EP 511: How to Pivot $50K MRR SaaS Company with Ian Cullen CEO of Leadiro

Ian Cullen, a demand generation expert and the co-founder of Leadiro, an account-centric data platform designed to enable account based marketing and sales development efforts at named accounts. Ian was previously the co-founder of Internal Results, which was acquired by Madison Logic in May 2016. He started his first business, Target 250 in 2001, grew it to a team of 130 staff and it was a leading B2B technology based, lead generation company which was sold in 2010.

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? – The Magic of Thinking Big
• What CEO do you follow – N/A

• Favorite online tool? — SimilarWeb
• Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Yes
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "Work hard because nothing happens overnight and if you really focus and you can achieve anything"

Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 01:37 – Nathan introduces Ian to the show
• 02:25 – Ian says he sold Target 250 for simply "not enough"
• 02:35 – Ian received investments from bench capitalists for Target 250
• 02:48 – After 6 months, Ian sold with a soft landing
• 03:19 – One year, non-compete, Ian set up an another company and sold it
• 03:48 – Chris is a partner and cofounder of Leadiro
• 03:57 – What Leadiro does and how they make money
• 04:00 – New startup, four months old, Leadiro is a B2b service platform that offers account-based marketing
• 05:19 – You can send cold emails to leads that are relevant
• 05:41 – Customers pay monthly or quarterly basis
• 05:55 – Average customer pays $ 20,000-40,000 per year but can be much higher, $ 6-10,000 per month depending on customer's volume
• 07:00 – Launched July 2016
• 07:06 – Serving under 20 customers
• 07:29 – Customers are people we know in the industry
• 07:57 – Our customers are people that are launching certain products into the market to a specific audience
• 08:25 – Do they need help in reaching out to a larger audience as opposed to their first party list of possible customers?
• 08:35 – Why are people buying your data instead of others?
• 08:41 – Our platform is proprietary, easy to use
• 08:59 – "You can upload a list of domains within 10 seconds [of using our product] and pull out a specific audience within those accounts" and get their email addresses
• 09:12 – For example, there are 200 companies you want to target, upload that to our platform, and you have a list of everyone who works in those companies (job title, level, function), and can select what you want
• 09:52 – Very common product, that people that win are those who market better
• 10:18 – Like Siftery, but Siftery doesn't get you the leads
• 10:53 – Leadiro's current revenue: $50,000
• 11:06 – Leadiro is self-funded
• 11:09 – Ian does not want to raise
• 11:19 – Team size: 6 people
• 11:31 – Hired people to develop full-time, remote, in New Zealand
• 11:56 – 3 in UK, 1 in Ireland, 2 in NZ
• 12:56 – 50,000 in MR divided by 20 customers = Monthly RPU: $2500 per customer
• 13:11 – Early cancellations, because they're in a learning stage
• 13:25 – One big struggle with this particular product—companies can download everything they need and leave
• 13:46 – Nathan wonders if these types of companies are SaaS companies or should there be a one-time fee where customers get what they need and leave?
• 13:55 – Something they are still working out, perhaps a 1-2 month subscription
• 14:22 – Discussion of competitors and who is doing the same thing well
• 15:21 – To connect with Ian, go to his LinkedIn
• 16:53 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

• Always think of how your product sets you apart from your competitors and SELL to that strength.
• A startup and any business for that matter is a work in progress—just keep at it.
• Work hard, focus in on your task, and you can achieve ANYTHING.

Resources Mentioned:

• Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
• Drip – Nathan uses Drip's email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel
• Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn't have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal
• 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.
• 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
• @Qwil – Johnny's business Twitter handle
• Blog - Johnny's business blog site
• Qwil.co – Johnny's business website
• Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives