Dan Martell - Buying Back Time with Ross @ Maropost.com - Escape Velocity Show #4

00:00:00.000 So in 25 years, I mean, I would be really proud if I could look back and, you know, have built an organization, not saying about the hard work aspect, you know, that supported a lot of causes that are really going to impact, you know, the overall, you know, planet is the only way I can say it, as in that doesn't necessarily relate to people in some cases, which may offend others and may not, but if we don't have a place to live, we really can't do very much.

00:00:24.140 Ross how's it going man good dude I'm really excited for this conversation founder of mayor

00:00:43.680 post CEO I believe you're still CEO okay cool and just a good dude I follow you on Instagram

00:00:51.300 We met a few months ago through Ryan Dice in Toronto.

00:00:55.360 Yeah, it was last May.

00:00:55.920 That was last summer, yeah.

00:00:56.820 Yeah, yeah, it was beautiful.

00:00:57.760 That was right before all the summer kicked off.

00:01:00.280 Yeah, yeah, and then you got busy.

00:01:02.400 So you definitely got to follow Ross on Instagram

00:01:04.820 because you're living a really cool life

00:01:06.800 as the founder of a very successful and big SaaS company.

00:01:11.380 Talk about Maripose in regards to the size of the company,

00:01:14.280 the kind of clients you work with, and kind of what it does.

00:01:17.200 Sure, so we're about 150 people.

00:01:18.800 We work with customers across every vertical, or sorry,

00:01:21.620 every, I should say, every size.

00:01:23.120 So both SMB, mid-market, enterprise client.

00:01:25.580 You do have an SMB product?

00:01:27.380 Yeah, it's not an SMB product in a way.

00:01:29.140 I sort of classify that in terms of revenue, right?

00:01:31.520 So we have a lot of customers who are at traffic conversion

00:01:33.620 where we are right now.

00:01:34.680 Kind of like the 5k a year level?

00:01:36.520 Yeah, there's more like 5k a month.

00:01:39.080 I mean, a lot of customers who are smaller revenue-wise,

00:01:41.860 they just happen to send a lot of email, right?

00:01:43.480 They generate a lot of the revenue from email.

00:01:45.240 We actually have one of our clients

00:01:46.880 here who didn't even realize this,

00:01:49.060 they're about a 25 million revenue company.

00:01:51.060 They do 100% of the revenue from email.

00:01:52.940 No way.

00:01:53.440 100% through Maripose.

00:01:54.260 Yeah, yeah.

00:01:55.260 So yeah, there's a unique dynamic within that kind of quote

00:01:59.480 unquote SMB space, where just a lot of their revenue

00:02:02.060 comes from that strategy.

00:02:03.500 And Toronto's HQ?

00:02:05.420 Yeah, Toronto's HQ, and then we have Chicago,

00:02:07.460 and then we also have an office in India as well.

00:02:09.140 Cool, and what do you guys do?

00:02:10.100 How do you separate the Toronto versus Chicago?

00:02:12.260 So Toronto is HR, finance, client success,

00:02:17.720 and then some of our executive team, myself, obviously,

00:02:20.540 and our COO, Joseph, is there.

00:02:22.100 Our CTO is there, as well.

00:02:24.020 Chicago is sales and marketing.

00:02:26.780 And then India is some development, system 0.60

00:02:29.480 administration, and some support, as well.

00:02:32.260 OK, some development, but still development.

00:02:33.760 It's mostly in Canada?

00:02:34.540 No, it's mostly in India, actually.

00:02:35.620 Oh, mostly in India. 0.96

00:02:36.760 And how many years has it been so far?

00:02:38.880 It's been seven years.

00:02:40.020 It depends on who you talk to.

00:02:41.500 Some people it's seven, some people it's five.

00:02:43.400 I mean, it's seven if you include the first two years,

00:02:46.020 which is I was still working at another company

00:02:48.400 while funding the development.

00:02:49.720 So if you count those two years, then it's seven.

00:02:52.000 And then you told me it's a touchy subject,

00:02:54.820 but you have a jet, a beautiful jet that's

00:02:57.060 got mirror posts on the front of it, which is obviously

00:03:00.340 something that comes after working your butt off.

00:03:02.800 And that's why I love that you said two years

00:03:05.180 of working at a company, funding this on the side

00:03:08.840 to make it go.

00:03:09.480 But you bootstrapped the business for pretty much

00:03:12.540 the history of it, or how does that?

00:03:14.580 Yeah, so two and a half years ago,

00:03:16.620 we raised, wouldn't be classified as a raise necessarily,

00:03:19.500 but we brought in some partners.

00:03:21.400 And they brought some money in, and that

00:03:23.220 allowed some of our founders, I guess, or myself,

00:03:26.880 Get some liquidity.

00:03:27.780 Yeah, to get some liquidity.

00:03:28.920 And so it just made sense.

00:03:30.860 But we never had to raise any capital for the business

00:03:33.140 to grow it.

00:03:33.800 I've always been focused on very much

00:03:35.520 having a profitable company.

00:03:36.660 Yeah, cash flow.

00:03:37.620 Yeah, I think companies get carried away

00:03:39.020 now with the raising process.

00:03:41.600 That becomes the business, actually, more so than-

00:03:43.640 That's a good way to put it, because that's

00:03:45.200 exactly what it is.

00:03:47.360 In some of them, their business is professional fundraisers,

00:03:50.400 not executing growth in their business.

00:03:52.700 What was the reasoning behind investing in the JET?

00:03:56.720 Was it to, I mean, obviously, you got a Chicago office.

00:04:00.540 I just really enjoyed it at the time.

00:04:03.500 I've always enjoyed traveling.

00:04:04.780 Were you trying to buy back your time, though?

00:04:06.900 Yeah, sort of.

00:04:08.040 For me, it was really 10 years of all go, no stop.

00:04:10.980 Hell yeah, man.

00:04:12.220 And so now, and I've never done anything sort of crazy,

00:04:16.560 I guess you could say.

00:04:17.520 A lot of people go out, and they have a liquidity event.

00:04:19.820 Yeah, houses, cars.

00:04:21.660 I'm actually selling the only cars I do have right now

00:04:24.180 to just make my life a lot more simple.

00:04:25.980 Yeah, less things.

00:04:26.800 I wouldn't say a jet makes your life more simple.

00:04:28.680 But yeah, you do get that time aspect.

00:04:31.260 It really is a time machine if you want to be anywhere

00:04:34.080 at any time.

00:04:34.760 And obviously, leveraging it for the business,

00:04:37.740 but also being able to build relationships with partners.

00:04:41.400 For sure, yeah.

00:04:43.080 The last couple of years, I would, you know.

00:04:45.060 Because you're here at Traffic Conversion Summit for the week,

00:04:48.120 and you came from Toronto, or where did you come prior?

00:04:50.360 I was coming, actually, from Florida.

00:04:51.720 And did you bring some customers from Florida over?

00:04:53.460 Not this time, but a couple of our teammates,

00:04:55.420 and then we're actually flying out from here

00:04:57.860 with some of our clients.

00:04:58.780 Yeah, man, making them feel great.

00:05:00.200 This is actually the one year where I usually fly to Austin,

00:05:03.620 pick up Ryan and Richard.

00:05:05.080 Yeah, he mentioned that, yeah.

00:05:06.360 Yeah, and bring them. 0.68

00:05:06.900 And this is the one year they had to fly.

00:05:08.100 You didn't do it?

