like it just man if I could just figure out how to do make that happen more? Um, yeah, so yeah, go ahead.

29:35.69
tylerking
Yeah dude I sorry at the risk of making this about me. Um I totally get what you're saying we we just got the none round of feedback from demand Maven the marketing consult I I can't believe that wasn't one of my updates here. There's a none round coming. But None of the things they said because they did all this research on our customers in the buying journey and all that they were like as soon as your ideal customer finds you they stop looking for serums they are not comparing you with other ones they've already tried None other ones and hated them all and the second they so they they don't even need to get that deep in the none they find out who you are. They're like. Oh this is what I've been looking for the whole time and their search stops immediately and I heard that I was just like fuck. Yeah, a and b but wait. Why aren't we bigger than we are then and which is the same thing. You just said how do we find more of these and and yeah, that's the challenge.

30:24.30
Rick
Ah, what? yes is that phase 2

30:30.83
tylerking
Yeah, so phase one of this project is demand Maven kind of getting all this feedback and figuring out what's the right positioning. What's the language who's the right buyer things like that and then phase 2 is like okay, how do we go out and actually get those people so on probably not a lot of the well.

30:41.50
Rick
Does that mean you could charge more.

30:50.49
tylerking
Maybe a little bit. Um, but None of their findings and going into a demand maven was like we should do a price analysis right? and I was like no, we're not going to raise prices no matter what you say and they were kind of like okay nubs. But um I mean they you know theyre a marketing agency. Of course they want to recommend that. Ah, because that's a good idea. Normally. But they did find they were like yeah your customers are very price. Sensitive. Um, yeah, and there's going to be more and more of that by the way with like the economy doing what it's doing I think like.

31:10.71
Rick
So yeah, it's interesting like you're you're for the person who doesn't want to spend a lot of money on Crm that is frustrated with all the other crms which means you can.

31:25.43
tylerking
Businesses that are a cheaper alternative to other things that's going to make more and more sense. It's my guess. Um, anyway sorry I didn't mean to hijack your topic but like great feeling I congrats on that.

31:33.97
Rick
No yeah, thank you? Um, if you figure something out with demand Maven that's transferable like I would love to like pull that out of you.

31:39.83
tylerking
Yeah I think I'm I think I know what they're going to say because they they did say how are people currently finding us the None main channels. They always say everyone says like don't say word to mouth that's bullshit like that's not a real channel. They said that's one so a professional gave me permission to say word of mouth is how we get customers. And then the second is seo so I'm guessing. They're going to say seo is how you get more.

32:02.77
Rick
So that was I I know how to do Seo and I'll just say like that's another thing I I should update you on after this before I forget about it I forgot to put that on here. But the second the word of mouth. What are the levers for word of mouth like.

32:16.34
tylerking
Know Yeah I don't know.

32:18.58
Rick
Obviously I would love to hear what they come up with it for that because I think the chamber kind of commerce ultimately is a word of mouth investment. Um, but I don't know how to like so like Jet like it's not It's not like someone you can measure whether someone is searching a term and clicking your site and then converting it's very like. You know pie in the sky.

32:37.96
tylerking
Yeah I realized that your product is very different from my product but like for me the way I've been thinking about this is like product led growth. Word of mouth is one part of product led growth that you almost can't control like you can make people happy. But. You can't create the situation where they bump into somebody who's looking for a Crm um, and they happen to say to him but all the other product like growth things is related to word of mouth like making it so that when someone uses your product. They naturally want other people to doing freemium stuff like that. Um.

33:12.80
Rick
Yeah, it's almost like ah it's almost like a it creates virality like there's there's like a you create a virus of some kind or people infect each other. Yeah yeah.

33:14.21
tylerking
Ah, yeah, it.

33:18.69
tylerking
Yeah I think virality is 1 big category of there's actually a book called product like growth that walks through all the different options I actually think it's a really good book. Um, but yeah, that's one of the big ones I well I I don't know if they invented it or they popular I think the book was early enough that they can kind of take credit for it.

