Geoff Roberts
@GeoffTRoberts
Followers
4,352
Following
729
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281
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6,577
Co-founder @outseta . The all-in-one platform to build SaaS and membership businesses.
San Diego, CA
Joined April 2011
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I want more people building start-ups and great lives at the same time.
Not compromising one for the other.
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@paulg
@brian_armstrong
Isn't that a terrible reason? Isn't that the definition of a lack of leadership?
"We're not going to advocate for basic human decency because it's hard, could be polarizing, and could impact us financially?"
So we're going to hide behind being a "mission driven company?"
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At
@outseta
:
💰 A full-time salary is $210,000 for everyone
🗓️ You can choose to work 1 to 5 days / week
🏠 Everybody earns equity on the same terms as our founders
I get so many questions about this—I finally wrote a deep dive. Basics in video; full details in first comment.
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@dvassallo
I love most of your ideas... This one bugs me. First off, how is this career advice?
Beyond that, I have a family. They're great. But having a family isn't for everyone. Let's leave space for that to be ok and for people to be fulfilled in their own ways.
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$33,280.
The amount of money I will pay for medical care as a start-up founder in the United States in 2023.
$1440 per month ($17,280 annually) to insure a family of 4 with mediocre coverage.
$16,000 out of pocket max that I've hit by June.
Insanity.
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Now that 2018 is well behind us...
Can we all at least agree that chat bots didn't change everything?
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A huge personal update—
@outseta
is now paying me enough that I don't need to take on any external work.
And an update on our org design.
A full-time salary at Outseta is $210,000 per year and everyone can earn equity on the same terms as our founders.
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Podcast idea I like: "New People"
You only interview interesting, lesser known people in tech—fighting back against the current status of all the same people interviewing all the same people.
I know it would be super hard to grow—but I still think it has legs. Thoughts?
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I got destroyed by 5 figures in medical bills in April. One ER visit, and two routine procedures for my kids.
I'm now in Greece, where a doctor will come treat you AT YOUR HOUSE for $50.
The US healthcare system is a disaster, especially for entrepreneurs.
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This is CRAZY.
Despite all the announcements this week, apparently there's inner turmoil at both Hubspot and Stripe.
Fantastic investigative reporting.
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What's up!
I wanted to introduce myself, what I'm working on, and what I talk about here on Twitter.
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Webflow friends!
Our new
@webflow
App has lifted off. 🚀
💰 Payments
✅ Authentication
🤺 Protected content
Directly in the designer.
Use Webflow forms to integrate:
👨👦 CRM
⛑️ Help Desk
📨 Email automations
No Zapier, no APIs, no other tools needed.
See it in action! ⬇️
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So
@levelsio
blew this guy up w/ a tweet—I must say his energy is infectious.
Here's his first break—a real opportunity make that "wifi money" by working w/
@outseta
.
@AMplayslife
this is not hocus pocus bogus.
It's a job offer w/ a signing bonus. ⬇️
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A milestone today.
My kids 1st day of free public school.
This was
@outseta
's MRR when they were born—we didn't even add a customer that month.
5 years and $100,000+ in (part-time) child care expenses later...
We survived.
Cheers all the bootstrapping parents of young kids.
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@Kev_Conti
It took my Co-founder Dimitris 2.5 YEARS to get to 50 customers (paying about $20/month) at Buildium.
No pivot, sold for $580M 12 years later.
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Alright ya'll—I spent this morning with
@AMplayslife
and operation Wifi Money is officially underway.
In full
#buildinpublic
fashion, episode one was plagued by recording issues.
Nonetheless, here's how this is all going to go down—follow this guy!
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Need a new hobby. I have 3 hours every Sunday for the next 22 years available.
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If you've taken the solopreneur path successfully...
Do you have a coach?
A peer group of some sort?
Do you feel the need for some external support / perspective given you roll solo?
All feedback on this topic appreciated.
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More than anything
@webflowconf
for me was a reminder that business is deeply personal.
Here's my recap of the event after spending a week immersed in all things
@webflow
.
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Last night my kids stroller was stolen.
This morning I went down to the beach on a search expedition. Found the guy that took it, snatched it from him, dumped all his shit out, and pushed it home.
Dad 1, thieves 0.
Anything is possible today.
#LFG
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This has been home for the last 6 weeks.
I have reached peak Greek.
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As people in tech are increasingly running scared, I've don't think I've ever seen a more obvious opportunity in tech to:
1) Work for yourself
2) Make great income
Start a
@webflow
agency.
Twitter is literally full of people practically begging for help with Webflow projects.
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#NoCode
is already WAY more powerful than people think. But it also takes way more technical skill than people think to push it to its limits.
