Dan Martell - Learn and Adapt As a Non-technical Founder with Darren @ Hugo.team - Escape Velocity Show #7

00:00:00.000 So that was really the nexus of Hugo. We weren't trying to sell it, but talking to customers,

00:00:03.980 they were more excited about what we were doing as a business internally than they were about

00:00:07.640 the product that we were trying to sell. And then one thing led to another. We realized that

00:00:11.300 engineers don't like to read slabs of text. They like Jira issues and marketers like Trello.

00:00:17.020 So we just added on the functionality to turn those insights from your meeting into

00:00:20.960 actions in your tools.

00:00:22.160 Admission sequence start. Three, two, one.

00:00:30.000 We'll be right back.

00:00:36.460 Darren, how's it going, man?

00:00:37.760 Good to see you.

00:00:38.240 So good to have you on the show.

00:00:41.180 So for those that don't know you, Hugo.

00:00:43.020 Do you go Hugo.team or Hugo.team?

00:00:44.760 Yeah, or just Hugo.

00:00:45.780 I like just Hugo.

00:00:47.180 People check it out.

00:00:48.420 You guys have been around for five years, four and a half?

00:00:52.120 A bit less, so about three years.

00:00:54.180 But Hugo, as it's known today, is only just over a year old.

00:00:57.180 OK.

00:00:57.960 So pivot in the product.

00:00:59.400 Oh, yeah.

00:00:59.900 What was it when you guys started?

00:01:01.620 Sure.

00:01:02.120 So we were more focused on the meeting preparation

00:01:04.220 side of the process.

00:01:05.180 How do I walk into the meeting prepared

00:01:07.100 and knowing what I need to know from prior company knowledge?

00:01:10.560 And we're in this dangerous space

00:01:12.800 where it was a consumer mobile app for a professional use case.

00:01:16.560 Yeah, exactly.

00:01:17.660 So who's paying for that, right?

00:01:19.220 And to share the full story, what happened

00:01:22.260 was we were out selling, essentially,

00:01:24.360 talking to customers, partners, investors, the usual story.

00:01:27.860 And this disconnect started forming between my co-founder

00:01:31.640 and I and the rest of the business.

00:01:33.320 We'd come back and say, hey, guys, guess what?

00:01:35.660 This customer said that.

00:01:36.980 And I think this is what we should do there.

00:01:38.660 And partners are more concerned about this feature.

00:01:41.260 And the team sort of got it.

00:01:43.340 But it was just us regurgitating what we knew.

00:01:45.840 So we built a hack for ourselves where, through Slack,

00:01:49.100 we'd integrate with our calendar, G Suite, as we were using.

00:01:51.800 And it would say, hey, you just caught up with Dan.

00:01:53.780 What happened?

00:01:54.400 And I'd share my notes via Slack.

00:01:56.060 And from there, it would copy the notes

00:01:58.340 to relevant Slack channels.

00:01:59.700 And the team were now getting this real-time feed

00:02:01.760 of insights from the front line.

00:02:03.320 So we thought this was just a good business hack,

00:02:05.480 how to keep everyone aligned.

00:02:06.880 And within days, the team was-

00:02:08.880 It's funny, because if I think of that stream of meetings

00:02:13.800 and what's captured and posted into essentially

00:02:16.380 like a social stream or a Slack channel,

00:02:18.820 I mean, that's the insights.

00:02:21.720 That's the knowledge inside your organization.

00:02:23.900 That's right.

00:02:24.560 And think about where it would go previously, right?

00:02:26.360 Like I used Devonote.

00:02:27.760 My co-founder likes to write things down.

00:02:29.800 Sales people were putting to their CRM.

00:02:31.940 So that was really the nexus of Hugo.

00:02:33.600 We weren't trying to sell it, but talking to customers,

00:02:35.840 they were more excited about what we were doing as a business internally

00:02:38.440 than they were about the product that we were trying to sell.

00:02:41.280 And then one thing led to another.

00:02:42.520 We realized that engineers don't like to read slabs of text.

00:02:45.060 They like Jira issues and marketers like Trello.

00:02:48.860 So we just added on the functionality to turn those insights

00:02:51.820 from your meeting into actions in your tools.

00:02:54.340 That's awesome.

00:02:55.040 So that's a year and a half into it.

00:02:57.280 This show is called Escape Velocity.

00:02:59.280 I'd love to learn more of like, you know,

00:03:02.600 we were just talking about Lassian being a channel partner

00:03:04.880 or a partner in the marketplace for you.

00:03:06.580 What are the things that you guys have done well

00:03:08.580 to get distribution or traction?

00:03:11.060 Sure.

00:03:11.840 So there's sort of a few.

00:03:13.060 We're still figuring it out, as is the standard caveat.

00:03:16.040 The few things that have been really differentiated

00:03:18.560 or transformative for us, one is partnerships.

00:03:21.880 And the funny thing about partnerships

00:03:23.040 is when we talk to advisors and other peers in the SaaS space,

00:03:26.200 everyone sort of dives away from them.

00:03:29.040 Call them what you want.

00:03:30.280 We, by nature of our product, we rely on integrations, right?

00:03:34.000 So there's 19 integrations.

00:03:35.580 I saw that, man.

00:03:36.280 You get a lot of integrations.

00:03:37.040 Yeah, it's a lot of integrations.

00:03:37.920 It's the core tools we need to connect your meeting nodes.

00:03:41.200 So all of those 19 companies are a lot bigger than us.

00:03:44.760 They have loyal customer base that they have a huge audience.

00:03:49.000 They have channels, whether it be blog, PR, things like that.

00:03:52.360 So how can we leverage that?

00:03:54.280 We add value to their tools, I guess.

00:03:56.440 So we've gone with each of them and found a unique angle

00:03:59.240 that we have.

00:03:59.820 How did you prioritize?

00:04:00.740 I don't mean to cut you off.

00:04:01.620 I apologize.

00:04:03.080 I'm known for that.

00:04:03.700 But you've got 19.

00:04:05.880 How do you decide what 1, 2, 3, the first 10 are?

00:04:09.820 To build?

00:04:10.420 Yeah.

00:04:10.920 We just wait for our customers to see what they're using.

00:04:12.960 Trello was number one.

00:04:13.960 Salesforce was number two.

00:04:15.580 It was in order of addressable market, basically.

00:04:17.500 Really?

00:04:18.000 OK, so it wasn't about distribution?

00:04:20.160 Not initially.

00:04:20.880 OK.

00:04:21.820 Until you get to that point of fit, where you're like,

00:04:23.580 hang on, we've got something valuable here.

00:04:25.120 Meaning that you need to have enough coverage of the use

00:04:29.000 cases, then you can be more strategic in your decision.

00:04:31.700 Spot on.

00:04:32.200 And on that, by the way, it's definitely

00:04:33.580 a curve that becomes asymptotic, where

00:04:36.020 each initial integration had a huge impact on audience

00:04:39.360 for us and customers.

00:04:40.580 And then after that, you might add one to pick up a few here

00:04:43.280 and a few there.

00:04:44.140 And which ones are driving the most growth for you guys today?

00:04:46.780 So back to the marketplace side of things,

00:04:49.180 Atlassian is right up there.

