How to Win podcast with Peep Laja

Growing a SaaS by Launching a Service - with Boast AI’s Lloyed Lobo

Oct 2, 2023

Lloyed Lobo, founder of Boast AI, shares his journey of launching a service business after failed software companies. He discusses the importance of starting with a service to learn and achieve customer success. Other topics include validating the ideal customer profile, building the first product iteration with no-code tools, and using owned media to build real relationships. Lobo emphasizes the significance of alignment with co-founders and investors, effective communication and consistency, and focusing on one market. Boast AI's success is attributed to starting as a service, building owned media, and aligning with core values.

22:15

Creator website

Episode guests

Lloyed Lobo

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Episode notes

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Starting with a service to gain customer success before building software can lead to company growth.

Validating an ideal customer profile and problem through paid consulting work can lead to product-market fit.

Deep dives

Bootstrapping with Service-Based Approach

The founder of MostAI, Lloyd Lobo, explains how he bootstrapped his company to over $10 million in revenue by initially offering a consulting service. By focusing on delivering outcomes for customers rather than just software, Lobo was able to gain customer success and refine his offering. He then automated the services, increasing gross margins and profits, while maintaining control and minimizing dilution.

Introduction

4min

Five Key Steps to Grow a SaaS

11min

The Importance of Owning and Engaging Your Audience

2min

Building Defensibility and Raising Funds in B2B SaaS

3min

Building a Successful Company: Alignment, Key Ingredients, and Winning Strategies

2min

Summary
This week on How To Win: Lloyed Lobo, founder of Boast AI, which helps companies find and claim tax credits from their R&D investments. LLoyed launched two different software companies, which failed. He followed it up with a service business, Boast, which took off.

You’ll hear why he thinks services are a better way to launch a company than software. We’ll dive into how he got his first customers by cold calling and we’ll discuss how he grew his company by publishing articles and organizing an event.

I’ll share how I used similar methods to grow my businesses.

Key points:

Start by selling a service to learn what to build and get good at customer success (00:36)
Pick an unsexy market that's not chased by trends (04:26)
Validate the ideal customer profile and problem through paid consulting work (04:55)
Product-market fit is when customers get an outcome and don't cancel (05:09)
Build the first product iteration with no-code tools (05:50)
Double down on what's working from 1 million to 10 million ARR (14:18)
Owned media like newsletters and events builds real relationships (15:35)
Alignment with co-founders and investors on values avoids issues (20:29)
Communication + creation + consistency drives success (21:33)
Boast won by starting as a service, focusing on one market, and building owned media (21:43)

Mentioned:

Boast.ai

From Grassroots to Greatness

Lloyed’s personal site

My Links: