#412 – How Martin Payne turned a flatlined company from $7M to $20M

[upbeat music] You're a SaaS founder.

You've built something solid, but growth still feels harder than it should.

Most SaaS companies don't fail because of bad tech.

They fail because they've never become a must-have to the right customer.

This podcast is here to change that.

I'm Ton Dobbe, and this is the Remarkable SaaS Podcast.

Every week, I talk to founders in the trenches, facing friction, making bold moves, and building companies that last.

We dig into real choices around focus, positioning, customer pool, team alignment, the things that separate forgettable software from the ones that people can't live without.

No hype, no hacks, just honest conversations to help you build something that people would miss if it was gone.

If your SaaS should be indispensable but isn't yet, this is your podcast.

Let's get into it.

The guest on my podcast this week is Martin Payne, CEO at TextUs.

I came into the company thinking this is not a turnaround situation.

This is a fine-tune, refine situation.

And so I, I just went in with the mindset of there's goodness here.

Now let me understand more specifically where the goodness is.

Let me understand where specifically things need to be removed or changed.

This is Martin.

We dig into what he did when he took over a company that had stopped growing and what he actually decided to leave alone.

You'll hear what he found that the people who built the business could no longer see, and the one move that he made twice, six years apart, for the same reason.

When growth stops, most CEOs are eagerly looking what to change.

Martin, however, wanted to know what to keep.

[upbeat music] You're a SaaS founder.

You've built something solid, but growth still feels harder than it should.

Most SaaS companies don't fail because of bad tech.

They fail because they've never become a must-have to the right customer.

This podcast is here to change that.

I'm Ton Dobbe, and this is the Remarkable SaaS Podcast.

Every week, I talk to founders in the trenches, facing friction, making bold moves, and building companies that last.

We dig into real choices around focus, positioning, customer pool, team alignment, the things that separate forgettable software from the ones that people can't live without.

No hype, no hacks, just honest conversations to help you build something that people would miss if it was gone.

If your SaaS should be indispensable but isn't yet, this is your podcast.

Let's get into it.

The guest on my podcast this week is Martin Payne, CEO at TextUs.

I came into the company thinking this is not a turnaround situation.

This is a fine-tune, refine situation.

And so I, I just went in with the mindset of there's goodness here.

Now let me understand more specifically where the goodness is.

Let me understand where specifically things need to be removed or changed.

This is Martin.

We dig into what he did when he took over a company that had stopped growing and what he actually decided to leave alone.

You'll hear what he found that the people who built the business could no longer see, and the one move that he made twice, six years apart, for the same reason.

When growth stops, most CEOs are eagerly looking what to change.

Martin, however, wanted to know what to keep.