Sell to SaaS?
Hey. It's Bootstrap Web, and it is Thursday. This is a this is new for us. We we usually we usually record on Fridays, but, I'm traveling tomorrow, and you messaged me, and, and we are making it happen this week before I head out.
Jordan Gal:Yes. Our general policy is if we're not available on Friday, there is no podcast that week.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I I assumed that this was gonna be an off week, but I don't know. You you were hyped about getting on the mics. Was hyped. And and now I'm now I'm hyped.
Brian Casel:So let's do
Jordan Gal:it. Okay. Okay. I have to get like re hyped. Yeah.
Jordan Gal:Because my last week has been characterized by so many conversations.
Brian Casel:I bet. Today Dude, you're you're in this this whirlwind. I I know it all too well where where you're just like like, you know, one day or one week goes by and you're super psyched about an idea and then it's like, no, not that. That was wrong. Now I'm on to the next idea and maybe this, maybe that and talking to people.
Brian Casel:Yeah.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. The the hype cycle that we've talked about.
Brian Casel:Mhmm.
Jordan Gal:But I get really energized from conversations with people, especially people I haven't either ever spoken to or haven't spoken to in a long time and then it could catch up. It's a little bit social. Mhmm. It's some business. But it's fun to have like 20 conversations going ranging from DMs all the way to like Zoom and email and everything else.
Jordan Gal:Yep. That part's fun. But today in particular, I had a lot of those and then I went and volunteered at the cafeteria in the elementary school with a hairnet and some gloves handing out pizza to these very awkward like eight year olds.
Brian Casel:Oh, that's great.
Jordan Gal:So I'm a little fried but but
Brian Casel:it's okay. Nice. Nice. Yeah. Tomorrow, super early in the morning, Amy and I are hopping on a plane.
Brian Casel:We're going down to Florida Keys for a for a a buddy's wedding, and then we're gonna extend it into into a no kids vacation for next week.
Jordan Gal:Sounds great. I'm heading to New York to my brother's birthday party. Little Manhattan night out on Saturday. I
Brian Casel:want to actually ask you about this. Might as Let's well do it on the talk travel for a minute. Let's talk flying. So give me give me like your lay of the land of like your routines. Like are you so we have like a super early flight tomorrow and I think that's pretty typical for us.
Brian Casel:We tend to do like early flights. Do do you do like early in the morning or do you usually like book stuff like at like a comfortable time of the day or do you do night flights? Any?
Jordan Gal:Okay. So it's very much split between business travel and family travel. Like Mhmm. Different approach, different mindset entirely.
Brian Casel:Yep.
Jordan Gal:Right. So when I'm traveling by myself for work, it is a very selfish, what do I want? Yeah. You know, compared to with the family, it's like, well, is it gonna Are they gonna be hungry? Like, a whole range of issues.
Brian Casel:Of
Jordan Gal:course. But since moving to Chicago, I am now a united person.
Brian Casel:Same here. Okay. We're all united. Yep.
Jordan Gal:So I I got I got myself the united credit card. Same here.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I I want to thank Rich I
Jordan Gal:went I went with the fancy one and I now I get the lounges, all that.
Brian Casel:Same here. Yeah. So I do that and and we have so I use that for the business and another United card for the family card and then we pool the miles. So we've just got tons of miles all the time. I mean, you know, we'll we'll just fly first on basically everything we do.
Brian Casel:You know? Do you
Jordan Gal:help me understand that because I I got I got I have something similar between I have Chase that I use
Brian Casel:for in Chase's world.
Jordan Gal:Okay. And yeah. When you're in Chase's world, I know I feel like I'm supposed to be sending the points to United and then buying.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I I never did so when I was when I was doing all the Chase cards, you know, like the Sapphire and the and this and the and the Chase Inc. For business, that too lets you pool all the points, but I was never I just read that Chase was the best point system so I just committed to that.
Jordan Gal:Yeah, same.
Brian Casel:But all I ever did with that was collect a lot of points and then just cash them in for cash and I know that that's like the not ideal value.
Jordan Gal:I know it's money.
