SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders 649: HolaGus $1.4M Raised Helping Clients Automate Support with AI with CEO Pablo Estevez
May 4, 2017
16:34
Pablo Estevez. He's a Mexican entrepreneur who co-founded HolaGus, an artificial intelligence company that focuses on automating customer service and sales via chat for Spanish speaking countries. Since founding his company, he has been distinguished for receiving awards like The Diamond Winner by MassChallenge.
Famous Five:
- Favorite Book? – The Hard Thing About Hard Things
- What CEO do you follow? – A lot
- Favorite online tool? — N/A
- How many hours of sleep do you get?— Usually 7
- If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "That this is going to be really, really hard, I was going to work a lot of hours"
Time Stamped Show Notes:
- 01:14 – Nathan introduces Pablo to the show
- 02:00 – HolaGus develops AI to automate customer service and sales via any chat channel
- 02:11 – HolaGus charges businesses for every assisted conversation
- 02:39 – HolaGus's standard fee is 1-2 Mexican pesos
- 02:47 – HolaGus has a pay-as-you-go model
- 03:20 – HolaGus is a B2C business and is similar to GoButler
- 03:37 – "If we really want to scale the business, we have to focus on the AI"
- 04:04 – HolaGus was launched in 2015
- 04:10 – There are 3 co-founders
- 04:22 – HolaGus has raised capital and is about to close their third round
- 05:04 – HolaGus has raised a total of $1.4M
- 05:23 – HolaGus focuses on the customer's closing and how much automation they're able to create
- 05:39 – "We try to keep the bots, like, between 80-90%"
- 05:53 – HolaGus focuses on closing the biggest amount of clients that they can
- 05:58 – HolaGus has a lot of interesting commercial deals in the pipeline
- 06:09 – HolaGus has already sold 3 contracts
- 06:16 – HolaGus only started selling 4-5 months ago
- 06:21 – HolaGus is hoping to close 85 clients
- 06:55 – HolaGus is still on pre-revenue
- 07:10 – HolaGus has different projected revenues and models for their 3 customers
- 07:12 – HolaGus has an upfront development fee of $25K
- 08:02 – HolaGus pricing will depend on the technology
- 08:13 – HolaGus develops AI, specifically for a business
- 08:39 – HolaGus is now creating an ocean of knowledge
- 09:08 – "If we have a thousand clients, our AI gets smarter and smarter really quick"
- 11:08 – Pablo believes that they automate a lot
- 11:25 – Total projected conversations for the first 3 customers will be 20K-40K conversations
- 11:56 – HolaGus tries to charge a minimum of monthly consumption
- 12:30 – The Famous Five
3 Key Points:
- AI technology can be complicated and needs continuous development.
- Play around with different payment models to see what works best and is most profitable.
- Starting and running a business is tough work—you just have to be dedicated.
Resources Mentioned:
- The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
- Organifi – The juice was Nathan's life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia
- Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
- Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
- Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
- Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books
- Freshbooks – Nathan doesn't waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives