Build Your SaaS – bootstrap in 2021

This week Jon and Justin discussed: Basecamp Note: we recorded this before Casey Newton's second article on Basecamp came out. Also: this article is a really thoughtful take on the whole situation. Ruby/Rails open source world. https://discuss.rubyonrails.org/t/effect-of-the-last-week-on-ruby-on-rails/77702  SO EXCITED: HELEN IS ON THE TEAM! 🎉 https://transistor.fm/helen/  Cost/benefit analysis It’s really difficult to make that calculation: should we commit to this? How do we know that the cost will be worth the benefit? For example, we could invest $100k + 6 months of time into building a mobile app for private podcasts, under the assumption that it will increase the number of private podcast customers we get. But what you don’t see is: How much time + energy does it really take to build it? Does it attract the wrong customers? How much time + energy does it take to support it? How does it affect the fun + calm of running the app? Is all that effort really worth it? Apple’s latest release is bad So many bugs from Apple: https://transistor.fm/apple-podcasts-problem/  One bug in Spotify: https://transistor.fm/spotify-bug/  What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Mitch Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast Oleg Kulyk Violette Du Geneville Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Diogo Chris Willow Borja Soler Ward Sandler Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) Travis Fischer Matt Buckley Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD) Noah Prail Colin Gray Josh Smith Ivan Curkovic Shane Smith Austin Loveless Simon Bennett Michael Sitver Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis,  Dan Buda  Darby Frey Samori Augusto Dave Young Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This we, we chatted about: Evil Crypto Teletubbies Voltswagon Fathom has acquired Google Jon is trying out a new private office, in a coworking space (Deskpass) Justin had a quick chat with Derrick Reimer, SavvyCal Tweet: Two years ago (March 2019), Justin posted a screenshot of our revenue numbers and we were just about to hit $10k in MRR. Jason Fried: Your company history is a myth Justin went full-time the next month (April 2019). Tweet: A mere six months after hitting $10k (April 2019), we hit $30k MRR (Oct 2019). This little business has given us more than we ever imagined. It’s changed our lives. Jon Youngfook is building Bannerbear Peter Suhm is building Reform Simon Bennett is building SnapShooter Tweet: There are so many productivity gurus, tips, hacks; lots of advice on how to "get more done in less time."  "Not Tamagotchi. The tomato technique. Ack, what's that called?" We're fine with getting a few good things done every day. "Gen Z is coming online now as potential customers. A whole new generation of kids is becoming adults." New releases on Transistor.fm: Private podcasts can receive email + play on the web Automatic tweet Two-factor authentication Import improvements What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Harris Kenny, Intro CRM podcast Oleg Kulyk Violette Du Geneville Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Diogo Chris Willow Borja Soler Ward Sandler Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) Travis Fischer Matt Buckley Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD) Noah Prail Colin Gray Josh Smith Ivan Curkovic Shane Smith Austin Loveless Simon Bennett Michael Sitver Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis,  Dan Buda  Darby Frey Samori Augusto Dave Young Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Real humans making a business together: Taking the leap Why is Justin jealous of Ben? Pros and cons of building a remote company in 2021 Limited exposure to your co-founder What would take to get Jon to move to Canada? Story: confronting a burglar with a crowbar The algorithm rewards you for being early Spending a lot of time on Clubhouse Apple Podcasts going into subscription podcasts roundtable “Podcasting needs better distribution” “Podcasting needs better discoverability” “There needs to be the Adwords for Podcasting.” ☝️ BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR How are we going to scale our SaaS? How does investing $500,000 in the podcast ecosystem change the ecosystem? Justin's talk with Jason Calacanis What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Harris Kenny Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Anton Zorin Bill Condo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Jon's back! He and Justin share their feelings/thoughts about the new year: Closing the door on the past Exciting revenue milestone Podcast companies losing money https://podnews.net/update/pocket-casts-for-sale https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/15/spotifys-big-bet-on-podcasts-is-failing-citi-says.html  https://www.macrumors.com/2021/01/15/apple-podcast-subscription-service/ Twitter's Trump ban https://twitter.com/evan_greer/status/1347948903921045511 https://www.fastcompany.com/90592060/capitol-attack-fascism-surveillance-censorship  https://medium.com/craft-ventures/section-230-mend-it-dont-end-it-e33799a43a5f  https://twitter.com/Kasparov63/status/1348355023101685761 https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/how-big-tech-impeached-donald-trump/617643/ What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Anton Zorin Bill Condo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week, Justin and Jason discuss the dynamics