WEBVTT NOTE This file was generated by Descript 00:00:00.260 --> 00:00:02.120 Mike Bifulco: Hello and welcome back to APIs you won't hate. 00:00:02.120 --> 00:00:06.129 My name is Mike Biko, I'm sitting down today for a discussion with a friend of 00:00:06.129 --> 00:00:09.929 mine from the internet who I've been lucky enough to bump into once or twice in real 00:00:09.929 --> 00:00:11.999 life, who I'm super thrilled to talk with. 00:00:12.279 --> 00:00:15.579 Zeno Rocha: Today I'm sitting down with Zeno Roche from Resend to talk about 00:00:15.879 --> 00:00:18.729 well resend and all the things that have led up to it and, and what's to come 00:00:18.729 --> 00:00:22.720 there, and the developer features Yeah level things that Resend has been up to. 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:23.270 Zeno. 00:00:23.270 --> 00:00:24.470 Thanks a ton for joining me today. 00:00:24.475 --> 00:00:24.920 How are you doing? 00:00:25.475 --> 00:00:26.495 Thank you, Mike. 00:00:26.495 --> 00:00:28.715 Yeah, it's been, I'm so happy to be here. 00:00:28.835 --> 00:00:33.605 I'm, I'm really excited to be talking about APIs and everything around that. 00:00:34.025 --> 00:00:37.565 I just love DAB tools in general, so this is, this is exciting. 00:00:38.465 --> 00:00:39.905 Well, you're definitely in good company here. 00:00:39.905 --> 00:00:42.065 I'm Mm-hmm to chat with you about it as well. 00:00:42.325 --> 00:00:43.135 Why don't we start here? 00:00:43.135 --> 00:00:45.955 Why don't you tell me just a little bit about yourself how you got to where you 00:00:45.955 --> 00:00:49.435 are and maybe your story leading up to resend and we'll dive in from there. 00:00:49.670 --> 00:00:49.790 I. 00:00:50.260 --> 00:00:53.290 Yeah, so I'm originally from Brazil. 00:00:53.340 --> 00:00:59.250 Nowadays I live here in San Francisco with my wife and my 2-year-old daughter. 00:01:00.030 --> 00:01:07.200 And I got into programming just like most of the people in my CS class. 00:01:07.200 --> 00:01:10.680 We just love playing games on our computer, so we're like, oh yeah, maybe 00:01:10.680 --> 00:01:13.050 that would be cool to, to do for work. 00:01:13.050 --> 00:01:16.020 And I got really into web development. 00:01:16.560 --> 00:01:17.670 Quite soon. 00:01:17.770 --> 00:01:22.210 I remember starting with flash actually, so action script three 00:01:22.210 --> 00:01:29.020 was my first language and I created all sorts of crazy things and we 00:01:29.020 --> 00:01:31.360 can even put one in the show notes. 00:01:31.700 --> 00:01:36.020 But it's this like particle thing where. 00:01:36.770 --> 00:01:41.300 This was back in, I gotta send you this because I think you, you appreciate it. 00:01:41.750 --> 00:01:48.770 So back in 2010 or 2009, I guess we, we built this thing and then 00:01:48.770 --> 00:01:53.250 we sent to Google just to see they had like this HTML five gallery. 00:01:53.280 --> 00:01:55.800 So there's like a button on the left where you can click 00:01:55.800 --> 00:01:57.270 and it generates the particles. 00:01:58.049 --> 00:02:00.299 And this was my first time. 00:02:01.320 --> 00:02:07.829 Using JavaScript to create the weird things that I would, I would do in Flash. 00:02:08.430 --> 00:02:13.920 And I was ama like, and the source, you can see everything on, on GitHub the 00:02:13.924 --> 00:02:20.640 source code is available and I was really amazed at the power of this new thing 00:02:20.640 --> 00:02:23.190 that was coming up called HTML five. 00:02:23.850 --> 00:02:25.440 So I. 00:02:26.714 --> 00:02:31.184 quickly transitioned from Flash to H ML five and my perspective when I 00:02:31.184 --> 00:02:36.374 started was okay, like it, and I always had this thing like, oh, I wanna be 00:02:36.374 --> 00:02:38.325 the best at whatever I do, right? 00:02:38.744 --> 00:02:43.754 So I'm like, oh, to become the best PHP programmer, it's gonna be so hard. 00:02:43.759 --> 00:02:45.314 Or the best Java programmer. 00:02:45.314 --> 00:02:48.614 It's gonna be so hard because like there are people that are doing this 00:02:48.614 --> 00:02:53.444 for like 20 years already, but HL five is this new thing that's coming up. 00:02:54.059 --> 00:02:58.709 Maybe if I run really hard, if I like really dive into this 00:02:58.709 --> 00:03:02.700 thing, then maybe I can get to the finish line in front of others. 00:03:02.700 --> 00:03:02.969 Right? 00:03:03.359 --> 00:03:05.159 Turns out there's no finish line. 00:03:05.159 --> 00:03:06.480 You're always learning. 00:03:06.540 --> 00:03:08.700 There's like all sorts of things. 00:03:08.700 --> 00:03:12.149 Like there's no such like program is not a. 00:03:12.989 --> 00:03:14.489 Infinite game, right. 00:03:14.549 --> 00:03:16.049 Yeah, it is a infinite game. 00:03:16.049 --> 00:03:20.820 In fact it's not a, a finite game, so you are always learning and always 00:03:20.820 --> 00:03:23.040 reinventing yourself as a programmer. 00:03:23.519 --> 00:03:27.149 But I've, yeah, I just always enjoyed building stuff, man. 00:03:27.149 --> 00:03:27.209 Yeah. 00:03:27.899 --> 00:03:28.289 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:03:28.379 --> 00:03:29.189 Oh, I love that. 00:03:29.429 --> 00:03:30.209 That's really funny. 00:03:30.209 --> 00:03:32.129 I I know you and I have never talked about this before. 00:03:32.129 --> 00:03:35.159 I don't think I've mentioned it podcast, but I've been building with 00:03:35.164 --> 00:03:37.139 JavaScript since around then, 2009. 00:03:38.069 --> 00:03:40.739 I had been playing with H Tm, l and CSS for like, quite a 00:03:40.744 --> 00:03:41.819 long time leading up to that. 00:03:41.824 --> 00:03:41.924 I, 00:03:42.839 --> 00:03:46.739 Finished undergrad in 2009 and was lucky to start a job at Microsoft. 00:03:46.739 --> 00:03:50.760 And literally the, the thing, the catalyst that set off the rest of my career as 00:03:50.765 --> 00:03:54.089 like a front end developer was I was in a room when someone walked in and 00:03:54.089 --> 00:03:56.159 asked, does anyone know what jQuery is? 00:03:56.909 --> 00:03:57.659 yeah, I've used that. 00:03:57.659 --> 00:03:58.200 And then I. 00:03:58.439 --> 00:04:02.369 Was fully, like, sucked into a gigantic project rebuilding dell.com 00:04:02.369 --> 00:04:03.569 from like the third week of my 00:04:03.569 --> 00:04:03.989 job. 00:04:04.419 --> 00:04:04.719 and 00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:08.739 the from there, like, you know, jQuery and mood tools and 00:04:08.949 --> 00:04:10.149 handlebars and all these things. 00:04:10.149 --> 00:04:12.339 And it's just like, it feels like a, a mess of things since then. 00:04:12.339 --> 00:04:15.099 And you're absolutely right that like, it ends, it doesn't get 00:04:15.294 --> 00:04:17.334 Zeno Rocha: Yeah, it doesn't get it. 00:04:17.454 --> 00:04:19.209 Mike Bifulco: and, more bugs pop up each week. 00:04:19.593 --> 00:04:23.883 Zeno Rocha: no, and I think there's like, when you mix that with open source, you 00:04:23.883 --> 00:04:26.403 get like a whole new beast too, right? 00:04:26.408 --> 00:04:29.403 Like as you start contributing, you start building our own 00:04:29.403 --> 00:04:31.793 projects is just fascinating how. 00:04:33.998 --> 00:04:36.278 It's a, it's a different world, man. 00:04:36.278 --> 00:04:38.233 It, it's so, so unique. 00:04:39.128 --> 00:04:39.548 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:04:39.638 --> 00:04:40.058 Yeah. 00:04:40.358 --> 00:04:43.668 A weird thing I, I feel like I've started to see with a few decades of 00:04:44.658 --> 00:04:47.338 is that like familiar faces pop up after a while too. 00:04:47.428 --> 00:04:50.548 You know, like you, you will bump into the same people building 00:04:50.548 --> 00:04:51.898 interesting things over time. 00:04:51.968 --> 00:04:55.058 Just kind of the way of the world and the way your network tends to work. 00:04:55.058 --> 00:04:57.888 And burning bridges is one of those things that I have been 00:04:57.888 --> 00:04:59.688 lucky not to do much in career. 