TinySeed

And it's, it's also ...

It's doubly weird because I have been working with, uh, the TinySeed community and the MicroConf community for years.

And, you know, I, I've known Rob Walling pretty much since I started DemandMaven, and, uh, it's really funny because one of the things that we do that ends up being one of the most popular pieces of content is we'll do, like, a Rob and Asia reacts type video content, and founders will submit questions, and Rob and I, and sometimes Craig, uh, Hewlett will join as well.

Um, but Rob, Craig, and I will just boom, boom, boom, answer all the questions, and it actually ends up being some of my most favorite content that I produce.

what a modern company could look like which is just one person and a bunch of agents and models could be like a very successful company and the challenge there is like the buck stops with me i just want to say one other thing about like having a co-founder like one positive that that i i can imagine is like uh accountability and staying on track I was talking to one of the TinySeed founders.

He said, I know how to raise money and build a venture-backed company and the team that you need behind that.

I don't know how to do that in the AI era.

Yeah, great.

How do you find people respond to that? Do you think that gives them some genuine feeling of ownership over the company?

You know, it's interesting, like working with the TinySeed folks, I see, you know, I've seen 250 different versions of this now.

And like Rob sees more, Rob and Anar see more.

But the way I look at, I'll say like intangible compensation is options only matter if you're going to sell.

Or who actually validates things before they launch them? Well, Me, for one.

And I validated or invalidated ideas before putting much time into them, right? My books, MicroKauf, multiple SaaS ideas, TinySeed.

And in addition to me, and I talked about this a couple episodes ago, most of the second-time founders and third-time founders, the serial entrepreneurs I see, they do more research and more validation before they select an idea.

rather than when they were first time and kind of flailing.

He found a cheap way to test it.

He observed actual market behavior, gathered evidence, and then he invested more resources.

So that's almost exactly the framework that I talk about, right? It's what I've used to build software companies, launch books, start MicroConf, start TinySeed.

And it's what I talk about in the SaaS playbook, and it's what the lean startup talks about.

I've started multiple SaaS companies, all bootstrapped.

I've invested in more than 230, both privately and through my SaaS accelerator, TinySeed, and I've written five books on building startups.

And one thing I know, the amount of money you need to get a SaaS off the ground has never been lower than it is right now.

Today, I'm walking through exactly what it takes to start a SaaS company, what costs money, what's free, how to build without cash, and how to find your first customers on a tiny budget.

If you really wanna go set up an LLC for specific liability reasons, you can go do that.

But in general, setting up a corporate entity, an LLC, an S corp, a C corp, is putting the cart before the horse when you have zero people willing to pay you anything.

I see this a lot in applications for my B2B SaaS accelerator, TinySeed.

Founders spending six months perfecting the product, dotting all the I's, setting up the bank accounts [chuckles], d- crossing the T's, but with zero customer conversations.

thanks.So thanks for this question.

Yeah, we have TinySeed companies, and they're micro comp companies as well, that sell into healthcare or just sell where they have twelve to eighteen-month sales cycles.

I've seen them make it work, so it's not a hard no.

I wouldn't do it myself.

I don't enjoy those types of businesses.

However, have I seen incredible businesses built that way? I have.

Are there some within TinySeed that do exactly this? There are, and those founders are different than I am.

You know, they get, I guess, get their motivation from something else.

He runs microconf, which is definitely the best conference for bootstrap software founders.

And then together with Einar Volset, he runs TinySeed.

Rob does a lot of stuff, which is one of the very few funds that makes sense for companies that have the bootstrapper mindset, the bootstrapper culture, bootstrapper goals, but they want to take just like a little bit of money from someone who understands and can help.

So I'm a proud investor and mentor at TinySeed and a proud speaker at MicroConf.

And Rob was an angel investor in my company, WP Engine, and that did well.

So we have a long history together, professionally and personally, and I'm thrilled to sit by him today.