00:05:08.700 We were talking about it the whole way here,

00:05:10.280 according to other people who were on the plane.

00:05:13.220 What have you learned about scaling business in general?

00:05:16.540 Because I mean, obviously, there's

00:05:17.520 the nuance in the early days of software specific.

00:05:19.920 But I mean, you guys are 150 employees, so it's business.

00:05:24.060 What have you learned trying to keep your skills leadership

00:05:27.540 as chairman and CEO?

00:05:29.100 Yeah, I mean, a big part of it has become about the team,

00:05:31.520 of course, more so than how we obviously we started.

00:05:34.020 And it was, I wouldn't say it was just me as an example.

00:05:36.540 I do have my CTO and co-founder as an example.

00:05:40.440 But I was running around.

00:05:42.480 I was the same person that sold you our solution.

00:05:45.400 I was the same person that supported you

00:05:46.660 while you had a solution.

00:05:47.160 No way.

00:05:47.660 I was the same person that billed you for a solution.

00:05:49.000 How long did you do that for?

00:05:50.600 That's for a long time.

00:05:51.580 So it was between years one through four and even five.

00:05:56.560 And what were the customer deal sizes back then?

00:05:59.140 Like, what was the deal?

00:05:59.800 They were always kind of the same, actually.

00:06:01.680 They were actually a little bit higher back then.

00:06:04.240 I think because, again, I was obviously

00:06:05.740 going after people who were sending more campaigns,

00:06:08.740 had bigger databases, whether they were bigger companies

00:06:11.080 or not.

00:06:11.240 Or agencies that manage a lot of them.

00:06:12.820 Yeah, exactly.

00:06:13.840 Like, as an example, digital marketer is a customer.

00:06:16.180 And they were early, right?

00:06:17.060 Yeah, they've been about four years.

00:06:19.840 And customers like them and a few others

00:06:22.000 where email is a core component to their business,

00:06:25.900 they really appreciated the relationship

00:06:28.000 we could bring to the table.

00:06:28.780 Yeah, they wanted to call the person.

00:06:32.480 And what was it that allowed you to compete?

00:06:35.580 I consider email marketing a pretty competitive space.

00:06:38.780 It is and it isn't.

00:06:39.540 So that's a conversation that comes up, again, at every level.

00:06:43.160 So the SMB side, you've got the true SMB side.

00:06:46.280 You've got the Mailchimp's and the Infusionsoft's,

00:06:48.740 and depending on what your business needs are.

00:06:50.660 Yeah, price-wise.

00:06:51.380 And on the enterprise side, yeah, you

00:06:52.620 have the Salesforce marketing cloud, the IBM marketing cloud,

00:06:55.460 the Adobe, and so on.

00:06:57.540 They can't offer the level of relationship or service

00:07:00.620 that we would, right?

00:07:01.800 Larry Ellison and Mark Benioff are not picking up

00:07:03.600 the phone to talk to.

00:07:04.440 No, exactly.

00:07:05.980 So I always came into it with that at the start.

00:07:08.440 I still consider that to be our philosophy

00:07:11.120 on the support side of things.

00:07:13.080 So it's just having that view and understanding,

00:07:17.700 and then building the product along with that philosophy

00:07:21.360 is really what has gotten us ahead.

00:07:22.820 And how do you do that in a way?

00:07:24.540 What I love is you choose a higher price point customer.

00:07:27.180 It sounds like you did a named account strategy,

00:07:29.520 where you're like, these are the companies that we know

00:07:31.500 have it.

00:07:32.380 So there's higher margin on that.

00:07:34.880 But I mean, obviously, the product also

00:07:36.180 has to deliver at a sophisticated level.

00:07:39.380 How do you keep up to what they need at that?

00:07:42.640 That was a huge focus of ours.

00:07:44.000 So when I started the business, it

00:07:45.180 was that support relationship aspect.

00:07:47.340 And it very quickly transitioned, not

00:07:49.360 at the expense of support, but into the product side.

00:07:52.000 So we have never really been a sales and marketing

00:07:55.560 organization like most of our competitors.

00:07:57.880 We've been a product and support company.

00:07:59.920 Not to say we aren't now focusing on that in a big way.

00:08:04.140 Executing on all those really cool ideas,

00:08:06.220 those ROI driving ideas early on from a technology standpoint,

00:08:10.000 that was the focus.

00:08:11.320 So we've moved ahead very, very quickly

00:08:13.360 in terms of development, in terms of-

00:08:14.760 The right product innovation.

00:08:16.040 Yeah, there was a lot of innovation.

00:08:17.500 And what are some of the things that you guys

00:08:19.120 brought to your product or the market

00:08:21.480 that your customers appreciated earlier

00:08:23.200 than the rest of the market?

00:08:24.240 One of the biggest things, this is going back, again,

00:08:26.680 like six years, was the drag and drop marketing automation

00:08:31.360 side of things.

00:08:31.860 It's not to say we were the first people to have that.

00:08:33.920 We just made it a lot easier.

00:08:35.140 Cleaner.

00:08:35.640 Yeah, cleaner, easier to use.

00:08:37.080 Are you a product guy?

00:08:38.420 I wasn't, but I do have to be.

00:08:39.440 Now you consider yourself.

00:08:40.540 You care about pixels and flowers.

00:08:41.580 Oh, for sure, yeah.

00:08:42.680 All of the features that we realistically have built,

00:08:46.580 for the most part, do either come from me

00:08:48.820 or are approved by me, because it's

00:08:50.240 such an important aspect of the company.

00:08:52.040 So that was a big area of just campaign builders and the campus.

00:08:55.180 Yeah, campaign builders.

00:08:56.660 Yeah, the journey builders.

00:08:58.400 Finding better ways to target and segment

00:09:00.620 and build personas now.

00:09:02.120 And now it's personalization.

00:09:03.980 So essentially, like segment, like pixeling customer

00:09:06.780 based on what they've done tag.

00:09:08.360 Is there like an auto tagging?

00:09:09.680 Yeah, it's all automated.

00:09:10.740 So it brings everything in from a customer, subscriber,

00:09:14.040 whatever you want to call it, perspective.

00:09:15.500 And then our customers can then go in and say, hey,

00:09:18.100 I want to target people who've clicked on this

00:09:20.120 or purchased that or have a lifetime value.

00:09:21.940 And it already happens. 0.95

00:09:23.140 So it doesn't like you have to configure all these frigging. 0.97

00:09:25.600 Correct, yeah. 0.97

00:09:26.220 Yeah, see, that to me is a big pain even in my world.

00:09:28.460 That was the biggest shift, actually,

00:09:30.060 that's happened and why there's 7,000 MarTech companies now

00:09:33.420 is people were building more or less features

00:09:36.940 as an entire company, but they were doing it

00:09:39.340 in a really easy way that, of course,

00:09:40.760 was getting them customers.

00:09:41.940 Because the kind of all-in-ones or the companies,

00:09:45.080 the larger ones that should have that functionality,

00:09:48.300 are too sort of not out of date, but or not even out of touch.

00:09:51.300 They're just not prepared to unwind the more complex

00:09:54.980 processes they've had.

00:09:56.240 Yeah.

00:09:56.740 So as in, if you're working with a Salesforce,

00:09:58.520 you're getting certain technology that's more 2010,

00:10:03.140 as an example.

00:10:04.140 The process to, say, accomplishing, you were using

00:10:06.360 pixels.

00:10:06.660 Is it 2010?

00:10:07.520 Yeah, version compared to 2019, which is two clicks

00:10:10.520 and then a copy and a paste.

00:10:11.840 That's it.

00:10:12.540 Oh, that's an interesting way of looking at it.

00:10:14.000 So you were able to bring a workflow that

00:10:16.540 was more modern to a customer that those bigger companies,

00:10:20.300 even though they might have more features, checklists,

00:10:23.140 the ones that mattered, you guys can compute.

00:10:24.660 That matter now, yeah.

00:10:25.620 That matter now.

00:10:26.760 And you mentioned relationship.

00:10:29.280 But I mean, was there a lot of conference going?

00:10:31.440 How do you find these customers?

00:10:33.280 What are your tricks?

00:10:34.460 Because obviously, it sounds and it

00:10:35.760 feels like you have the ability to build relationships quickly

00:10:39.520 and kind of listen properly.

00:10:41.740 A lot of the people watching this

00:10:43.220 are a little bit more introverted, but if you had to.

00:10:46.020 I fall within that group.

00:10:47.020 Yeah, so default introvert, but can play the extrovert

00:10:50.460 or can go after.

00:10:52.020 What do you do to build those relationships?

00:10:54.520 Like, how do you get in front of these accounts?

00:10:56.020 I mean, oddly enough, I do fall somewhere

00:10:59.220 in the middle of introvert.

00:11:00.420 I'm certainly not an extrovert, like some of our common friends,

00:11:04.020 like Adrian, as an example.

00:11:05.260 Yeah.

00:11:07.080 We did a lot from, well, let me step back.

00:11:09.320 So I just started meeting people,

00:11:12.180 like the digital marketer groups, like individuals

00:11:14.220 like Adrian, as an example, where we just became friends,

00:11:17.740 almost, more so than the partner relationship.

00:11:22.000 and it became the the aspect of well you have this amazing product as well we love spending time

00:11:27.740 together why don't we actually you know why don't we work together in a way and so it was less of

00:11:31.780 sort of a sales process and more of a relationship building you know kind of exercise both on a

00:11:36.960 personal side and a professional side yeah so genuinely you you were curious and were interested

00:11:41.820 in other people exactly yeah so it's like i just find your business fascinating yeah and then

00:11:47.460 through doing great work for them was it referral based initially yeah so we had a lot of referrals

00:11:51.600 taking place.

00:11:52.400 It wasn't anything like any process around it.

00:11:54.760 It was just people were becoming so successful

00:11:56.820 with our technology that they were recommending

00:11:58.740 to their friends.

00:11:59.360 Yeah.

00:11:59.860 And was there a specific company you were taking business from?

00:12:04.140 It's all over the place.

00:12:05.360 I mean, the bulk of it is sort of, again,

00:12:08.840 there's tons of Salesforce marketing cloud, tons of org.

00:12:12.420 These were all other email or marketing automation

00:12:14.740 providers before.

00:12:16.380 So tons at that level, a lot in the mid-market, which is more.

00:12:19.220 I mean, these are also now owned by Oracle, as an example,

00:12:22.440 bought a company called Bronto, which was big in the e-commerce

00:12:25.540 side.

00:12:27.600 You know, there was Blue Hornet, which has now

00:12:29.020 been merged to another product.

00:12:30.540 So we get a lot from them.

00:12:31.440 We get some from Mailchimp.

00:12:32.440 We get a lot from Infusionsoft.

00:12:34.880 It just comes from ever.

00:12:35.460 So no one specific one.

00:12:36.440 It's not like you built the business off of something.

00:12:38.640 And I think because we can work with sort of anyone,

00:12:41.360 like any vertical, there wasn't really one direction

00:12:44.460 we would target.

00:12:45.280 Was there, I mean, because you deployed the accounts as well,

00:12:47.900 Was there some kind of rules, like principles

00:12:51.660 around how you wanted the customer experience to be

00:12:54.320 in regards to response times?

00:12:55.740 For sure, yeah.

00:12:56.320 Yeah, so talk about that.

00:12:57.540 Yeah, so we were one of the, I don't

00:12:59.180 even know if we were one of the first companies,

00:13:00.440 but I'm betting we were to actually have in-app live chat.

00:13:03.700 So like 24 hour in-app live chat, I should say that.

00:13:06.540 I still don't see providers that we work with that have it.

00:13:09.980 So as in, Ross is trying to launch a campaign

00:13:13.100 or create a segment or create a persona.

00:13:15.380 And they're stuck.

00:13:16.280 Yeah, and so they're stuck.

00:13:17.220 they can chat with somebody 24-7, 365,

00:13:19.460 with a sub 30-second response.

00:13:22.680 How do you train that?

00:13:25.320 At the time, it was a little more stick-related.

00:13:27.560 Now it's a little more carrot-based.

00:13:29.120 Yeah.

00:13:29.620 So I mean, that's hard for a product that I'm

00:13:31.540 assuming has a lot of different features.

00:13:33.480 It was, yeah.

00:13:34.040 Yeah.

00:13:34.540 And then so now.

00:13:35.040 A lot of things would roll back to me in the early stages.

00:13:37.800 Essentially, first level, tier one,

00:13:39.540 and then it could escalate and queue them up

00:13:41.980 if they needed to wait.

00:13:43.120 But that was something that was important to you.

00:13:45.160 Oh, yeah, that still is the number one.

00:13:47.740 Number one, making sure they never feel like you're not.

00:13:49.840 Because it goes like a lot of solutions now, right?

00:13:52.200 You send in a ticket, and you get a response two days later.

00:13:54.440 It's crazy.

00:13:55.100 Yeah, like how can you run a business that way?

00:13:56.680 Yeah, no, and somehow they do.

00:13:58.440 It's almost like it's-

00:14:00.520 Well, it's been entrenched in their customers understanding

00:14:05.300 that, oh, this is the norm.

00:14:06.500 We're not going to get anything better.

00:14:07.460 It just is what it is.

00:14:08.020 Yeah, unless we pay for it or whatever.

00:14:09.760 Yeah, and even when you do, it's questionable.

00:14:11.300 Yeah, you still don't get it.

00:14:11.880 So and then in regards to activating accounts,

00:14:14.440 would you guys go out of your way to make sure that,

00:14:18.120 let's say you meet one of Ryan's buddies at a conference,

00:14:20.540 and he's like, hey, I really want to use you.

00:14:22.500 Were you super proactive?

00:14:24.720 Yeah, so I mean, it's like I bring this up

00:14:27.660 because I meet some founders, and I just

00:14:29.300 feel like they're not hungry.

00:14:30.640 You know what I mean?

00:14:31.240 I come from a sales background.

00:14:32.520 Perfect.

00:14:33.020 So I should have mentioned it.

00:14:33.840 Yeah, so that is by far, I would say I'm partially depressed

00:14:38.300 that I don't get to do that anymore, because that is by far

00:14:40.480 the funnest.

00:14:41.160 And describe what was fun about that.

00:14:43.660 I just, I love showing the product.

00:14:45.560 I actually think that, and I think customers would always

00:14:48.240 say to me, you are more excited about you

00:14:52.060 selling us your product.

00:14:53.280 How could we not be excited?

00:14:54.960 You're showing us this feature, and you're

00:14:56.280 telling about all we're going to do with it.

00:14:58.520 And you're more excited than our own team is based on that.