00:04:51.520 They've got a great marketplace, a very loyal following.

00:04:54.760 And Slack is the other one that's probably number one

00:04:57.700 even above Atlassian.

00:04:58.840 Why?

00:04:59.400 Because people are looking, obviously,

00:05:00.980 to improve their process with Slack.

00:05:02.500 But the thing that's interesting about Slack

00:05:04.360 is Slack says a lot about your company.

00:05:06.760 So internally, if I tell you who our persona is, spot on.

00:05:09.800 They get collaboration.

00:05:10.900 They get transparency.

00:05:12.280 Go and try to tell a company on Exchange

00:05:14.020 why the CEO should be sharing their media notes.

00:05:16.140 Microsoft Exchange.

00:05:16.980 Yeah.

00:05:18.280 So essentially, you can use the product tool sets

00:05:21.560 as almost a characteristics of the mentality

00:05:25.080 of the organization based on.

00:05:26.740 So I mean, if you're always, you know,

00:05:28.160 Jeffrey Moore's technology adoption curve,

00:05:30.100 you're looking for those early adopters, early majority,

00:05:33.860 and you're saying the product that they use can be a tell.

00:05:39.220 But what do those marketplaces do well that drives adoption?

00:05:44.040 Like, do they allow you?

00:05:45.100 I'm sure you don't, I'm assuming you don't pay for placement.

00:05:47.160 Do you do reviews on those marketplaces?

00:05:49.140 Did they, as partners, promote you guys?

00:05:51.720 How did you get it to actually drive real sign-ups and stuff?

00:05:55.520 So it's got to be outside the marketplace.

00:05:57.480 If we're in the marketplace, we're one of thousands of apps.

00:06:00.580 And obviously, there's not much differentiation.

00:06:02.880 So we've looked for opportunities with each of them

00:06:04.860 to stand out.

00:06:06.400 What can we offer as a small, early-stage startup

00:06:09.180 to these big tech giants?

00:06:10.740 And each one's different.

00:06:12.220 I spoke about Atlassian before.

00:06:14.160 Hugo is used by the whole company.

00:06:15.700 It's cross-functional by nature.

00:06:17.860 Atlassian is a product suite that's historically

00:06:20.800 been focused on software teams.

00:06:22.020 So they use your product?

00:06:23.600 They're starting to internally, yes.

00:06:25.560 But I mean, they're focused on software teams and selling.

00:06:28.360 Well, here we are with Hugo with marketing teams, HR teams,

00:06:31.540 design, legal.

00:06:32.800 So we're going, hey guys, here's a way

00:06:34.300 to expose Jira to your marketing team or your legal team.

00:06:38.320 Oh, OK.

00:06:38.820 So you're saying that the use case was value

00:06:41.520 add to their use case.

00:06:43.460 And then does it show up in their conversations

00:06:47.060 with their customers?

00:06:47.960 Is that why?

00:06:49.820 So the way it would work with that use case example,

00:06:54.700 I'm in sales, for example.

00:06:56.340 I have no idea how engineering prioritizes bugs.

00:06:58.960 I'm in a conversation with a customer.

00:07:00.880 They raise a bug.

00:07:01.940 I can highlight that part of my meeting note

00:07:04.020 and send that straight through to engineering.

00:07:06.960 And the way I do that is by creating a JIRA bug.

00:07:09.300 From engineering's perspective, instead of just getting

00:07:11.260 a plain Jira bug, they're getting the full context

00:07:13.800 of the customer complaint that gave rise to it.

00:07:15.760 And from a salesperson's perspective,

00:07:17.580 I'm now using Jira.

00:07:18.580 I have an interface for Jira.

00:07:20.220 I understand that that's how our work is priced.

00:07:22.900 I guess I apologize.

00:07:25.400 Trying to understand, what makes the Atlassian marketplace

00:07:30.020 drive?

00:07:30.480 Is it just their user base?

00:07:32.340 Because it's in the marketplace.

00:07:34.580 I've done a lot.

00:07:35.320 I did 13 integration deals when I built my company, Flowtown.

00:07:38.200 And it's kind of like everything.

00:07:39.800 And there's the ones that actually, it's 80-20.

00:07:43.220 What was true about Atlassian?

00:07:45.400 Was it did they write a one-off blog post for you guys?

00:07:48.260 Did you guys promote them?

00:07:49.760 Did they promote you?

00:07:51.320 How?

00:07:51.900 Yeah.

00:07:52.480 So the few layers.

00:07:53.520 So that point I was giving about making it wider

00:07:55.980 than just software teams, that's a strategic priority

00:07:58.180 for Atlassian.

00:07:58.760 It's publicly known.

00:08:00.080 We're helping them do that.

00:08:01.180 So we're an app that's our value prop

00:08:03.100 is consistent with their strategic priority.

00:08:04.800 So that's important.

00:08:05.740 Yeah, that's right.

00:08:06.240 That's important.

00:08:06.880 There's not many other geo integrations

00:08:08.540 that are great for legal teams, for example.

00:08:10.780 Hugo is one of them.

00:08:12.020 So that's number one.

00:08:13.520 Number two is finding an issue that matters.

00:08:15.540 We're about to release something pretty exciting with Atlassian

00:08:18.080 focused on gender equality and the role that collaboration

00:08:20.600 tools have on gender equality.

00:08:22.220 Atlassian are incredibly active and effective

00:08:25.400 at diversity and inclusion.

00:08:26.600 Yeah, I heard Jay talk about that at Sastor.

00:08:28.880 Exactly.

00:08:29.740 Yeah, his open talk.

00:08:31.280 So we're talking about something similar at Atlassian

00:08:34.220 Summit next week.

00:08:35.300 We're releasing a white paper together.

00:08:37.100 There's a lot of strategic overlap there.

00:08:40.020 Of course, that helps.

00:08:41.140 That's brand and product marketing for us.

00:08:43.520 And it's important to Atlassian

00:08:44.880 because independent collaboration companies out there

00:08:47.600 are talking about the issues they care about.

00:08:49.920 And then third is just essentially being active and hustling.

00:08:53.520 They've got the audience.

00:08:54.260 They've got the channels.

00:08:55.140 It costs them money to produce high-quality content

00:08:57.220 where we know what matters to them

00:08:58.920 and we're going and waving a draft blog post in their face

00:09:01.420 saying, hey, you guys care a lot about marketing teams

00:09:04.860 and the way they communicate.

00:09:06.000 hey, here's a post about it

00:09:07.480 that we've written from the perspective of Hugo.

00:09:09.660 And that approach with that last in particular

00:09:11.640 has been very effective.

00:09:12.920 And then we've done that with each different marketplace

00:09:14.740 and found something different.

00:09:16.520 Walk me through the Slack one then.

00:09:18.420 Sure.

00:09:19.120 So Slack's actually a lot more difficult.

00:09:22.020 We haven't, most of the marketing we've had with Slack

00:09:24.600 has been through the normal channels

00:09:25.900 and we've been selected as app of the week

00:09:28.560 and things like that organically.

00:09:30.300 But a better example of another approach

00:09:32.720 would be like with Zoom.

00:09:34.240 Zoom launched an app network.

00:09:36.000 an app directory not long ago.

