Hey - Marc here.


Happy Saturday morning, motivated B2B SaaS Founders!


Here's at least one tip to keep in mind as you grow your B2B SaaS company:


Today's issue takes about 5 minutes to read.

 

Read this online →

 

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In today's issue, I share some key takeaways from a recent presentation of Cody McLain, the founder of SupportNinja, at the Founder500 event. He discussed how he bootstrapped to $20m in 5 years (and three growth channels he used to hit the first 100 customers).


Cody McLain was a high school dropout with no backup plan. His only option was to make money with his business. He discovered himself along the way and picked up flying, scuba diving, and photography. By achieving little things, he expanded his potential and thought of what was possible for himself. 

 

About SupportNinja

Founded in 2015, SupportNinja is an outsourced support company based in Austin and Dallas, with IT services and tech companies in the Philippines. They offer tech companies and online businesses customer support, back office, content moderation, lead generation, and data mining. 

Many companies would come to them expecting customer support but would find out that there were many other avenues they could help them with.

 

Their sample process:

  1. Build a Business Process Management System (BPMS) in Pipefy.
  2. As your team runs the process over and over, it becomes obvious how to improve it.
  3. Update components overnight.

Instead of just being the static employee following directions from the upper management, he allowed them to feel like they could add, update, and help revise that process. It also gives them a sense of ownership they otherwise wouldn't have had.

 

P.S. In 2017, they generated $3.9m in revenue and almost hit $25M ARR in 2021! The secret to their success is a combination of good old-fashioned marketing with targeted leads through strong branding efforts and not outsourcing everything (as many other companies do).

 

Challenges

He always wanted to start a Startup but didn't want the risk of creating a new business.

Early on, he had feelings of “ imposter syndrome,” mainly when he sold his hosting company. He tried to figure out what he would do next and discovered he wanted to work with startups but didn't necessarily want to be one. 


It was risk-averse.

It was already a proven model, and in most of Cody's ventures, he found a niche untapped by anybody else. He can guarantee no matter what industry or vertical you're in, there's going to be some niche that is untapped that perhaps you haven't discovered yet.

 

Advice to Other Founders

The business should serve us, not the other way around.

There's more to life than entrepreneurship. When we build the business around ourselves, we often forget why we started the company in the first place. That's especially true when you're bootstrapping.


Prioritize staff retention to maximize tacit knowledge.

A strong culture retains employees, which develops a deep bank of tacit knowledge. It also allowed the agents to build relationships with the clients because they liked working for them. Sometimes, they would even have "League of Legends" nights, enabling them to play video games in the office. 


Try to replicate as much of putting yourself in their position and seeing what they would want. 

Instead of calling them agents, they call them ninjas. Whenever they hire an agent, they would have this cool wooden samurai sword, and they would be knighted. It created a peak experience environment. significantly different from every other experience they've had.


Incorporate BPMS to maximize scalability.

Most clients end up dropping off during the onboarding period. He uses BPMS (Business Process Management System) to combine the process from a static document into an active part of that process. He also used Pipefy to build documentation, allowing them to develop their Kanban board, similar to Trello.

 

Bonus

  1. Cody wrote a book called "From Foster Care to Millionaire."
  2. In 2019, as a benefit of their efforts, they ranked 86th on the Inc. 5000 list as one of the fastest-growing companies in Texas.
  3. He used “TaskUs” offerings as his baseline and founded SupportNinja.


TL;DR

Cody McLein, the founder of SupportNinja, shares his success story at the Founder500 event. In 2017 they generated $3.9m in revenue and almost hit $25M ARR in 2021! He started SupportNinja because he wanted to help startups without all the risk that came with starting a new business himself. Early on, he had feelings of “imposter syndrome,” but realized it was something he could work through and overcome. If you're interested in hearing more about Cody's story, here is a link to the full interview.

 

P.S. Here is a link to the full interview if you are interested in listening to the full episode: How he bootstrapped to $20m in 5 years (and 3 growth channels I used to hit first 100 customers)

 

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See you again next week.


Whenever you're ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:


1. 1:1 SOPs Call (Consultation Call for Guidance) 


2. Work 1:1 with me to create customized Sales SOPs to remove yourself from the sales process and virtually guarantee that your investment in your next salesperson ensures they will hit their number? (Done for your Service). Click here to see if you qualify.