Support Shepherd

Marshall Haas had spent years in e-commerce—owning hotels, running various e-commerce brands like Peel phone cases—and learned a fundamental truth: margins matter. The math was simple: to stay competitive, he needed world-class talent without paying Silicon Valley or U.S. median salaries. Like many e-commerce operators, he started hiring offshore, initially in Latin America and the Philippines, discovering he could get equally skilled programmers, data analysts, and customer support teams for roughly one-fifth the cost. This wasn't a new practice—it had been happening since the days of "The World is Flat"—but Marshall saw an opportunity to systematize it. Around 2020, he launched Support Chipper (later rebranded to Support Shepherd), a SaaS platform to help other businesses tap into this offshore talent pool.

Marshall branded the company carefully from day one. The website and visual identity were refined early, establishing the green color that would become synonymous with the brand. The core offering was straightforward: a marketplace and management system connecting businesses with pre-vetted offshore talent. The product resonated immediately with cost-conscious founders and operators. What made it work was solving a real pain point—not just offering names of freelancers, but providing an integrated hiring and management solution that made remote teams feel like employees.

One of the earliest major power users was Nick Huber, an entrepreneur with multiple businesses including self-storage facilities, a cost segregation company, and various service agencies. Nick's cost seg business, in particular, relied on offshore talent—he had Colombian team members conducting video property tours with iPads to identify depreciable components. When Marshall's platform made this workflow seamless, Nick became an evangelist. Initially, Nick cut an affiliate deal: he'd refer customers and take a commission. But that wasn't enough. Within months, Nick approached Marshall with a bigger ask—equity. He wanted skin in the game. Marshall agreed, and Nick became a part owner.

About a year later, Sean Perry (co-host of the "My First Million" podcast with millions of monthly impressions) approached Marshall with the same story. Sean was already a power user—he'd built a substantial portion of his team using offshore hiring—and wanted to invest. Rather than just an affiliate commission, Sean also took an equity stake. This was the birth of the "audience co-founder" model in action: two influential entrepreneurs, each with trusted audiences of hundreds of thousands to millions, joined the cap table not just for financial return but to actively promote the product.

The product-audience fit was extraordinary. Sean and Nick weren't hired spokespeople—they were authentic, passionate users solving real problems with the platform every single day. When they promoted Shepherd on their podcasts, Twitter, and newsletters, it wasn't marketing; it was them sharing tools they genuinely loved. The effect was dramatic. Within a year of Sean joining as an equity partner (around mid-2023), the company grew approximately 300%—far exceeding the conservative 50-75% growth they'd initially forecasted. The valuation climbed accordingly.

What made this model work was the "depth of trust," not just audience size. Sean and Nick had built reputations in the B2B and entrepreneurship space where they were known for only endorsing products they genuinely used. When they put their names behind Shepherd, their audiences listened. The company didn't need traditional marketing—it had two of the most credible voices in the space amplifying its value proposition.

By late 2023/early 2024, Shepherd had grown so dramatically that acquisition offers began arriving. Nick and Sean initially discussed raising capital together to buy the company outright, but Sean decided it was too much operational complexity and stepped back. Nick, however, went all-in. He raised $29.7 million and acquired a controlling stake in Support Shepherd at a $52 million valuation—a stunning achievement for a bootstrapped, four-year-old company. This meant the valuation had more than tripled in just one year, from approximately $15-17 million to $52 million. Sean, despite opting not to sell his shares, maintained his equity position and continued as a partner. Nick's bold move—essentially betting his entire net worth and reputation—was a massive signal of confidence in the business and the offshore staffing market more broadly. The deal exemplified what Perry calls the "audience co-founder" trend: entrepreneurs with trusted platforms becoming strategic equity partners who drive growth through authentic promotion, not traditional paid advertising.