00:09:37.980 We were the first app.

00:09:39.420 Why?

00:09:39.920 Because when Zoom goes and knocks on the door of Atlassian

00:09:43.500 or of Slack or anyone like that, they

00:09:46.000 don't have a single app.

00:09:46.880 Who's going to want to build for them?

00:09:48.180 But as an early stage startup, Zoom's

00:09:50.160 offering us a press release, conference speaking spot,

00:09:52.880 blog posts for the separate-

00:09:54.580 Prominent placement.

00:09:55.560 Prominent placement.

00:09:56.340 And they have a huge customer data.

00:09:57.760 Exactly.

00:09:58.680 Emails out to those customers.

00:10:00.180 And it's just an API.

00:10:01.480 We can do that in a day or two, right?

00:10:03.060 I mean, obviously, you've got to make it perfect.

00:10:04.480 But it's not a huge overhead, as you know.

00:10:07.160 So we're like, bingo.

00:10:08.380 We can go and be that team, that company there.

00:10:11.920 BlueJeans is obviously moving down market a little bit

00:10:14.580 as well.

00:10:15.080 They're very enterprise focused.

00:10:16.340 They've now partnered with a cool startup

00:10:18.220 kid who's doing some really interesting stuff.

00:10:21.280 We're early stage.

00:10:22.160 We're young.

00:10:22.660 We're innovative.

00:10:23.480 And it's a great press story and a great product marketing

00:10:26.980 story.

00:10:27.480 So do you have that conversation with them about,

00:10:29.280 hey, if we do this, because we're a small team,

00:10:31.360 we want to build the integration,

00:10:33.480 here's what would be nice as like, yeah?

00:10:36.920 Definitely.

00:10:37.620 We can't afford to take the bets without knowing the payoff.

00:10:41.720 So we'll go and say, hey, this would be a great use case.

00:10:43.680 Here's a prototype.

00:10:44.820 We think your customers would like it.

00:10:46.480 Here's what we want.

00:10:47.360 It doesn't cost you anything.

00:10:48.960 So let's do it.

00:10:50.360 And what have you got them to agree on?

00:10:52.140 I mean, it sounds like the press release,

00:10:54.620 prominent placement in the app store.

00:10:56.220 Content.

00:10:57.240 So we do a lot of third party content that we write.

00:11:01.200 Conferences are a big one.

00:11:02.640 So we get to talk about, speak on stage, thought leadership,

00:11:05.740 an issue we care a lot about, that value proposition

00:11:08.500 indirectly supports, product marketing,

00:11:11.380 so to their customers, emails, and things like that.

00:11:14.880 And I guess we're just figuring out new channels

00:11:17.040 and things to do, yeah.

00:11:18.700 And what else have you guys figured out in regards to,

00:11:21.140 what marketing do you guys do today?

00:11:23.140 Sure.

00:11:23.960 So we're a self-serve business, so it's all marketing-led.

00:11:27.960 And what's an annual contract value for you guys?

00:11:30.500 So we're $6 per user per month for teams of six or more.

00:11:34.040 And we're focused S&B.

00:11:35.240 So our teams range from $20 to $250, essentially.

00:11:39.140 So you're getting an ACV in the $1,200.

00:11:43.000 Or sometimes a bit more.

00:11:44.240 We've got some bigger teams, but that's sort of size.

00:11:47.780 So other channels, we experiment, obviously,

00:11:50.540 with paid ads and things like that.

00:11:52.220 We're moving now towards doing content marketing,

00:11:55.140 but in a differentiated way.

00:11:56.840 It's funny, you read the books, and you hear people talk.

00:11:59.040 What works?

00:11:59.540 So saturated.

00:12:00.000 Exactly.

00:12:00.500 And what worked a year ago is irrelevant now.

00:12:03.220 But our persona of our customer are highly educated, motivated,

00:12:07.020 young professionals who do read a lot,

00:12:09.520 and they do want to improve.

00:12:10.940 So we're focusing on the issues that are relevant,

00:12:13.920 that are value in their own right,

00:12:15.440 even if they didn't have a marketing objective beneath them.

00:12:18.980 So as I mentioned, we're about to put a white paper out

00:12:21.160 on the state of gender equality in tech,

00:12:23.400 looking at actionable ways for early stage companies

00:12:25.680 to make a difference there.

00:12:29.240 It's pretty substantive content.

00:12:30.700 It's not a five best ways to do X, Y, Z.

00:12:33.680 So that's looking effective and has

00:12:35.780 been effective for us before.

00:12:38.000 We do paid ads.

00:12:39.740 And conferences have worked out really well for us.

00:12:42.400 And how do you do conferences on the cheap?

00:12:44.360 Because that's obviously.

00:12:45.680 Yeah.

00:12:46.800 Every conference organizer is going to hate me.

00:12:49.580 So firstly, when we started attending them

00:12:51.500 to figure things out, we don't need

00:12:53.120 to go to the sessions most of the time.

00:12:54.660 And many conferences are now giving away

00:12:56.640 free or discount tickets to attend

00:12:59.280 and see what others are saying and doing.

00:13:01.080 So that's what we did from a research perspective.

00:13:04.000 From attending and sponsoring, again,

00:13:06.960 if we can find something strategically relevant,

00:13:09.140 so if I can go to a big IT conference

00:13:11.260 and be the young hotshot entrepreneur from Silicon

00:13:14.680 Valley who can talk about a different perspective on things,

00:13:19.440 we're getting in there free.

00:13:21.120 So you're pitching speaking as the primary.

00:13:23.700 So our strategy with conferences now,

00:13:25.360 we won't sponsor a conference we don't speak at, almost always.

00:13:29.620 Because that's how we're genuine.

00:13:32.320 We're marketing-led, right?

00:13:34.380 Yes, we can pitch our product, like any founder

00:13:36.740 should be able to.

00:13:37.820 But we're not putting you into a pipeline

00:13:39.580 and going to hassle you.

00:13:41.300 We want you to be aware of Hugo and Dan.

00:13:43.060 We want you to find it and see value and then convert.

00:13:46.220 So we want to talk about something that matters

00:13:47.800 and things that are changing, the future of work

00:13:49.960 and teamwork and these real issues.

00:13:51.820 And that requires us to speak.

00:13:53.180 That's amazing.

00:13:53.920 So you actually, for the most part, if you're speaking,

00:13:56.080 you're not paying.

00:13:57.340 You've got to cover your expenses.

00:13:59.600 What do you do to get the most out of an event?

00:14:02.160 We're here at LTVConf in New York City.

00:14:04.980 What's your go-to playbook for maximizing your time away

00:14:09.320 from the office?

00:14:10.660 Sure.

00:14:11.160 So speak as early in the conference as you can.

00:14:14.720 Get a booth or some way to capture interest

00:14:17.080 so people aren't on a wild goose chase looking for you.

00:14:19.920 So it's an easy way to go, hey, I disagree, or I love that,

00:14:22.380 talk to me more about this or that. A little bit of preparation. I'm not the typical print a list

00:14:28.700 and highlight and set up meetings before. It's also not the type of conferences we go to,

00:14:33.420 but I definitely always have a few strategics where I'm like, I just really want to get a

00:14:37.100 conversation with whoever, and I will try and create that as much as I can. But in a genuine

00:14:42.540 way, I think SDRs, sales development reps, and the whole process of people setting meetings for

00:14:48.780 or others is so weird.

