Max Yoder

Former Co-Founder & CEO, Lessonly · 1 appearance on the record.

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founderexecutiveauthorentertainer@MaxYoder ↗LinkedIn ↗dobetterwork.com ↗

Max Yoder co-founded the Indianapolis-based team learning and training software company Lessonly in 2012, serving as its CEO until its acquisition by Seismic in August 2021. He is also an author, speaker, and musician who has written workplace culture books including Do Better Work.

19statements → 10claims → 0claims resolved → 3.95/5average certainty → 1.26/5average debate potential → 6said about them ↓

1 not yet assessed 9 not checkable as stated how the 10 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

10 assertions · 2 insights · 7 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 10 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 0 are resolved, 1 is not yet assessed, and 9 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Max argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

How they sound: not measured why? →

We measure speaking style by listening to the audio itself, and a fair number needs at least 2,000 words from one person on tape we have measured. There is too little of Max Yoder on measured tape to publish a rate. This says nothing about how they speak.

Everything Max Yoder said on Top Founders that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Insight
Ad position six can outperform position one in software directories
“We've actually seen in certain directories that being at position six is better than being at position one.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 13:20 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lessonly adds over $1 of ARR per $1 of cash burned
“Our goal is always to make sure that if we're going to burn a dollar of cash it's going to create more than a dollar of annual recurring revenue. And we've done that ever since.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 5:25 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Insight
Customer churn is healthy when it reflects opinionated product direction
“But I think it's kind of healthy for people to not agree with our philosophy in some small portion, because that means we have an opinion and we have a direction.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 7:32 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Lessonly bypasses HR to sell directly to frontline teams
“We are like the non-HR learning software. So HR is not our buyer. We go into these frontline teams who have a lot of evolution on them, and we help them keep up with that evolution.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 2:36 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Lessonly subscriptions average between $10,000 and $25,000 annually
“Yeah, it's an annual, annual subscription anywhere between, you know, 10 to 25,000 dollars a year on average.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 2:47 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Yoder: Lessonly crosses 450 paying customers
“Yeah, we have 450. We just passed the 450 mark.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 6:39 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Over 60% of Lessonly customer acquisition comes from organic and directories
“More than 60% of our customers are finding us on the internet through either organic search or directories and they are liking what they're seeing and converting and the other 40, actually the other 30, 30, there's 30% that are coming from outbound sales and l…”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 6:49 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lessonly achieves over 100% net revenue retention
“We're outpacing a hundred percent on the dollar side and that it feels really good.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 7:10 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Launching paid services drove 10% additional ARR in one quarter
“We just launched services in Q two. We had never had paid services, and it was amazing. It actually contributed 10% of our Q two number, and we came up with the services package in Q two, and in that same quarter, drove 10% additional ARR for our, you know, ov…”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 8:42 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Over 90% of Lessonly clients create their own lessons
“The vast majority of our clients, because this is a new thing, you know, more than 90% are all creating their own lessons.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 10:49 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lessonly achieves an 88% fully-loaded SaaS gross margin
“It's actually, I think, actually, 88, you nailed it, and we're, and we have done our best to make that as true as possible, you know, like, not trying to inflate that. We've thrown in as many new costs from the engineering side to the CX side, and it's amazing…”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 11:17 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lessonly's fully weighted customer acquisition cost is under $12,000
“So it's less than 12 grand.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 12:41 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Yoder: Lessonly maintains a nine-month CAC payback period
“Nine months.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 12:46 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Lessonly is entertaining unsigned preemptive funding offers
“We got some preemptive offers that I'm entertaining, but none of them have been signed.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 15:22 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Assertion Not publicly verifiable
Houzz expanded Lessonly from sales to company-wide deployment
“Houzz is a great client of ours. We started working with their sales team. If you guys have never used Houzz, they do a really great job helping you understand how to decorate and add great furniture and living spaces to your house and home. We work with their…”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 1:51 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Lessonly made just $600 in total revenue in late 2012
“And I mean that seriously from July to the end of December, 600 dollars.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 4:26 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Lessonly reached $60,000 in ARR by the end of 2013
“No, that would have been at the end of the year. We were doing 60,000 dollars in annual recurring revenue.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 4:41 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Max Yoder: Lessonly employs 80 people mostly in Indianapolis
“We are 80 people, mostly all out of Indianapolis, Indiana.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 4:56 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning
Disclosure
Max Yoder: Lessonly has raised $6M in total capital
“We've raised six million to date.”
Max Yoder Jan 1, 2018 ▶ 5:20 891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning

The other half of the tape: Max Yoder's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 6 times in 1 episode on Top Founders. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Mike Preuss 6

Every mention by year

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2019 6 mentions in 1 episode

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
891 SaaS: Lessonly Hits $6m+ ARR for Internal, Non-HR Solution for Team Learning Jan 1, 2018 8m
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