Brian Casel:But like one time I tried to book a flight through Chase's platform and it like messed up the seats and this and that. Was like, don't want, I'll just do the, you know. But what I learned over time was that like, okay, yeah, you'll accumulate a lot of credit card points and you can get some cash back for that and it can pay for like half of a vacation here and there. So that's kinda nice. But you're still basically paying for your flights no matter where you go and you're flying on all these different airlines.
Brian Casel:And then this past year, had a good conversation with my buddy Rich and he was like, you gotta get on on the United game plan here.
Jordan Gal:Okay.
Brian Casel:And so I switched out all the cards to United and now like so we only fly United that, you know, the Hartford Airport here, it's like all United flights.
Jordan Gal:Oh, that's awesome.
Brian Casel:So like, so every time we fly and everything we buy is building up United points. So then like every flight we buy, we just go on to united.com and pay with miles and do just like the normal So we have like one main family card for like groceries and life with the family and then like the business card. So everything on on the business goes there. So all of that stuff, just the normal spending gives us like several $100,000 several 100,000 miles a year. So like, and I don't I don't fly like as much as you do.
Brian Casel:I I do a bunch of trips but like Mhmm. For the most part, it's we're flying first or, you know, economy plus.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. That was that's my question because I I'm I think I'm like you where there's nothing more satisfying than buying travel, you know, for free. So that's where I spend the miles. But
Brian Casel:It's it does seem like switching to United, it's like we're flying for free whereas when we were in Chase, we were still paying for it for whatever Yeah.
Jordan Gal:I I still I I I have Amex personal and I also do Chase with the business. So I'm I'm using those portals and booking United flights. I'm going to United, see which flight I wanna go, then I go here, so then I book it. I do the same thing with Hertz. Mhmm.
Jordan Gal:I my Amex give me some like president club on Hertz thing and that is actually worth it because you just walk right to your car because you know renting a car is the worst experience.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I haven't I don't think I've like optimized the car thing. I think I still just get whatever.
Jordan Gal:The the car thing I I like because that that has ruined my mood at the beginning of of vacations before. I had the worst experience of my rental car experiences when we got to Hawaii. We went to Hawaii and I I I was in disbelief. I I was there, I don't know, two hours, two and a half hours. I was like, I'm trying not to scream.
Brian Casel:I I can't stand it. Like, cars and hotels too. It's like, dude, I booked this online. You have all of my information. Why am I Why standing do you need my ID?
Brian Casel:What what are you typing into the computer? Just I just need a key so I can go to my
Jordan Gal:That feels like it's getting better with the electronic cards. So you can check-in on your phone and then use your phone as as the key card. So that feels like it's getting better.
Brian Casel:Yeah. For some reason, I'm I'm not there yet. Don't know why.
Jordan Gal:Hurst feels better because all the lots are the closest
Brian Casel:Mhmm.
Jordan Gal:To the airport. And then if you do the President Club thing, then your name is up on the board and it just tells you what spot your car's in. And, you know, there are a few things more satisfying than just walking past the line of miserable people and just going right to your car and leaving.
Brian Casel:So our thing that sucks now is that we where we live in Connecticut, we are not very close to the airport. So we're like a good hour drive from Hartford and we're like an hour twenty from like New York LaGuardia. So so tomorrow we have like a 6AM flight. So so what you know, we just get a hotel the night before at at the airport and then we go.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. Go in
Brian Casel:the morning. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Which I do a
Jordan Gal:I I I love it. My my general thinking is I should travel more. I should stop waiting. I should take my kids to see things in the world that I want them to see. Mhmm.
Jordan Gal:Like, that's my mindset lately. You know, for a while after moving, you know, something about the move or something just just didn't wanna go anywhere. Just wanna be left alone. Just stay home. Yeah.
Jordan Gal:And now I'm like, well, if I want my kids to see Europe, know what I gotta do? I gotta book flights.
Brian Casel:Go to Europe.
Jordan Gal:That's all I gotta do. I just gotta book some Yeah.
Brian Casel:My kids love love to travel and we do too. So it's like we we don't really have any issues on planes. Like we've taken them to Asia and stuff and Yeah.
Jordan Gal:It's been great,
Brian Casel:you know. So, yeah, we'd we'd like to do more of it. So anyway, that's that's the travel podcast today. That was fun.