00:14:50.820 I went to Sastoc last year, and I probably

00:14:52.800 had like seven or eight SDRs reach out to me as a speaker

00:14:57.240 to schedule time with their sales reps.

00:14:59.520 And I'm just like, this works?

00:15:00.900 Like, it's just so weird.

00:15:01.920 100%.

00:15:02.500 Exactly.

00:15:03.000 You just delete them all, or I don't know.

00:15:05.400 I sometimes think, well, hang on.

00:15:06.480 If you want my time to talk to me about something,

00:15:08.660 but your colleague doesn't take the time to reach out.

00:15:11.400 It's just a weird dynamic, right?

00:15:12.480 Yeah.

00:15:13.100 So we're steering clear.

00:15:14.200 I'm trying to do it genuinely.

00:15:15.160 Have you ever gone to a conference and not bought a ticket

00:15:17.280 just lobby conned it?

00:15:19.260 Well, no.

00:15:21.600 Because you can usually get in free or cheap.

00:15:24.540 Or we share tickets around.

00:15:25.860 I got in trouble for that the other week.

00:15:27.280 What do you mean by that?

00:15:28.160 So at one particular conference, we get given four passes.

00:15:32.000 Usually it's two of us there.

00:15:34.000 We go reach out to our other partners and say, hey,

00:15:35.880 who wants two free tickets?

00:15:37.140 And then we get vice versa.

00:15:38.480 So we'll often grab a ticket from a partner and jump on there.

00:15:41.980 That's cool.

00:15:42.780 That's creative.

00:15:43.880 I mean, their tickets.

00:15:45.280 Totally.

00:15:45.780 It's not like you read the fine print

00:15:46.900 and they say you can't share them or whatever.

00:15:49.020 Or who's going to go and kick out a big fast brand.

00:15:51.960 I just love that, because I think in the early days,

00:15:54.420 people are trying to preserve capital, but at the same time,

00:15:57.580 get in front of their customers.

00:15:59.920 And did you guys make a list of events

00:16:01.540 that you think you should be speaking at?

00:16:03.020 Yeah, so we do a little bit.

00:16:04.740 We're quite opportunistic.

00:16:06.280 It's very much stepping stones, right?

00:16:07.680 So Josh, my co-founder, is talking

00:16:09.760 at Atlassian Summit next week, 4,500 people.

00:16:12.060 That's huge.

00:16:12.520 It's a great one.

00:16:13.060 Congrats.

00:16:13.560 Thanks.

00:16:14.180 And it's a good audience for us.

00:16:15.220 Everyone gets it.

00:16:15.820 They're all sass-savvy. 0.99

00:16:16.720 It's one of your top, yeah.

00:16:18.140 Exactly.

00:16:18.680 And then, yeah.

00:16:19.360 But you go and pitch to Atlassian.

00:16:21.880 So what we do is we go and grab the small guys

00:16:23.740 and build up this speaking resume.

00:16:25.600 And you just take one to the other to the other.

00:16:27.300 And there's always stuff on.

00:16:28.560 And if there's no cost to it, so let's go to a 200-person

00:16:31.080 conference in Utah.

00:16:32.360 It's $300 return on United.

00:16:34.420 We'll speak.

00:16:34.960 We get good speaking practice.

00:16:36.200 There may be some leads.

00:16:37.440 But we've now got this on the resume.

00:16:38.880 We have a good video of him talking or me talking.

00:16:41.040 We've got a good resume.

00:16:41.780 And then we jump onto the next one.

00:16:43.540 And then, as you know, I want to-

00:16:45.260 Speaking begins speaking.

00:16:46.360 Exactly.

00:16:47.020 That's what people, yeah, it's a fascinating thing.

00:16:51.760 Some founders don't have the skill, right?

00:16:53.620 They're nervous.

00:16:54.400 They don't want to do that.

00:16:55.420 But I think if you're the kind of person that thrives

00:16:58.080 in that environment, there's no way to go from know, like,

00:17:02.660 trust faster than getting the opportunity

00:17:04.840 to share some valuable thoughts with an audience.

00:17:08.320 And I share that same in my speaking kind of rider.

00:17:11.840 it says, like, I've got to go in the morning of the first day.

00:17:14.800 I want to go early.

00:17:15.680 And the reason why is because I'm going to stick around

00:17:17.000 for a few days, and I want to meet the people in the audience.

00:17:19.040 And it just provides better context

00:17:20.600 for that conversation to occur.

00:17:21.900 Totally.

00:17:22.400 And it's genuine conversation.

00:17:24.020 Yeah.

00:17:24.760 They know your thoughts.

00:17:25.800 They know your backstory, origin story.

00:17:28.260 As you look to the product, I love that you guys

00:17:32.080 went through the pivot.

00:17:32.920 Now you've got kind of a more full-featured product.

00:17:35.780 What do you guys see as the next either expansion revenue

00:17:40.560 opportunity or product?

00:17:44.060 Like, what are you guys thinking of doing next to help?

00:17:46.320 Sure.

00:17:46.860 Easy answer.

00:17:48.120 So today, one of the benefits of Hugo

00:17:50.820 is we enter through a team.

00:17:51.900 So let's say customer success.

00:17:53.340 The CS team doesn't have many tools.

00:17:54.900 Their notes are everywhere.

00:17:55.740 They're like, we need this.

00:17:57.180 They share their notes via Slack through Hugo.

00:17:59.680 They create your tickets.

00:18:01.440 They sync their CRM, et cetera.

00:18:03.280 And all of a sudden, someone in product

00:18:04.740 seeing this thing called Hugo in Slack sharing customer

00:18:07.420 notes, product's been pulling their hair out for months,

00:18:09.900 trying to get access to customer insights. So they say, thank you, I'll have a seat. And before

00:18:14.120 we know it, we penetrate 90% of the company, because everyone wants access to those meeting

00:18:19.020 notes. So that's really great from a growth perspective internally. And that's a key KPI

00:18:24.140 for us. We really look at penetration, do some LinkedIn calculations and try and see the

00:18:29.120 penetration. But the key gap for growth in terms of growth for us is intercompany growth. So great,

00:18:34.560 we've got your whole company using Hugo, but most of your meetings are outside the company.

00:18:38.540 How do we leverage that?

00:18:40.640 How do we use that as a way to grow between companies?

00:18:44.120 And we're very focused on that right now,

00:18:46.420 providing a one place for meeting collaboration

00:18:48.780 between companies.

00:18:49.920 So that's fascinating.

00:18:51.240 So again, for companies watching,

00:18:54.320 the idea, the pattern that I'm extracting

00:18:56.680 is look for activities that might allow your product

00:19:00.200 to be shared outside of the core team.

00:19:03.040 A while ago, I talked about this concept

00:19:04.660 called shareable moments, because I

00:19:06.080 saw this a lot with fresh books for invoicing.

00:19:08.680 Well, it inherently has a shareable moment

00:19:11.040 where you send an invoice to somebody else,

00:19:12.620 and it says, oh, how did you send this beautiful thing?