33:29.24
Rick
That's a very original original name.

33:35.36
Rick
Well that is awesome I will pick like since you brought up seo. So um, we already wanted to do like a phase two of seo because we have good tracks on Seo but we're not investing in it and I just don't have time j d is not good used to his time. He's best doing.

33:52.34
tylerking
Yeah.

33:54.35
Rick
Outreach and stuff. So um, it just so happened that someone on Linkedin reached out to me and it was a person like just saying hey I just wanted to connect with you kind of annoying Linkedin message but but it was I looked at her profile and it was so well positioned and messaged. It was like copywriting services I was like this is good.

34:07.82
tylerking
Well this.

34:13.28
Rick
So I replied I was like you're a really good copywriter positioning you know like I'm impressed with your profile. Um, she ends up like winning to quin school sable I didn't know this but like we have personal connections. So I'm going to try to talk to her about doing some contract work for us on Seo um, but like I'm just I'm finding myself. Because I have increased conviction around the business I'm just finding myself going like let's get let's place more bets. Let's place more bets. Let's get more going. Um and and figuring out ways for me not to be the limiter of of opportunity. Um, which is why I think I say yes to all the chambers like.

34:46.22
tylerking
Um, yeah, why? yeah.

34:51.96
Rick
How do I get? how do I get Seo moving um is another another thing without my time being a limiter given that I'm not full time on the business. Do you have any thoughts about that.

35:00.38
tylerking
yeah well yeah I mean I'm going through the same thing and I'm I'm waiting to hear what demand Maven tells because I I don't know how to do I know how Seo used to work which is like hire some person and on the other side of the world but just so because you can pay them less to like write. 50 crappy articles a day and get long tail search volume from that and then probably do a little onsite optimization to convert those people my impression is that does not work anymore and the reason it sucks that that doesn't work anymore like my impression is you have to like write really good. Insightful stuff. Which is good for the world. I'm glad that Google is this isn't my experience as a user of Google but what marketers say is Google is doing a better job of only sending traffic to high quality stuff. Um, but it also means fewer people can write it. Like you could write really great content on health benefits stuff. But if the point is to remove you as a bottleneck who else could write that I have no idea I I don't know.

35:53.64
Rick
Yep.

35:59.99
Rick
But that's why like I saw this person who seemed to like be able to write well like to my standard. Um and so I'm like yeah I guess that's the thing like so there's going to be. It's going to be more expensive potentially for her to get the knowledge to be able to write but and then it's still not going to be as.

36:06.78
tylerking
But she doesn't know anything about Health insurance right.

36:16.23
tylerking
Yeah, this has always been. My problem is like it's not about saving my time. The problem is I am not a domain expert in the topics that bring crm traffic like like if the thing I'm so jealous of a competitor of ours closed dot close I O or maybe.

36:18.26
Rick
Yeah, that's interesting. So it may not work.

36:27.54
Rick
Um.

36:35.84
tylerking
They get the dot com I don't know close is a cerm and their founder is stllli Fd who's like in our circle like in the kind of microconf community stuff but he's like he's a sales Guy. He knows all these sales tricks he you can just when you hear him talk you're like yeah this guy sells and he writes great content and I'm just like. I Don't know any of the stuff he's talking about So How do I compete with that.

36:56.34
Rick
So you're saying and like the kind of the new Seo world domain expertise is like and is a is a necessary first step good writing a second and um and as a result like it's hard to outsource it to a non-demain expert.

37:04.67
tylerking
Yeah. Ah, a question I have is because I was just listening to a podcast I think it was startups for the rest of us with Rob Walling and he was with Asia Asia aranio who is the head of demand maven so she's the person I hired. Um, she was saying.

37:23.62
Rick
Um.

37:28.37
tylerking
I think it was that it might have but it might not have been that episode someone was saying on something I was listening to recently you expect a writer if you hire like an Seo agency or something like that you expect a writer to write one piece of content every two weeks I was like wow that is a lot less than I thought. What's your reaction to hearing that.

