The Exchanges

Q So 2015 is go live date and how much time energy has been building up the code and the MVP before your first sale?

A Oh, it took us probably two and a half years. So Limbo's fully bootstrapped. So at the early days, it was literally just me coding at night, trying to like get an MVP. These, these type of systems have been around for like decades, right? We weren't trying to do anything necessarily, necessarily new as when it comes to features. And so there was, uh, a large run, uh, or initial get to, uh, to go to actually get a build. And so it took about two and a half years to get that first paying customer. They were on the per asset plan. They were a whopping 12 dollars a month. I was ecstatic. My wife thought I was kind of crazy all these years to get it going.

AI assessment note: “Oh, it took us probably two and a half years.”

Q Yeah. What are some of those reasons? I mean, if you added a hundred grand in new MRR, about 1.2 million ARR over the past 12 months with driven growth.

A Yeah, so one of the big things is, like, a big shout out to our sales team. They're doing absolutely awesome. Um, we redid our entire sales presentation, um, really over the last, like, 14 months or so. Really nailed it down on how do we present Limbo, and how do we talk with the customers to make sure that they're, they feel that their, their problems are going to be solved with us. And so that was one big thing. We redid, um, our, our sales systems, our sales stack, To, to outreach and HubSpot and really made it like before we weren't really using a good CRM, or at least we weren't using HubSpot to the power it could be. And, uh, our VP of sales, Jake Westbrook did a great job setting that all up. And I didn't think it was really going to pay off until 20, 21, but it started paying off in the middle of the year, which, uh, that was a huge help. We were starting to actually get real metrics on like, How are we handling the leads and like how quickly are we closing them and where is it going wrong? And that, that all factored in a lot. Also our, our success team has started to do a really good job onboarding people, which is, uh, uh, greatly expanded our expansion efforts and made people like basically after the first month or two immediately start upselling. Again, I thought that was actually going to be like a payoff six to 12 months in the future or longer, but because they'…

AI assessment note: “We redid our entire sales presentation, um, really over the last, like, 14 months”

Q Makes all makes a lot of sense. Now, would you consider raising like capital today? Or do you think you just sort of keep operating as you are and grow how fast you want?

A Yeah. So we're doing, um, we are getting some capital, but it's through debt. So like we just, uh, and I was going to tell you this, but we just got, uh, our, uh, approval to get, um, about 350 K from, uh, a local bank through the SBA. And so that's going to help growth. And then we have another, you know, X number of dollars lined up just on debt. So no equity. Um, and so we're going to see what we can do with that, I think, over the next like six months. But if everything's doing the way that we want it to be, and it's like we're at five million AR by middle of next year, um, there's probably a chance we will actually look at getting some growth capital where we can go raise at a pretty good multiple, I hope, because we are growing really fast and be able to have someone come by, you know, 10 to 20% of the company or whatever, and be able to really use that to grow. Additionally, um, some of the founders... Well, as much as possible, obviously.

AI assessment note: “we are getting some capital, but it's through debt. So no equity.”

Q Oh wow. Okay. So how are you getting customers today? Where are you finding them?

A Yeah. So, uh, a content strategy. So through SEO and today we're still getting the majority through that way. Um, about a year and a half ago we started an outbound arm. And so since then we've, uh, made it so that about 30% of our, our deals come from just like cold outreach. Um, but yeah, in the early days, you know, full stack developer was kind of shy to call people. You know, it wasn't the typical, like, biz dev, and so I was like, well, I'm pretty good at SEO, so I'm going to build up, you know, our web presence as I'm actually building the product itself, because I knew it was going to take a while, and so those kind of aligned right. We were starting to rank well right when, um, the MVP was starting to get to be something.

AI assessment note: “a content strategy. So through SEO and today we're still getting the majority”

Q I mean, how were you paying bills during that time?

A Yeah, so, well, like when you know how to code, you don't have to pay a developer, right? And so, there was just a lot of sweat equity. And then also, I'm really blessed to have my father help, um, with, uh, you know, with just a bunch of advice, but also giving us office space. And so, Um, I was working full-time for him in a family company, and he was like, okay, if you finish all of your work for the family company, then you can spend all the rest of the time on your other company. And so it was just basically working a lot of twelve-hour days. I'd spend four to six hours on the, on the day job, right? And then I would spend the other, you know, you know, eight to six hours on, you know, just coding and building Limbo.

AI assessment note: “I was working full-time for him in a family company”

Q You're there. It's the SDRs and customer success. Do you give a group quota target to customer success in terms of expansion?

A Uh, not yet. We're really careful in giving quota to, um, the customer success because we don't want them to just be like an extension of the sales arm. Like our, like our first core value is, you know, we really care about our customers. We call our customers obsessed. And I know a lot of companies say that, but we actually live it. And so if we, if we put quotas on our, uh, customer success, they may, uh, not act the way that we want them to act. Now we do pay commissions on it because we do want to motivate it. Right. And we want, we, we always want our employees to share in our success, but we don't be like, Hey, you have to hit at least this amount this month or else, you know, there's a problem.

AI assessment note: “Uh, not yet. We're really careful in giving quota to, um, the customer success”

Q Super interesting. Now talk to me about capital. Have you bootstrapped the company or raised?

A Yeah, it's completely bootstrapped. Uh, uh, I only, thanks. It's been, uh, an interesting journey and it's, uh, very tempting to go raise money when you're, when you, it's like, oh, it's starting to work. I should go raise. And, uh, but yeah, no, we, uh, you know, I, I've been incredibly blessed to have my father be able to like, give me a spot to work and then also be like, Hey, you don't have to work, you know, all eight hours here at the family company and come work on it. So I haven't had to do what a lot of people typically do where they're like, you know, top ramen and, you know, complete, you know, devotion and whatnot.

AI assessment note: “Yeah, it's completely bootstrapped.”

Q So three 60 in terms of AR and what would I earn if I hit that quota in the first year? What my full comp be?

A Yeah. So we, we pay really good commission to our account executives. So basically the before quota, you get two X MRR. So if you close, you know, 3000, let's say you're fully ramped, you close 3000, that's a 6000 dollar commission check to you. If you get over quota, it's three X MRR. So if you close like 5000 MRR, you're starting to bring in a lot of money Um, on just commissions and let's see, 5000 would be like a 10,000 dollar commission check. If I'm doing the math right, I'm not doing the math right. Yeah. And so, uh, then there's of course a base pay. Now we don't pay high base, right? We really want everyone to succeed with us. And so if we aren't doing well, then no one's getting paid well.

AI assessment note: “then there's of course a base pay. Now we don't pay high base”