We need BETA TESTERS for TRAFFIC INSIGHTS // July R!.com Ops Recap // LIVE TUESDAY: Robb Clark: How to Build RB2B's Self-Serve Support System

Hey RB2Bers!

It’s been a big week!

As always in true work-in-public style, here’s our SaaS metrics dashboard.

If you’re looking at our churn numbers and saying to yourself, “that looks absolutely terrible”, believe me, I am too.

We will run into an ARR ceiling at 11% user churn per month sooner rather than later.

We’re implementing churnkey.co to try to track churn reasons and show relevant offers this month, and hoping that ilija in sales can gather some relevant information on the front end about who our “true ICP” is.

I think if we can end up getting it down to 5-6%/mo we can keep bolting products on and get above $50m ARR with the size of the TAM and the efficiency of our go-to-market, but I really don’t know.

The good news is that you’ll get to follow along from home the entire way!

We Need Beta Testers - Marketers/DemandGen - for “Traffic Insights”!!!

What we’re building:

• Something that will give you analytics by webpage and UTM of ICP traffic (aggregate, not person-level information)

• Think pie charts of industry, title, employee count, etc by page or UTM

• You can see which pages/campaigns are driving the most ICP traffic

Who we need to beta test:

• Marketers or DemandGen who are looking for traffic insights

• A paid customer on a $249/mo plan or higher (you need volume)

• You are willing to give us feedback on PDFs we show you of your real data

What to do if you want to beta test:

• Write me back and say “beta test” and include the URL of the site which RB2B is installed on.

R!.com July 2024 Ops Recap

We closed July ‘24 at $23.5m ARR (+2.5%) as a combined company, with Retention.com at $21.5m ARR (-1.3%) and RB2B at $1.97m ARR (+64%). Here’s what PAIN looks like as a startup founder:

This is Retention’s ARR journey timeline:

ARR:

Sep 22 $11.7m <<<< 6 FTE, bootstrapped. This is AWESOME
Oct 22 $11.8m <<<< This thing is a UNICORN!!! Let’s hire 50 people
Nov 22 $13.5m
Dec 22 $13.6m <<<< We’re DEFINITELY hitting $50m ARR by the EOY
Jan 23 $14.4m <<<< I’m going to make a docuseries about it!
Feb 23 $15.4m <<<< 7 VP’s started today! Team up to 55! To the MOON!!!
Mar 23 $16.7m
Apr 23 $17.8m
May 23 $18.4m
Jun 23 $19.2m
Jul 23 $19.5m <<<< UH OH… We were overselling. VP sales quits
Aug 23 $20.2m <<<< Shrunk sales team by 75%
Sep 23 $20.7m
Oct 23 $21m
Nov 23 $21.7m
Dec 23 $21.9m <<<< Whiffed on $50m ARR by over 50%
Jan 24 $21.7m <<<< UH OH … We just went backwards
Feb 24 $21.6m
Mar 24 $21.3m <<<< ROCK BOTTOM… no idea when this will turn around
Apr 24 $21.9m <<<< Launched RB2B
May 24 $22.3m <<<< Wait… we just hit a new high as a combined company!
Jun 24 $22.8m
Jul 24 $23.5m <<<< Holy crap - RB2B went from $1-$2m ARR in 6 weeks!

So what happened?

Why did we think we were going to hit $50m by year-end 2023?

But end up at $21.9m?

The biggest thing that happened was that I thought that by focusing on a VERY narrow ICP at the end of 2022, we would eliminate our churn problem and our metrics would look like Klaviyo.

What actually happened?

Churn improved, but not NEARLY to where I thought it was going to.

The other thing I missed on was TAM.

We thought there were 50,000 stores we could make successful in the Shopify ecosystem.

By March of this year, we lowered our target account list to 1,400.

Ouch.

TAKEAWAY:

The biggest lesson I learned is that Retention is in a high-churn product category, selling to a high-churn buyer persona.

Do I wish I would have done things differently?

Yes.

In late 2022 and early 2023 I lost all of my bootstrapping discipline and started acting (and spending) like a VC-backed company.

I wish I would have gone slower.

Stuck to my bootstrapping values.

We would have arrived at the same place.

With less heartache and more profit.

It could be worse though...

There are companies in our space who have similar revenue trajectories who raised big money at $100M+++ valuation.

They’re facing the same churn issues, in the same target market.

And they’re stuck.

Their founders are overworked, underpaid employees of their VCs.

There’s no way they will ever grow into their valuations.

There is no exit where they make money.

What happens when a bootstrapper makes this type of mistake?

He falls back on a stable, profitable startup.

He then uses that profit to do things like build a startup within a startup.

And if he’s lucky enough…

His startup ends up looking like RB2B.

Keep building.

How to Build a Self-Serve Support System Using Workflows and AI with Robb Clarke

RB2B has around 2,800 interactions with our support content, chats, and emails every week.

Here’s are some crazy stats:

• 17,445 free users (who need support)

• 658 Paying Customers

• $2.2m ARR, 60% m-o-m growth rate

• 2,800 Support Interactions

• 2.8% involve a human being

• 93% CSAT (satisfaction score)

Guess how many people we currently have in this operation?

ONE PERSON.

ROBB.

BY HIMSELF.

(although he is looking for someone to join the team, prior engineering/javascript experience is a requirement)

Robb is going to teach you:

1/ The tools he uses
2/ The workflows he’s set up
3/ When AI gets involved (and when it doesn’t)

You won’t want to miss this week!

It’s Tuesday at 3pm EDT, 12pm PDT.

Sign up here.

As always, if you made it this far, thanks for reading.

Feedback is always welcome, and I do love it when people say “I made it to the end”, so if you feel like brightening my day, shoot me that back.

Have a great weekend, and keep building!

Adam