37:48.64
Rick
I mean how much are you paying the person I would think that would cost like None okay

37:52.70
tylerking
Yeah, so I think those days are gone I think but but what they didn't get into and I wish I'm curious about this is that because the assumption is this person is not a domain expert and a lot of that time is spent doing the research.

38:06.50
Rick
Maybe.

38:08.34
tylerking
Like can could someone who doesn't know anything about health insurance but is a great writer spend two weeks reading about a topic and then write like a really badass post on it.

38:17.14
Rick
Yeah, yeah I think I think you could do that with but a smart person. There's a good writer can do that about just about anything but then like you you so but but I think what? what's interesting here is there is sort of like the more you use the same writer.

38:23.24
tylerking
Yeah.

38:33.99
tylerking
More yeah.

38:34.71
Rick
The more domain expertise they build and the higher the return on Investment. So What I'm thinking about now is there's probably like a test What I'm thinking about with this particular contractor is I'll probably do a test post on something more generic and then just see like does does like do we work Well together. You know is the content like good um is it postable like how much. Editing is involved if that goes well like rather than do more blog posts like it's probably a big piece of content. That's lots and lots of words and lots lots of pages that is a core piece and then spawns multiple posts from that and so I'm I'm starting to think about this project.

38:59.31
tylerking
Ah.

39:12.22
Rick
Differently than it's not just a blog post writer. It's probably ah, a blog post test small piece of content tests to validate and then a big project that leads to lots of little little pieces of content because of because of the investment in the domain expertise thing anyway that that helped me think through it. Thank you.

39:21.67
tylerking
That makes sense. Ah, sorry to belabor this but I I talked a while back about the book traction by Gabriel Weinberg um which lists all these different traction channels and I was kind of interested when I hit that that they so do Seo and content marketing is 2 different channels. Um. Which which what you were just saying kind of made me think of that and they're basically saying Seo is target the keywords and get the people to come to your site who are searching for stuff content marketing I'm probably slightly oversimplifying it. But it's right content. So good people are going to share it.

39:59.17
Rick
Yeah, kind it's content manufacturing and Seo is figuring out how to take that content and scientifically manipulate Google.

40:06.95
tylerking
Yeah, but the the way I interpreted this book is like it's not the same content probably right? Yeah, okay, that's fair. Um, yeah I guess it didn't talk about the repurposing but like.

40:12.75
Rick
Oh you know you got to repurpose it but a good Seo person is able to do that if the content's already written. Yeah.

40:24.80
tylerking
The idea that like write this one really massive great article. That's probably bad for Seo because it's like you just spent a lot of time ah like one page cannot be that's great for seo probably but it's much more likely to get shared. It's much more likely to um, really engage people who actually land on it. So um.

40:38.53
Rick
I like it.

40:44.80
tylerking
Have some more updates but I feel like you've got a big topic that we definitely want time for. Do you want to do your topic and then if I have time for my updates later I'll squeeze a minute at the end.

40:52.56
Rick
It's kind of related to the Seo thing. So maybe this is um, something we can talk more about as I dive into it. But maybe as a precursor like here's what I'm here's what I'm thinking like I've mentioned chambers of commerce as an investment I feel really good about that I've mentioned um. Seo as an investment we're going to do that. The I have expertise in chamber of commerce marketing I have expertise in Seo I could but like what's different about digital marketing like getting into you know, paid search pay display retargeting. Um, net new audiences audience deployment I don't know anybody this stuff means still I'm still trying to figure it out I don't have that expertise and so I just don't know where to start with this but I would love to I would love to get the ball rolling where if someone comes to leg up site. They're in Utah and they look at like. Creating an account or a contact page like retargeting them with with some sort of messaging I don't I don't think it's a good use of my time I think to start figure that out I want to have a partner in crime who can help me with that. That's what I'm you know trying to solve for but I don't know like have you. You have any suggestions on where to go like my my thought is like go find a digital marketing agency to help me with this.

