My guest for Ep154 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was the Founder and CEO of ChartMogul, Nick Franklin.

ChartMogul is the leading subscription analytics platform for SaaS companies and Nick has had a unique approach to building the company.

He launched ChartMogul in 2014 as a solo founder, has grown a globally distributed team of 57 across 3 head quarters in Toronto, Berlin and Seoul and despite having spent over $20M in building their platform and company, he has not raised external funding over the last 4 years.

We covered a range of topics in this interview including:

• A deep dive into Key SaaS metrics for startups
• Why Nick has decided to “fundstrap” the business
• Why he operates as both the CEO and Head of Product
• ChartMogul’s approach to pricing strategy and why they introduced a free tier
• & much more!

Timestamps

• 2.45 – Nick’s background and starting ChartMogul
• 3.53 – How the idea for tChartMogul came from his time working at Zendesk
• 7.32 – Pursuing a business idea when you’re working for another company and managing competitors launching before you do
• 11.07 – How competitors enhanced Nick’s conviction for their product 
• 13.54 – Differentiating your business from competitors through finding your strengths and staying focussed on them
• 17.10 – Deciding what to focus on and why defining the target audience is so important
• 20.35 – Trying and failing with new product lines 
• 27.10 – The importance of focusing on existing customers to reduce the churn rate 
• 30.11 – The key metrics startups should be focusing on to track success
• 34.23 – The choice to raise early then moving focus to customer revenue as a source for growth 
• 41.06 – Why ChartMogul have taken their approach to raising and their future plans
• 43.35 – The pricing strategy used by ChartMogul and why it was the best approach 
• 47.18 – How to decide on the pricing strategy that is best for your business and making sure existing customers are comfortable when making pricing changes
• 52.32 – Choosing where to open offices around the world and how ChartMogul approached it 
• 57.51 – How Covid-19 impacted how ChartMogul worked remotely 
• 1.02.35 – How Nick manages being the Head of Product and CEO 
• 1.05.12 – Getting in contact with Nick and ChartMogul

Links Mentioned 

Nick’s Links 

• Nick’s Twitter 
• Nick’s LinkedIn 
• ChartMogul Website 
• ChartMogul Twitter

People Mentioned 

• Patrick Llewellyn

Companies Mentioned  

• Zendesk 
• Pipedrive
• 99designs 
• Linktree
• Who Gives A Crap
• Stripe 
• Chargebee
• Recurly
• PayPal
• Apple 
• AppStore Connect
• Google Play

Past Episodes Mentioned 

• Episode 85 – Patrick Llewellyn

Connect with VCs and Angel Investors:

If you are planning on fundraising in the next 3-6 months and want to connect to VCs and Angel investors, apply to get featured in my monthly newsletter, Playbook Deal Flow. More details here.

Feedback/connect/say hello:

Rohit@startupplaybook.co
@RohitBhargava7 (Twitter)
/rohbhargava (LinkedIn)
@rohit_bhargava (Instagram)
My Youtube Channel

Credits:

Music: Joakim Karud – Dreams

Other channels:

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Find all links to the podcast here.

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