Jordan Gal:Okay. Okay. Speaking of travel, I screwed up MicroConf. Also, MicroConf screwed up. Why would you do it during Passover?
Jordan Gal:Yeah. So, yes, I I'm not willing to miss Passover this year. It's very very important to me, especially this year.
Brian Casel:I'm not going
Jordan Gal:to Michael Connf. I tweeted. If anyone needs a ticket, let let me know.
Brian Casel:I might end
Jordan Gal:up selling it for really cheap or giving away or something.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I I thought about, trying to grab a ticket last minute, but I'm you know, between the Florida trip, I'm I'm gonna need to get back and get rested. And and I have so many projects happening right now that it's just so I I I'm so psyched for for next week to sit and lounge around and hang out and and and hang out with some some long time old friends at the wedding and everything. So that's gonna be a nice relaxation because I've been really grinding hard on on work, but I am gonna return to a lot more projects coming up. So
Jordan Gal:Okay. Okay. Well, I'm trying to figure out what project to to go toward. Yep. So you and I got into a conversation before we started recording.
Jordan Gal:Mhmm. It's related to a product idea that I'm working with and it is selling to SaaS companies.
Brian Casel:Yep.
Jordan Gal:And we had we had a little debate on whether or not that's a good idea or bad idea. Yeah. Well, let's get into it. What what what are some
Brian Casel:pros and cons? You know, we're not gonna talk about the thing that you're actually No.
Jordan Gal:Not not sure.
Brian Casel:Considering or anything. But but, yeah, like part of part of that discussion was was whether or not in general we should pursue products that sell to SaaS companies as as a space, as an as an industry. You know, and I and I think like anything else, I don't think that there's any dogmatic correct or incorrect thing. I think it's very situational. But I tend now these days, and for the particular thing that you were talking about, I tend to lean toward like, I don't know about SaaS as the answer for that one.
Brian Casel:Mhmm. And and also in so so a few like more general things that we were talking about. I know that Patrick Campbell has published some pretty good content on this. I forgot exactly where, but SaaS is not as big as we all think it is, as as a space. Like, there's just not that many successful SaaS companies compared to other things like e commerce or whatever.
Brian Casel:Other things like other spaces.
Jordan Gal:Right. There aren't that many.
Brian Casel:Or like organizations that need help desk tools or organizations that need CRM. Right. Or If you're selling specifically to SaaS, there's not that many of them. And then there's the other challenge that we were talking about. I think this applies to a lot of different types of tools where it's like, I think the nature of SaaS that with it being recurring and subscription based, that that's true of their customer basis, but that's also true of their infrastructure.
Brian Casel:And the thing so like once I once I figure out a problem in in my business and I buy a tool for that and I install it and it works Yeah.
Jordan Gal:Leave it alone.
Brian Casel:We're good. I don't wanna switch it.
Jordan Gal:Yes. Yes.
Brian Casel:You know? Yeah. There are a No lot of matter how much better the alternatives are. I just don't wanna switch. And I think that's the case for a lot of stuff.
Jordan Gal:Yes. The switching it's not even switching cost. I know that's the term. Yeah. It's switching pain, friction, the emotional, the psychological, like, oh, I don't wanna deal with it.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. There there are some inherent advantages. One of the advantages that I have found over the last few days in my research is the ability to talk to people. Yeah. Customer's a right person.
Brian Casel:Founder advantage can't can't be taken lightly. I think like especially anytime you have some sort of personal inroad advantage, you you gotta consider it. I I think and that I had multiple businesses that I made that calculation. Like I remember specifically when I one of the biggest reasons back in the day now that when I sold Restaurant Engine was because I was selling to restaurants and I did not want to travel to the restaurant industry conference and talk to restaurants all the time and I had trouble reaching them. My next business was Audience Ops which basically sold to SaaS for the most part.
Brian Casel:And and in in that scenario, at that time, and that type of service in that market, this was back in 2015, it worked pretty well for me because I was doing a I I was solving a problem that SAS really had particularly at that time, which was like blog content and not as figured out as as it is today. Yeah. But also my network. This podcast had had already begun by that point but like I I had been networked with SaaS. I was going to micro conference stuff like that.