42:08.49
tylerking
Yeah I've um, I've never personally excuse me I've never personally hired a like full service digital marketing agency like we're working with demand Maven but they even they're like pretty clear on their website. They're like once we give you your recommendations. You're going to have to go find a different agency or do it in-house or something. Um, so is the idea that like you hire them and then they just figure the rest out or just that they've got. They've got a copywriter They've got a designer. They've got seo and whatever you. Say the next project is they'll have a person to do it.

42:44.83
Rick
Yes I think like I need someone to execute my ideas and provide me feedback on whether they're working um and present ideas like kind of riff all my ideas I don't want someone to come and like we do what demand Maven's doing where they're like.

42:51.84
tylerking
Ah.

42:57.37
tylerking
Okay.

43:03.62
Rick
I'm going to go meet with everyone at your business I'm going to talk to customers I'm going to tell you what to do and I'm like no I I know what I want tell me what my tactical options are and help me execute the tactics and let's decide whether it's working or not over time incrementally.

43:13.78
tylerking
Yeah, cool. So what I'm about to say a agrees with what you just said and b does not help answer your question at all. But I just want to say this for the audience's benefit I think a very common mistake people make is they think you can like 100% delegate things. We've talked about this with employees before so people know I don't feel this way.

43:22.92
Rick
It's ah.

43:33.37
tylerking
About employees. But so often I hear smart people who talk about contractors differently like as long as they're not a w 2 employee all of a sudden delegation is much easier or something like that. We even saw 2 fairly high profile companies. Um maybe and gum road.

43:38.31
Rick
Um.

43:53.11
tylerking
Do this thing where they're like we're hiring only contractors that way. We don't have to do any management. It's like that is not how it works it doesn't matter if the person works at an agency or they're a contractor or they're a w 2 employee, you're still managing them and you still have to ensure their success right? So I just want to get that out there that that's like.

44:05.77
Rick
Ah.

44:12.26
Rick
A thousand percent like yes, um, but I need someone who does have the expertise to execute um and and bring some like tactical like a list of tactics we could do and the ability to execute them.

44:12.59
tylerking
Ah rule I Assume yeah.

44:21.53
tylerking
Yeah. Right? And I think that's realistic. Um, now my problem I'm very skeptical of these general purpose marketing agencies because I know a handful of people who have like started a business without some core skills that you need Sometimes it's building a website or whatever.

44:29.98
Rick
Yeah.

44:44.85
tylerking
Even designing a lot of times marketing agencies get hired to design products and I feel like people are just like rather than having any of this ability in house I'm going to hire this but and it's always gone terribly like the the quality of the work is awful and all that I'm sure there are good marketing agencies out there. But I've only ever heard nightmares.

44:59.49
Rick
Yeah, you're making me like want to go find like a contractor who like I'm feeling really confident about this copyright person because she's focused and specialized and a 1 kind of a 1 ne-woman shop

45:04.21
tylerking
Um.

45:13.34
tylerking
Um, yeah.

45:15.52
Rick
And I'm wondering maybe I I need to find someone like that who's like kind of doing this on their own and scrappy and kind of can. It's not a team of people. It's one person. Um, who's like specializing this stuff. Okay.

45:25.50
tylerking
I like that a lot but let let me argue against what I just said a little bit is the reason the people I know is the reason when they hired a marketing agency that it failed is it that marketing agencies are just like overpriced, low quality work or is it that. These people were hiring someone to do an impossible task and didn't set them up to succeed but you Rick have a much better. You already have a lot of expertise you expect to be able to to manage them rather than fully delegate and maybe the exact same agencies would have worked fine for you which of those seems more right.

46:00.75
Rick
I Think that um the more people who are involved at our stage the less likely it's going to succeed because it's going to be lower budgets and precision like it needs to be precise. Um, yeah, and so I think at a larger organization where you're spending more money.

46:08.46
tylerking
Um, the budget's a big thing.