00:04:59.688 --> 00:05:02.578 And if you're listening, don't burn bridges because it can, 00:05:02.698 --> 00:05:03.808 it can get dirty, you know? 00:05:04.328 --> 00:05:05.738 Zeno Rocha: You talked about MO Tools, right? 00:05:05.738 --> 00:05:09.068 Like who would've thought that Guillermo, who was a contributor on 00:05:09.068 --> 00:05:11.888 MO Tools will now be the CEO of ell? 00:05:11.888 --> 00:05:12.128 Right? 00:05:12.128 --> 00:05:15.818 So that just goes to, to show that yeah, it like. 00:05:16.598 --> 00:05:17.078 Yeah. 00:05:17.288 --> 00:05:18.698 It, it's a small world. 00:05:18.878 --> 00:05:20.348 This, this tech community. 00:05:20.898 --> 00:05:23.268 Mike Bifulco: Something I like to ask my engineering friends is what 00:05:23.268 --> 00:05:25.818 is the oldest thing that you've made that's still on the internet? 00:05:26.158 --> 00:05:26.698 Because you'll find 00:05:26.818 --> 00:05:29.488 a lot about what people were doing, you know, way back when. 00:05:29.538 --> 00:05:30.883 That's, it's a fun project. 00:05:31.163 --> 00:05:35.003 And I would imagine your HTML five demo here it probably goes back pretty 00:05:35.003 --> 00:05:37.943 far in terms of things that you've made that still exist, at least. 00:05:38.693 --> 00:05:39.233 Zeno Rocha: yep. 00:05:39.283 --> 00:05:42.248 The my first open source project that really popped up. 00:05:42.863 --> 00:05:44.808 Was something called jQuery Boilerplates. 00:05:44.963 --> 00:05:49.823 And I remember the story is actually pretty wild because I built that 00:05:49.823 --> 00:05:54.453 project and then launched it and then smashing Magazine picked it up 00:05:54.603 --> 00:05:59.283 and then it blew up and I was like, just starting to learn about jQuery. 00:05:59.343 --> 00:06:04.143 And here I was thinking that I could build a border plate for Jake Ray, but 00:06:04.143 --> 00:06:06.903 I got this PR from a very well known. 00:06:07.953 --> 00:06:10.083 No Js person. 00:06:10.563 --> 00:06:16.173 That was basically like deleting all my code and saying, oh, the title 00:06:16.178 --> 00:06:19.503 of the PR was something along the lines of like, delete everything. 00:06:19.508 --> 00:06:21.693 That's the only way that you can build this up again. 00:06:22.443 --> 00:06:26.943 And the the, the gif was like, actually like deleting everything. 00:06:26.943 --> 00:06:32.373 So I, I remember feeling so sad and so disappointed that I, that I've created 00:06:32.373 --> 00:06:34.023 something that maybe wasn't good for this. 00:06:34.788 --> 00:06:36.378 The guru there. 00:06:36.828 --> 00:06:39.918 And then reaching out to people that I knew were doing interesting things 00:06:39.918 --> 00:06:45.438 like adios money and alongside with him, we like recreated that project. 00:06:45.438 --> 00:06:48.688 And then it got much better and, and much bigger later. 00:06:48.688 --> 00:06:54.308 But just goes to show that how yeah, how interesting the community 00:06:54.308 --> 00:06:56.518 can be sometimes but also. 00:06:57.193 --> 00:07:00.553 How much you've learned from from it, which is the most 00:07:00.553 --> 00:07:01.783 interesting piece for me. 00:07:02.653 --> 00:07:03.223 Mike Bifulco: certainly. 00:07:03.973 --> 00:07:05.168 how did you get from there to 00:07:07.408 --> 00:07:10.438 Zeno Rocha: Man, I've done all sorts of crazy things. 00:07:10.468 --> 00:07:16.938 I've done a lot of I built a theme called Dracula, which I think by now is like 00:07:16.938 --> 00:07:19.458 one of the most popular themes for VS. 00:07:19.458 --> 00:07:21.648 Code in, in, in terminals. 00:07:21.648 --> 00:07:23.058 In, in, in everything. 00:07:23.478 --> 00:07:27.258 I think it has like 6 million downloads on, on VS code right now. 00:07:27.858 --> 00:07:29.628 That was a very big part of. 00:07:30.228 --> 00:07:35.928 My love for, for building dev tools and building open source. 00:07:35.978 --> 00:07:38.438 I've done this project called Clipboard js. 00:07:38.748 --> 00:07:42.258 Back in the day, the only way to do copy to clipboard was using flash. 00:07:42.468 --> 00:07:45.468 So then when this was released in JavaScript, I was so excited. 00:07:46.053 --> 00:07:46.173 I. 00:07:46.173 --> 00:07:49.923 And I think the PU too has like 30,000 GitHub stars. 00:07:50.463 --> 00:07:54.753 So I've done like all sorts of side projects. 00:07:54.753 --> 00:07:57.033 I've always loved the idea of side projects. 00:07:57.033 --> 00:07:57.963 That's another thing. 00:07:58.443 --> 00:08:03.543 Just I, I've always felt that with your nine to five job, 00:08:03.903 --> 00:08:05.613 there's always a ceiling to. 00:08:06.018 --> 00:08:08.958 What I would be able to learn, and maybe that's because the, that 00:08:08.958 --> 00:08:10.878 company just uses one language, right? 00:08:11.178 --> 00:08:14.328 Or they use one particular technology stack. 00:08:14.718 --> 00:08:19.788 So side projects, they always have been this outlet for creativity. 00:08:20.478 --> 00:08:25.908 And I've done, I, I did a little bit of product management. 00:08:25.908 --> 00:08:31.028 I, I did a little bit of, of a vp role in other places. 00:08:31.028 --> 00:08:35.078 I was a CPO at another company, but I've, I've never really. 00:08:37.493 --> 00:08:40.613 I've never really stopped loving JavaScript and open 00:08:40.613 --> 00:08:41.993 source and programming. 00:08:42.908 --> 00:08:43.448 Sure. 00:08:43.538 --> 00:08:43.988 Yeah. 00:08:44.018 --> 00:08:44.468 Okay. 00:08:45.058 --> 00:08:46.768 Dracula by the way, is everywhere. 00:08:46.798 --> 00:08:47.788 I feel like I bump into it in 00:08:47.863 --> 00:08:48.928 Mm-Hmm I expect half 00:08:48.928 --> 00:08:49.378 the time. 00:08:49.478 --> 00:08:49.958 And that's one 00:08:49.958 --> 00:08:50.948 of things that like 00:08:50.998 --> 00:08:53.368 Gets your name out into the open, like a lot of good side projects, 00:08:53.398 --> 00:08:54.778 like people start to recognize you and 00:08:55.198 --> 00:08:58.228 a known quantity to people who've never truly actually you. 00:08:58.628 --> 00:08:59.228 Mike Bifulco: But that ends up 00:08:59.558 --> 00:09:01.268 helpful tool in the long term as well. 00:09:01.608 --> 00:09:03.138 Then jump forward to React 00:09:03.463 --> 00:09:03.883 Zeno Rocha: mm-Hmm. 00:09:04.303 --> 00:09:05.988 Mm-Hmm Yeah. 00:09:05.988 --> 00:09:10.668 So one of my frustrations is that like, through all these years, like 00:09:10.668 --> 00:09:16.008 I've used all sorts of APIs for email, sending postmark, mail, guns, 00:09:16.008 --> 00:09:18.638 SendGrid mandrill, you name it, right? 00:09:19.358 --> 00:09:24.338 And I've always felt like these products were not built for me as an engineer. 00:09:24.518 --> 00:09:27.968 Maybe they're really nice for product managers or, or. 00:09:28.493 --> 00:09:33.743 Product marketers, but as an engineer who is like building a forget password 00:09:33.748 --> 00:09:35.693 flow, I wish there was something better. 00:09:36.473 --> 00:09:41.393 And I felt that frustration multiple times throughout my career. 00:09:41.393 --> 00:09:44.453 Like sometimes dealing with like really big customers like 00:09:44.843 --> 00:09:48.083 McDonald's, having emails going to span, I'm like, oh my gosh. 00:09:48.083 --> 00:09:49.553 Like how do we fix this problem? 00:09:50.003 --> 00:09:55.673 And just me integrating a side project so we. 00:09:56.648 --> 00:10:00.488 We just like try to come up with this idea of like, okay, what 00:10:00.488 --> 00:10:01.868 if email sending was better? 00:10:01.868 --> 00:10:06.038 Because it really feels like email sending as a whole industry 00:10:06.368 --> 00:10:09.218 got stuck in 1995 or something. 00:10:09.218 --> 00:10:13.478 Like, to do a, a rounded corner is extremely difficult still. 