SaaS Startups

KIT is a virtual marketing assistant SaaS platform that helps e-commerce business owners automate their marketing through SMS-based commands. Founded by Michael Perry in October 2013, KIT pivoted from a web application to an SMS-first product in January 2015 after discovering that small business owners were unwilling to spend time on marketing tasks themselves. As of January 2016, KIT has 2,000 paying customers generating $30k MRR with a $19 average revenue per user and a sustainable $21 customer acquisition cost primarily through Facebook ads.

Matt Schaup transitioned from running a $2.5M/year residential painting company in Northern Colorado to building a coaching and mastermind business focused on helping entrepreneurs discover their purpose and authentic story. His mastermind membership launched at $99/month with a capped 100-member limit, reaching 87 members within the interview timeline (generating ~$8,700 MRR). He combines one-on-one coaching, keynotes, his proprietary 'life plan process,' book sales, and guest expert calls to serve a growing audience of business owners and entrepreneurs.

RJ Metrics is a business intelligence SaaS company founded by Robert Moore in 2008 that helps mid-market companies make data-driven decisions. The company grew profitably from its attic-based origins to $1M in revenue by 2012 with just 8 employees, and has since raised $22M across multiple rounds. With approximately 400 customers paying $10K-$100K annually, RJ Metrics generates at least $4.8M+ in annual recurring revenue with customer lifespans of 3-4 years.

Molly Marie Kaiser is a serial entrepreneur who bootstrapped her way from $50,000 in debt to building multiple six-figure businesses. Her most recent venture, Venture Shorts, is an online info product platform that teaches creative entrepreneurs how to build their own knowledge-based businesses, generating just over six figures in its first year through course sales and eBooks.

Venture Pact is a SaaS platform launched in 2012 that helps businesses source and manage vetted software development teams. Founded by Randy Reyes, a former private equity analyst at Silver Lake Partners, the company operates on a hybrid model combining transaction fees (basic plan) and monthly subscriptions (premium plan). By 2015, Venture Pact had over 100 customers, was bootstrapped with 31 employees, and generated revenues in the seven figures.

Kim Ades founded Frame of Mind Coaching 10 years ago as a coaching practice and grew it into a multi-revenue business with 18 coaches (10 certified) generating approximately $600,000 in annual coaching revenue. To systematize her journaling-based coaching methodology, she built Journal Engine Software, an in-house tool that she now licenses to 400+ coaches, speakers, and trainers at $69/month, creating an additional $28,000/month in recurring revenue.

Get Ambassador is a SaaS referral marketing platform founded by Jeff Epstein in 2009 that helps companies of all sizes track and manage referral programs. By February 2016, the company had scaled to over 300 paying customers, $3.5M in 2015 revenue, and was running at a $320k monthly rate with 43 employees, having raised $2.9M in total capital.

Bottlenose is an enterprise SaaS company providing big data analytics and trend detection for large consumer brands and enterprises. Founded by serial entrepreneur Innova Spivak, the company processes close to 100 billion data records per day at a rate of about 1 million per second, using machine learning to detect emerging trends across 13 different data channels. With fewer than 100 enterprise customers paying annual contracts ranging from tens of thousands to over half a million dollars, Bottlenose has raised over $20 million and is currently in fundraising mode for a larger round.

Libsyn is a podcast hosting platform that has been operating for 11+ years and is currently profitable. With over 29,000 paying podcasters hosting their shows on the platform, the company generates approximately $600,000 in annual revenue from subscription fees averaging $15-20 per customer monthly. Rob Walsh, Vice President of Podcaster Relations, shares industry insights about podcast downloads, iTunes algorithm mechanics, and advertising CPM rates ($30-50 range for shows with 5,000+ downloads per episode).

Bounce Exchange is a behavioral automation software company that helps e-commerce and publisher sites increase conversion rates by reacting to users' digital body language. Founded by Ryan Urban in 2012, the company grew to $17M in 2015 revenue with a run rate goal of $40M by end of 2016, serving 250-300 paying customers across ~700 websites. The company eschewed traditional VC-funded growth models, staying mostly inbound, hiring minimal sales staff, and maintaining nearly break-even profitability while scaling.