00:15:01.220 How can we not be kind of, it's supposed

00:15:03.240 to going through the demo, and you're like, oh, yes,

00:15:05.160 they have segments, and automation, and journeys,

00:15:07.660 and so on and so forth.

00:15:08.760 And then you get to the end, and then there's

00:15:10.260 all these other conversations around contracts and legal

00:15:13.500 and so on, that ruins the whole experience.

00:15:15.940 You want to be able to get through that quickly

00:15:17.400 and then jump in and be excited about what

00:15:19.460 the first stages of the relationship is going to be like.

00:15:22.500 And I miss that a lot.

00:15:24.020 You miss that demo, that show and tell,

00:15:25.980 that just excitement for the product.

00:15:28.560 What were some of the, from a leadership point of view,

00:15:30.900 because I feel like that folks kind of passed the 2025 people,

00:15:35.760 what are some of the things, how did you

00:15:37.680 develop who you were to be able to lead the company that's still an ongoing process very

00:15:42.820 much because there was you know um up until you know the last couple of years we didn't have

00:15:48.660 you know really an executive team or anything it was still a lot of ross related activities

00:15:52.820 not because i wanted to hold on to those or anything it grew so quick yeah it just grew so

00:15:57.100 quickly yeah care about those areas yeah and i that's that was a big thing and so you know

00:16:01.300 giving up the reins and support and in sales and in marketing and and what went first for you

00:16:06.700 like what did you delegate or hire it was it was the support some of the support side so support

00:16:11.620 customer success kind of have somebody lead that and then they run off on that and then you kept

00:16:16.540 marketing and sales yeah marketing we really you don't really do marketing no we didn't really

00:16:21.460 know yeah i'd say just now are we really you know starting to do things i spoke on your stage i know

00:16:27.060 you're spending some money on yeah no we did a lot of that though right we still did the sponsor

00:16:31.020 Yeah, and that gave us the exposure,

00:16:33.260 but it really wasn't a focus of a strategy.

00:16:36.120 Lead generation.

00:16:37.020 Correct.

00:16:37.520 Yeah, it was more of brand awareness

00:16:38.920 so that people are like, oh, I've heard of you guys.

00:16:41.020 So that made the conversation easier.

00:16:43.620 How do you guys plan?

00:16:44.820 How do you plan strategy, if you don't mind me asking,

00:16:46.680 around cadence, communication?

00:16:48.920 Yeah, so I'd say a lot of that.

00:16:50.320 I mean, do you mean around how we communicate

00:16:52.620 with our customers?

00:16:53.580 No, more about how do you lead your executive team now?

00:16:56.320 Like what's the planning cadence?

00:16:58.220 What's the outcomes of those?

00:16:59.520 A lot of it is kind of after me, it's a single point.

00:17:02.760 So it goes from me to my COO and then down to our CTO

00:17:06.900 and our VP levels from a sales marketing perspective.

00:17:10.380 That was a huge focus, I'd say, over the last 12 months,

00:17:15.660 which is more it's placing me in the role I was meant to be.

00:17:18.120 And I'm not a people manager.

00:17:19.560 That is certainly not one of my fortes.

00:17:21.160 So my COO kind of operates as the integrator

00:17:24.440 within the business.

00:17:25.480 And I operate with kind of the vision and direction of it.

00:17:28.280 And that makes things a lot easier.

00:17:29.620 When did you apply that kind of Geno Wickman style?

00:17:32.680 Yeah, that's exactly.

00:17:34.340 That was the book our CEO was reading.

00:17:36.080 It's like, yeah, we got to do this.

00:17:37.380 Yeah, traction.

00:17:38.080 So when did that come to that?

00:17:39.600 Probably starting 12 months ago.

00:17:41.060 Wow, it's that new.

00:17:41.940 Yeah, that new.

00:17:42.440 But you built a big company even without that.

00:17:44.280 Yeah, but I think we, again, because we

00:17:47.540 had so many great relationships and we

00:17:48.920 had this amazing product, it was easy to drive it forward.

00:17:51.780 But that next stage is not going to allow.

00:17:53.840 What got you here won't get you there.

00:17:56.280 And what do you appreciate about that now?

00:17:57.940 Is it fun knowing that you don't have to manage the people side?

00:18:00.820 Yeah, that certainly is.

00:18:02.860 But again, I miss some areas that I know I have that have

00:18:06.160 to be given up.

00:18:06.940 Yeah.

00:18:08.140 We've got an amazing sales executive

00:18:09.820 that came over from Salesforce, actually.

00:18:12.280 He's in charge of that team.

00:18:13.400 Ross is not on demos anymore.

00:18:14.780 Ross is not doing pictures.

00:18:15.940 He's not processing paperwork.

00:18:17.680 It's not to say I can't miss those things.

00:18:20.320 Processing paperwork, though?

00:18:21.800 Yeah, that was the funnest part.

00:18:23.200 Why?

00:18:23.700 The best part about it was because the day would end,

00:18:26.980 or it'd be 12 o'clock and the docusign hits your,

00:18:29.560 you know, and then you send that off to finance.

00:18:31.740 Yeah, it's your closing deals.

00:18:33.160 I mean, that's true, man.

00:18:34.600 There is something exciting about the art of the deal.

00:18:36.560 It's like going hunting, and it's the closure of the work.

00:18:41.480 Where do you see the opportunity for your guys' business

00:18:44.560 in the future?

00:18:45.100 Like, what do you see in this space in regards to,

00:18:48.220 where is it going?

00:18:49.360 I mean, there's been a lot of consolidation, right?

00:18:51.160 Like, again, the sales forces are

00:18:53.320 buying companies up like crazy.

00:18:55.620 I'm actually seeing a lot of companies

00:18:57.240 who are relatively stagnant or even on a decline,

00:19:01.260 that they're partnering or somebody's

00:19:04.080 acquiring somebody to see if they can produce greater results

00:19:07.980 combined versus as individuals.

00:19:11.000 For us, I mean, it's more about where

00:19:15.140 we're going to take the product and it's-

00:19:17.020 Because you've got to choose a problem space, right?

00:19:19.140 Yeah, yeah.

00:19:20.840 The great thing for us is every vertical

00:19:22.640 that we seem to function in is a problem space.

00:19:25.120 You know, everyone is dealing with issues

00:19:27.460 within marketing automation, whether it's engagement issues,

00:19:29.860 whether it's customer retention issues, whether it's

00:19:33.760 So it's communication, and that's, there's a lot to.

00:19:36.640 There's a lot going on there.

00:19:37.720 Yeah, I mean, there's no lack of opportunity.

00:19:39.400 We went from, what, 300 or 500, you know,

00:19:41.200 six years ago on the martech kind of spectrum

00:19:44.020 to 7,000 plus now.

00:19:45.620 That's crazy.

00:19:46.540 Yeah, and so that's what I meant about kind of those feature

00:19:48.620 as a company aspects.

00:19:49.600 I mean, for us, it's avoiding all of that.

00:19:51.280 It's saying, you know, our focus, you know.

00:19:53.380 What is your, how do you guys define your core right now as a business?

00:19:56.940 Yeah, so that's what I was going to say, actually, is so the, you know, the core up until, you know, two years ago was, you know, email, mobile, social, marketing, automation, marketing cloud, what have you.

00:20:06.920 You know, now it's more, you know, single customer view and bringing in the e-commerce aspect of that and then bringing in the support and the service aspect of that.

00:20:14.340 So, you know, really focusing on the overall customer journey, not just the marketing journey.