All the best no coders are tech natives even if they don't write code.
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Unpopular opinion:
#NoCode
scales much further than you think it does.
But no-code also a point of diminishing returns.
The most complex no-code projects require a level of technical skill—and have a level of technical complexity—that the real benefits of no-code are lost.
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There's been one bug in
@outseta
—more like a cockroach—that persisted for 6+ years.
It wasn't a serious thing, but it drove me mad. It became a part of our company lore.
As of 6 minutes ago—SQUASHED.
A new era begins!
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Today's social media lesson...
You may very well be a great person.
But when your entire public persona is based on being a dick on Twitter, people are going to come after you.
You reap what you sow.
Being purposely divisive + toxic is not a growth strategy worth pursuing.
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Tomorrow—after almost 3 years of quietly building
@outseta
alone in my garage—I'll finally emerge to head to
@webflowconf
.
Can I still wear my slippers though?
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Really cool to see
@outseta
's model resonate with so many people—the reach here is pretty cool to see.
Recording an episode for Mike's podcast tomorrow morning to talk through it all in more depth!
Thanks, Mike. 🙏
Wow.
Outseta has one of the most innovative cultures I’ve ever seen.
• Everyone makes $210,000, and you can choose to work 1 day ($42K salary) to 5 days ($210K) per week.
• Equal ownership with no classes of stock or preferential treatment for investors.
• Operates without
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1K
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Launched a course this morning that details exactly how we landed our first 500 customers
@outseta
.
It's on
@ProductHunt
today.
But let's talk about what worked...🧵
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I am often critical of the tech industry—for many reasons. So let me sum up this week with this:
@webflow
is a company worthy of admiration.
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@Julian
Not at the scale you're describing, but went through a similar process and ended up here:
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Well this was the unexpected highlight of my
@webflowconf
.
Thanks
@EdgarAllanCo
for building with
@outseta
and
@masonpoe
for sharing the story. 🙏
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Spent the last few days
@microconf
in Atlanta. Best MicroConf I've been to yet.
This event has the highest concentration of early stage SaaS founders that I've come across.
My takeaways from
#MicroConfUS24
... 🧵
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In today's unexpected news, one of our customers—on a $39/mo
@outseta
subscription—sold $172,624 of an online course... in November.
I was not even aware of this customer prior.
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Forget about 10%.
If you're selling software, memberships, or courses
@outseta
's all-in payment processing fees are always 3.9%.
And you get CRM, email, help desk, and reporting to boot.
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When we started building
@outseta
we were specifically looking for:
1) An idea big enough to hold our attention for 15 years
2) An idea durable enough to still be relevant in 15 years
Today is exactly 7.5 years since we started.
Both have proven true so far. To the next 7.5!
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Choose an enemy. Slay monsters. The hero's journey.
To me these tactics feel... tired.
I wish more companies had a straightforward page that describes what they offer, who it’s for, and when their product is (and isn’t) a good fit.
So I made one.
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Set new MRR records
@outseta
for 12 consecutive months in 2023.
Here's to keeping that streak alive for all of 2024!
Happy New Years all.
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I have an actual IRL business meeting tomorrow.
Where I have to like... wear clothes and make words and stuff.
Pray for me.
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We launched
@outseta
6 years ago today.
Highlights from 2022:
-4x'd revenue
-395 production pushes
-I went full-time &
-
@jameslavine_
ramped up to 4 days per week
-Moved to a 7-day free trial, requiring a credit card
-Standardized pay for our team
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SaaS has been a big deal for 15+ years now.
If you think about it objectively, it's incredibly bizarre that in all this time no one built a product that offers all the tablestakes functions require to launch a SaaS product.
-Payments
-Auth
-Transactional Emails
-Etc, etc, etc.
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September was
@outseta
's best month ever.
October has historically been a great month for us.
@webflowconf
coming up...
Lots to be excited about!
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Celebrating 19 years with the
#1
girl in the game today. I'm 37, so officially over half of my life now.
I can't @ mention her because she doesn't have Twitter, or Instaface, or Snapdragon. Just an IRL beauty.
Kinda badass if you ask me.
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After selling for $580M, here's what I learned about scaling
#SaaS
start-ups during my time at Buildium.
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@dvassallo
I bought this—first time I've ever purchased something like this. It was because of *credibility*—I've watched your account grow and enjoyed your tweets.
But my favorite takeaway from the entire course...
"You need to be interesting in real life to be interesting on Twitter."
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I'm working on a super deep dive into how we landed our first 500 customers
@outseta
. What sticks out to me most speaks to the compounding nature of SaaS.
It took...
4 years to get to 100 customers.
