StarZero All shows Try the podcast clipper →

Jan 21, 2022 · 15m · top-founders

His SaaS Will Be Huge Because of $1m+ Agency With Ready To Go Customers

Joe Colley · 6m spoken Nathan Latka · 6m spoken
0:00 / 0:00

gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions

In this episode of Conversations with Nathan Latka, entrepreneur Joe Colley explains how he leveraged the profits and client distribution of his $1M+ marketing agency to self-fund over £1.3 million into Pulse, an AI platform that predicts creative ad performance and return on ad spend prior to launch.

How this conversation actually went

Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Nathan holds 47.4% of the talking time here. How this is scored →

Nathan as informed peer 3.8 Guest teaching 2.0 Guest disagreement 1.0 Nathan pushing back 3.3
05100:0010:000:44–2:53 · Nathan as informed peer 3/10 Introducing Pulse's Predictive AI Creative Technology Nathan presses Joe on how Pulse can accurately predict emotional responses if passive users scroll without leaving digital signals. Joe calmly clarifies how public datasets, watch duration, and NLP models approximate audience sentiment.2:54–7:27 · Nathan as informed peer 4/10 SaaS Pricing Model and Agency Target Market Nathan drills into customer pricing tiers and pushes Joe on the mechanics of avoiding equity dilution by proving revenue before seeking institutional funding. Joe agrees with the timing strategy and details his self-funding from agency profits.7:31–12:45 · Nathan as informed peer 6/10 Sponsor Break: Electric IT Support for Founders Nathan role-plays as a prospective investor demanding an equity stake in both the marketing agency and SaaS tool, breaking down why investors resist split founder focus. Joe defends maintaining both entities while keeping upcoming structural changes confidential.12:46–14:54 · Nathan as informed peer 2/10 Beta Testing Metrics and The Famous Five Nathan confirms beta usage metrics before transitioning into the Famous Five rapid-fire questions, resulting in an agreeable and cooperative closing dynamic.0:44–2:53 · Guest teaching 3/10 Introducing Pulse's Predictive AI Creative Technology Nathan presses Joe on how Pulse can accurately predict emotional responses if passive users scroll without leaving digital signals. Joe calmly clarifies how public datasets, watch duration, and NLP models approximate audience sentiment.2:54–7:27 · Guest teaching 2/10 SaaS Pricing Model and Agency Target Market Nathan drills into customer pricing tiers and pushes Joe on the mechanics of avoiding equity dilution by proving revenue before seeking institutional funding. Joe agrees with the timing strategy and details his self-funding from agency profits.7:31–12:45 · Guest teaching 2/10 Sponsor Break: Electric IT Support for Founders Nathan role-plays as a prospective investor demanding an equity stake in both the marketing agency and SaaS tool, breaking down why investors resist split founder focus. Joe defends maintaining both entities while keeping upcoming structural changes confidential.12:46–14:54 · Guest teaching 1/10 Beta Testing Metrics and The Famous Five Nathan confirms beta usage metrics before transitioning into the Famous Five rapid-fire questions, resulting in an agreeable and cooperative closing dynamic.0:44–2:53 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Introducing Pulse's Predictive AI Creative Technology Nathan presses Joe on how Pulse can accurately predict emotional responses if passive users scroll without leaving digital signals. Joe calmly clarifies how public datasets, watch duration, and NLP models approximate audience sentiment.2:54–7:27 · Guest disagreement 1/10 SaaS Pricing Model and Agency Target Market Nathan drills into customer pricing tiers and pushes Joe on the mechanics of avoiding equity dilution by proving revenue before seeking institutional funding. Joe agrees with the timing strategy and details his self-funding from agency profits.7:31–12:45 · Guest disagreement 2/10 Sponsor Break: Electric IT Support for Founders Nathan role-plays as a prospective investor demanding an equity stake in both the marketing agency and SaaS tool, breaking down why investors resist split founder focus. Joe defends maintaining both entities while keeping upcoming structural changes confidential.12:46–14:54 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Beta Testing Metrics and The Famous Five Nathan confirms beta usage metrics before transitioning into the Famous Five rapid-fire questions, resulting in an agreeable and cooperative closing dynamic.0:44–2:53 · Nathan pushing back 3/10 Introducing Pulse's Predictive AI Creative Technology Nathan presses Joe on how Pulse can accurately predict emotional responses if passive users scroll without leaving digital signals. Joe calmly clarifies how public datasets, watch duration, and NLP models approximate audience sentiment.2:54–7:27 · Nathan pushing back 4/10 SaaS Pricing Model and Agency Target Market Nathan drills into customer pricing tiers and pushes Joe on the mechanics of avoiding equity dilution by proving revenue before seeking institutional funding. Joe agrees with the timing strategy and details his self-funding from agency profits.7:31–12:45 · Nathan pushing back 5/10 Sponsor Break: Electric IT Support for Founders Nathan role-plays as a prospective investor demanding an equity stake in both the marketing agency and SaaS tool, breaking down why investors resist split founder focus. Joe defends maintaining both entities while keeping upcoming structural changes confidential.12:46–14:54 · Nathan pushing back 1/10 Beta Testing Metrics and The Famous Five Nathan confirms beta usage metrics before transitioning into the Famous Five rapid-fire questions, resulting in an agreeable and cooperative closing dynamic.