00:19:14.720 Or like project management with Basecamp,

00:19:16.580 because it's like if I invite you to collaborate Slack.

00:19:18.640 I mean, Slack is channel creation and inviting people.

00:19:22.960 So what you guys are doing is saying,

00:19:24.620 here's this use case.

00:19:25.800 How do we broaden it?

00:19:27.300 And is that going to be a byproduct of product marketing

00:19:30.500 to your existing customers to try to educate them

00:19:32.440 on a new use case?

00:19:33.260 Is it going to be some different integrations,

00:19:37.740 expanding the product?

00:19:40.080 How do you educate the customer on that?

00:19:43.200 Sure.

00:19:43.700 Well, the best thing is the features are all there.

00:19:45.960 We have to make some data model changes,

00:19:47.360 but no one cares about that.

00:19:48.980 So it's purely a project education thing.

00:19:51.320 The use case exists, so we hear it all the time.

00:19:53.400 All our engaged customers are like, yeah,

00:19:55.040 but I'm working with this partner.

00:19:56.880 I brought on this agency.

00:19:58.260 We're collaborating on this project.

00:20:01.260 How can we share those notes together?

00:20:03.140 So we're just going to add another paradigm to Hugo to create shared spaces between companies.

00:20:08.520 And what's interesting is that there's a sort of like an upsell or like a product growth opportunity for existing customers.

00:20:15.140 So we can get Hugo within their team and then push them to use it between, you know, between companies.

00:20:21.380 Or there's a whole new use case, right, where people are looking for a way to collaborate between companies,

00:20:26.560 where we've got these deep relationships and I just need something common between us.

00:20:30.220 And yet Slack share channels are great for chatting now.

00:20:32.560 Trello.

00:20:33.360 Trello, exactly.

00:20:34.400 That's for the actions.

00:20:35.440 But where are the notes?

00:20:37.160 And I think there's the two ways to go about it.

00:20:40.180 And we'll test and see, to be honest.

00:20:41.940 That's cool.

00:20:42.520 So started in Sydney, moved to San Francisco.

00:20:47.420 Obviously, because similar, East Coast Canada, San Francisco.

00:20:56.000 What's been the biggest impact of being in that city

00:20:58.780 in regards to your startup?

00:21:02.020 Because everybody's like, should I move?

00:21:03.440 Should I not move?

00:21:04.440 What's your thoughts on that?

00:21:06.460 We oscillate.

00:21:07.820 We wouldn't be where we are today if we had to move there,

00:21:10.920 and for a few reasons.

00:21:12.300 So firstly, the serendipity when everyone's doing what you do

00:21:16.760 is out of this world.

00:21:17.840 I've had three transformative UberPool rides where,

00:21:22.320 and I don't talk in UberPool, by the way.

00:21:24.020 That's a big no-no, apparently.

00:21:26.480 But where I've just been on the phone,

00:21:28.760 and someone's overheard a conversation and said,

00:21:30.280 hey, I hear you work with Freshworks.

00:21:32.280 I'm actually just started as this, you know,

00:21:34.340 as executive in their office here and things like that, number one.

00:21:37.960 Number two is, you know, we support remote work.

00:21:41.040 Obviously, our team's part remote and the nature of what Hugo does,

00:21:44.180 and we're getting more and more remote.

00:21:45.900 But building deep relationships that partnerships require,

00:21:49.780 it really helps in person.

00:21:51.480 And I can walk a few blocks and basically see any one of our partners.

00:21:55.400 I can go to all their events.

00:21:56.620 I can go and drop off a bit of swag and hustle them.

00:21:58.960 I can hang out for a beer across the road.

00:22:01.540 And I think that would have been a lot slower

00:22:03.280 without being in the city.

00:22:04.120 I mean, just the sheer number of events people, I don't think,

00:22:07.240 understand.

00:22:08.020 It is crazy.

00:22:09.720 There's three or four events going on every day.

00:22:11.260 You've got to be selective.

00:22:12.260 Yeah.

00:22:12.760 You'll go crazy. 0.99

00:22:13.540 At first, did you go a little like a fat kid on cake? 0.99

00:22:16.740 I did, I did.

00:22:17.620 Because you've got to figure out who's who and where things are.

00:22:19.900 And it's a good way to acclimate yourself to the city.

00:22:24.200 But after that, we're very selective now.

00:22:26.180 I have an objective pretty much always,

00:22:28.480 even if it's a human objective, like really

00:22:30.520 want to get to know Dan better.

00:22:31.640 One person or people, not just go there serendipity.

00:22:34.760 Yeah, exactly.

00:22:35.500 Yeah, a certain point, it's like, OK, well,

00:22:37.180 I've got stuff I actually have to do if I'm

00:22:38.720 going to take time away from this.

00:22:39.920 Yeah, that's right.

00:22:40.780 And in regards to who you needed to become

00:22:45.440 as a co-founder for your team, what

00:22:48.140 have you learned about just growing into the role

00:22:51.140 that you're playing today?

00:22:52.780 It's interesting.

00:22:54.480 Obviously, I mean, leadership in general.

00:22:56.480 I came from a legal background.

00:22:58.400 I was a corporate lawyer in Australia, and it's very hierarchical.

00:23:02.660 And you look up to the partnership as these people who are the best of the best and all sorts of things.

00:23:08.240 And you start to realize the difference between an executive and a leader.

00:23:11.620 And I think what we've had to figure out is to be that leader of the ups and downs.

00:23:18.240 And it sounds very cliched, but one of the big lessons, I guess, for us is to take the team with us for the ride.

00:23:25.660 My natural instinct was to shield the team

00:23:27.900 from the not-so-great experiences

00:23:30.280 and then celebrate the great ones and the wins.

00:23:32.960 But we're wasting a whole bunch of brains.

00:23:35.560 We've hired these smart people.

00:23:37.080 They're all intelligent, intellectually smart,

00:23:39.120 and emotionally smart.

00:23:41.300 We've now really created a culture,

00:23:43.020 and I've learned as a leader and as Josh,

00:23:45.100 to bring them along with us.

00:23:47.300 And most of the time, the better ideas

00:23:49.220 are coming from them anyway.

00:23:50.120 So do you not shield them anymore from the lows?

00:23:54.260 Not at all.

00:23:54.840 And that way you get to leverage their brain power.

00:23:57.380 Totally.

00:23:58.540 And in regards to just being able to deal with the highs

00:24:01.960 and lows, we talked to actually Mike Cannonbrook, right,

00:24:04.980 from Atlassian.

00:24:06.540 I emailed him, cold emailed him a decade ago.

00:24:10.340 And he replied, it was about a partnership.

00:24:12.080 But it was in that email exchange I discovered his blog.

00:24:16.120 And I mean, he wrote a lot of just like founder type stuff.

00:24:19.960 And a lot of people, if they hear me

00:24:21.600 talk about the entrepreneurial pendulum,

00:24:23.020 And actually, that idea came from Mike Canenbrook's.

00:24:25.500 Yeah, just this, you swing from question mark

00:24:27.780 to exclamation mark, from take over the world.

00:24:31.080 I know what I'm doing with my life, exclamation mark

00:24:32.920 to question mark.

00:24:34.700 Why am I doing this?