Brian Casel:So that definitely helped that that business early on.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. It feels like I can get 50 customers myself by talking to people for three months. I that
Brian Casel:would say like there's a big but here. That was a service business, that was productized service.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. You don't you don't need that many customers.
Brian Casel:You don't need that many customers for it to be good. And then later, I did multiple SaaS attempts. I did process kit and I started Zip Message. And both of those, if not exclusively, they didn't solely target SaaS, but like, I tried to sell it to a lot of SaaS companies and I had a hard time with those products for for different reasons. But some of it was SaaS just don't wanna switch from what they're using, you know?
Brian Casel:And every SaaS has their own unique preferences and needs. And I did find it easier, like in ZipMessage when I when I pivoted to Clarity Flow, it it's not fully figured out yet, but I am finding it easier to connect with, like, coaches' pain points in solving their problems than I did with selling Zip Message to SaaS remote teams in general. You know?
Jordan Gal:Yeah. It's a funny thing.
Brian Casel:Because they were too comfortable with, like, things like Loom. You know?
Jordan Gal:Sure. Sure. Yeah. You you I don't even know what what what the answer is that you have to do something so different that it gets them to leave or you have to actually make it so easy to to switch that that they're willing to do it or you have to catch them at the right time or you kinda just have to be in the market long enough that as people do switch and do start new companies that they're jumping onto your service first, and you've got the lock in.
Brian Casel:Yeah. That was that I remember thinking in ProcessKit early on, like, was so ProcessKit was like a tool for creating processes and then assigning them to your team. So if you have a very systematic team, systematic process oriented team, and the idea was, and what I learned talking to a lot of customers on that was if your team is like 10 people or more, fifteen, twenty people or more, you are very process oriented, but you are already all set in your systems and your tools. So you are not going to adopt a new tool like ProcessKit because you've already figured out your processes system using other tools. So Yes.
Brian Casel:And then and then what I found was like, alright, if I try to sell this to five person teams who are sorta on the upswing and they need their processes, then then it works for them and they adopt it and then they can hopefully grow into it. They can hopefully grow their team with process kit. And that and that did work for some customers, but it had other challenges. So like, I and and so then then it's like I I also challenge the question of like, is the should the strategy be targeting the small guys and then hope that they grow into our product? I tried that, I don't love it.
Brian Casel:It seems better to have a product that you can sell directly to large established companies who have no problem paying for tools, you know?
Jordan Gal:So here's my here's my take on that. My current take because I have had different takes throughout
Brian Casel:Mhmm.
Jordan Gal:The last few years. One of the criteria we talked about for an idea that we wanna pursue is low friction self serve, very scalable. Right? If you have a good month, you signed up 20 customers last month, and then this month you have a good month and you signed a 100 customers, I want that to feel pretty similar inside the company. I don't I don't want that to create five times more calls.
Jordan Gal:Five times more support. I want the scalability of self serve. And going after sophisticated SaaS companies that are willing to pay $500 a month for a tool is antithetical to to that. So Yeah. It's like can it be done?
Jordan Gal:Yes. It can be done. You can sell a $50 tool with freemium tier to SaaS companies, and you can get customers. But is that a spot in the market that's worth going after if by definition, your average revenue per user is, let's call it a $100 because some are free, some are 50, some are $2.50, whatever it is. I want 10,000 customers.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. Are are there are there 10,000 customers?
Brian Casel:I don't know. I mean, because I I think the other challenge that we talked about was like again, you're if you're targeting the the startups, so the ones that are not big enough yet to already be set with their tools, then then even if you win most of those startups, most of them are going to fail. So right out of the gate, even if you win all of them, only a small percentage of the or can can even be eligible to continue with your product. So that that limits you out of the gate. But then the other thing that we talked about was like like I it depends on the category of of the tool, but like I don't wanna sign up for a tool.
Brian Casel:Like, to me, like simplicity is not necessarily like a feature or a benefit. I do want the thing to feel intuitive and easy to use, but in general, I want tools that have the power that I need. Whether I think I'll need that in the future or I need it now, I I'm not gonna, like, commit to a tool now knowing it's limited in simplicity and knowing that, there's a like, if my business is is successful, we're gonna need more complexity so we will change tools later. Like, I'm not gonna make that calculation. I don't I don't wanna do that.