7 months to get to 200 customers.
6 weeks to get to 300 customers.
Keep going!
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I think
@jackbutcher
has done more good for
#Web3
than anyone.
Digital art? NFTs? Not my thing.
But Jack makes a compelling case for:
-The tech
-Building in public
-Establishing a style that attracts clients rather than adapting to them
Fun interview:
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My morning routine...
Open Twitter.
See a bunch of knuckleheads flaunting their success, pretending that they are humble.
Mumble to myself...
"Real gangstas move in silence."
Get back to doing my work.
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If I was single, I'd be nomadic.
I have twin 3 year old boys so my wife + I decided to travel for 6 out of every 24 months. Have done this 2x already.
Booked our next adventure—3 months in Sifnos (a Greek island) starting May 1. Open ended after that.
Massively pumped.
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Increasingly thinking about:
Can we build a $10M ARR company.
-20 employees making $250k year
-The remaining $5M split between (non-salary) operating expenses, profit sharing, and positive impact initiatives
Not sure this is the model for us yet, but I like this concept.
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I really enjoyed
@levelsio
's comments on how nomading didn't make him happy, shipping a lot does, + how constraints in life are good. Great interview.
For me, I'm notably happier:
1) Being in a stable relationship
2) Working on a single project, long term
3) When traveling
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We hired a big London tax advisory firm to give us an assessment of
@outseta
's VAT obligations.
I can't tell you how much time + money it just saved us.
If you're concerned about VAT don't listen to me or any software company.
Talk to an expert.
The fear mongering is rampant.
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Launching a course tomorrow that details exactly how we landed our first 500 customers
@outseta
.
Things I didn't do:
-Write any content specifically for sake of SEO
-Send any follow up emails
-Publish any content or social posts on a set schedule
Sharing what did work tomorrow
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I'm looking for an
#Illustrator
that's intimately familiar with tech Twitter / the
#indiehacker
community. This is a must—the project will be hard to pull off otherwise.
Super fun, paid gig availability immediately. No deadline.
Who you got?
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Had to back out of a meeting about 5 minutes before it started today after getting a distress call about one of my kids being sick at school.
Got this back from the person I cancelled on.
Hard to overstate how far a little humanity goes.
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A customer asked for a major new feature
@outseta
—it happens to be the biggest thing we're working on.
It's a huge undertaking, so I told him it wouldn't be ready until early 2025.
His response:
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Inspired by
@dvassallo
's recent Twitter course and dialogue around making small bets, here's the first info product I'm selling on
@gumroad
. Hats off to
@shl
+ team.
Here are 8 video breakdowns of the strategies I used to land
@outseta
's early customers.
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While my feed is filled with tech folks having Webflow vs. Framer debates (rightfully so)...
Squarespace is just out there serving the average person better + making $1B+ in annual revenue.
Seriously impressive. Squarespace is more of a pioneer than they're given credit for.
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Every day now is demos w/ people looking to migrate from Webflow memberships.
"I knew you offered memberships... but you also offer logic...and you send emails, so I don't need another email tool."
"That's right."
"And I get a CRM, too?"
"Yup."
"And reporting!"
"Yup."
...
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Something I'm thinking through...in full
#buildinpublic
fashion.
I am the "marketing founder"
@outseta
... but truth be told, I haven't really focused on marketing in about three years.
As in, I've spent less than 20% of my time here. This fall, that changes...
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I've finally cracked marketing to developers!
1) Purposely introduce a bug for your most important customers
2) Fix it remarkably quickly
3) Throw in a minor enhancement in the process
Rise and repeat.
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Investors? Nope.
Management? I'll pass.
Salary negotiations? Standardized salary.
Sales? Self-serve.
Budgets? Nah.
Forecasts? Can't control the future.
Performance targets? Arbitrary.
Chargebacks? Forget it.
Tech stack woes? Outseta.
Make things simple!
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I think there's an opportunity for many
#SaaS
companies to charge LESS for their software, and MORE for their service.
Just want access to the product? Here you go at a super affordable rate.
Want the service that comes with it? We'll charge a fair rate for our time.
Thoughts?
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People drinking less is hugely positive.
People optimizing for sleep is too.
I love Huberman just as much as you.
But if we're getting all clinical...
Having kids has wreaked havoc on the quality of my sleep + accelerated aging 10x more than alcohol ever has.
Just sayin'.
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Update—this customer has now sold $667,238 of her online course in less than 5 months.
I guarantee you've never heard of her.
Her site doesn't even have a custom domain.
Easily the craziest online entrepreneurship story I've come across. Never seen anything like it.
In today's unexpected news, one of our customers—on a $39/mo
@outseta
subscription—sold $172,624 of an online course... in November.