00:20:18.340 Like a 360.

00:20:19.300 Correct, yeah.

00:20:19.900 Yeah, so now you have, like, lifetime value.

00:20:21.720 Exactly.

00:20:22.060 You have the purchase system.

00:20:22.820 We have that already, and that's the great piece,

00:20:24.520 because we bring that information into the marketing side

00:20:27.140 to target.

00:20:27.420 So when you're doing support, now all of a sudden

00:20:29.020 you've got a 360 view.

00:20:30.220 Yeah, if I had a screen here, I mean, I would show you.

00:20:32.000 I mean, it's bringing all of those communication aspects

00:20:34.880 in, all of the purchasing information,

00:20:36.880 all of the service and support aspects.

00:20:37.660 And do you care if they do those activities off platform

00:20:40.920 and you just integrate them?

00:20:41.540 Our focus would be for them to do them in our platform.

00:20:44.800 We're not looking to be an integrator, as an example.

00:20:47.160 And that's what a lot of people are doing.

00:20:49.120 That's not the philosophy that I think

00:20:50.600 is going to make people successful.

00:20:51.840 Yeah, you want them to have a native experience.

00:20:54.180 Yeah, you want actionable information.

00:20:56.220 Anyone can go buy Tableau, or Domo, or Grow,

00:20:59.340 or Looker, or whatever.

00:21:00.480 That's great.

00:21:00.980 I love looking at pretty dashboards.

00:21:02.400 I'm like, OK, how do I click this, and then do something?

00:21:04.980 Yeah, to do some action around it.

00:21:07.400 What have you learned about building SaaS?

00:21:09.240 Like, I mean, what's the, yeah, what happened here, really?

00:21:13.340 Yeah.

00:21:14.160 I mean, what do you mean when you say that?

00:21:15.740 Who have you learned from, or what

00:21:17.200 were some of the things that weren't so obvious

00:21:18.660 in the beginning?

00:21:19.740 So I talk about this way too much.

00:21:22.140 And it's not a positive in any way.

00:21:23.640 And I do not recommend it.

00:21:24.640 But I was never a reader.

00:21:26.640 I literally have not finished a book even to this date,

00:21:29.500 whether that be audio and it's being read to me or physical.

00:21:33.560 I would have spent more time doing that

00:21:35.060 if I could have gone back.

00:21:36.300 Because it's not that I think we made a lot of mistakes.

00:21:39.980 I mean, I don't think we've made that many

00:21:41.620 compared to what happens in a lot of scenarios.

00:21:43.480 And that's great.

00:21:44.300 And I'm excited and happy about that

00:21:45.740 and lucky at the same time.

00:21:47.860 But I think there was clearly things

00:21:50.200 that could have been done at an earlier stage.

00:21:51.760 I would have brought in more individuals

00:21:53.380 at a leadership perspective, maybe in year three and four.

00:21:56.860 I would have invested in them as well.

00:21:58.420 I don't mean in them from a budgetary standpoint,

00:22:00.860 but bring in the right people.

00:22:02.100 Coach them.

00:22:02.640 Yeah, yeah, yeah, and spend more time.

00:22:04.240 Yeah, and investing in a way where maybe I don't

00:22:07.580 have to coach them, actually.

00:22:08.720 Like I used an example.

00:22:10.760 Our COO came from CIBC, a big top five Canadian bank.

00:22:16.180 I don't need to coach him on all these areas.

00:22:18.680 We brought in an SVP of sales from Salesforce.

00:22:21.820 We don't need to coach him.

00:22:22.780 We brought in an SVP of marketing

00:22:24.640 from another multi-billion dollar organization.

00:22:27.940 We don't have to coach him.

00:22:29.700 So that's been something I wish I would have done

00:22:31.940 a little bit or could have, but that's not the path.

00:22:34.360 What's your way of learning then if it's not books?

00:22:36.800 Because obviously you've grown.

00:22:38.260 I go with my intuition a lot.

00:22:40.420 I do believe people really need to go with their gut

00:22:43.000 in order to be happy about the decision

00:22:44.460 they've made, both positive and negative.

00:22:46.980 There's no second chances.

00:22:48.600 There's no take back.

00:22:49.380 So you have to be comfortable with that.

00:22:51.580 And the more comfortable you are with, obviously,

00:22:53.520 your past history, the more comfortable you're, of course,

00:22:55.500 going to be with making those decisions moving forward.

00:22:57.960 I've never had a problem with decision making.

00:23:00.120 So you feel like you've always been pretty decisive.

00:23:02.160 Yeah, I've been very decisive, both positive and bad.

00:23:04.700 Yeah, both good and bad.

00:23:05.700 But I think now, when we're at the stage we're at today,

00:23:07.920 is now, again, I have to start understanding,

00:23:10.300 OK, where did people go wrong in the 20 or 30

00:23:13.960 to 100 million, or the 100 million to 200 million,

00:23:16.720 it's not going to be the same story that got us from 0 to 20.

00:23:20.300 Do you feel like the partners that you worked with

00:23:22.840 was a source of knowledge around scale?

00:23:25.780 Because I feel like, no, so you didn't learn it like?

00:23:28.300 Well, it just never came up, because it wasn't really a thing.

00:23:31.860 Yeah.

00:23:32.360 So who did you learn from, or is it really just intuition?

00:23:37.400 Yeah.

00:23:38.100 Man, that's really unique.

00:23:41.380 I listen to my customers at the same time.

00:23:43.320 Like, as in, you know, if somebody had an idea or a concept,

00:23:46.480 you know, we would take that idea or concept

00:23:48.120 and merge it with maybe a bunch of others we had.

00:23:49.880 And we're like, oh, this is even better now.

00:23:51.000 Did you have a process for doing that?

00:23:52.500 No.

00:23:53.000 No, so really just, like, get close to the customer.

00:23:55.980 Correct, yeah.

00:23:56.520 And then feed that back into product roadmap.

00:23:57.840 Well, like I said, the same individual who was, you know,

00:24:00.900 selling, deploying, and signing contracts.

00:24:02.520 Yeah, was supporting you at the same time.

00:24:04.220 So I have access to that information.

00:24:07.080 Did you sleep for?

00:24:08.460 Not a lot, no.

00:24:09.160 No.

00:24:09.780 But I love that.

00:24:10.560 It was so fun, yeah.

00:24:12.060 I mean, you said something a little bit earlier

00:24:14.680 about people not willing to grind or use a different term.

00:24:18.420 But I don't feel like they're driven.

00:24:20.520 Yeah, I mean, if you're not driven, 0.99

00:24:22.340 you do not belong in any other shit. 0.99

00:24:23.340 And I say this, Russ, because what I love, 0.99

00:24:25.140 what it sounds like based on what you're sharing,

00:24:27.140 is I meet people all the time.

00:24:29.660 It's like they're in an industry, and there's a lead.

00:24:32.640 Like, they're at a dinner, and this person's like,

00:24:35.200 oh, I'd love to talk sometime.

00:24:36.540 And they're just like, OK, cool, we'll talk.

00:24:38.220 This is a soft subject.

00:24:39.180 And I'm just like, dude, get his card.

00:24:41.760 Get his contacts.

00:24:42.600 Schedule a meeting.

00:24:43.420 Let's do it.

00:24:44.040 What are you doing?

00:24:44.700 I mean, I remember one time my brother, he sells houses.

00:24:46.880 And he's at the gym.