Jordan Gal:Okay. I I'm having I can formulate the vision in my head. I have not yet been able to articulate what it looks like as a as a a business model maybe, more so than just a product. The only thing that comes to mind is 37 signals is is the the approach and the vibe that those products give, which is it's relatively simple. It does not have the bells and whistles.
Jordan Gal:If you want those bells and whistles, do not look to us to build them. Go somewhere else. So Yeah. Because I because not because I'm such a badass that I can tell everyone to go screw themselves. It's just that if you leave that spot in the market, you are in for a world of pain and complexity and on boarding friction.
Jordan Gal:Most importantly, you are in for a world of hurt around on boarding friction.
Brian Casel:I think 37 signals and base camp in particular, it's it's weird. I have such a conflicted view because I I happen to be a big fan of of of them as a company and Jason Fried and DHH and everything. But, yeah, I've I've tried Basecamp as as a product, like, to use as my project management tool.
Jordan Gal:Like Right.
Brian Casel:I think I think the last time that I tried it was like maybe two years ago, something like that. Okay. This was before I I sort of I don't love Notion, but I but I've sort of defaulted to Notion these days. But, you know, I I've used Basecamp multiple times over the past ten, fifteen years. And the most recent time was was like two years ago.
Brian Casel:And I took a brief look at the Hey email product. And in both cases, I was like, it's clever. It's simple. But man, it is too simple or too it doesn't have some of the power features that I that I would need. And and that and then that sort of speaks to a SaaS founder, or a SaaS company.
Brian Casel:Like, sometimes, like, simple things, like, oh, you guys don't have Kanban boards? I I kinda need that in a in a project management tool, or, you know, like like just little things like that,
Jordan Gal:You know? I I wanna be in the I know
Brian Casel:I know that they've added Kanban boards. I know. But then I then I even tried it. I was like, oh, but you can't, like, reorder it or this or that. It's like, ugh.
Jordan Gal:Okay. So so here's the question. Basecamp clearly uber successful. Yeah. How can it be that it's so successful if their general approach is, no, we're not gonna build that for
Brian Casel:you. Just think that well, first of all, today's success for Basecamp is because they are Basecamp. They've been around a while. So so there's that there's that there there's like that natural momentum thing. I don't think that like SaaS companies are really their best customers anymore because I think most most most SaaS companies are using Notion or whatever other.
Jordan Gal:So is it that Basecamp is wide enough, is horizontal enough of a product that the potential
Brian Casel:The real estate agents, the teachers, the you know
Jordan Gal:Nonprofits, I mean Nonprofits. Whatever.
Brian Casel:That I think probably get they still get a lot of like web design agencies, small ones.
Jordan Gal:Right.
Brian Casel:You know.
Jordan Gal:So is that the key the the ability to say screw you, I'm not building that for you. Does that have to go along with a massive potential market?
Brian Casel:I don't I don't think it has to be massive, but I think it has to be non technical. So like selling a product to insurance agents, selling a product to doctors, selling a product to dentists or real estate agents. Like, they are not gonna want or need all of the bells and whistles that that like I don't know. Like, what's something that like SAS uses a lot? Like, you know, just like these super automation tools where you gotta send a lot of data back and forth.
Brian Casel:They're not gonna care about that stuff. They're gonna care about booking appointments. Then so if you niche down, it's like the Bootstrapper playbook. You niche down, you'd be like x popular tool for doctors, for lawyers, right?
Jordan Gal:Yeah, okay.
Brian Casel:And so that helps for marketing, but then on the product, you can like really make the product ideal for them. Like, that's what I did with coaches. It's like we we started adding all these features that only coaches would ever care about. You know?
Jordan Gal:Yes. And and I think that's the right way to start. The Yeah.
Brian Casel:I I wish I hadn't started that way. I I did the other thing.
Jordan Gal:I I wanna go into look. I I just made the same mistake of trying to go out and creating a category. It's not that it was a mistake. It just didn't work. So what?
Jordan Gal:Okay. Now, I'm reacting to that. Maybe I'm overcompensating, and I'm saying I wanna go into a very established, gigantic competitive ecosystem with hundreds of options and be purpose built for one use case and do a better job on that. I think that's a logical, like, approach.