00:10:13.788 --> 00:10:17.628 So we're like, no, like may like this, this whole idea of 00:10:17.628 --> 00:10:20.178 my email not rendering the same. 00:10:21.033 --> 00:10:26.043 On Outlook and Gmail and Yahoo Mayo and superhuman like that. 00:10:26.043 --> 00:10:32.673 Just for me, like in 2023 that didn't, like, my brain wouldn't process that idea. 00:10:32.673 --> 00:10:34.143 I'm like, we gotta fix this. 00:10:34.623 --> 00:10:41.163 So we started building like an API for sending emails, but then as we 00:10:41.163 --> 00:10:45.753 were building, we're like, oh, the API is super cool, but there's this 00:10:45.753 --> 00:10:50.103 problem right before sending an email, which is the actual email template. 00:10:50.508 --> 00:10:55.818 Like putting together that HTML and people don't wanna use tables they 00:10:55.818 --> 00:10:58.698 don't like it is just like so outdated. 00:10:59.158 --> 00:11:00.448 But what are they using now? 00:11:00.508 --> 00:11:01.798 They're using React. 00:11:01.798 --> 00:11:04.258 They're using XJS, they're using Tailwind. 00:11:04.918 --> 00:11:09.178 So we came up with this idea of a project called React email, or 00:11:09.178 --> 00:11:14.008 you could use that modern stack to create your emails so you can have. 00:11:14.878 --> 00:11:19.118 Type definition using type script and JSX. 00:11:19.118 --> 00:11:22.748 So no more like, hey, empty space, comma, right? 00:11:22.748 --> 00:11:24.068 Like that type of stuff. 00:11:24.488 --> 00:11:30.848 And that was super helpful and we released React email in December, 2022. 00:11:31.298 --> 00:11:34.898 And then in January, 2023 is when we announced recent. 00:11:36.308 --> 00:11:37.448 Mike Bifulco: Pretty incredible. 00:11:37.778 --> 00:11:42.338 I think there's, there's a lot of pain you've probably lived through in building 00:11:42.343 --> 00:11:46.388 React email, but in case someone listening to the show has never tried to send 00:11:46.388 --> 00:11:50.208 an email that looks good before it is one of the fundamentally hard problems 00:11:50.208 --> 00:11:51.558 of building things for the internet. 00:11:51.878 --> 00:11:55.718 Zeno Rocha: Email is formatted in HTML and CSS and on some level plain text. 00:11:56.048 --> 00:12:00.168 But it is really hard to get email clients to look to be compatible, right? 00:12:00.168 --> 00:12:04.018 You, you may Yeah there's a long period of time where a lot of web developers 00:12:04.018 --> 00:12:07.738 spent their time making it so that things looked the same in Safari and 00:12:07.738 --> 00:12:09.838 Firefox and Chrome at the same time. 00:12:09.843 --> 00:12:12.088 Mike Bifulco: Like browser compatibility was a big thing for a long time. 00:12:12.458 --> 00:12:15.288 And before that, you know, Netscape and all the other things that existed 00:12:15.608 --> 00:12:18.848 this whole time since the internet was born, email compatibility has been an 00:12:18.848 --> 00:12:22.538 issue because essentially every email provider has different rules for what. 00:12:22.898 --> 00:12:25.478 Things they support out of H TM L and a lot of that is like, they 00:12:25.478 --> 00:12:28.358 try not to do things that will break your experience with email. 00:12:28.748 --> 00:12:31.688 You know, for example, I don't know if you think back far enough, you probably 00:12:31.688 --> 00:12:34.538 don't want an email with a Marques scrolling across it or like blinking 00:12:34.538 --> 00:12:36.068 images or dynamic stuff loading. 00:12:36.073 --> 00:12:37.838 So it's just a different problem to solve. 00:12:38.118 --> 00:12:41.143 And, and I have tried to send good looking emails in the days long 00:12:41.143 --> 00:12:45.473 before React email existed and essentially every time gave up. 00:12:45.548 --> 00:12:49.248 It was just like, good enough and you know, move forward from there. 00:12:49.498 --> 00:12:51.928 And this is something that your team attacked head on, right? 00:12:51.928 --> 00:12:55.188 And, and I feel like that's a really interesting inroads to then the API, 00:12:55.193 --> 00:12:59.228 which becomes interesting too and was a really good hook to get people interested. 00:12:59.448 --> 00:13:03.888 So, so you launched React to email and then, I mean, it was, I guess I just a 00:13:03.888 --> 00:13:06.008 matter of weeks before resend launched. 00:13:06.578 --> 00:13:06.758 Zeno Rocha: Yep. 00:13:07.688 --> 00:13:08.768 Mike Bifulco: let's talk a little bit about that. 00:13:08.768 --> 00:13:09.368 So what, what is the 00:13:09.758 --> 00:13:10.208 Resend? 00:13:10.778 --> 00:13:11.318 Zeno Rocha: Yeah. 00:13:11.438 --> 00:13:17.003 And just one anecdote for for folks to think about, like, if you are launching 00:13:17.003 --> 00:13:22.218 an API, if you're launching an open source project, like whatever it is, it's really 00:13:22.218 --> 00:13:24.588 important to think about the storytelling. 00:13:24.933 --> 00:13:30.723 And that's something that I try to spend a lot of time because that's 00:13:30.728 --> 00:13:32.403 what's gonna resonate with folks or not. 00:13:32.463 --> 00:13:32.793 Right? 00:13:32.913 --> 00:13:40.653 And we, we are very much intentional about let's give before we ask. 00:13:40.863 --> 00:13:45.993 And the way we gave was through React Team know this open source project. 00:13:46.383 --> 00:13:49.773 That's the first step of the journey of sending an email, right? 00:13:49.773 --> 00:13:50.283 You get. 00:13:50.928 --> 00:13:54.168 This beautiful Figma file from the designer. 00:13:54.168 --> 00:13:58.698 And when you start implementing, you're like, wow, this is so much different 00:13:58.698 --> 00:14:00.138 than what I'm used to in the web. 00:14:00.618 --> 00:14:05.208 So we wanted to fill that gap and the answer was react email. 00:14:05.748 --> 00:14:08.868 But after the email was done, I need a way to send it. 00:14:09.648 --> 00:14:15.858 And again, thinking about primarily that no JS stack, how 00:14:15.858 --> 00:14:18.468 does that fit into that world? 00:14:18.978 --> 00:14:24.938 And from a DX perspective I feel like no one was really giving 00:14:24.938 --> 00:14:26.888 the love that email deserved. 00:14:26.888 --> 00:14:33.878 So like this thing is so crucial for the web, but no one is investing time to 00:14:33.878 --> 00:14:40.028 build a, a proper API or to have a open API spec to have a postman collection. 00:14:40.028 --> 00:14:44.168 Like everything that surrounds, like building and distributing an API. 00:14:44.858 --> 00:14:47.258 So that's where recent came up about like. 00:14:48.323 --> 00:14:51.323 Once you have the email, you need a way to send it. 00:14:51.863 --> 00:14:57.203 And it's more than sending, because the moment you send, now you have to worry 00:14:57.208 --> 00:14:59.783 about was the email delivered or not? 00:14:59.843 --> 00:15:02.663 Did it bounce, was it marked as spam? 00:15:03.173 --> 00:15:03.773 Where is it? 00:15:03.773 --> 00:15:05.333 Is it on the primary box? 00:15:05.333 --> 00:15:07.163 Is it on the, the spam folder? 00:15:08.183 --> 00:15:12.303 So there's this whole observability on top of email that is. 00:15:13.503 --> 00:15:14.493 Taken for granted. 00:15:15.103 --> 00:15:17.953 So that's why we were like, no, we gotta build a dashboard. 00:15:17.953 --> 00:15:20.623 We gotta build the stripe of email. 00:15:20.653 --> 00:15:22.393 We gotta build the of email. 00:15:22.513 --> 00:15:24.733 And that was the whole exercise from day one. 00:15:25.243 --> 00:15:26.233 How can we do that? 00:15:26.503 --> 00:15:30.733 So it's gonna require amazing docs, it's gonna require a 00:15:30.733 --> 00:15:32.323 lot of attention to detail. 00:15:33.073 --> 00:15:35.533 It's gonna require speed. 00:15:35.923 --> 00:15:39.463 Like you can't just navigate on that dashboard and it's extremely slow, like. 00:15:40.033 --> 00:15:41.323 Other competitors are. 00:15:41.803 --> 00:15:46.933 So we were just like trying to tick those boxes to really make 00:15:46.933 --> 00:15:48.343 something that people cared. 