ACQ2: The Acquired Interviews

We're joined by Patrick Campbell, founder & CEO of the world's leading SaaS profit-optimization service ProfitWell, to dive deep on all things pricing and monetization. Patrick began bootstrapping ProfitWell 8 years ago, and has since grown the business into a massive success with customers like Notion, Lyft, Masterclass, Atlassian, Help Scout, HubSpot, Cisco, Autodesk and many more. Patrick gives us a masterclass in how to think with a profit-maximization lens about pricing, feature development, growth and retention. And, as a special bonus at the end of the episode, he talks about his own entrepreneurial journey, bootstrapping the company without any venture funding, along with challenges overcome along the way. This episode has something for everyone to learn about company building — and is not one to miss!

Links:

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Show Bookmarks:

[01:43] – Patrick’s Start

[04:09] – Pricing Overview

[12:32] – Pricing Models

[18:31] – Freemium, Trials,  and The First 30 Days

[28:53] – Picking the Price and Common Pitfalls

[33:35] – Conducting Research for Pricing

[46:24] – Grand(father/mother)ing Existing Customer Base

[56:50] – Bootstrap vs Investment

[64:10] – Initial Team Structure of ProfitWell

 

People Worth Knowing:

Brian Balfour

Casey Winters

Nick Francis

Peter Zotto

 

Companies Mentioned in Episode:                                                                  

ProfitWell (Price Intelligently)

Gemvarra

US Intelligence Community

Menlo Ventures

Hallmark

Reebok

McKinsey

Google AdWords

AWS

Snapchat

Hubspot

Zoom

Zuora (Billing System)

Berkshire Hathaway

YesWare

Slack

Amazon

HelpScout

 

Episode Specific Terms:

Acquisition, Monetization, Retention (the pillars)

Underpricing

Analysis / Paralysis

Revenue Per Customer

Lifetime Value

Cost of Production vs Shipping

Billing Systems

Value Metrics

Add-Ons

Inside Sales

Unique Pricing-Per-User

Freeware & Shareware

Growth Hacker (aka Full Stack Marketing)

Viral Coefficient and Network Effect

Multivariant Research and Data Limitation

Pricing Signal

Qualitative and Quantitative Research

Conjoint Analysis

Two-Factor Authentication

Indie-Business

NPS / CSAT Scores

Unit Economics

Tech-Enabled Service

 

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What is ACQ2: The Acquired Interviews?

ACQ2 is Ben and David's conversations with expert founders and investors. Acquired the stories of great companies — and ACQ2 dives deeper into the lessons we can learn from them, often with the protagonists themselves.