Brian Casel:Mhmm. It's a
Jordan Gal:Okay. Here's a question. Here's a question. Here's a question. Here's a question.
Jordan Gal:If you're not sure because you're getting conflicting messages. In my research last few days, I have one person say that they wanna invest where to send the check. I have one person that says I would sign up today because I'm using x and I'm embarrassed that I'm using that and I wanna do better. And I had another person, like, explain, like, basically exactly that I'm on the right track. Then I talked to someone else who's in this space and said, absolutely not.
Jordan Gal:This is a world of hurt. Do not do this. I talked to someone else that I really respect who was like, I just don't see where the opportunity is. Given conflicting information, how do you
Brian Casel:That's the hardest thing, man.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. Of course. So where do you go next? Do you just book a landing page? Do you just say something on Twitter?
Jordan Gal:My take is next week, I wanna set up conversations with 10 SaaS founders. Me and Jess, right, our VP of product, we jump on I
Brian Casel:think I think the thing we were saying earlier I I think the thing that we were saying earlier about, like, using your personal advantage and your network in SaaS, that can easily work against you. And that's that has worked against me as as much as I appreciate all the help and feedback that I've received from friends and advisers and networks. Look, it's just all more supportive than you generally need it to be. So, like, you know, there's just gonna be more support for you as a person, as a founder, and like you know, whereas if if that this is one of the things that I've come to appreciate about selling to a quote unquote foreign industry who like people who don't know me or you know, I I get told no a lot and that's really helpful in information. You know, like why is it not working for you?
Jordan Gal:As opposed to the danger of jumping on with me, getting excited about it and then getting a false sense of, hey, we talked to 10 people and six of them are ready to
Brian Casel:Yeah. That's happened right now. Times where I where I pitch a product or even ask for investment and get investment offers and this and that. And people people have pre purchased products from me, paying hundreds of dollars only to never use it. Right.
Jordan Gal:That's supposed to be the ideal validation, actual money.
Brian Casel:Yeah. And that's why I've learned that that's sort of bullshit. Mhmm. You know? I I just don't I that's why I I personally, I've come to the conclusion that, like, you can't validate until you have a product ready to sell and give to customers and have them start using it today.
Brian Casel:And if they use it and continue to use it, then it's validated. Pre selling, my take is that's BS. Know? So what do you do? So it's like what do you do, right?
Brian Casel:I don't know. It's I don't know. Like gut instinct, talk to more people. I do think that like you can get you can psych yourself into like, I have to talk to 50 people before I allow myself to build anything. I also don't agree with that.
Brian Casel:I think it's easy enough to to start building, especially when you have a team at your disposal.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. It's almost like a willingness to quit. You you have to be willing to go six weeks in. Yeah. And launch some type of funky MVP that supposedly does the most valuable thing.
Jordan Gal:And then looking around and saying, I changed my mind. Screw all that.
Brian Casel:Yeah. Right. Okay. So if you're if you're gonna compare spend eight weeks only talking to people and not building anything, and then, that, like, you can talk to a 100 people, but then you have to like, like parse and see, do I really trust what that person actually told me? Yes or no?
Brian Casel:Versus spending eight weeks, yeah, talking to some people, but also building. And then at the end of that eight weeks, having something to say, here. Here's the thing. You can use it today. It costs this.
Brian Casel:What do you think? And then you know. Then you just know, you know and look, it is possible to build and ship a thing in two months. People can dispute that but it's absolutely possible. That depends on what we're talking about internally.
Brian Casel:Pair it down, simple MVP and you can do it.
Jordan Gal:Yes. That that's what we're talking about internally. This is this is partly why we love Laravel. Because when we look around at Laravel, between the admin, the the tailwind elements, the connections to different services, we look at that and we say, you know, in eight weeks, we can get something functioning that does one use case. A bunch of conversations and a bunch of feedback does not mean that it's gonna be successful.
Jordan Gal:It means that we have enough information to say, do we like where this is going? Or even if this worked out, it wouldn't be good anyway. So let's
Brian Casel:You're still gonna have the early customers who can put up who can put up with the bugs. They can put up with the lack of feature parity with the competitors, but they are they are in love with your special sauce, and that's what you build first. Right? And and those are gonna be the early adopters. And I I don't personally consider myself to be like an like I don't I don't buy other products that are like super MVP.
Brian Casel:You know? But there but you know, I've had those customers in my products and they they exist.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. Look, when when we launched the checkout, it was it was I don't wanna say garbage, but it was not functioning. It was not. It wasn't working. Yep.
Jordan Gal:And the strength of the feedback is what kept us going. Because it wasn't this sucks, is it worth it? It was woah, if we get this right, this is gonna be a hit. That's what pushed us to keep going. I guess in the situation that we're in right now, the most important thing is to set expectations that we are not committed to this yet.
Jordan Gal:We are gonna build and prove that it's worth committing. We need to view this skeptically.
Brian Casel:Yep. I like it.
Jordan Gal:I think that's that's how we can do it in such a way where we're challenging ourselves and also in such a way that I won't break the enthusiasm and will of the engineering team building because from the beginning we're gonna be saying, we're not I'm not sure. We're not sure. We're not committed. But
Brian Casel:going alright. Going back to that question, like, about SaaS or thinking about whatever market you're thinking about targeting. You know, like, you and I, like, have both, followed politics over the years. Right? And, like, presidential politics and everything.
Brian Casel:And you hear these politicians talk about like, can you make a case for how for your path to victory, right?
Jordan Gal:Right, like is it a game worth worth playing?
Brian Casel:Yeah, like like can you actually make a case where like this is how we get enough delegates, this is how we win the right states and this and that, and if the answer is like you have a path that you can make that case, you pursue it, otherwise just drop out. I think the same is true for this. Before you even build that MVP, like, I don't think it it it's good it's good to talk to people. But in general, just your analysis of what you see in the market, like, I think you need to be able to say like, we are going to go to market in this way. This is who we're going to sell to and this is the hypothesis that like, I think that like there's a chance that this could be true and then we go build it.
Brian Casel:But like if if I The the SaaS thing, like, I kinda have trouble painting that path. Like, there there's a little there's a few too many, like, roadblocks to to say, like, there's a high likelihood of this path working in my view.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. Like, do do you want an adjacent market that you can get to or does that like defeat the purpose of staying focused? Yeah. I I I hear you. All all I know is that in the current hype cycle of this idea, I like it.
Jordan Gal:And I've now started to get feedback from both sides, the pro and the con. And I feel like I'm getting closer to a more sober analysis.
Brian Casel:Yes. We'll see. Yeah. It's so hard. It it's it's like fun and exciting and fucking hard at the same time.
Jordan Gal:I am It's
Brian Casel:like anything else.
Jordan Gal:I'm I'm having fun. It's Yep. It is not I don't wanna discount the feeling I had walking around the last few days with this little tingly buzz of, oh, we can do this. Oh, I like this. Oh, I like talking to these people.
Jordan Gal:I'm one of these people. These are this is my realm. I can add value. I I I think I can see you. You know, like that.
Jordan Gal:And and I talked to Rock, and I talked to Jess, and they're all feeling the same thing. I I don't think that can be taken lightly.
Brian Casel:Yeah. Yeah. And again, it comes down to like different needs for each person. Like me at some point, I'm gonna build some new products at some point. I don't know when, but like I definitely intend to grow my portfolio at some point.
Brian Casel:And I'm sure I'm gonna do products that are probably targeted at SaaS. But like but probably those products, if if and when I do them, like I don't need them to be huge companies. They can just be things in my portfolio that like some people can like like all I needed to do is x number of customers and I'm happy and it's and it's a good thing for my little portfolio but like but you know, in your case, you're in a very different situation like yeah. So there's all these different considerations that go into it. Like is this a product that we can win in the way that we want to win?
Brian Casel:You know. True.
Jordan Gal:Yo, speaking of talking, I got a call.
Brian Casel:There you
Jordan Gal:I'm a minute late to my next conversation.
Brian Casel:Yeah. Take take what they tell you with a grain of salt.
Jordan Gal:Yeah. That's right. Yo, have a great time in Florida.
Brian Casel:Oh, it's gonna be a good time. Alright. I'm glad we I'm glad we fit this one in.
Jordan Gal:Cool. See you, everyone.
Brian Casel:Alright. Later, folks.
