Can a small team really bootstrap to $8M ARR in a crowded SaaS market?
In this episode, Rob Walling chats with Philippe Lehoux about how he and his co-founders bootstrapped Missive, a collaborative email and team inbox tool. They deep dive into landing early customers, unique horizontal positioning, content-driven growth, enterprise sales, and how to compete with VC-backed competition.
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Topics we cover:
- (2:05) – Missive’s $8M ARR journey and email pivot
- (6:02) – Early idea and first customers
- (11:16) – Unique positioning: horizontal vs. vertical
- (13:41) – How they prioritize features
- (15:39) – Why they stayed bootstrapped and decline funding
- (20:25) – Content strategy and “vs” pages
- (21:39) – Affiliate program driving 30% of growth
- (25:24) – Challenges and benefits of being horizontal
- (30:28) – Enterprise sales and pricing
- (32:06) – Scaling with SOC 2 compliance
Links from the Show:
If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you!
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