00:15:48.523 --> 00:15:53.593 And I feel like there's something when you go to a, a website and like you 00:15:53.593 --> 00:15:57.253 understand if, if there are s STKs for all the languages, you're like, oh, cool. 00:15:57.943 --> 00:16:02.463 Like you start gaining trust from developers by, by putting 00:16:02.463 --> 00:16:03.753 those building blocks in place. 00:16:05.193 --> 00:16:06.693 Mike Bifulco: Yeah, the storytelling telling angle of 00:16:06.693 --> 00:16:07.743 that is really interesting. 00:16:07.843 --> 00:16:08.893 Thank you for sharing, by the way. 00:16:08.893 --> 00:16:09.943 I think it's really cool to hear 00:16:09.973 --> 00:16:10.693 firsthand 00:16:12.253 --> 00:16:16.023 I interact with a lot of people who are on the journey of becoming a 00:16:16.023 --> 00:16:19.203 founder or building their first product or building their, you know, maybe 00:16:19.203 --> 00:16:21.783 their 10th product, but they haven't had something successful before. 00:16:22.143 --> 00:16:25.773 And often one of the discussions I have with people that is hardest to convince 00:16:25.778 --> 00:16:30.063 people is that the story is as important as the product may be more important 00:16:30.063 --> 00:16:31.713 than the product in your early days. 00:16:31.963 --> 00:16:34.813 And that even if you're building something where the first releases are flawed. 00:16:35.148 --> 00:16:39.228 Hard to Your early adopters are the people who love the product because they love you 00:16:39.228 --> 00:16:42.078 or they love your team, or they love the brand and the story that you're telling. 00:16:42.418 --> 00:16:44.308 And that's a hard thing to get across. 00:16:44.308 --> 00:16:48.868 So how, how did you land on that as your path for getting this out into the wild? 00:16:48.873 --> 00:16:49.408 Was this something 00:16:50.008 --> 00:16:50.968 you had gained along the way? 00:16:52.808 --> 00:16:57.808 Zeno Rocha: I think it's an exercise of looking inwards and, and thinking, 00:16:57.838 --> 00:16:59.158 what are the things that I enjoy? 00:16:59.663 --> 00:17:08.363 When I go to a website and I see that there's a typo or that the design is not 00:17:08.363 --> 00:17:15.143 as refined, and then I go to the docs and it doesn't really click for me, like 00:17:15.148 --> 00:17:17.273 I can get to a quick start very easily. 00:17:17.888 --> 00:17:22.628 When I copy the code and I, I try to run that code, it doesn't run because 00:17:22.628 --> 00:17:26.108 of some silly coma that's missing. 00:17:26.738 --> 00:17:31.298 And after I run it, like it takes a long time from the moment I sign up 00:17:31.298 --> 00:17:35.528 and get the API key to the moment I see the value of the product. 00:17:36.128 --> 00:17:40.838 Just getting to those conclusions myself as a user and then trying to 00:17:40.838 --> 00:17:42.578 avoid that as much as possible, like. 00:17:43.163 --> 00:17:46.553 One thing in the email industry is that when you sign up for all these 00:17:46.553 --> 00:17:51.023 other services, you got a first request to access and they put you 00:17:51.028 --> 00:17:54.923 on this verification list for three days, and then they tell you, oh yeah, 00:17:54.923 --> 00:18:00.203 now you're approved As a developer, I hate that with my whole heart. 00:18:00.233 --> 00:18:06.083 Like that's so against everything that I believe that level of friction. 00:18:06.413 --> 00:18:11.663 Like, I wanna be able to experience the API in 30 seconds because that's 00:18:11.663 --> 00:18:17.123 the time I have on a Saturday afternoon while my, my daughter is running around. 00:18:17.503 --> 00:18:23.173 And if I like that experience, then maybe I'll bring it over at work Monday 00:18:23.173 --> 00:18:27.223 morning, I'll talk to my coworker and say, guys, you gotta check out this API. 00:18:27.223 --> 00:18:28.483 Look how cool it is. 00:18:28.853 --> 00:18:31.523 So there's definitely, I. 00:18:32.933 --> 00:18:38.483 For me, my angle is I'm not building a company, I'm not building a team. 00:18:38.903 --> 00:18:39.983 I'm building a brand. 00:18:40.943 --> 00:18:44.963 And to sustain that brand, I need a stellar team. 00:18:45.773 --> 00:18:49.553 And to sustain that team, I need a stellar company, a stellar 00:18:49.558 --> 00:18:52.373 machine, to be able to sustain that. 00:18:52.973 --> 00:18:53.543 So. 00:18:55.853 --> 00:18:58.433 Not, not many people think like that because building a 00:18:58.433 --> 00:19:00.773 brand takes 10 years, right? 00:19:00.773 --> 00:19:01.943 Or 15 years. 00:19:02.093 --> 00:19:03.083 It's a long time. 00:19:03.523 --> 00:19:06.973 But I, I definitely spend a lot of time thinking about this rather 00:19:06.973 --> 00:19:10.408 than, oh yeah, what's the next feature we, we need to ship. 00:19:11.518 --> 00:19:14.458 Mike Bifulco: Yeah, you've just touched on quite a few things that I think add 00:19:14.458 --> 00:19:17.908 up to a lot, and to your last point, that building a brand takes a long time. 00:19:18.838 --> 00:19:21.058 The story you've told me so far is you building a brand 00:19:21.058 --> 00:19:22.258 for a very long time, right? 00:19:22.258 --> 00:19:22.378 This 00:19:23.368 --> 00:19:27.298 HTML five demo and Boilerplate and your Dracula theme. 00:19:27.298 --> 00:19:30.898 Like first things I heard about React email was it was, 00:19:31.108 --> 00:19:32.008 oh, made by the guy who made 00:19:32.938 --> 00:19:35.698 oh, that immediately gives it some, some cachet to 00:19:35.918 --> 00:19:36.338 Zeno Rocha: mm-Hmm 00:19:36.388 --> 00:19:39.238 Mike Bifulco: And your, you know, your name is something that that grows in 00:19:39.238 --> 00:19:43.588 value because I've seen, you know, a Zeno attached to a dozen interesting things. 00:19:44.423 --> 00:19:44.663 brand. 00:19:44.663 --> 00:19:47.123 You may not, you, I'm certain you weren't this when you're 00:19:47.278 --> 00:19:49.108 Zeno Rocha: mm-Hmm mm-Hmm. 00:19:49.223 --> 00:19:50.048 Mike Bifulco: but like you 00:19:50.053 --> 00:19:52.523 you, you may not realize it in the current moment, but you're 00:19:52.523 --> 00:19:53.993 building a brand towards the thing. 00:19:53.993 --> 00:19:57.273 Whenever you land on what the thing is, people will trust you more. 00:19:57.273 --> 00:20:00.153 And part of that, the uncomfortable thing for a lot of people is 00:20:00.158 --> 00:20:01.923 sharing your work early and often. 00:20:01.928 --> 00:20:05.623 Side projects, no matter how embarrassing you might feel, they are shows that 00:20:05.623 --> 00:20:08.993 you're working on, on interesting things and feeds forward in ways 00:20:08.993 --> 00:20:10.493 that are very unexpected For sure. 00:20:11.303 --> 00:20:11.593 Zeno Rocha: Yeah. 00:20:12.183 --> 00:20:16.393 It's funny how I think there's a shift in the way people consume. 00:20:17.158 --> 00:20:18.718 Things in the world, right? 00:20:18.718 --> 00:20:24.698 Like there used to be a time where you are buying a product and you have no 00:20:24.698 --> 00:20:27.188 idea who the founder of that product is. 00:20:27.188 --> 00:20:31.448 There's still a lot of cases like that, obviously, like maybe that's 90% of that 00:20:31.478 --> 00:20:36.908 the case, but then there's this whole subset of companies that we love using. 00:20:37.508 --> 00:20:41.618 Because we also know the founder I'm sure I know, love it or hate him. 00:20:41.618 --> 00:20:45.368 Like there are many people that bought Teslas because, you know, they had a, an 00:20:45.368 --> 00:20:48.728 association with Elon Musk four years ago. 00:20:49.208 --> 00:20:53.438 Like a lot of people love for sell because they see Guillermo very involved. 00:20:53.648 --> 00:20:57.188 So there's, there's these things that play out and I definitely 00:20:57.188 --> 00:21:00.488 feel like the personal branch. 00:21:01.943 --> 00:21:07.193 That like I, I, I'm always thinking how does my personal brand follows recent 00:21:07.313 --> 00:21:09.653 and how does one support the other? 00:21:09.983 --> 00:21:12.713 If you, there's some silly things like, oh, you go to the 00:21:12.713 --> 00:21:14.753 website of that person, right? 