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Dec 2, 2019 · 15m · top-founders

1591 How She Started as An Employee, Then Moved to Owner

Bruna San Roman · 7m spoken Nathan Latka · 5m spoken
0:00 / 0:00

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

Host Nathan Latka interviews Switch.cm Managing Director Bruna San Roman about her journey from remote employee to equity-holding leader and how she scaled the hospitality SaaS platform to 200 locations and $6,000 in monthly recurring revenue.

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 45.4% of the talking time here. How this is scored →

Nathan as informed peer 5.0 Guest teaching 2.7 Guest disagreement 1.3 Nathan pushing back 3.3
05100:0010:002:33–6:27 · Nathan as informed peer 6/10 Switch.cm Origin Story, Acquisition, and Leadership Transition Nathan probes the backstory and corporate structure following Switch.cm's acquisition, doing quick mental math to calculate monthly revenue based on customer count and ARPU. Bruna collaboratively shares the founding narrative and explains the legacy freemium users.6:31–13:30 · Nathan as informed peer 7/10 Growth Marketing Conference Sponsorship and Announcement Nathan drills down on unit economics, challenging Bruna's reported growth numbers and correcting her definition of CAC when she conflates acquisition cost with recurring customer support. He also redirects her when she pivots away from answering the monthly churn rate question.13:30–14:54 · Nathan as informed peer 2/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions The episode concludes with the standard Famous Five rapid-fire routine, maintaining an easygoing and conversational tone with simple, direct answers.2:33–6:27 · Guest teaching 3/10 Switch.cm Origin Story, Acquisition, and Leadership Transition Nathan probes the backstory and corporate structure following Switch.cm's acquisition, doing quick mental math to calculate monthly revenue based on customer count and ARPU. Bruna collaboratively shares the founding narrative and explains the legacy freemium users.6:31–13:30 · Guest teaching 4/10 Growth Marketing Conference Sponsorship and Announcement Nathan drills down on unit economics, challenging Bruna's reported growth numbers and correcting her definition of CAC when she conflates acquisition cost with recurring customer support. He also redirects her when she pivots away from answering the monthly churn rate question.13:30–14:54 · Guest teaching 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions The episode concludes with the standard Famous Five rapid-fire routine, maintaining an easygoing and conversational tone with simple, direct answers.2:33–6:27 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Switch.cm Origin Story, Acquisition, and Leadership Transition Nathan probes the backstory and corporate structure following Switch.cm's acquisition, doing quick mental math to calculate monthly revenue based on customer count and ARPU. Bruna collaboratively shares the founding narrative and explains the legacy freemium users.6:31–13:30 · Guest disagreement 2/10 Growth Marketing Conference Sponsorship and Announcement Nathan drills down on unit economics, challenging Bruna's reported growth numbers and correcting her definition of CAC when she conflates acquisition cost with recurring customer support. He also redirects her when she pivots away from answering the monthly churn rate question.13:30–14:54 · Guest disagreement 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions The episode concludes with the standard Famous Five rapid-fire routine, maintaining an easygoing and conversational tone with simple, direct answers.2:33–6:27 · Nathan pushing back 3/10 Switch.cm Origin Story, Acquisition, and Leadership Transition Nathan probes the backstory and corporate structure following Switch.cm's acquisition, doing quick mental math to calculate monthly revenue based on customer count and ARPU. Bruna collaboratively shares the founding narrative and explains the legacy freemium users.6:31–13:30 · Nathan pushing back 6/10 Growth Marketing Conference Sponsorship and Announcement Nathan drills down on unit economics, challenging Bruna's reported growth numbers and correcting her definition of CAC when she conflates acquisition cost with recurring customer support. He also redirects her when she pivots away from answering the monthly churn rate question.13:30–14:54 · Nathan pushing back 1/10 The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions The episode concludes with the standard Famous Five rapid-fire routine, maintaining an easygoing and conversational tone with simple, direct answers.

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

0:00 · Nathan 50.5% · guest 49.5%0:00 · Nathan 50.5% · guest 49.5%3:00 · Nathan 13.7% · guest 86.3%3:00 · Nathan 13.7% · guest 86.3%6:00 · Nathan 83% · guest 17%6:00 · Nathan 83% · guest 17%9:00 · Nathan 31.6% · guest 68.4%9:00 · Nathan 31.6% · guest 68.4%12:00 · Nathan 38.7% · guest 61.3%12:00 · Nathan 38.7% · guest 61.3%15:00 · Nathan 97% · guest 3%15:00 · Nathan 97% · guest 3%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 8:38 Clarifying user growth versus revenue growth

Bruna pushes back against Nathan's accusation of inconsistent metrics by distinguishing that the 150% growth refers to user quantity rather than total dollar revenue.

 Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 10:16 Pushback on monthly CAC phrasing

Nathan refuses Bruna's framing of customer acquisition cost as a monthly ongoing expense, reminding her that CAC is a one-time upfront cost to acquire a customer.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 8:46 Differentiating user volume from ARPU growth

Bruna corrects Nathan's assumption about revenue growth by explaining that average ticket sizes changed, so user growth and revenue growth scaled at different rates.

 Nathan holds their own ▶ 10:39 Dissecting CAC versus recurring support costs

Nathan demonstrates SaaS metric expertise by untangling Bruna's blended numbers to separate true acquisition spend from recurring monthly customer support.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicNathan as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementNathan pushing backWhy
Switch.cm Origin Story, Acquisition, and Leadership Transition 6313 Nathan probes the backstory and corporate structure following Switch.cm's acquisition, doing quick mental math to calculate monthly revenue based on customer count and ARPU. Bruna collaboratively shares the founding narrative and explains the legacy freemium users.
Growth Marketing Conference Sponsorship and Announcement 7426 Nathan drills down on unit economics, challenging Bruna's reported growth numbers and correcting her definition of CAC when she conflates acquisition cost with recurring customer support. He also redirects her when she pivots away from answering the monthly churn rate question.
The Famous Five Rapid-Fire Questions 2111 The episode concludes with the standard Famous Five rapid-fire routine, maintaining an easygoing and conversational tone with simple, direct answers.

Statements from this episode (7)

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm's average customer ticket size is around $30 per month
“Our average ticket is around 30.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 2:17
Assertion Supported
Switch.cm was acquired in April 2017 by Flymya and BOD Tech
“It was basically in 2016 that I joined the team. But then in April, 2017, they sold the company to a new company, to FlyMia and BOD tech team, based in Myanmar and Singapore.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 4:48
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm grew users by 150% post-acquisition
“So since the acquisition, we changed completely the growth model and the strategy, the pricing and so on. We have grown a 150% in terms of users and yeah.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 5:26
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm has over 200 customers across 40 countries
“We have 200 plus in 40 countries.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 5:47
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm generated under $1,000 in monthly revenue in late 2017
“It was less than a thousand.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 8:24
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm loses two to three customer accounts per month
“Our canceling rate is around two to three uses per month.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 11:58
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Switch.cm employs 16 in-house staff and 19 total workers
“We are 16 in house and 19 considering also freelancers.”
Bruna San Roman Dec 2, 2019 ▶ 12:30
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