Maestro Conference is a SaaS conferencing platform founded in 2009 that powers interactive webinars and large-scale conversations with breakout group functionality, allowing up to 5,000 participants on a single call. As of March 2016, the company has 1,000+ paying customers averaging $100/month MRR (~$90K), with growth driven primarily by word-of-mouth and high-profile clients like Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders. Julian Martinez, the first marketing hire, joined in March 2016 to implement paid social and SEM strategies after the business had relied on organic growth, with plans to address a 30% monthly churn rate and improve conversion rates from the homepage.

Gift Starter is a consumer crowdfunding platform that allows people to break down expensive online purchases into affordable chunks that friends and family can co-purchase as gifts. Founded by Aerie Ewen in July 2014 after winning a hackathon, the company pivoted from a B2B e-commerce plugin model to a consumer-facing payments platform, raising $525,000 in angel capital and achieving $12K revenue in 2015 with plans to reach $50K in 2016.

John Bowen is a serial entrepreneur who built and sold multiple financial services businesses, including a $2 billion advisory firm and a company taken public on the Canadian market. He now runs CEG Worldwide, which coaches top financial advisors through a subscription model, and co-founded AESNation.com with thought leaders like Dan Sullivan and Joe Polish to research and educate entrepreneurs on wealth creation and best practices.

Loganics is a 6-year-old SEO fulfillment agency founded by 28-year-old serial entrepreneur Adam Steele that builds citations and acquires backlinks for digital marketing agencies. Operating with minimal founder involvement through a team of 50+ people in the Philippines, the company generated approximately $500K in revenue in 2015 and was on track for $750K in 2016 with 3,000+ clients across 70 countries and nearly 250,000 citations built.

AstroPrint is an IoT platform for the 3D printing industry, often called the "Android of 3D printing." Founded in 2013 and pivoted in 2014, the company makes 3D printers easy to operate and connects them to a cloud-based app store ecosystem. With $150,000 in 2015 revenue and $400,000 raised, they're pursuing a B2B licensing model targeting printer manufacturers and major brands, projecting $500,000 in 2016 revenue.

Map My Fitness (Map My Ride, Map My Run, Map My Walk, Map My Hike) was founded in 2006 by Robin Thurston after a cycling trip in Switzerland. The company grew to 20 million monthly active users by 2013 through purely organic, word-of-mouth growth with no paid customer acquisition. At exit, the company had $17 million in trailing 12-month revenue across multiple business lines (advertising, subscriptions, and SaaS API licensing) and was acquired by Under Armour for approximately $150 million.

DO is a bills and payments platform founded by John Rampton in 2015 that helps businesses get paid faster through invoicing, time tracking, and payroll features. Nine months after launch (as of the February 2016 interview), the platform had processed $4 million in transaction volume in February 2016 alone, generating approximately $40,000 in monthly revenue through credit card transaction fees. John leveraged his expertise in SEO and online marketing to drive tens of thousands of customer signups, with about 60,000 total users and 20,000-30,000 active users.

TransTutors is an AI-assisted tutoring platform that helps college students with homework and assignments through a $20/month subscription model. Founded in August 2014 by Aditya Singhal, the company achieved over $1 million in revenue in 2015 and was doing $60-80k MRR by early 2016 with approximately 3,000 active paying monthly subscribers. The company grew through organic search traffic from 2 billion monthly Google searches by college students seeking homework help, and was raising a $500k convertible note from 500 Startups at a $2.5M cap.

metadata.io automates demand generation for B2B companies by reverse engineering customer data to build ideal prospect profiles and find look-alike audiences across social platforms and networks. Launched in May 2015, the company reached $35,000 MRR in February 2016 with a dozen customers paying an average of $3,000/month, after raising $300,000 in seed capital from angels, 500 Startups, and Right Side Capital. Founder Gil Alush, a 33-year-old software engineer turned VP of marketing, is targeting mid-market and enterprise companies with a value-based pricing model and planning to raise a couple million in equity at a $5-6M pre-money valuation.

Lead Genius is an AI-powered SaaS platform that automates lead generation, enrichment, and email outreach for enterprise sales teams. Founded in 2011 by mathematician and Berkeley researcher Anand Kokkarni, the company has raised $8 million and achieved $8M ARR by 2015, with approximately 200 enterprise customers paying an average of $40,000 annually. The business demonstrates strong unit economics with a 10:1 LTV-to-CAC ratio and has achieved the coveted net negative churn by expanding existing accounts faster than customer losses.