00:21:15.023 --> 00:21:16.913 And then they have a personal website live. 00:21:16.943 --> 00:21:19.433 That's the first thing do, do they have or or they don't. 00:21:19.493 --> 00:21:24.263 And then you go, it's all of like outdated blog posts and stuff like that. 00:21:24.263 --> 00:21:25.283 So you're like, oh, okay. 00:21:25.433 --> 00:21:28.073 Or it's extremely ugly and it doesn't match. 00:21:28.698 --> 00:21:31.638 The values that so resend is very polished, right? 00:21:31.638 --> 00:21:34.368 And then you go to my personal website and it's super like me. 00:21:34.758 --> 00:21:35.508 It's just there. 00:21:35.778 --> 00:21:39.858 Like no, it needs to communicate that because then it's a cohesive 00:21:39.858 --> 00:21:45.468 message that, hey, if you care about details, this will be for you. 00:21:45.648 --> 00:21:47.028 If you don't, that's totally fine. 00:21:47.028 --> 00:21:50.118 There are all these other competitors you can do, you can go and use. 00:21:50.418 --> 00:21:53.328 But if that's something that you, that's important to you. 00:21:53.948 --> 00:21:57.758 Here's another person that also cares just much as you do. 00:21:58.188 --> 00:21:58.248 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:21:59.598 --> 00:21:59.898 Yeah. 00:21:59.958 --> 00:22:01.368 Yeah, that's good stuff. 00:22:01.968 --> 00:22:06.458 A thing that I think we don't often talk about too, as, as founders of startups, 00:22:06.458 --> 00:22:09.908 is that like your story is also wildly important to the people who are gonna cut 00:22:09.913 --> 00:22:13.328 you a check worth hundreds of thousands of dollars or millions of dollars. 00:22:13.328 --> 00:22:15.158 They want to hear about you and your success and know 00:22:15.158 --> 00:22:16.418 that you have a track history. 00:22:16.823 --> 00:22:20.223 And that you have relationships and, you know that you're, you're reliable 00:22:20.223 --> 00:22:21.543 and stable and things like that too. 00:22:21.543 --> 00:22:22.783 And it adds up, right? 00:22:22.783 --> 00:22:26.368 We've, we've had, I've had investors in, in our company mention blog 00:22:26.368 --> 00:22:27.718 posts of mine from years ago, 00:22:28.388 --> 00:22:28.678 Zeno Rocha: Well, 00:22:28.798 --> 00:22:29.368 Mike Bifulco: about, but it's like, 00:22:29.398 --> 00:22:29.998 oh I see who was 00:22:29.998 --> 00:22:31.048 thinking about this back then. 00:22:31.053 --> 00:22:32.518 It's like, yeah, okay, cool, cool. 00:22:32.518 --> 00:22:32.968 That's good. 00:22:32.968 --> 00:22:35.938 Like, I, you know, hope I didn't put too many sarcastic jokes or dumb 00:22:35.938 --> 00:22:37.168 memes in that post but 00:22:37.508 --> 00:22:39.578 I've been, you know, doing it for a long time since then. 00:22:39.578 --> 00:22:40.568 It really does add up. 00:22:41.068 --> 00:22:41.488 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm. 00:22:42.033 --> 00:22:43.143 Yeah, no, it does. 00:22:43.848 --> 00:22:45.918 Mike Bifulco: I'm veering a little bit from our traditional APIs. 00:22:45.918 --> 00:22:49.488 You only hate podcast because I think I could talk forever to interesting 00:22:49.488 --> 00:22:52.608 founders about the interesting things they're building, also at 00:22:52.613 --> 00:22:53.898 risk of a linch mob chasing me 00:22:53.903 --> 00:22:56.538 down if to you about open API before long. 00:22:57.068 --> 00:22:59.198 At some point we're gonna have to talk more about being, being 00:22:59.248 --> 00:23:02.068 founders and being, you know, a creator and all that other stuff. 00:23:02.818 --> 00:23:05.218 about the API side of resend. 00:23:05.248 --> 00:23:07.708 Like what, what is it like to design an API first product? 00:23:09.838 --> 00:23:11.618 Zeno Rocha: Me And man, it's so unique. 00:23:12.173 --> 00:23:17.663 Especially because I think we, we traditionally spend more time on 00:23:17.663 --> 00:23:24.323 the website, on, on the backend, on the, on all these other interfaces. 00:23:24.503 --> 00:23:30.948 And then we don't think about the API as this very unique interface with a 00:23:30.983 --> 00:23:37.073 very unique set of requirements such as speed like how do you make it. 00:23:37.763 --> 00:23:40.373 So that the request is as fast as it can be. 00:23:40.923 --> 00:23:44.853 There's a lot of principles that we try to follow in terms of simplicity 00:23:45.633 --> 00:23:48.093 that we, we are very careful of. 00:23:48.193 --> 00:23:55.303 We sometimes go to other APIs and we see like a lot of information and, and 00:23:55.303 --> 00:23:59.533 then it's hard to translate that to the different use cases that users have. 00:23:59.953 --> 00:24:01.183 So for us, we're like. 00:24:01.843 --> 00:24:04.993 How can we make an API to send just one email? 00:24:05.293 --> 00:24:07.933 Just the easiest interface possible. 00:24:08.503 --> 00:24:10.423 And then there are more advanced use cases later. 00:24:10.423 --> 00:24:14.713 Like, oh, I wanna replace a template variable with this content. 00:24:14.743 --> 00:24:16.273 Okay, let's not care about that right now. 00:24:16.303 --> 00:24:23.383 Oh, I wanna send 100 emails in one API call versus 100 API calls for 100 emails. 00:24:23.683 --> 00:24:25.093 Okay, let's not care about that. 00:24:25.573 --> 00:24:29.593 So there's this tension when you're building of. 00:24:30.388 --> 00:24:34.708 You gotta build fast and you've gotta build high quality, right? 00:24:34.738 --> 00:24:38.308 And then what people tend to do is just, they're like, oh, I can't have 00:24:38.308 --> 00:24:40.708 both, so I'm just gonna pick one. 00:24:41.398 --> 00:24:44.248 And if you pick just quality, then it's gonna take two years 00:24:44.248 --> 00:24:45.508 for you to ship your API. 00:24:45.928 --> 00:24:51.598 If you just pick speed now, you are gonna introduce tons of breaking changes in 00:24:51.598 --> 00:24:53.368 the first year that you launched, right? 00:24:53.698 --> 00:24:55.558 And we know how hard it is for. 00:24:56.068 --> 00:24:57.418 To, to migrate APIs. 00:24:57.418 --> 00:24:59.638 It's extremely difficult process. 00:25:00.718 --> 00:25:05.578 I feel like the answer is you gotta do both, but then the way 00:25:05.578 --> 00:25:07.888 you do it is you gotta cut scope. 00:25:08.368 --> 00:25:13.138 So you gotta make your API as easy as po Like maybe you're not gonna cover all 00:25:13.143 --> 00:25:20.968 use cases and that's fine, but you need the, the, that minimum lovable product of 00:25:20.968 --> 00:25:25.228 an API is is not just the functionality is everything surrounding it. 00:25:25.858 --> 00:25:29.948 And I feel like that's where most people fall apart because they're 00:25:29.948 --> 00:25:31.448 like, oh yeah, the API is running. 00:25:31.448 --> 00:25:31.898 Here it is. 00:25:31.898 --> 00:25:32.978 Here's an endpoint. 00:25:33.068 --> 00:25:34.748 No, let me check your docs. 00:25:34.748 --> 00:25:39.788 Like, do you have all that surrounding ecosystem that people need to get started? 00:25:40.278 --> 00:25:47.928 I very much believe that we're living in a SDK first world, not an API first world. 00:25:48.618 --> 00:25:52.938 I think an API first world was what we were living in 2015. 00:25:52.938 --> 00:25:52.998 I. 00:25:53.913 --> 00:26:00.573 In 2024, we are living in SDK First World because that's how people consume APIs. 00:26:01.293 --> 00:26:08.254 Like if I want to use, let's say Firebase, I haven't even started using, I, I, 00:26:08.259 --> 00:26:12.993 I didn't even sign up, but I already know that, oh man, if I use their SDK, 00:26:12.998 --> 00:26:15.363 I'm sure they will handle offline. 00:26:16.353 --> 00:26:20.673 Sink, and I'm sure they'll have something already, like if I'm using 00:26:20.673 --> 00:26:23.823 Stripe, I'm sure they'll have some sort of like pagination built in. 00:26:24.183 --> 00:26:27.333 Like there's all these things that you know, that you expect 00:26:27.433 --> 00:26:29.623 that it'll make your life easier. 