46:20.38
Rick
And you're getting more like dedicated resources like I would much rather have one person focused on this for 10 hours a week than 10 people focused on it 1 hour and I feel like with a full server full service agency. There's specialization involved and so like you get like multiple people less of more people and i.

46:29.21
tylerking
Yeah.

46:39.43
Rick
Feel like that is not going to be successful because there is a certain amount of time that you need to invest to just to understand what needs to be done much doesn't have anything to do with actually executing and I think we would eat all the agencies time up and just getting everyone on the same page.

46:51.53
tylerking
Yeah, well and this is this could be a whole separate episode that doesn't even necessarily have to be about agencies but like how does any early stage bootstrap startup compete when like every other company has so much more budget and the and like everyone wants to come up with creative clever answers this but there isn't one. It's. The founder is dragging everyone else I think and if you're paying like well I don't mean that necessarily I said this for myself recently or not recently but a while back I learned a lesson which was in the early days of hiring people I hired people and i.

47:14.40
Rick
Does that mean I need to like drink some coffee and like figure out Google ads is that what you're saying.

47:30.86
tylerking
Delegated and I'm using air quotes here to them in the form of I abdicate it I said oh I don't want to think about marketing anymore you go do marketing and every time I did that it failed the times that it worked was when I hired somebody and said I know how to do this I Take great pride in it I don't want you to take this like to to change this radically. You to come in learn how to do it my way and then make it better. Um, so it's fine to to have other people doing a lot of the work I think but you can't abdicate responsibility and I'm not saying you you want to here. That's not my point but I'm I'm I'm having trouble putting a point on this but like. Marketing agencies charge a premium and in ah in the best case scenario they do good work but it doesn't Matter. You don't have enough money to pay the premium you you have to be the differentiator that allows low cost to get good results I think.

48:19.71
Rick
And I think I'm I'm realizing that the None phase of this probably isn't going straight to a contractor. It's it's investing in amount of knowledge so that I I can evaluate and manage a person.

48:35.19
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.

48:37.40
Rick
And it's like maybe like I hire a coach. It's like almost like a hey I need to go find a digital marketing expert and pay them to teach me That's a probably a better use of resources right now than um, ah do I have time for it. Um, don't do an heartbeat.

48:42.49
tylerking
Um, yeah, do you have time for that like if you were full time on leg up Health I'd Say. Just go do it all like you you have the skill set to to learn this and be like you don't need anyone else's help.

48:56.20
Rick
Yeah. So The interesting thing about digital marketing. Um is that it helps it's It's like um, like it. It has the crossover with windfall. Um, so so that's the space windfall plays in that I'm still like not quite like. Strong I could be a much stronger domain expert and help winfall more if I were so that's where it's like interesting to like say like oh this makes sense to spend not windfall time on but like yeah this how this has like multiple multiplying returns on investment. Um, so do I have time.

49:24.32
tylerking
Um, yeah.

49:33.88
Rick
Not at the expense of I have to drop So I say no to something else to make time for this but you know maybe I should.

49:35.45
tylerking
Right? I mean my playbook if I were in your shoes I think would be subscribe to some podcasts from people who are really good at whatever you want to be doing here. Follow some people like that on Twitter and something I did recently that was surprisingly effective. Followed a couple people on Twitter who run agencies and I haven't hired any of them yet and I forget their name so I'm not going to say who they are. But if I had to hire like I think I may be needing to hire an Seo person at some point and I already know who they are because I follow them on Twitter and they've convinced me through tweets. Um, so. You could potentially do that and just start like getting a feel for who's in this world. What are they talking about what are these topics? Um, but I do think hiring a individual contractor or 3 however, many you need. And putting the pieces together is likely to be a better fit just generically for any early stage bootstrap company than going to an agency. That's my guess.

50:31.84
Rick
Then hiring a full service Hc yeah I agree with that takeaway the other takeaway here is like I just want to reiterate like if you don't know how to manage something. Um and you're and you're not going to invest the time into learning how to manage it like you probably shouldn't hire someone.