I was not even aware of this customer prior.
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Putting out a feeler...
Any front-end developers interested in working part-time
@outseta
?
Mixture of cash ($100/hr) + equity that vests immediately at the same rate as our founders. 20-40 hours per month.
1 meeting per week, otherwise work async.
React, Angular, Javascript
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I bought my first house and I've never seen it before.
Tomorrow, I begin traveling 5,061 miles to live there.
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The founder of a $1B+ company has been using
@outseta
for his next SaaS project for a few years now.
He deletes contacts from his account so he's paying the lowest possible rate each month.
Lesson there.
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My kids turned 3 today.
The perspective I share with people who are on the fence about having kids:
1) Kids are awesome. Probably way more awesome than you think.
2) Parenting generally sucks. Probably much more than you think.
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Officially our best month ever in terms of revenue
@outseta
.
The best part?
We had a very average month in terms of new customers added. The growth is driven by our customers growing revenue while using our product.
Several customers' businesses taking off in a big way.
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I finally did it—I watched all of
@webflow
's video tutorials in one day.
Aka... a marketer grapples with learning design.
There's a high probability this is useful to no one other than me and the Webflow user research team!
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Sitting down to begin writing...
"The Great
@outseta
Product Update of Summer 2021"
This will be the most fun and massive product update I've written in my career.
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The day after the need for more robust membership tooling on
@webflow
sites became a major topic of conversation, this lands in my inbox.
Simply put—we're committed to building the best membership software for use on Webflow sites.
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Generally speaking I'm the founder who thinks their product sucks and always has so much to improve.
But sometimes messages like these remind me we're getting a few things right!
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October was our best month ever
@outseta
.
The best part a/b our business model is our growth is driven entirely by our customers' growth.
The number of startups that implemented Outseta pre-revenue that are now at hundreds of thousands in revenue is swelling.
So cool to see!
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My start-up
@outseta
is on
@ProductHunt
today!
All the tablestakes tools required to launch a SaaS or membership business so you can get back to building what matters—your product.
Everything we've learned launching 1000s of start-ups in this product.
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When I was 25, I suddenly found myself leading marketing at a tech company that had caught fire.
Rather than hiring over me, they hired the CMO who took Constant Contact from $15M-$250M in revenue to mentor me.
Imagine what that does for a young person's confidence and career.
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I chat with 50 or so start-up
#founders
every week.
The most prevalent silent killer of start-ups that I see is not access to capital or developers.
It's founders that build unnecessary complexity into their businesses at the earliest stages.
Get out of your own way. Simplify!
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It's hard to overstate how many crazy talented people are going broke trying to build early stage tech start-ups...
...and how many hugely mediocre people are getting rich working big tech jobs.
You've got to truly love the early stage stuff.
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Here's a full write up of how this all works, where it came from, and why this format might work well for your start-up.
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Celebrating 18 years with my homegirl today. I'm 36, so officially half of my life now. 😲
She's been easily my favorite part.
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Work in progress update.
Still messing around with the lighting, audio, and
@screenstudio
but definitely leveled up the video / audio game more today than ever before.
Bootstrappers don't hire fancy consultants to build out their video / podcast studios.
The learn to hang sheetrock, texturize and sound proof walls, and paint it themselves. 💪
Finished product about two days away.
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I've found that about 1% of customers are "problem customers" in SaaS.
Most are just abusive + should be fired.
But we have 1 that's had 677 support interactions w/ us (97 tickets) over 2+ years.
He was on a free plan for most of this time.
We no longer offer a free plan.
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I have a vision where the team
@outseta
focuses on only four things:
🏗️ Building great software
📈 Marketing
💁♀️Providing excellent customer service
🧑🤝🧑 Hiring
Everything else is noise.
Tomorrow I'm going to share how we're eliminating nearly everything else.
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June was
@outseta
's best month ever (by a pretty wide margin) in what's historically been our slowest month of the year.
Momentum!
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@trentjhughes
In-N-Out and Trade Joe's are routinely my examples of great American businesses that aren't known to the average person outside of the US.
Phenomenal businesses worthy of studying and all the praise they receive.
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@bentossell
All I want is the support use case. Train AI on
@outseta
's knowledge base docs, then provide an interface where customers can ask questions and get answers.
Goal is simply to be "Level 1" support and deflect the easy questions.
Docs:
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@theSamParr
If you're struggling to find meaning in your life, I think most people aren't suddenly going to find it in either.
But the flaw in your thinking in my opinion:
-Psychedelics = over in 6 hours
-Kids = 20 year commitment
Act accordingly.
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We are living through the golden age of website builders.
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