of market demand. Justin's original tweet Jason's response What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @jasonfried Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Anton Zorin Bill Condo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week, Justin catches up with Simon Bennett of Snapshooter: Every once in a while, we highlight one of our listeners who are building their own SaaS. This week: Simon Bennett, comes back to tell us what's happened since he left his full-time job 7 months ago. Looking for automatic backups for Digital Ocean, AWS, WordPress, or Laravel? Check out https://snapshooter.io. Simon had just put his kids to bed (he's in the UK) and sat down in his office to have a chat with Justin. What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @MrSimonBennett Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Anton Zorin Bill Condo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Justin is joined by everybody's favorite Twitter Uncle: Ian Landsman (founder of HelpSpot). Ian's encounter with his internet hero Joel Spolsky Do you get worried that this all going to go away? How scared should we be of the competition? How do you hedge your bets? We prognosticate about what our bootstrapper friends' blind spots are. 🤣 We both ask for investors live, on air. How founders should manage their personal finances. How our past experience can make us blind to opportunities. How can devs connect with marketers? Which startups would we invest in. What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @ianlandsman Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Helmut Irle Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

We're back!  Justin's voice sounds terrible (sorry!) When is the next wave of economic despair going to happen? The maker/creator market is on 🔥 right now. How long will it last? How "soft" is the prosumer market? How fragile is it? A BUNCH OF NEW TRANSISTOR FEATURES: Zapier integration Podcast:locked Easily submit your podcast to the major podcast directories. Podcast distribution checklist How do you work on your startup when you're feeling down? "There were weeks when I got almost nothing done because I was stressed out about the state of the world." "It's hard to force yourself to do creative work if you're not feeling good emotionally." What should we talk about next? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Helmut Irle Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

We have a bonus episode for you this week! Justin was on the Framework podcast. Check out the other Spec.fm shows Subscribe to Framework in Overcast Want to reply to something we said? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @tomcreighton, @therobhayes Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Take It EV podcast Ethan Gunderson Helmut Irle Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Jon and Justin talk about "optionality" in bootstrapping. (Justin is concerned, Jon thinks we should just enjoy the moment). DHH: "Part of what gave us the confidence to turn down the whole world of venture capital was a small sale of equity to Jeff Bezos. That gave our personal bank accounts just enough ballast that the big numbers touted by VCs and acquisition hunters lost their lure." Are we at peak podcasting? Things are good right now - will they be good for 10 years? 20 years?  Fred Wilson: "Taking money off the table." How much did the founders of Buffer, Robinhood, etc. take off the table? Article. Des Traynor: "A founder is spending 60 months of their best years in their startup (instead of their career). That is a substantial upfront investment; it's like a seed round, but instead of money, it's your life." How much richer than us is Jeff Bezos? Want to reply to something we said? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Helmut Irle Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Late-summer update! This week on the program, we bring you a super spicy interview that Justin did on the TechZing podcast. Do you really need to build an audience before you build your product? Justin's tweet There's this idea that you need to grow an audience, talk to an audience, and then build something they want. Is that really necessary? IndieHackers interview with Vincent Woo justinjackson.ca/surfing Tweet: what do we mean when we say "audience?" Want to reply to something we said? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @justinvincent Leave a comment on the TechZing episode page. Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Helmut Irle Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Mid-summer update! This week on the program, Justin and Jon talk about: If you're bootstrapping SaaS, how many monthly trials do you need? Tweet: "You probably need more trials than you think." Breaking out of your own way of thinking "All it took was someone talking to me to have a different way of thinking about it." Want to reply to something we said? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm Thanks to our monthly supporters: Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week on the program, Justin and Jon talk about: Updates on Transistor: new API is almost done, static site generator, growth slowed in June? Questioning whether we should slow down for the summer Talking about the Simplecast acquisitionWhat would sell for? Mike: “Anything that’s a life-changing amount.” Want to reply to something we said? Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Bootstrapper shout-out of the week: Nusii https://nusii.com Professional proposal templates Thanks to our monthly supporters: Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week on the program, Justin and Jon talk about: A friend, whose SaaS has grown 300% since the beginning of the quarantine. They just hit $6k in MRR. At that stage, he's in the "almost but not yet." You're either: Brainstorming how to make money faster Brainstorming how to work less Different stages: Pre-launch stage: you're working on your product on the side. It's fun! There's nothing stealing your time and attention because you don't have customers yet. The beta stage: still pretty fun! You have a few customers who are using your product, and maybe paying you money. The "launched" stage: now, you have way more users. Now you're doing way more customer support, responding to feature requests. How much did we work when we were building Transistor?Jon figures we spent 45 to 60 hours a week (each). Jason Calacanis’ tweet: "It takes 100 hours per week to build a business!" “Good businesses have margin." Josh Wood: "At Honeybadger, we work 30 hours per week." Margin gives you the opportunity, as a founder, to live beyond your keyboard. To engage with the world. Sandy Hudson (Sandra & Nora podcast): "The quarantine gave people the time and space to wrestle with the current moment." The Dept of Veteran Affairs "As your little baby Rails app grows up, you can't just run everything on the same service." "The whole internet is just patchwork of pipes and duct tape."  You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Bootstrapper shout-out of the week: LessAccounting https://www.lessaccounting.com/ Cloud base accounting software and services for non-accountants. This used to be owned by Allan Branch (Paul Kogan owns it now). It’s specifically designed for small businesses with 1-25 employees and contractors Thanks to our monthly supporters: Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Structural racism affects every part of the economic system. It affects bootstrappers too! It defines: Who we hire Who we invest in Who we promote Who we chat with Who sees our numbers Who we invite to speak Who gets access to our platform "It's not just about being oppressed or being an oppressor, it's about resisting oppression and resisting being an oppressor; being an ally, being an advocate for social justice." – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum (clip)Right now, in cities across America, people are protesting systemic violence and oppression against Black people.We (Jon and Justin) are waking up to how complicit we are in the system. We're seeing our privilege. We're humbled and motivated by the words of Dr. Erin Thomas:"You can directly impact the extent to which your organization counters historical inequity, inequality & injustice."The bootstrapping, SaaS, and startup ecosystems need to wrestle with these issues."How can you help? By working to dismantle a system of racism from which you reap the benefits. If you are not working to do that then you don’t actually want to help." – Kristina DanielsInstead of Patreon shout outs, we're shouting out these causes: The Loveland Foundation's therapy fund.  Diversity in Tech Patreon The Great Unlearning Patreon Podcasts in Color Patreon Want to take the next step? Abadesi Osunsade is offering How to be pro-Black at work Rachel Rodgers is running Reimagining Small Business Kim Crayton is doing an event called Introduction to Being an Antiracist Things to read, listen to, and watch: Peggy McIntosh's "Knapsack of Privilege" The podcast series, Seeing White So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo Bernice King on MSNBC Documentary: A time for burning, 1966 This podcast was recorded on June 4, 2020.★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

👋 Justin here. This episode is to let you know why there's no episode today. (I've had a few DMs from folks that were worried!)We're good; we had some server trouble this morning that took all our time and attention today. We're hoping to be back next Tuesday with a full episode.Thanks everyone; we appreciate your support! ✌️Special thanks to Dean Layton James, from CloudPeriscope and Benedikt Evans from UserList for giving us ideas on how to fix our issues today! ❤️You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Bootstrapper shout-out of the week: SeekWell.io "Send SQL (MySQL, Postgres, Snowflake, Redshift, and SQL Server) to Google Sheets, Excel, Slack, or email" Thanks to our monthly supporters: Colt Borg Marc Beinder Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) with UserInput.io Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week on the program, Justin and Jon talk about: The new Transistor UI, and how folks are responding to it. "Damn the torpedoes!" – seeing if our update worked in IE11 after we deployed. Tobias Lütke, Shopify: “All the trends have been accelerated. The pandemic has moved everything forward 10 years. So now we need to build 2030 level software in 2020.” Restaurant trends: https://www.exploretock.com/ https://themargins.substack.com/p/doordash-and-pizza-arbitrage Bug bounties - what do other SaaS companies do with these? Mike Myers on Conan You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Bootstrapper shout-out of the week: ScrapingBee "A web-scraping API that takes care of proxies and headless browsing for you so you'll never get blocked again while scraping." Used by companies like SAP and Zapier! Thanks to our monthly supporters: Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) with UserInput.io Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week on the program: As requested, we're going to start highlighting our listeners who are building their own SaaS. This week: Simon Bennett, a long-time Patreon supporter and a friend of the show. He just went full time on his project https://snapshooter.io, which does automatic backups for Digital Ocean.  