50:48.72
tylerking
Yeah, hundred percent

50:50.95
Rick
You're going to manage to do it? Um, ah so my takeaway is I need to go learn how to manage this and I'm going to go do that.

50:55.68
tylerking
Ah, yeah, supplement to that point don't hire someone if you don't have time to work with them like with demand Maven they're doing 95% of the work but like every week they send us something they're like hey we need these metrics from you and. Can you send an email to all these customers to arrange the interview if we didn't have time to commit to supporting them. The whole thing would have been a flop and I do think that's a mistake people make they hire the agency and then they're like let me know in three months when growth is good. Yeah yeah, um, final closing thought from me on this.

51:22.76
Rick
Um, wait and then they're like meanwhile like we've been blocked for three months we haven't got anything done.

51:33.57
tylerking
There is a middle option. We haven't talked about which is an agency but not a full service agency. That's what demand Maven is if you go to their website. They're like we are for saas businesses and we do growth marketing I'm not getting their positioning right? but right and this other person I'm talking about.

51:45.25
Rick
Special specialized agency.

51:50.90
tylerking
Runs an agency just doing seo and I don't even think they write the content I think they just do the Seo research. Um I'm guessing that is cheaper and then you can fill in the gaps rather than at a full service agency. You're paying a premium. For that work as well. As for all this other work that you could potentially do yourself I don't remember his name and I don't feel comfortable recommending him anyway, I could I'll privately tell it to you but I have no idea if he's actually good I just am impressed by his Twitter. Yeah I'm happy to do that.

52:07.13
Rick
Who who is the Seo person. Okay, okay, cool. Ah cool. Yeah I would love for you to slack me that.

52:24.27
tylerking
And hopefully one of us hires him and then we can actually say his name I don't know is it? Maybe maybe I'm being is it weird to like recommend someone, you have no experience working with. Yeah.

52:25.16
Rick
I.

52:30.76
Rick
I I think like mentioning him and recommending him are two separate things. Um, so it's like disclaimer haven't worked with it like who this person is is this? um I mean I wouldn't have any problem putting the link in the show notes. For example.

52:42.26
tylerking
Here I'll look it up real quick. Even even if this person is a terrible seo person. He's at least good at selling agency services on Twitter yeah, oh except I don't remember what his name is.

52:50.45
Rick
Um, well maybe we should hire him as a social media marketer The worst is when you get like you're trying to hire a web designer and you like get these proposals from people like pitches from people reaching out to you who have terrible websites and it's like.

53:07.54
tylerking
Um, yeah, it's terrible. Yeah, um, okay, this person some other indie hacker I follow recommended following them? Um JHShirk s

53:09.27
Rick
Like I'm not going. You know your website like you can't possibly good. Be good at web design if your website looks like that.

53:24.10
tylerking
CHERCK I will also I'll send you an actual link wreck and if I remember I will put this in the show notes. But JHShirk is the person I'm talking about.

53:28.37
Rick
Cool sorry for um, taking a lot of the time today. It was super helpful to me. Um, you have some stuff left over for the next episode which we can ah which we can cover when we we get there. Um anything else you want to.

53:42.56
tylerking
Yeah, sounds good all right? So let me do a couple of these rants and shout outs just because we do have a few minutes and unless you got somewhere to be Um, okay I want to so a common theme I Keep going back to is like.

53:47.75
Rick
You know, talk about before we jump. Okay, go ahead, go ahead.

54:01.45
tylerking
I'm a hater and I'm often like more negative than a lot of other people are and I'm trying to like justify that by convincing people. It's okay I found my people on Reddit I should have already known about this subreddit but it's um, our slash buttcoin. It's called b utt buttcoin and it's a subreddit just making fun of bitcoin. Which a I love the topic but what I especially love is once while you go in the the comments and somebody's like hey like a lot of people are being hurt by the the downturn in bitcoin like you guys should stop having fun and like the none comment at all. He's like fuck you I want to have fun go away and I just love it. I love their at it. And to be clear I do have sympathy for people who unknowingly got scanned by bitcoin and stuff but our butt coin just has my vibe of negativity so much I'm loving I'm love and follow in that just thought I'd give it a little shout out.