00:24:47.880 And a friend of his said, yeah, my buddy, Chris, who runs

00:24:50.100 a BMW dealership, is going to build a new house.

00:24:52.320 My brother's like, can you make an introduction?

00:24:54.840 What's his cell number?

00:24:56.460 I want to talk to Chris before he decides on a builder.

00:24:58.880 And it's like, that's the level of intensity

00:25:02.360 that I feel is lacking.

00:25:03.900 It sounds like that was innate in you.

00:25:06.680 Did that come from the sales training?

00:25:08.680 No, actually, I shouldn't say no.

00:25:11.060 I didn't really ever have sales training.

00:25:13.540 OK, but you were in sales prior?

00:25:15.240 Yeah, correct.

00:25:16.060 In the first direct sales job I had, the first weekend,

00:25:20.120 or a role I had, the first weekend,

00:25:21.600 we had Sandler's sales training.

00:25:23.440 I can't remember anything today.

00:25:24.280 Sandler, I remember.

00:25:24.920 Yeah.

00:25:25.420 Yeah.

00:25:25.920 And funny enough, it was taught by an Indian gentleman

00:25:28.340 named Guru Ganesh.

00:25:29.440 I can't believe I remember that.

00:25:31.540 But I think there's fundamentals there that I kept,

00:25:34.040 but it was the work ethic that really got us there.

00:25:36.320 Yeah, and when you say work ethic, it was the-

00:25:38.340 Putting in the time.

00:25:39.080 Doing the time.

00:25:39.820 Putting in the time.

00:25:41.260 Building the book of business, the prospecting.

00:25:43.560 Yeah, just you got to be, as you just said a minute ago,

00:25:45.320 people don't want to, you know,

00:25:47.560 it's almost like a lot of people, even in sales,

00:25:49.120 they're afraid of people.

00:25:50.180 So you're not willing to say,

00:25:52.420 hey, I've got Dan on the hook here.

00:25:53.980 Let's just book a meeting right now.

00:25:55.540 You know what I mean?

00:25:55.860 If you change it later, you change it later.

00:25:57.380 If you don't, then great.

00:25:58.300 I'll talk to you next week.

00:25:59.260 Yeah, they are afraid of people.

00:26:00.460 They are, yeah.

00:26:01.180 It's so weird.

00:26:01.780 Yeah.

00:26:03.060 And it's not, I don't know if it's getting better or worse

00:26:06.420 or companies are making it easier to sell

00:26:09.360 with sales enablement tools and lead generation tools

00:26:12.620 and communication, sales automation is obviously a big piece.

00:26:17.200 I hope that's not the case.

00:26:18.680 I hope there still is maybe a resurgent of the human side

00:26:22.680 of things.

00:26:23.420 But that's why a lot of companies

00:26:25.020 want to build self-service products.

00:26:27.020 And we are doing that ourselves as an addition

00:26:29.980 to what we're doing today.

00:26:30.840 Yeah, customers do want to self-serve

00:26:32.360 in certain circumstances.

00:26:34.160 But nothing's going to replace the human touch.

00:26:36.420 Yeah.

00:26:37.760 Where do you see, well, A, I'd love to know,

00:26:40.780 how did you guys make the decision to,

00:26:42.460 I know you said some liquidity for early founders,

00:26:45.360 but how did you go through that process?

00:26:47.520 Did you hire a bank?

00:26:48.520 Did you?

00:26:49.260 We actually just had organizations actually

00:26:52.860 very similar to how we were getting customers by referral.

00:26:54.940 People were just hearing about us in the VC, private equity

00:26:57.620 space, and we had sort of leapfrogged a lot of that,

00:27:00.460 given our revenue growth.

00:27:02.180 Usually you're being caught in the $2, $3, $5 million

00:27:05.240 in revenue.

00:27:05.940 we were 20 plus when we were getting our first reach outs.

00:27:10.500 So we went through, there was probably

00:27:13.000 100 that we met over an 18-month time.

00:27:15.200 Did you really talk with 100 different?

00:27:17.140 I mean, some more than others, right?

00:27:18.440 Some you realize quickly, you're like, oh, this is not,

00:27:20.260 we're not interested in anything here.

00:27:22.600 And we weren't going out to market, though.

00:27:24.760 So we did finally bring on an investor or investment banker,

00:27:29.460 which is coincidentally the same team that our CEO was on.

00:27:33.700 Oh, and that's how you met the CEO?

00:27:34.700 Yeah, that's how we met.

00:27:35.320 Okay, perfect.

00:27:36.120 Yeah.

00:27:36.500 And so, you know, it's, where was I going with that?

00:27:39.360 Just in regards to, you know.

00:27:41.640 Evaluating.

00:27:42.060 Yeah, evaluating it.

00:27:43.280 You know, what I would do today would have been a lot different than what I did back then.

00:27:47.860 You know, back then people are showing up with these like, you know, huge checks.

00:27:51.080 And now those checks have gotten even bigger because there's not a lot of opportunity out there for great company or with great companies.

00:27:57.920 And so they're, you know, they're all bidding against each other in a way.

00:28:01.120 And I don't know that that's a, you know, a positive thing for the industry.

00:28:04.600 I'm kind of going off topic here to your question.

00:28:06.460 No, I love it.

00:28:07.880 You know, I think as we kind of went through the process with them,

00:28:11.060 we were actually at the end.

00:28:12.300 And I was like, you know what?

00:28:13.160 I don't even want to think about this anymore.

00:28:14.520 Because it's taxable.

00:28:14.980 Somebody else take it.

00:28:15.780 It is so draining.

00:28:16.600 It's draining.

00:28:17.220 Yeah.

00:28:17.320 So you're just like, somebody else take care of it.

00:28:18.640 Well, no, we didn't even do that.

00:28:19.620 And then the current partners that we have now just kind of popped up last minute.

00:28:24.960 But after that, it would have been no more like zero.

00:28:26.960 Like, forget it.

00:28:27.540 Do they literally just like.

00:28:28.940 Like the next week.

00:28:29.820 Yeah.

00:28:30.640 It's so interesting how sometimes it's just timing in the moment.

00:28:33.980 Yeah.

00:28:34.600 And were the numbers public ever, Ross?

00:28:36.660 Yeah, they were.

00:28:37.440 And how much did you guys?

00:28:38.600 $37 million US at $163 million.

00:28:41.620 And what's the goal for you?

00:28:45.700 Is it to IPO?

00:28:47.500 Yeah, it would be that, if anything.

00:28:49.040 I mean, my focus has always been to build

00:28:50.660 a really good organization, or great organization,

00:28:52.680 I should say.

00:28:55.420 It's never been to sell to somebody else,

00:28:57.360 just have that buried and kind of sail off into the sunset.

00:28:59.860 You know what I mean?

00:29:00.360 What's the point of spending 10 or 20, or in many cases,

00:29:03.400 30, 40 years of your life only to do that.

00:29:07.020 So for us, I think the natural progression

00:29:08.720 is to move into a public direction.

00:29:10.460 But I'm not over here thinking, if we don't go public,

00:29:13.580 we're nothing and we failed.

00:29:15.660 It's not that at all.

00:29:16.460 You don't care.

00:29:16.960 You just want to build a great company.

00:29:18.660 I love that you corrected yourself.

00:29:20.080 A great company.

00:29:21.700 Yeah, I mean, so how do you think of doing that?

00:29:25.580 Because I mean, I'm sure you've gotten a ton of people

00:29:27.940 inbound that have expressed interest to acquire.