Simon had just put his kids to bed (he's in the UK) and sat down in his office to have a chat with Justin. You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda, @MrSimonBennett Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Need a podcast? Transistor allows you to host all of your podcasts in one place. We also offer private podcasts: use them with your team, or on your membership site. Get a 14-day trial here. Thanks to our monthly supporters: Anton Zorin Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) with UserInput.io Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Justin and Jon have the giggles. People in tech get bent out of shape about who owns certain ideas, UI patterns, business models. “They ripped off my idea” "They copied us!" This blog post by Justin Mitchell:https://medium.com/@itsthisjustin/no-idea-is-unique-but-this-is-insane-a247ec80f6a7 Good Stackexchange thread:“In the history of science, this is known as "Railroad time". I.e, when the economy has reached a certain state of infrastructure (coal, steel, and land available, plus steam engines and demand for transportation), it's "Railroad time", and the idea of building railroads occurs to many people naturally at the same time.” Documentary: https://www.generalmagicthemovie.com/ Multiple discovery (simultaneous invention): “the hypothesis that most scientific discoveries and inventions are made independently and more or less simultaneously by multiple scientists and inventors” Synchronicity: “the simultaneous occurrence of events which appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection.” Collective consciousness. How to respond if a competitor rips of your idea:  Paul Jarvis tweet: "fathom copycats pop up so often that i've lost count. we honestly don't mind them... they STOKE THE FIRE 🔥 to make our product even better." Hedge against the competition: Build your brand: the way people perceive your company; how “top of mind” are you? Build your audience: competitors can't easily replicate who you know, and who knows you. Customer service: how well you take care of people; how responsive you are Continued product improvement: you don’t have to be the most novel; you just have to show continuous improvement in vectors that customers care about. Last longer than your competition: don’t hire too many people, keep your costs low; if you can outlast your competition, you don’t have to worry about them stealing your stuff. You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Need a podcast? Transistor allows you to host all of your podcasts in one place. We also offer private podcasts: use them with your team, or on your membership site. Get a 14-day trial here. Thanks to our monthly supporters: Bill Condo Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) with UserInput.io Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Justin and Justin talk about where they're at. Podcasts like the Project Journey show, are at the beginning of their journey. Marie Poulin is a good example of an entrepreneur who's experienced a breakthrough this year; we should celebrate those! Justin's tweet: "What are we doing this for? Is the purpose of life to "Start business. Make most money. Die." We want to engage with an audience that wants more out of life." "Stay in your lane." The people who listen to this show aren't one-dimensional. We all live in a social, economic, and political context. We have feelings, families, histories. "Business" exists within these contexts. If our ideas about business are divorced from their human context, how helpful are they really? 22:18 – the Tailwind CSS project is plumbing.  23:15 – what kind of SaaS projects would we start right now? 27:10 – how much money does Nathan Barry have in the bank? 28:50 – you could still build this kind of app (Carrd competitor) 29:30 – Miguel's new product SiteSauce.app You can reply to this podcast here: Twitter: @buildyoursaas, @mijustin, @jonbuda Leave a comment on PodHunt; it's like Reddit, but for podcasts. Email us: mail@transistor.fm ★ Need a podcast? Transistor allows you to host all of your podcasts in one place. We also offer private podcasts: use them with your team, or on your membership site. Get a 14-day trial here. Thanks to our monthly supporters: Sofia Quintero Diogo Chris Willow Mason Hensley Borja Soler teami.io Ward from MemberSpace.com Eric Lima James Sowers (like Flowers) with UserInput.io Travis Fischer Matt Buckley, from NiceThings.io  Russell Brown Evandro Sasse Pradyumna Shembekar (PD), pradyumna.dev Noah Prail, eventOneHQ.com Robert Simplicio, Simplicio.com Colin Gray alitu.com Josh Smith, hellosift.com Ivan Curkovic Brian Rhea (Pronounced “Ray”) Shane Smith, dev.transistor.fm Austin Loveless Simon Bennett, snapshooter.io Michael Sitver, letterjoy.co Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, usefathom.com  Dan Buda danbuda.com Darby Frey Samori Augusto, thebicrowd.com Brad from Canada Sammy Schuckert Mike Walker Adam DuVander Dave Giunta (JOOnta) Kyle Fox GetRewardful.com ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★