00:24:35.520 Should I keep doing it?

00:24:36.760 And sometimes you'll swing back and forth a couple times

00:24:38.980 per week, sometimes a couple times per day, right?

00:24:41.440 Exactly.

00:24:42.160 What have you learned, or what do you

00:24:44.120 do to deal with those swings personally?

00:24:48.460 Yeah. So it's a few things. Firstly, I have ultimate respect for single founder businesses.

00:24:56.580 I don't know how those people do that. It's really impressive. And the reason I say that is

00:25:02.160 having a co-founder. So typically, you know, your swings aren't aligned perfectly, which is a good

00:25:07.520 thing. Yeah. They pull you up when you're feeling down. Exactly. And vice versa. You know, not

00:25:11.880 getting too excited about some big customer or some big win because we've still got this problem

00:25:15.620 to solve. So sort of neutralizing a bit in the middle. And Josh and I, my co-founder,

00:25:20.100 we're pretty disciplined about going for walks and getting out and just venting or celebrating

00:25:25.380 in that way. So that's number one, having someone. And you can offset that. It's not that you're on

00:25:30.420 your own if you don't have a co-founder, advisors or network of friends who are in the same boat.

00:25:35.380 Another benefit being in San Francisco, finding a B2B SaaS founder who's experiencing the same

00:25:40.260 Same thing as everywhere.

00:25:41.260 Throw a rock.

00:25:41.760 Exactly.

00:25:42.260 You're going to hit three.

00:25:43.260 Exactly.

00:25:43.760 So that's it.

00:25:45.500 Other than that, we've been trying to live in San Francisco,

00:25:49.020 not just live in a bubble of startups.

00:25:53.140 My wife and I have been pretty strict.

00:25:55.760 We just had a baby as well.

00:25:56.880 Four months ago, yeah.

00:25:57.540 Exactly.

00:25:58.080 So we obviously care a lot about a family life in SF,

00:26:00.920 and we realize that we're here to live as a family, not just

00:26:04.380 because it's a means to an end to build a SaaS business.

00:26:08.100 It's a long game, as you know.

00:26:09.700 It's not an in and out sort of story.

00:26:12.220 So we travel a lot around the country, explore California.

00:26:15.600 So is that a reminder of playing the long game

00:26:18.560 or thinking long game?

00:26:19.680 Is that how you deal with the highs and lows, just

00:26:22.340 realizing this is not a temporary thing?

00:26:25.300 Exactly, exactly.

00:26:26.740 You only ever have, in my view, you only ever

00:26:28.760 have one real low once, right?

00:26:30.880 So you have your first person that resigns.

00:26:33.380 Your key engineer resigns.

00:26:34.940 Sure, it's always the worst the first time.

00:26:36.400 That's right. 0.96

00:26:36.900 You're like, we're screwed. 0.98

00:26:37.580 It's all over. 0.85

00:26:38.180 And then two weeks later, you're like, well,

00:26:39.300 actually, it's kind of cool, because now I get to hire

00:26:41.060 someone who fills this gap, which I really need now.

00:26:43.740 The next time someone resigns, you're like, oh, that's fine.

00:26:45.780 When Mike resigns, yeah, that's right.

00:26:47.920 And so each time something bad happens,

00:26:50.240 it's kind of the last time you care about.

00:26:51.980 Well, not care, but the last time it really hits you.

00:26:54.080 It hurt that bad.

00:26:55.300 So the long game there.

00:26:56.700 And the third thing I think is, I lost my train of thought.

00:27:01.180 Sorry.

00:27:02.240 Just like how do you deal with the highs and lows?

00:27:03.860 You said the first thing was co-founder.

00:27:05.400 Second thing was playing the long game.

00:27:07.100 Yep, definitely playing the long game.

00:27:09.140 And I guess the third is, you know, it's related to long game, but it's just a perspective thing.

00:27:15.560 So we're so deep in the weeds that everything feels critical, you know, every bit of churn,

00:27:21.460 every bug, et cetera. Switching tasks and looking at other facets of the business all the time

00:27:26.760 reminds you the impact and usually how small it is, right? So a marketing channel completely

00:27:32.880 falls over for us. We realized that this entire campaign we've been working up to amounts to

00:27:38.080 nothing well i know that number one that that's knowledge that's value um and two i have six

00:27:42.660 marketing campaigns in play at the moment so i move on to my next ones so i really try we have

00:27:46.760 a weekly meeting called a high low with our team and we we call it that to try and zoom into that

00:27:51.340 stuff so we are upset when we lost a customer for that bug but then zoom out and be like hey guys

00:27:55.700 high low high low that's smart it's a reminder just to be visionary and look at the big picture

00:28:01.180 but also look at numbers and how are we performing and i find that most people i've worked with

00:28:05.680 before oscillate, right?

00:28:06.860 You're either a numbers person, you're the finance dude

00:28:08.920 with the spreadsheet going, you know, we're over budget here.

00:28:11.780 Or you're this visionary leader who

00:28:13.680 wouldn't know how to create a Facebook ad campaign

00:28:16.040 or wouldn't be able to pitch than sell the product.

00:28:18.520 We really try and cover both.

00:28:20.260 And that does help with the pendulum we spoke about.

00:28:23.300 Yeah.

00:28:24.040 And who do you, I mean, in regards to your mindset,

00:28:31.360 skill set of things as an entrepreneur

00:28:33.540 that you've had to learn.

00:28:35.100 What's your process for learning those things?

00:28:37.980 Being around sounds like proximity matters for you.

00:28:43.720 And you go to a lot of events, which

00:28:45.040 is helpful because you're obviously

00:28:46.740 seeing speakers on stage share wisdom.

00:28:49.620 But what's your go-to?

00:28:50.940 Do you read?

00:28:53.220 So it's funny.

00:28:53.940 I read, but not so much from a learning perspective.

00:28:58.160 I mean, obviously, you learn every time you read.

00:29:00.380 I only read nonfiction.

00:29:01.280 That's what interests me.

00:29:02.160 I don't learn the how-tos.

00:29:03.700 I read to just broaden ways of thinking.

00:29:06.680 Awareness, yeah.

00:29:07.460 Yeah, awareness.

00:29:08.580 That's a good word for that.

00:29:10.280 Specifically, to learn new skills, I just try.

00:29:13.300 So I, as I say, came from a legal background,

00:29:15.720 completely non-technical.

00:29:17.140 Now, in the product, I look after all the data,

00:29:20.140 analytics, our website, all of our marketing automation,

00:29:23.840 and I just figure it out.

00:29:25.380 I mean, we're in an awesome time for no-code.

00:29:28.420 And I was joking to someone yesterday

00:29:31.740 that Zapier is like my gaffer tape.

00:29:33.900 Like it holds the whole business together.

00:29:35.660 So I just try and play and figure out.

00:29:38.460 There's obviously so much content online

00:29:39.860 and there's basically not much we can't do now

00:29:43.200 being non-technical founders

00:29:44.940 other than the real meat of our app.

00:29:47.780 And we've obviously got an engineering team

00:29:49.040 and good engineering leadership to help us with that.

00:29:51.380 And what do you guys do to kind of like keep communication?