speaking balance: gold is Nathan, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)

0:00 · Nathan 43.2% · guest 56.8%0:00 · Nathan 43.2% · guest 56.8%3:00 · Nathan 27.7% · guest 72.3%3:00 · Nathan 27.7% · guest 72.3%6:00 · Nathan 65.3% · guest 34.7%6:00 · Nathan 65.3% · guest 34.7%9:00 · Nathan 48.4% · guest 51.6%9:00 · Nathan 48.4% · guest 51.6%12:00 · Nathan 42.1% · guest 57.9%12:00 · Nathan 42.1% · guest 57.9%15:00 · Nathan 95.7% · guest 4.3%15:00 · Nathan 95.7% · guest 4.3%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 10:53 Joe rejects Nathan's premise on divesting the agency

Joe directly counters Nathan's suggestion to sell his agency, arguing that maintaining strong industry agency connections is vital to Pulse's growth.

 Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 11:15 Nathan role-plays tough investor terms

Nathan refuses to let Joe off easily on his dual commitments, adopting the persona of a lead investor forcing a package deal across both businesses.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 2:05 Joe explains passive ad interaction tracking

Joe walks Nathan through the technical mechanics of tracking engagement through watch times and comparative content datasets even when users do not explicitly click or react.

 Nathan holds their own ▶ 11:40 Nathan details agency-to-SaaS dynamics and investor friction

Nathan demonstrates industry domain knowledge by articulating how agency customer bases boost Net Dollar Retention for SaaS spin-offs while creating complex licensing and cap table issues.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicNathan as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementNathan pushing backWhy
Introducing Pulse's Predictive AI Creative Technology 3313 Nathan presses Joe on how Pulse can accurately predict emotional responses if passive users scroll without leaving digital signals. Joe calmly clarifies how public datasets, watch duration, and NLP models approximate audience sentiment.
SaaS Pricing Model and Agency Target Market 4214 Nathan drills into customer pricing tiers and pushes Joe on the mechanics of avoiding equity dilution by proving revenue before seeking institutional funding. Joe agrees with the timing strategy and details his self-funding from agency profits.
Sponsor Break: Electric IT Support for Founders 6225 Nathan role-plays as a prospective investor demanding an equity stake in both the marketing agency and SaaS tool, breaking down why investors resist split founder focus. Joe defends maintaining both entities while keeping upcoming structural changes confidential.
Beta Testing Metrics and The Famous Five 2101 Nathan confirms beta usage metrics before transitioning into the Famous Five rapid-fire questions, resulting in an agreeable and cooperative closing dynamic.

Statements from this episode (7)

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Colley claims Pulse predicts ad emotional reactions with 97% accuracy
“On predicting the outcome of emotional responses to creative content. So when someone is publishing a piece of content, are they going to feel angry about it? Are they going to feel sad about it? Confused? Unhappy? How many people are going to engage with it? …”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 1:48
Disclosure
Colley: Pulse subscriptions range from £500 to £5,500 per month
“It varies from 500 pounds a month in, in British pounds all the way up to however much they want to be paying. But the range for staff subscriptions is 500 to five and a half thousand a month.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 3:03
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Colley: Pulse has roughly 100 agencies ready to onboard at launch
“At the moment, we're pre-rev but as soon as we hit revenue generation, we know that we have a hundred and so agencies that are going to be taking the platform on from day one.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 3:40
Assertion Supported
Colley: Talkwalker entry pricing is around £6,000 per year
“Majority of entry point for similar products like Talkwalker, for example, people are paying six grand a year for a similar product.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 4:28
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Colley: Pulse has burned £1.48 million since launch
“We've done 1.48 million pounds so far.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 4:45
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Colley claims Pulse uses quantum computation to process marketing data
“The tech stack that we have behind this has meant that we've had to deploy some quantum computation elements as well and a variety of other facets to the product in the backend to handle these vast quantities of data that we have.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 5:00
Disclosure
Colley self-funded £1.33M of Pulse via his marketing agency
“So a 150,000 has come from private investors. The rest has come from me and the money that I've accrued over the past, however long by running my marketing agency.”
Joe Colley Jan 21, 2022 ▶ 5:18
Made with StarZero

Turn any episode into a week of clips.

This entire site, over 2,600 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable, runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.

Try the podcast clipper Learn more