00:26:30.133 --> 00:26:34.543 So I don't think people start from rest purely like they 00:26:34.543 --> 00:26:37.843 start from, I, I love no js. 00:26:37.933 --> 00:26:40.213 I needed a no JS dk, I love Ruby. 00:26:40.213 --> 00:26:41.293 I needed Ruby s dk. 00:26:41.683 --> 00:26:43.663 So we are very intentional about that too. 00:26:44.233 --> 00:26:49.603 Like starting day one with a lot of coverage for, for different SDKs, 00:26:50.473 --> 00:26:52.483 but it's extremely hard to do that. 00:26:52.623 --> 00:26:55.893 There's a lot that we can dive into that one particular subject, 00:26:56.523 --> 00:26:59.903 but I think, I feel like there's a significant shift and you gotta 00:26:59.903 --> 00:27:03.293 think about everything in between. 00:27:03.293 --> 00:27:07.553 Not only like what's the body and what's the response. 00:27:08.408 --> 00:27:08.768 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:27:09.248 --> 00:27:09.638 Yeah. 00:27:09.908 --> 00:27:11.678 I like your point about SDK first. 00:27:11.928 --> 00:27:16.458 We, we are now trained to want to go, you know, do the NPM install or the 00:27:16.768 --> 00:27:20.428 the PIP install or whatever, add the gem for the thing rather than go, go. 00:27:20.563 --> 00:27:25.603 Through the API spec and send, you know, curl requests to chase things down. 00:27:26.293 --> 00:27:29.113 You're, you mentioned the trade off between building fast 00:27:29.113 --> 00:27:30.793 and high quality being scope. 00:27:31.133 --> 00:27:32.783 And I'm curious how you manage that. 00:27:32.783 --> 00:27:37.343 Do you do, do you have a gigantic backlog of things and are you reprioritizing them 00:27:37.343 --> 00:27:40.433 or do you have a pretty good like, roadmap ahead of you that you're building towards? 00:27:41.568 --> 00:27:44.658 Zeno Rocha: We have at, at all times. 00:27:44.658 --> 00:27:47.988 We are cutting scope even like every single day. 00:27:48.418 --> 00:27:54.343 Because we are building a product that it's not revolutionary, right? 00:27:54.343 --> 00:27:58.828 Like, it's not like e like sending an email has been here forever. 00:27:58.828 --> 00:28:01.868 It's going to keep existing forever. 00:28:02.258 --> 00:28:02.918 So. 00:28:03.803 --> 00:28:05.543 Our differentiator is quality. 00:28:05.933 --> 00:28:09.593 And because of that, because we can't just say like, oh no, we're gonna ship 00:28:09.593 --> 00:28:14.693 this thing, and it's half baked, eh, like the, the good enough doesn't cut for us. 00:28:15.113 --> 00:28:20.453 So if that's the case, then at all times we are re revisiting scope. 00:28:20.783 --> 00:28:24.233 We might come from a user interview and then we learn all these 00:28:24.233 --> 00:28:25.763 things and we start implementing. 00:28:26.393 --> 00:28:31.523 Then we're like, oh, but we gotta ship it fast, but we can't ship crappy stuff. 00:28:31.883 --> 00:28:35.363 So we're like, okay, we gotta remove this feature, remove this other 00:28:35.368 --> 00:28:36.833 feature, remove this other feature. 00:28:37.373 --> 00:28:40.703 I feel like that's a very interesting, like some people are 00:28:40.703 --> 00:28:44.723 afraid of cutting scope or they feel like they can't push back. 00:28:45.083 --> 00:28:50.693 So it's important to foster that culture of like, yeah, saying no, like, no, we're 00:28:50.693 --> 00:28:54.198 not gonna do this for this reason, and I. 00:28:55.133 --> 00:28:56.003 We can. 00:28:56.543 --> 00:28:58.013 Yeah, totally right. 00:28:58.193 --> 00:28:59.483 It's super hard, man. 00:28:59.633 --> 00:29:00.383 Super hard. 00:29:01.073 --> 00:29:04.103 Mike Bifulco: Yeah, this is, this is where I should disclose that. 00:29:04.103 --> 00:29:07.103 A few weekends ago I spent a few hours around at Resends 00:29:07.153 --> 00:29:08.438 features and before 00:29:08.498 --> 00:29:11.258 Zeno and started recording, I told him I had a list of demands I 00:29:11.258 --> 00:29:11.918 was gonna send his 00:29:11.918 --> 00:29:12.278 way. 00:29:12.528 --> 00:29:15.048 So I'm, I'm now primed to hear no on 00:29:15.713 --> 00:29:17.808 honestly, that's, that's a good, a good sign that you're building 00:29:17.808 --> 00:29:19.878 a product that has to it as well. 00:29:20.298 --> 00:29:21.768 I have so many questions to follow on that. 00:29:21.768 --> 00:29:21.978 So it's 00:29:21.978 --> 00:29:22.398 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm 00:29:22.698 --> 00:29:25.338 Mike Bifulco: to to hear user interviews are a part of your process too. 00:29:25.578 --> 00:29:29.808 I think tools in particular, that is a, a really tough thing to do 00:29:29.808 --> 00:29:33.953 because developer users are highly critical wily, like developers know 00:29:33.953 --> 00:29:36.593 when they're being sold to and may even shy away from that sort of thing. 00:29:36.863 --> 00:29:39.203 How do you find the right people to do user interviews with? 00:29:40.683 --> 00:29:40.973 Zeno Rocha: Yeah. 00:29:42.803 --> 00:29:47.603 I feel like the, the doing a user interview for a visual product 00:29:47.603 --> 00:29:51.323 is completely different than you doing a using interview for an API. 00:29:51.353 --> 00:29:51.683 Right? 00:29:52.373 --> 00:29:57.833 We, we try to get a hold of the people who are actually building 00:29:57.833 --> 00:30:00.023 this stuff as early as possible. 00:30:00.483 --> 00:30:01.023 So. 00:30:02.088 --> 00:30:06.048 Thankfully, because of all the work that we do and the time that we spend 00:30:06.048 --> 00:30:11.118 on branding, thankfully we have a lot of inbound and we can hear from folks 00:30:11.118 --> 00:30:17.028 like, there's a very popular open source CMS that is now considering recent. 00:30:17.598 --> 00:30:23.868 So what I do is I, I first like, let me go to their source code. 00:30:24.378 --> 00:30:26.748 Like this is a, an opportunity where. 00:30:27.283 --> 00:30:29.143 They, it's actually available. 00:30:29.143 --> 00:30:34.273 So I can take a look and then I can see every single API call they make and I 00:30:34.273 --> 00:30:36.043 can see like, what are the parameters? 00:30:36.073 --> 00:30:38.263 How do they send those things? 00:30:38.263 --> 00:30:40.933 Like do they transform the value before sending? 00:30:40.993 --> 00:30:47.233 What is the type of transformation can we do the transformation on, on the SDK like. 00:30:48.178 --> 00:30:52.828 Silly example, like, oh, let's say you're talking about sending attachments and I 00:30:52.828 --> 00:30:59.218 can send the whole string, or I can do the base 64 conversion already built in. 00:30:59.278 --> 00:31:02.338 Like, so there are small things that you can try to do. 00:31:02.518 --> 00:31:05.668 But yeah, we just try to get as much information as possible. 00:31:05.668 --> 00:31:09.988 And of course, most times the code is not open source, of course. 00:31:09.988 --> 00:31:13.228 And then when that's the situation, we, we try to get it 00:31:13.228 --> 00:31:14.818 like, yeah, let's screen share. 00:31:14.878 --> 00:31:17.878 Like, whatever you can show me, please do. 00:31:17.878 --> 00:31:19.918 Because then we can make it better, right? 00:31:20.068 --> 00:31:25.858 Like we talk to a lot of our friends in the beginning of recent, like, let me 00:31:25.863 --> 00:31:27.568 understand your email implementation. 00:31:27.658 --> 00:31:29.848 What are the, the ramifications here? 00:31:29.848 --> 00:31:31.348 Is there anything that we're missing? 00:31:31.828 --> 00:31:39.378 And cover the most important 20% first and make that exceptional before 00:31:39.378 --> 00:31:41.538 getting to the, to the other 80. 00:31:42.273 --> 00:31:45.123 Mike Bifulco: Yeah, well right there, that sounds like a super 00:31:45.123 --> 00:31:46.773 handy tool for cutting scope as well. 00:31:46.773 --> 00:31:50.343 If you can understand what the most important things are to a solid, you 00:31:50.343 --> 00:31:53.643 know, group of people at, at least gives you a target to build towards. 