00:29:31.180 How do you decide not to sell versus raise capital?

00:29:34.360 I mean, I think that would get or become very difficult

00:29:37.180 at certain numbers, right?

00:29:38.680 If somebody shows up with a check for a billion dollars,

00:29:42.100 it's going to be a little hard to say no to that.

00:29:44.200 I mean, unless you're totally unreasonable.

00:29:46.960 That's a good way to explain unreasonable.

00:29:49.660 Not thinking.

00:29:50.360 No, exactly.

00:29:51.340 So I think, again, it just goes back to that philosophy.

00:29:57.280 I think there's certain stages for founders,

00:30:00.040 or I hope these are the stages they go through,

00:30:01.520 where at first it's about growing the business

00:30:04.060 and making money.

00:30:04.840 And for me, it was about building a profitable-

00:30:06.340 In the beginning, focus on money.

00:30:08.200 And then it transitioned now to building a business.

00:30:11.820 Exactly.

00:30:12.320 But still maintaining profitability, right?

00:30:14.440 And that's a big issue, or my belief,

00:30:16.540 it's a big issue in the tech space right now.

00:30:18.200 Because again, there's-

00:30:19.480 Yeah, there's a lot of capital chasing money.

00:30:21.220 Yeah, your business becomes raising money.

00:30:22.980 It's like, I'm not even in business to sell software here.

00:30:25.080 Yeah, I'm a professional fundraiser.

00:30:26.720 Professional fundraisers, yeah.

00:30:28.720 So I mean, I would like myself or personally,

00:30:31.180 I would love to see our industry move away from that.

00:30:33.460 Highly unlikely, because again, of the amount of money

00:30:35.680 that is out there and available.

00:30:37.600 It's just growing.

00:30:38.280 I mean, last week I heard about a fund that they opened up

00:30:41.820 a new fund.

00:30:42.240 It's $8 billion.

00:30:43.740 I don't even think there's $8 billion

00:30:45.080 that you can spend in the verticals they're in right now,

00:30:47.400 unless you're putting five of that into Uber or Facebook

00:30:51.580 or whatever.

00:30:53.580 But I mean, so it sounds like you

00:30:55.120 went from building the product, making money,

00:30:58.480 than a choice to like, I want to build a great company.

00:31:01.180 Because I think people ask me like, well,

00:31:03.520 how do I know if I should sell or not?

00:31:04.720 It's like, well, if you're going to sell the business

00:31:06.040 and you know you want to build another one,

00:31:08.620 and you probably want to build something similar, why sell it?

00:31:11.560 Because that's the vehicle.

00:31:12.720 You know what I mean?

00:31:13.600 Is that true for you?

00:31:14.320 That is true, yeah.

00:31:16.420 I've actually, sharing this, just a personal thought

00:31:19.560 I've gone through over the last kind of six months

00:31:21.440 is whether this is the last company.

00:31:24.160 You know what I mean?

00:31:25.360 Is this the last one, or is this one of three?

00:31:28.320 or one of, hopefully not one of five or 10,

00:31:30.280 but one of a couple more.

00:31:32.180 And that's just the natural progression for myself.

00:31:34.380 Or is this the one?

00:31:35.760 This is the one.

00:31:36.660 And you have to really, those are, actually,

00:31:38.880 you asked a question earlier, which

00:31:39.960 is in regards to decision making and such.

00:31:42.540 Those are the tough decisions you have to make

00:31:44.160 at this stage.

00:31:45.940 Do we want to, again, because you

00:31:48.300 have to make a bunch of very critical choices

00:31:51.180 within a relatively short amount of time

00:31:52.980 that are going to move you in that direction,

00:31:55.620 in the least stress, or with the least stress possible.

00:31:58.080 has an impact on the business.

00:32:00.500 What does a great company mean to you?

00:32:02.940 You know, again, I've always been tied.

00:32:05.640 This may be the sales individual in me,

00:32:07.280 but always been tied to profitability.

00:32:09.280 I think that, again, it goes back to work ethic.

00:32:11.460 If you work really hard, your company

00:32:12.860 can be more profitable.

00:32:13.700 I think that will hit a limit at some point.

00:32:16.340 I think that's an amazing piece because, again,

00:32:18.380 you have a business that is actually producing cash.

00:32:21.780 And you're doing that, whether that be for yourself,

00:32:23.820 whether that be for the growth of the business,

00:32:25.440 whether that be for your team, your employees,

00:32:27.120 you have, you know, I think you, you, once you reach a certain size as well, you really have

00:32:30.960 to think about, okay, what are we doing with this thing? I don't mean doing, going public or, or

00:32:34.980 selling to somebody else. Like, are we going to use this to impact the world? Are we going to use

00:32:39.220 this to provide better education? Are we going to use this because we want to, uh, protect the

00:32:43.520 environment, right? And the impact side can't be just about the cash anymore. Yeah. The philanthropic

00:32:48.560 or philosophical side of things really, you know, comes into play. I think some people think about

00:32:52.020 that too early.

00:32:53.260 And then it becomes, OK, well, it stunts

00:32:54.780 the potential growth and impact.

00:32:56.540 Exactly.

00:32:57.000 I really want to have a social cause here.

00:32:59.560 Well, that's great.

00:33:00.080 You made $500,000 last year.

00:33:01.620 You can't really help anybody.

00:33:02.640 Maybe you can help yourself.

00:33:04.020 But I'd love to see more people do that at the stage

00:33:08.760 where they're established, the business is strong,

00:33:11.460 the customer base is strong, and they've

00:33:13.260 got a great growth plan.

00:33:14.260 Have you guys made that decision already at Maripost?

00:33:16.120 I have.

00:33:17.500 And I speak for the company.

00:33:19.500 But we haven't done as much as I wish we would.

00:33:24.820 But I know why.

00:33:25.540 And I want to have a plan around what

00:33:28.060 we're going to do over the next three to five to 10 years.

00:33:30.940 And what companies inspire you around that

00:33:33.300 in regards to impact of the ..

00:33:35.260 Yeah, that's a great question.

00:33:36.240 I mean, there's, of course, a lot of the e-commerce

00:33:39.800 or retail organizations that are giving me.

00:33:41.820 More consumer-focused, like the Warby's and the Toms.

00:33:44.000 Yeah, exactly what I was going to say.

00:33:45.200 The Warby's, DefiWare, Toms, come to mind,

00:33:48.260 where they're giving away one product for every,

00:33:50.180 I mean, that's great.

00:33:51.100 I think there's a marketing strategy there, of course.

00:33:53.880 There's 100% marketing strategy there, yeah.

00:33:55.800 Yeah, but at least they're doing something.

00:33:57.520 And I think that's the big thing.

00:33:58.420 They could have chose not to do it.

00:33:59.280 Yeah, and that's what most people do.

00:34:00.920 They don't do anything.

00:34:02.480 You know, again, even the large organizations,

00:34:04.560 like, I hate to say this, Salesforce does a great job.

00:34:08.000 They really do give back a lot.

00:34:09.640 I actually don't think they get enough credit for the work

00:34:11.720 that they do.

00:34:12.220 The 1%, man, it inspired me.

00:34:13.980 Yeah, exactly.

00:34:14.880 And so I think every company has to start thinking about those things earlier on

00:34:20.320 as part of their goals, like as part of their strategy.

00:34:22.780 Like, OK, maybe this year we're going to hit $50 million.