00:29:55.540 I mean, obviously you have a product that does this.

00:29:57.180 I'm assuming you guys use your own product.

00:29:58.600 You have meetings.

00:29:59.220 It would be weird if you didn't.

00:30:01.060 But what have you learned around communication rhythms

00:30:03.900 and stuff as you continue to scale and learn

00:30:05.700 from your customers?

00:30:06.480 How do you guys disseminate that?

00:30:07.740 You've got the high-low meeting.

00:30:08.940 What other meetings you guys feel are important,

00:30:11.360 the walk-in talks with your co-founder?

00:30:13.680 Yep.

00:30:14.280 So we try and cap internal meetings at 10% of our time.

00:30:18.820 It's just dangerous.

00:30:20.520 And it's not the culture we want to create internally.

00:30:24.120 External meetings with customers, obviously,

00:30:25.980 Hugo's solving that problem.

00:30:27.080 sharing it internally and that works super well for us as it should um other than that we we we

00:30:32.920 share data um internally we use slack for everything um so slack um both in the natural

00:30:38.600 way of sharing but using automations so one really good example is um we use error logging software

00:30:43.400 called bug snag so now whenever a user gets served an error we post it to a slack channel that was

00:30:49.480 the first step um so everyone knew that it was in our face that hey dan the customer worth this arr

00:30:55.560 just ran into this problem and saw this ugly error modal. 0.95

00:30:58.680 That sucks. 0.63

00:30:59.640 It creates a culture of caring about that. 0.99

00:31:01.440 It puts it front and center and makes sure

00:31:03.360 that we're communicating internally about what matters.

00:31:05.620 And then we went one step further.

00:31:06.900 We trigger an email now to you and say, hey, Dan, really

00:31:09.120 sorry, this sucked.

00:31:09.940 You just got this error.

00:31:11.400 Just so you know, Kristin from the engineering team 0.66

00:31:14.040 is actually looking at it right now.

00:31:15.800 And we automate that.

00:31:16.700 That's through Zapier, Bugsnag, and Customer

00:31:18.780 Hero for our email coms.

00:31:19.740 It sounds like you've really gone deep on Zapier.

00:31:21.540 Oh, yeah.

00:31:22.080 Holy cow. 0.89

00:31:23.040 That's amazing.

00:31:23.700 I love it because there's a lot of non-technical

00:31:25.380 founders that lean away from it because they think, well,

00:31:28.140 it's just too far past.

00:31:30.840 Like, I'm never going to learn how to code, so why bother?

00:31:33.520 But you're right.

00:31:34.060 It's like there's so many tools today

00:31:35.760 that allow you to connect and build these kind of solutions

00:31:40.000 without any other engineer involved

00:31:42.100 that allows the communication to flow.

00:31:44.800 So Slack is kind of like that repository

00:31:47.100 of just this stream of knowledge.

00:31:50.280 And then Zapier to pull things over.

00:31:53.020 What other kind of stuff do you guys log?

00:31:55.260 Sure.

00:31:56.220 So other sort of no-code tools we use.

00:31:58.620 Webflow is great.

00:32:00.280 Webflow is a HTML, CSS visual editor.

00:32:04.040 So our entire website, which is full of animations

00:32:06.760 and complicated CSS and things you'd

00:32:09.840 think that we've had some front-end developer on,

00:32:12.060 did that we built ourselves, been completely non-technical.

00:32:14.440 That's been really.

00:32:15.300 Wow, your site looks great.

00:32:16.420 Yeah, thanks.

00:32:17.120 And that's, don't know the first thing about it.

00:32:19.040 Didn't know the first thing about that before.

00:32:21.420 We use a lot of data capture products,

00:32:23.700 like Chart.io and that, which again, allows us, I learned SQL through Chart.io. It's a drag and

00:32:29.120 drop SQL editor. And then you see the SQL you're creating. And all of a sudden, I'm now running

00:32:32.580 queries across our data. So I basically look through all of these integrations. Like the

00:32:39.720 marketplace that we spoke about is like our SaaS lead gen. What else is everyone connecting? What

00:32:43.780 does it do? What's it going to do for me? Another one that's really interesting is Segment.io.

00:32:49.620 That's changed our business. Why? Because I want to try a new analytics product. I want to

00:32:53.680 try an NPS product in our app.

00:32:55.960 Previously, I'd create a Jira ticket.

00:32:57.800 Engineering would complain about it.

00:32:59.740 Then I want to pull it out a week later.

00:33:01.120 We didn't want to do.

00:33:01.960 They're going to hate me forever.

00:33:03.100 I go in a segment now and say, cool,

00:33:04.840 connect the front end of our app to this thing.

00:33:06.460 And a minute later, it's done.

00:33:08.600 So that has really made us more agile from an integrations

00:33:11.980 perspective as well.

00:33:13.240 That's cool.

00:33:13.940 So in regards to transparency around the business,

00:33:17.120 the numbers, et cetera, how do you guys deal with that?

00:33:19.500 Internally or externally?

00:33:21.440 Yep.

00:33:21.940 Everything is completely transparent.

00:33:24.020 We haven't gone quite as far as buffer on salaries

00:33:26.320 and things like that yet.

00:33:27.460 But everything around performance, customers,

00:33:30.700 all very transparent.

00:33:31.960 We dashboard.

00:33:32.680 We share all those numbers.

00:33:34.060 It's important, right?

00:33:34.900 Because in the end, that's the only way to drive alignment.

00:33:37.580 Yes, I'm an engineer, and my goal in my mind

00:33:40.000 is these 10 JIRA bugs or these five features.

00:33:43.040 But for what?

00:33:45.260 At the same time, do I really need to do those bugs?

00:33:47.420 I could just push it off a bit.

00:33:49.440 But if you know that we've lost three customers

00:33:51.720 Or we have this big opportunity in the pipeline.

00:33:53.840 If only we build this feature, you're

00:33:55.800 building it for the right reasons.

00:33:57.060 And you can do a better job at it.

00:33:58.320 That's awesome.

00:33:59.440 Darren, where do you think the world of B2B SaaS is going?

00:34:03.400 Like, what's non-obvious?

00:34:05.760 Maybe you feel like everything.

00:34:06.920 Because in the Valley, you kind of

00:34:08.040 feel like everybody knows this stuff.

00:34:09.480 But I mean, it's not a very old.

00:34:11.680 I mean, it used to be called application service provider.

00:34:14.600 The word SaaS is still kind of new in our lexicon.

00:34:17.280 Where do you think we're going over the next decade with?

00:34:20.100 how we go to market, how we build solutions,

00:34:22.860 how companies consume these apps.

00:34:24.620 So we think about this all the time, obviously.

00:34:26.820 Bottoms up adoption is now a no-no.

00:34:28.980 A few years ago, that would have been an insight.

00:34:31.340 The likes of Slack and Hugo now, to be fair,

00:34:33.820 it's not a CIO who says, we will roll this out.

00:34:36.100 And if they do, it's probably not going to be effective.

00:34:38.240 So we know that.

00:34:38.980 But it's funny, because some new founders, young founders,

00:34:41.500 don't even realize that that's not how it was done.

00:34:43.980 Yeah, totally.

