Laura Roeder: Paperbell generates seven-figure ARR after four years bootstrapping
Laura Roeder · Episode 750 | Making Your First Hire, Testing Prices, And More Li... · Jan 21, 2025 · at 2:29
Laura Roeder, founder of Paperbell and former founder of MeetEdgar, describes the revenue scale and background of her coaching platform to host Rob Walling.
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“Paperbell is a bootstrap SaaS that's been around for four years. We're in the seven-figure annual reoccurring revenue range, and it's a tool for coaches, like life coaches, to run their business.”
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“We had one person engineering team for the first three years of the business. And our one person was able to build extremely similar to what their entire team built.”
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“They seem because maybe because they had only, you know, quote unquote, ten million, they seem to have put it all into engineering and extremely little into marketing.”
Roeder: Bootstrappers test pivots with ads, while VCs overhaul entire products
“I think bootstrappers think more like, okay, if it's not working, if you need a pivot, let me try just like running a few ads to this market. Let me try just changing the marketing and not too much with the product and let's see if it gets traction there. Wher…”
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“We did not end up acquiring practice and it wasn't, it didn't really end up being a serious conversation, and they ended up just shutting down. And I, you know, I did find out that they weren't that large, that we were definitely far ahead of them as far as re…”
Roeder: Startups should ignore Bluesky and market on established social platforms
“Don't market on blue sky. It just launched. You know, like, hang out there for fun if you want to. Like, mark it on LinkedIn, on Instagram, on Reddit if that's where people are, YouTube, lots of people on YouTube. Like, just don't overthink it. Go for the most…”