00:31:54.698 --> 00:31:58.443 the, the nice thing I always say to folks about cutting scope is you can add 00:31:58.443 --> 00:32:01.743 things back later if you find they're really necessary, but you'd also be 00:32:01.743 --> 00:32:03.513 surprised with, with what get away with. 00:32:04.323 --> 00:32:05.403 Zeno Rocha: Yep, that's true. 00:32:05.448 --> 00:32:08.428 Mike Bifulco: Your team recently had a pretty large launch week. 00:32:08.478 --> 00:32:10.008 You, you had a week long event of 00:32:10.318 --> 00:32:10.738 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm. 00:32:11.088 --> 00:32:12.498 Mike Bifulco: called Forward, recent, forward. 00:32:12.578 --> 00:32:13.748 You wanna talk a little bit about that? 00:32:13.753 --> 00:32:14.588 What was that week all about? 00:32:14.643 --> 00:32:14.883 Zeno Rocha: Yeah. 00:32:14.973 --> 00:32:18.123 We, we try to do these things every so often. 00:32:18.183 --> 00:32:19.983 I feel like releasing softer. 00:32:21.223 --> 00:32:27.128 It is not about this one peak moment that happens every year or every two years. 00:32:27.128 --> 00:32:30.278 Like I, I see it as a. 00:32:33.218 --> 00:32:37.058 Almost like a heartbeat, you know, like you are, you're monitoring, like 00:32:37.063 --> 00:32:39.098 you, you need the small releases. 00:32:39.248 --> 00:32:43.418 Those are your change log weekly, you know, things that you're improving and 00:32:43.418 --> 00:32:45.158 then you, but you also need the big ones. 00:32:45.408 --> 00:32:49.398 If you're not, if you're just like, not shipping consistently, then you're dead. 00:32:49.968 --> 00:32:52.068 You, you, you gotta need that combination. 00:32:52.068 --> 00:32:55.528 And I think developers appreciate that as well. 00:32:55.828 --> 00:32:57.988 So we try to be very. 00:33:00.928 --> 00:33:05.458 Proactive about releasing things and communicating even if there's more. 00:33:05.488 --> 00:33:09.808 But then from time to time we do an event like that where like, okay, let's 00:33:09.808 --> 00:33:14.458 just ship a bunch of things in, in that same week and really create momentum. 00:33:14.528 --> 00:33:18.458 That's something that's really important for any product that you're doing. 00:33:18.828 --> 00:33:21.198 And the whole. 00:33:21.963 --> 00:33:25.803 Scope of that week was like, how can we make the API better? 00:33:25.803 --> 00:33:33.303 Like I mentioned that example of sending 500 or 100 emails in one API request. 00:33:33.693 --> 00:33:36.663 That's something that we shipped during that launch week because we heard 00:33:37.203 --> 00:33:41.913 from our users like, yeah, I wish I didn't have to send those 100 requests. 00:33:41.913 --> 00:33:42.393 Just one. 00:33:42.393 --> 00:33:44.673 And then you do the queue on your end. 00:33:45.183 --> 00:33:45.903 We're like, oh, okay. 00:33:45.903 --> 00:33:46.113 Yeah. 00:33:46.113 --> 00:33:46.473 So. 00:33:47.193 --> 00:33:51.018 It's one piece left less of infrastructure that you need to build. 00:33:51.598 --> 00:33:53.288 It's not easy to manage a queue. 00:33:53.508 --> 00:34:00.338 You gotta deal with that letter cues and retries and, and it's, it's painful. 00:34:00.398 --> 00:34:01.718 So, okay, let's deal with that. 00:34:02.238 --> 00:34:07.998 But we also launched marketing emails, which was something that we, I think by 00:34:07.998 --> 00:34:13.398 now listeners already understood that I take a lot of inspiration from Stripe, 00:34:13.398 --> 00:34:15.708 for example, or, or, or other dev tools. 00:34:16.248 --> 00:34:20.688 And we're very much following that Stripe trajectory of like, Hey, you have. 00:34:21.363 --> 00:34:24.573 The rest API for like payments. 00:34:24.633 --> 00:34:27.603 And then you have stripe elements. 00:34:27.633 --> 00:34:31.083 So those are like components that you can embed in your app and then 00:34:31.088 --> 00:34:35.613 you have Stripe checkout where it's like a whole standalone thing that 00:34:35.618 --> 00:34:37.443 you can just point to see, name to. 00:34:38.013 --> 00:34:39.228 We're very much following that. 00:34:40.953 --> 00:34:43.323 Idea of different abstraction layers. 00:34:43.773 --> 00:34:47.853 So this one abstraction layer that we introduced now is just an editor, or 00:34:47.853 --> 00:34:51.633 what you see, what you got editor, that you can send emails without needing 00:34:51.633 --> 00:34:54.183 to, you know, configure everything. 00:34:54.513 --> 00:34:54.933 Cool. 00:34:54.993 --> 00:34:56.583 So that's one piece that we're doing. 00:34:56.883 --> 00:34:58.794 And there are others, you know I would love for you. 00:34:58.824 --> 00:35:01.884 Like no one wants to build a unsubscribe page. 00:35:02.004 --> 00:35:04.764 It's the, the most boring thing in the world. 00:35:04.944 --> 00:35:07.884 I am now looking into like, how can we build. 00:35:08.424 --> 00:35:15.804 A radix or a shed cn ui, similar solution to that, where you're just building 00:35:16.264 --> 00:35:19.744 the building blocks or the whole thing depending on, on, on what you prefer. 00:35:20.254 --> 00:35:26.224 So I think that's a another way of looking into this, like regardless of what we, 00:35:26.764 --> 00:35:28.479 we announced that week, like how do you. 00:35:29.104 --> 00:35:31.594 Think about our, the, the different abstraction layers 00:35:31.594 --> 00:35:34.449 that your own API can empower. 00:35:35.839 --> 00:35:36.289 Mike Bifulco: Sure. 00:35:37.219 --> 00:35:39.889 And, and I think anyone listening to this, right, if you're imagining the 00:35:39.889 --> 00:35:43.549 problem set, you can kind of envision some things that might come from 00:35:43.554 --> 00:35:45.469 there and, and prioritizing that. 00:35:45.659 --> 00:35:48.839 Is a super interesting challenge, but it's also about just knowing 00:35:48.839 --> 00:35:52.079 your product and listening to your, your user base and hopefully figuring 00:35:52.079 --> 00:35:53.069 out what's important to them. 00:35:53.069 --> 00:35:56.789 And you know, marching towards more productivity for your users probably means 00:35:56.789 --> 00:36:00.549 more value and more money transparently for, for the business as well. 00:36:00.659 --> 00:36:03.749 Yeah, I, I will make sure there's a link in the show notes to the 00:36:03.749 --> 00:36:05.219 launches from recent forward. 00:36:05.549 --> 00:36:07.199 I'd imagine that was a pretty hectic week. 00:36:07.229 --> 00:36:09.299 Was it an all hands on deck situation for your team? 00:36:09.299 --> 00:36:09.659 How, how 00:36:09.664 --> 00:36:10.264 Zeno Rocha: Oh yeah, 00:36:10.289 --> 00:36:11.339 Mike Bifulco: We that 00:36:12.184 --> 00:36:12.424 Zeno Rocha: yeah. 00:36:12.424 --> 00:36:14.824 We're six people total. 00:36:14.924 --> 00:36:19.364 Not everybody knows how to code or is coding full time. 00:36:19.964 --> 00:36:24.014 So that means like we have a very small engineering team in practice. 00:36:24.014 --> 00:36:29.384 So we, we try to do what's best with what we have. 00:36:29.504 --> 00:36:34.574 And I think there's something really unique about having a small team as well. 00:36:34.574 --> 00:36:38.954 I think we were able to move very fast in areas where maybe other 00:36:38.954 --> 00:36:40.304 companies wouldn't because of it. 00:36:40.304 --> 00:36:40.664 So. 00:36:41.579 --> 00:36:47.759 It's an interesting balance, but launch weeks are, are these things that if 00:36:47.759 --> 00:36:53.639 you wanna do that, you gotta understand the impact that this will cause because 00:36:53.639 --> 00:36:57.809 it's definitely a lot of stress, a lot of attention that you get in return. 00:36:57.814 --> 00:37:03.719 But you are pushing the team extremely hard for entire week and. 00:37:04.904 --> 00:37:07.364 You gotta know the consequences of that. 00:37:07.364 --> 00:37:12.224 Like people will be extremely tired on, on the following week, they won't be as 00:37:12.224 --> 00:37:17.804 productive or like, there's all these things that you need to take into account. 00:37:17.804 --> 00:37:21.434 So I try to be mindful of those consequences. 