54:52.60
Rick
Yeah I'm I'm looking at right now like someone posted an image of some guy who clearly like who who tweeted. Um, he's bullish on bitcoin and he's clearly like the leader of like a bitcoin focused company and the guy replies no shit you bet your whole company's future on it.

55:04.96
tylerking
This help.

55:11.88
Rick
It's like yep, this is just like 1 after the other with these. It's hilarious.

55:14.56
tylerking
And they have these amazing running jokes in every comment threat because almost all the posts are like something bad happening because there's a lot of bad stuff happening right now and the first comment is always This is good for bitcoin because that's what all the like bitcoin stands always say is like something happens so like Counterintuitively This is actually good for bitcoin.

55:29.20
Rick
Ah, this this will be in our favor in the long term.

55:32.99
tylerking
Yeah yep, the other thing I want to complain for a none um, we've talked. We've talked about webflow a ton on this podcast I think I summarize this correctly say you and I both love the product and the pricing is just nonsense like not not the actual price but like the way trying to understand. What you will pay because there's like all these different things you have to pay for in different places right? So they? yeah yeah because you pay for your site which is separate from paying for your team. Did you get the email about webflow workspaces. Um I got this email this week and it's like the email.

55:53.90
Rick
Yeah, when you want to add and a team member like it's like the worst thing ever. Now.

56:08.41
tylerking
Like good news. We've like simplified everything given you more control pricing is like ah like so much better now and it's like thank God This was like the worst part of webflow and thankfully they fix it So I'm like gleefully clicking the link and I click the link and all it is is a price increase and nothing else changed.

56:13.60
Rick
Um.

56:26.93
tylerking
As far as I can tell I'm so fra and I don't care about the price increase webflow is worth what they charge me I'm not mad about that. But from what I can tell they've done nothing to simplify this problem and they they wouldn't even just have the courage to say we're raising your price.

56:41.29
Rick
Ah, man.

56:43.40
tylerking
It frustrated me and they they did technically I think there's like some power features you get with this new workspaces thing but like for my use case. Ah nothing changed as far as I can tell Yeah, that's funny. Well oh nice I should share log.

56:50.67
Rick
Well I didn't get the email So I'm hoping I'm hoping nothing changed for me. But I don't have any team members. So I I give everyone my login. Yeah.

57:02.86
tylerking
The nice thing is this caused me to go dive into their pricing and I realized we could actually drop down a tier so they raised my price and then I downgraded so they lost money off this.

57:08.77
Rick
Good, good job screw them. Um the ah best investment I've made at leg up ventures is one password which saves me from having to add additional users to things JD and I just share the login and it's painless. Um.

57:22.80
tylerking
Nice. Yeah I Assume that's technically against like terms of service and stuff. But who cares now I mean worst case scenario they come and say hey pay for both the and I assume like long term the plan would be to but you're in Scrappy mode right now.

57:28.66
Rick
I Didn't say it I was just kidding. Um.

57:41.16
Rick
Scrappy mode for sure I didn't I'm just kidding don't could don't sue me I can't afford to get sued right now.

57:44.73
tylerking
And lets an knowing serum we we let we explicitly let people do this I mean it could be abused and we we could technically stop them. But when people call and ask we're like yeah, go ahead if if our product is not providing enough value that you want multiple users you should not have to pay for multiple users.

57:59.71
Rick
Yes, amen.

58:02.90
tylerking
Yeah, um, cool. Well those are my rants and shout outs. Thanks for hearing me complain about stuff.

58:08.20
Rick
Be ah more to come next with our two weeks from now. Um, if you'd like to review past topics and show notes visit startup to http://lasts.com see you next week

58:15.86
tylerking
See you.