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Some numbers for perspective: Baremetrics spent almost 8-10 years working on their product for a $4 million exit. They didn't raise a lot of VC capital, so thei

Some numbers for perspective: Baremetrics spent almost 8-10 years working on their product for a $4 million exit. They didn't raise a lot of VC capital, so their founder got a very good payday b/c he wasn't diluted that much. Buffer still has not exit, to my knowledge and has had 2+ consecutive years of falling revenue. Their list of acquirers is getting shorter and shorter, and their founders have not cashed out yet(excluding the 1 who got ~$1 million or so after raising from VC - very distasteful IMO). Buffer and Moz are the 2 companies that are examples of companies that aimed too high, raised too much money, and made a success less likely for the founders. So, sometimes aiming high isn't that good if it means raising capital, and where a few $million exit won't be a huge success since you're getting diluted.

saluki 4y ago
That's true, good points. Yeah, it's a nice balance finding the sweet spot. I did see the article about buffer's revenue peaking and has continued falling.
treis 4y ago
>Some numbers for perspective: Baremetrics spent almost 8-10 years working on their product for a $4 million exit. They didn't raise a lot of VC capital, so their founder got a very good payday b/c he wasn't diluted that much. His investors walked away from their $800k invested so that was helpful. Even still, netting 3.7 million sounds great but it's somewhat misleading. For comparison, if you got a job today for 250k, got 5% raises, and invested all your money at 5% returns you'd end up with 3.5 million after 7 years. That's kind of where I always end up w/ bootstrap SAAS ideas. My salary as a developer always sounds like a lot but it really sounds like a lot when you start talking about charging customers to match it. When you add in time value of money and risk the path to a successful bootstrap SAAS is a pretty narrow one.
- altdataseller 4y ago
  1) A 250K job is not readily available for everyone, let alone 350K if you're taking into account annual raises for 7 years. Sure, if you're fortunate/diligent enough, but not everyone can get into FAANG, or have what it takes to master those interview questions (or want to). I also believe the founder of Baremetrics did not have a developer background. Even if you are able to make that much in your job, the math starts to change dramatically when you have a bootstrapped company, where you can pay yourself half your regular salary for years before you decide to sell the company. 2) Yes, investors walking away from 800K is a good valid point. If we want to talk about true bootstrapped successes, BuzzSumo and Backlinko are better examples. But yes, the path to a successful bootstrapped SaaS is a narrow one - it's always been a narrow one. But even with a narrow path, it's still larger than the path to a successful funded SaaS. Both have low probabilities of success, but one is more of a moonshot than the other, IMO.

saluki 4y ago

That's true, good points. Yeah, it's a nice balance finding the sweet spot. I did see the article about buffer's revenue peaking and has continued falling.

treis 4y ago

>Some numbers for perspective: Baremetrics spent almost 8-10 years working on their product for a $4 million exit. They didn't raise a lot of VC capital, so their founder got a very good payday b/c he wasn't diluted that much. His investors walked away from their $800k invested so that was helpful. Even still, netting 3.7 million sounds great but it's somewhat misleading. For comparison, if you got a job today for 250k, got 5% raises, and invested all your money at 5% returns you'd end up with 3.5 million after 7 years. That's kind of where I always end up w/ bootstrap SAAS ideas. My salary as a developer always sounds like a lot but it really sounds like a lot when you start talking about charging customers to match it. When you add in time value of money and risk the path to a successful bootstrap SAAS is a pretty narrow one.

altdataseller 4y ago
1) A 250K job is not readily available for everyone, let alone 350K if you're taking into account annual raises for 7 years. Sure, if you're fortunate/diligent enough, but not everyone can get into FAANG, or have what it takes to master those interview questions (or want to). I also believe the founder of Baremetrics did not have a developer background. Even if you are able to make that much in your job, the math starts to change dramatically when you have a bootstrapped company, where you can pay yourself half your regular salary for years before you decide to sell the company. 2) Yes, investors walking away from 800K is a good valid point. If we want to talk about true bootstrapped successes, BuzzSumo and Backlinko are better examples. But yes, the path to a successful bootstrapped SaaS is a narrow one - it's always been a narrow one. But even with a narrow path, it's still larger than the path to a successful funded SaaS. Both have low probabilities of success, but one is more of a moonshot than the other, IMO.