00:37:21.434 --> 00:37:25.964 If I'm doing it, then, okay, what are the, the trade offs 00:37:26.699 --> 00:37:27.209 Mike Bifulco: Sure. 00:37:27.659 --> 00:37:28.649 Well, it sounds like you've, you've 00:37:28.839 --> 00:37:28.959 Zeno Rocha: I 00:37:29.069 --> 00:37:32.279 Mike Bifulco: not only a very exciting team to be on with sort of high demands 00:37:32.284 --> 00:37:36.459 and a very at stake, interesting product, but hopefully like a, a healthy place to 00:37:36.464 --> 00:37:39.729 work where people are excited to be there and, you know, the challenges come and go, 00:37:39.734 --> 00:37:43.379 but like the reason to be there remains that that's all extremely exciting. 00:37:43.379 --> 00:37:46.859 And I think that, building developer tools is, like you said at the beginning 00:37:46.859 --> 00:37:48.539 of the show, like a, an endless game. 00:37:48.599 --> 00:37:51.449 You know, it's there will always be additional things to build for. 00:37:51.449 --> 00:37:55.019 And I mean, even email lately has had new regulations passed. 00:37:55.019 --> 00:37:55.859 I think I saw something 00:37:56.729 --> 00:37:58.829 a requirement for one click on subscribe, 00:37:59.249 --> 00:37:59.469 Zeno Rocha: Yep 00:37:59.699 --> 00:38:02.969 Mike Bifulco: as like a HTP header or something like that, that send along. 00:38:03.309 --> 00:38:04.179 There will always be new problems 00:38:04.264 --> 00:38:04.684 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm. 00:38:05.209 --> 00:38:08.119 Mike Bifulco: I I'm curious if you're already thinking about the next 00:38:08.239 --> 00:38:10.309 sort of what, what's to come, right? 00:38:10.309 --> 00:38:12.869 Do you have like a series of things you're excited for? 00:38:12.874 --> 00:38:14.039 What's, what are you thinking about right now? 00:38:15.269 --> 00:38:17.399 Zeno Rocha: There are a lot of directions that we can go 00:38:17.689 --> 00:38:21.439 in terms of recent being this. 00:38:22.804 --> 00:38:26.254 One stop shop for all of your communication needs, 00:38:26.344 --> 00:38:27.424 and that's our vision. 00:38:27.614 --> 00:38:33.974 In the long term, we, we are doing email, but we're not 00:38:33.974 --> 00:38:35.654 necessarily an email company. 00:38:35.924 --> 00:38:42.164 Maybe email will be the primary thing that we do for the next 10 years, 00:38:42.524 --> 00:38:44.474 but we don't want to be just that. 00:38:44.634 --> 00:38:47.874 There's some interesting changes in the market with. 00:38:48.639 --> 00:38:51.399 That affect different communication tools, right? 00:38:51.399 --> 00:38:57.879 Like sending SMS is getting harder and harder, and I think the, the magic and the 00:38:57.884 --> 00:39:05.749 beauty of Twilio that we knew from 2013 or 12 and 11 isn't really there today. 00:39:06.139 --> 00:39:10.609 So we could explore that path and start creating APIs for sending 00:39:10.609 --> 00:39:14.619 SFS, sending push notifications, sending all these other things. 00:39:15.849 --> 00:39:21.639 But we can also just double down on what our users are telling us, which 00:39:21.729 --> 00:39:23.469 right now is like inbound emails. 00:39:23.499 --> 00:39:25.359 They want to be able to receive an email. 00:39:25.869 --> 00:39:28.179 Okay, let's, let's get that figured out. 00:39:28.179 --> 00:39:31.569 You know, and we have a lot of challenges around scaling. 00:39:31.569 --> 00:39:37.119 We're sending dozens of millions of emails every month, and we gotta be creative. 00:39:37.389 --> 00:39:42.129 And like, whenever I, I re like, I talk to my co-founder, like, oh yeah, let's 00:39:42.129 --> 00:39:43.689 think about this new architecture. 00:39:44.319 --> 00:39:46.749 And then we have this discussion of like, oh yeah, how long do 00:39:46.749 --> 00:39:48.279 you think this is gonna last? 00:39:48.639 --> 00:39:50.259 Like, oh yeah, maybe nine months. 00:39:50.529 --> 00:39:54.519 And then in three months we gotta revisit the whole thing because now, like we got 00:39:54.519 --> 00:39:56.499 so much more load than we were expecting. 00:39:57.279 --> 00:39:59.289 So it's an endless game. 00:39:59.599 --> 00:40:02.329 But I I, there there's some really interesting paths 00:40:02.329 --> 00:40:03.469 that we could take from here. 00:40:04.234 --> 00:40:04.594 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:40:05.044 --> 00:40:07.414 you are speaking to my soul right now. 00:40:07.774 --> 00:40:08.434 Cutting scope. 00:40:08.434 --> 00:40:11.554 Staying simple being committed to the endless game is a 00:40:11.554 --> 00:40:13.734 really, really noble pursuit. 00:40:13.794 --> 00:40:17.554 And, and I that brings you a lot of success and that your users, your team 00:40:17.624 --> 00:40:20.599 are all, are, are happy with the story you're telling along the way here. 00:40:21.119 --> 00:40:24.519 It has been super, super wonderful to get to catch up with you Zeno. 00:40:24.519 --> 00:40:26.499 I, I hope that we get to do this again in the future. 00:40:26.869 --> 00:40:29.869 You are, please consider yourself more than welcome to come back and hang 00:40:29.869 --> 00:40:31.369 out anytime you have any launches or 00:40:31.704 --> 00:40:32.124 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm 00:40:32.179 --> 00:40:34.399 Mike Bifulco: chat about, or if you wanna rant to me about open API, 00:40:34.529 --> 00:40:34.949 Zeno Rocha: Mm-Hmm. 00:40:34.969 --> 00:40:36.019 Mike Bifulco: anytime th 00:40:36.049 --> 00:40:36.949 thanks much joining. 00:40:36.949 --> 00:40:38.839 Before we go for people to find you online? 00:40:38.839 --> 00:40:40.069 And where do people find resend? 00:40:41.254 --> 00:40:46.294 Zeno Rocha: I definitely spent way too much time on Twitter slash x. 00:40:46.554 --> 00:40:49.105 So I think that's the, the best place you can find me. 00:40:49.374 --> 00:40:54.024 I am Zena Rocha there, so yeah, feel free to to follow there. 00:40:54.024 --> 00:40:57.414 But I'm also on LinkedIn and, and all these other places 00:40:57.444 --> 00:40:58.979 with that same username. 00:41:00.089 --> 00:41:00.539 Mike Bifulco: Perfect. 00:41:00.539 --> 00:41:02.519 We'll make sure that's there and resend, of course, 00:41:03.059 --> 00:41:03.989 Zeno Rocha: Yes. 00:41:04.109 --> 00:41:07.509 Yeah, recent.com and recent at X too. 00:41:07.989 --> 00:41:08.739 Please check it out. 00:41:08.744 --> 00:41:12.429 I, I tried the API and then let me know if it's good or not. 00:41:12.559 --> 00:41:18.224 I would love to hear the feedback of your audience because they obviously care a lot 00:41:18.224 --> 00:41:22.214 about API design, which is something that I also care, so I'll love your feedback. 00:41:22.994 --> 00:41:23.534 Mike Bifulco: Yeah. 00:41:23.594 --> 00:41:27.284 I would be remiss if I didn't also mention on your behalf that one of my favorite 00:41:27.284 --> 00:41:31.004 things about Resend right now is that the pricing tiers are extremely generous. 00:41:31.334 --> 00:41:34.214 Can get in and do a lot for free and really get a good sense of the product. 00:41:34.494 --> 00:41:37.399 And that is, that is for sure a differentiator and well worth. 00:41:37.399 --> 00:41:38.649 Going and giving the things a poke. 00:41:38.899 --> 00:41:43.039 And I hope our audience does so that you can get lots of angry messages about HT 00:41:43.039 --> 00:41:45.529 TP headers or, whatever the case may be. 00:41:45.589 --> 00:41:47.809 We, we've, we've got a passionate group and if you're out there, 00:41:47.809 --> 00:41:48.949 please do give it a shot. 00:41:48.949 --> 00:41:51.199 And, and chase down Gino Zino with your feedback. 00:41:51.459 --> 00:41:52.479 Zino, thanks so much for joining. 00:41:52.479 --> 00:41:53.319 I really appreciate it, man. 00:41:53.379 --> 00:41:55.539 I hope a, a great afternoon and we'll catch you soon. 00:41:56.284 --> 00:41:57.004 Zeno Rocha: Thank you, Mike. 00:41:57.004 --> 00:41:57.724 See everybody. 00:41:58.299 --> 00:41:58.719 Mike Bifulco: take care.