00:34:45.540 Yeah, so the whole idea of teams using a tool,

00:34:50.300 free and or low cost.

00:34:52.220 And then eventually, it shows up in multiple departments.

00:34:54.920 And then some sales guy at a Slack or Dropbox calls and says,

00:34:58.940 hey, you've got 1,500 people using our thing.

00:35:01.440 There's no consolidated security.

00:35:02.720 It's usually, do you want to use our thing?

00:35:04.220 And they say, no, we don't have a need for that.

00:35:05.720 It's funny, that.

00:35:06.540 Funny enough, we have 500 people in this department

00:35:09.200 or across the company using it.

00:35:10.580 So bottoms up adoption.

00:35:13.220 The other is, so there's obviously a SaaS explosion now.

00:35:17.180 The latest data that we used in some of our content,

00:35:19.940 129 distinct SaaS tools at an average SMB.

00:35:25.020 It's insane, right?

00:35:26.120 So 129.

00:35:27.320 129.

00:35:28.120 I have a spreadsheet.

00:35:29.460 I'm probably at 60.

00:35:32.460 There you go.

00:35:33.000 Exactly.

00:35:33.560 Yeah.

00:35:34.100 It's funny because you don't realize how many things,

00:35:36.140 but it's like you just keep adding, right?

00:35:38.360 And you might have three landing page tools

00:35:41.400 and two analytics tools.

00:35:43.620 And then just some plugins that you paid a little bit for.

00:35:46.120 Plugins, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:35:47.120 Absolutely.

00:35:47.620 So that's obviously happening.

00:35:49.600 And already, it's getting hard.

00:35:50.840 If you hop on the phone and say, look,

00:35:51.960 I have this great SaaS tool that, half the time,

00:35:54.160 we're like, look, sorry, we can't handle any more SaaS.

00:35:57.040 So our take on that is that when we look at that 129, 0.96

00:36:00.540 and we took the top 500 and tried to bucket them,

00:36:04.400 more than 90% of them are department specific.

00:36:06.900 So if you think about when you start a company,

00:36:08.520 before you have distinct functions,

00:36:10.900 You go email, Calendar Office 365 or G Suite.

00:36:14.800 You go chat now.

00:36:15.760 Slack have done a great job there.

00:36:17.140 Project management.

00:36:17.920 Project management.

00:36:19.400 And that's about it.

00:36:20.480 I mean, maybe the CRM next if you're a real sales company.

00:36:22.960 Some financial tool.

00:36:23.860 Yep, your QuickBooks.

00:36:25.400 But already, that's department specific, right?

00:36:26.960 Because as soon as you grow, who's

00:36:28.600 going to have access to QuickBooks?

00:36:29.620 Your finance team and the CEO.

00:36:31.080 Who's going to have access to your CRM, the sales team?

00:36:33.740 So why only a 10% of them company-wide?

00:36:37.980 And with them, and we're saying, out of all the SaaS

00:36:40.200 companies, there's only 10% that are company-wide.

00:36:42.660 That's right, that are used across the company.

00:36:45.120 So that's an interesting opportunity,

00:36:46.500 because what's happening is these SaaS tools

00:36:49.200 are perpetuating team silos.

00:36:50.940 All of our sales data is in Salesforce.

00:36:53.040 All of our engineering feature work and bugs are in JIRA.

00:36:57.540 All of our marketing campaigns are in Asana.

00:37:00.240 So of course, there's going to be team silos.

00:37:02.640 The only way to share across teams is conversations.

00:37:06.020 So what we're trying to do with Hugo,

00:37:07.480 and I think a general direction that we're heading,

00:37:09.400 is building horizontally, looking for ways

00:37:12.040 to reduce the fragmentation of data that's

00:37:14.620 happening in these silos and the fragmentation of people,

00:37:17.560 where people don't think outside their little world

00:37:19.480 of marketing or engineering or whatever it is.

00:37:21.700 So even though, I mean, because I

00:37:23.120 see this with a lot of founders going horizontal and broad,

00:37:26.440 you guys still focus on specific use cases.

00:37:29.440 Was that something that you went wide, then narrow,

00:37:32.320 and then wide again?

00:37:33.940 How did you guys decide on those specific use cases?

00:37:36.460 So it's a definitional thing.

00:37:37.600 we got this wrong and right so many times, right?

00:37:39.620 So yeah, of course we want to be everything

00:37:41.160 for everyone to start with, the usual founder growing up.

00:37:43.680 Then we hit founder puberty where everyone's like,

00:37:45.540 no, you've got to be something very specific,

00:37:47.080 have a focused use case.

00:37:48.860 But a focused use case doesn't mean

00:37:50.840 that it's not a value to the whole company.

00:37:53.240 So we went after very specific use cases.

00:37:55.400 We knew that customer success is a great way

00:37:57.640 to enter a company.

00:37:59.200 They generate, they have a lot of meetings,

00:38:00.560 generate insights that are valuable

00:38:02.040 to the rest of the business.

00:38:03.260 We knew that a company of a certain size

00:38:05.060 that uses Slack and G Suite says a lot

00:38:07.460 about their persona.

00:38:08.460 So we, and there are a few other things

00:38:10.020 that we've made us very specific.

00:38:11.220 We want you.

00:38:12.320 But the product to be valuable is going to go horizontal.

00:38:15.700 A bit like Slack, right?

00:38:16.780 They went off to engineering teams.

00:38:17.900 There's nothing really about Slack that makes it

00:38:20.020 unique for engineering teams.

00:38:21.700 So we do it that way, and then grow horizontally.

00:38:24.560 That's super smart.

00:38:25.700 Darren, super intriguing conversation.

00:38:30.680 I love the fact that you guys think a lot about SaaS.

00:38:34.180 It sounds like this is like the amount of data and companies.

00:38:37.220 I mean, it sounds like this is your world

00:38:38.720 and it's what you talk about all the time.

00:38:40.340 Where can people find you online or kind of consume your stuff?

00:38:43.100 Sure.

00:38:43.640 So from our website, hugo.team, we publish a bunch on our blog.

00:38:48.380 It's all thought leadership.

00:38:49.580 There's no product marketing on our blog.

00:38:51.320 We've kept it that way on purpose.

00:38:53.420 Getting more active on Twitter, we're hugoproduct.

00:38:56.900 And at events, I guess we're trying,

00:38:58.980 that's what I love about coming here, speaking,

00:39:00.620 and then the conversations afterwards.

00:39:02.300 The real genuine one-on-one conversations about the stuff

00:39:05.040 that we care about is where some of my best conversations

00:39:07.840 in the last two years have happened.

00:39:10.000 That's awesome.

00:39:10.840 So find you at events.

00:39:11.680 Darren, appreciate you, man.

00:39:12.800 Thanks, Dan.

00:39:13.640 Thanks for coming out.

00:39:14.420 Cheers.

00:39:15.260 Thanks for watching this episode of Escape Velocity.

00:39:17.660 Be sure to like and subscribe

00:39:19.440 and leave a comment with your biggest insight

00:39:21.760 from our conversation.

00:39:23.160 Be sure to check out the next episode.

Dan Martell - August 01, 2019

Learn and Adapt As a Non-technical Founder with Darren @ Hugo.team - Escape Velocity Show #7

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