00:34:25.320 But in March 2022, what are we going to do with-

00:34:29.320 From an impact.

00:34:30.020 Yeah, are we going to give 1% of our revenue to X?

00:34:33.100 Or are we going to provide more to our-

00:34:34.980 Now, was that important to you because of you personally wanted that

00:34:38.200 to be part of the drive of the growth?

00:34:40.360 Or was that for the employees?

00:34:42.180 or no sorry at this stage it's just sort of my philosophy on what we need to do yeah you

00:34:47.600 you know obviously there's a lot of noise in the political landscape these days definitely

00:34:52.200 want to get into that but um you know we don't seem to be doing very much as a as a collective

00:34:57.780 group and the leaders that we've chosen don't seem to be doing very much you know and maybe

00:35:01.420 that's because it's becoming more complicated or there's different goals in mind from from

00:35:05.340 different i shouldn't be getting into this but political parties um whereas it's coming down

00:35:10.380 to individuals, ironically, in many cases,

00:35:12.780 in the tech space of all spaces, who are driving the next stage.

00:35:16.620 Elon Musk's focus is to create sustainable organizations

00:35:21.900 on Earth, or hey, we're heading to Mars.

00:35:23.900 That's more or less his philosophy.

00:35:25.420 Yeah, and transition us off of fossil fuels.

00:35:28.060 Off fossil fuels, yeah.

00:35:29.020 But what if that doesn't work?

00:35:30.060 So that's why I have the space company over here.

00:35:32.940 Yeah.

00:35:33.900 So it's interesting.

00:35:34.780 So you just feel the innate drive to want that for yourself.

00:35:40.220 and you feel a responsibility for doing that,

00:35:42.260 the business growth for you is, yes, let's still

00:35:44.840 be profitable and generate cash.

00:35:46.280 But also, let's ask ourselves why we do this as well.

00:35:51.800 Because I mean, I think that's-

00:35:52.840 We only need a certain amount, right?

00:35:54.960 Yeah.

00:35:55.460 Like you're a successful guy.

00:35:57.040 You want to continue to be successful.

00:35:58.520 Same here.

00:36:00.500 No one needs a billion dollars.

00:36:01.980 No.

00:36:02.480 You just don't.

00:36:03.100 I'm not saying you shouldn't have a billion dollars,

00:36:05.060 or you should give it all away.

00:36:06.220 And it's totally your choice.

00:36:07.320 You earned that right.

00:36:08.120 And I have nothing but respect for the people

00:36:09.560 who did earn it, but I live a nice life as you do

00:36:14.180 and as many of the individuals do here

00:36:15.660 and many of our mutual friends.

00:36:16.900 And what more can you buy?

00:36:19.120 As I said, you don't need 10 homes.

00:36:20.820 You don't need two cars.

00:36:21.860 I think that's the fascinating part

00:36:24.100 is building the business to be a vehicle of change.

00:36:27.180 And for me anyways, the change to the biggest impact

00:36:30.360 is on our team, right?

00:36:31.640 Like being an example of excellence, right?

00:36:34.280 Like, do you think about that of like,

00:36:36.580 I want to build a business and operate

00:36:38.220 or lead people in a way that really sets a standard for them

00:36:42.020 if they go and-

00:36:42.980 I do, yeah.

00:36:43.720 But I also feel that that's difficult these days.

00:36:48.140 Because of the transient nature of employment or-

00:36:51.080 That, yeah, that's definitely one.

00:36:52.640 I mean, that as well as just, again, people,

00:36:55.920 it's like I said with the business aspect before,

00:36:57.580 people come into it with this social idea involved

00:36:59.720 and it's like, okay, but I'm not making any money.

00:37:01.460 So like these things don't go together.

00:37:03.180 Like you do need funds to do something,

00:37:05.340 to make a change, to make an aspect.

00:37:06.460 Of course, you can you can donate your time. That's the same thing. But people seem, you know, in many cases are too busy to to donate that time because it's happy hour at five o'clock or because their friends don't want to go cycling on the weekend or ride around on scooters or whatnot.

00:37:19.340 Got it. I mean, that's a difficult, you know, kind of area for me because, you know, again, I've kind of leapfrogged a few times personally and the company has, you know, has done the same.

00:37:30.560 So stepping back and saying, OK, now you guys all

00:37:33.800 have to do this when I'm living a certain kind of lifestyle

00:37:37.100 while I'm able to do all these other great things

00:37:39.680 doesn't always go hand in hand.

00:37:41.480 Got it.

00:37:42.060 Fast forward 25 years, what do you want your,

00:37:45.240 I mean, it's a big question, but whatever.

00:37:46.760 I like asking them.

00:37:48.080 What do you want to, looking back, what

00:37:50.480 would have made you proud?

00:37:51.780 Like, what would you want to accomplish that you'd be like,

00:37:54.320 oh, OK, that was a good 20.

00:37:55.700 It's a great question.

00:37:56.720 I was actually, before I answer that,

00:37:59.000 I met a gentleman the other night here at the conference

00:38:01.380 who he's got to be, you know, in his 60s or 70s.

00:38:05.100 And he said, you're not going to look back when you're 80

00:38:06.880 and be like, yeah, I worked really hard.

00:38:08.520 You're going to look back and think about all the experiences

00:38:10.520 that you had with, you know, friends, family,

00:38:12.180 and all that kind of stuff.

00:38:13.620 So in 25 years, I mean, I would be really proud

00:38:15.940 if I could look back and, you know, have built an organization,

00:38:19.260 not saying about the hard work aspect, you know,

00:38:21.600 that supported a lot of causes that are really going to impact,

00:38:24.340 you know, the overall, you know, planet is the only way I can say it,

00:38:28.860 And that doesn't necessarily relate to people in some cases, which may offend others and may not.

00:38:35.060 But if we don't have a place to live, we really can't do very much.

00:38:38.200 So, you know, making an impact in that area to me would be critical.

00:38:41.800 You know, again, the common themes today are obviously cleaning up our oceans, of course, you know, creating better recycling and programs, renewable energy as an example, you know, protecting our, you know, animal community in terms of extinction, right?

00:38:54.680 We seem to be, you know, winding that clock down even quicker these days.

00:38:57.920 i think that's that's becoming very hard you know it's becoming very difficult and it's not that i

00:39:02.980 would ever want to say that it can't be done but people really need to turn a corner here uh you

00:39:08.480 know collectively and and makes decisions that couldn't sometimes be painful and obviously it's

00:39:13.140 not coming in the best form from the guy who's flying around on a private jet um but i do you

00:39:17.780 know cover all of our carbon costs and that i don't tell people that because i i you know deserve

00:39:21.680 any sympathy or credit or anything like that it's just that's you know the choice you made yeah it's

00:39:26.340 my personal choice, and I also make those choices

00:39:29.780 to benefit everyone.

00:39:31.560 That's awesome.

00:39:32.220 Ross, I really appreciate the time, man.

00:39:33.660 Thanks so much for coming on here.

00:39:34.920 We'll talk soon, bro.

00:39:35.680 Definitely.

00:39:36.100 Thank you.

00:39:36.420 Thanks for watching this episode of Escape Velocity.

00:39:39.540 Be sure to like and subscribe and leave a comment

00:39:42.420 with your biggest insight from our conversation.

00:39:45.040 Be sure to check out the next episode.

Dan Martell - June 20, 2019

Buying Back Time with Ross @ Maropost.com - Escape Velocity Show #4

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