Dane Maxwell AMA-- SaaS, Membership Sites, The Foundation

[AllenCrawley]

Just got an email from MJ asking me to look at this thread? Just looks like a load of questions and NO answers? Or am I missing something?

You are missing something. D.Maxwell is Dane and he's doing a great job answering everyone's questions. Look for his reply's. One of which is just 2 posts above yours.

 

[codo3500]

I just had to look at your supposed age...due to your childish immature response...43? You are right you do not now me and the likelyhood is you never will ....lucky me. Reading comprehension? Then you think MJ personally emailed me? Really

I had a quick scan over my emails, then had a quick scan over the thread...I made a mistake and to be honest I am very busy and looking at the emails for a 'break'. Some of us are too busy working the dream than sitting in front of a screen dreaming?

May I suggest you go and play on Facebook, Twitter or something! Maybe watch American Idol or Celebrity News?

Thank you to Allen Crawley for pointing me in the right direction.

You're 42, have an obvious belief that you're successful - yet you still couldn't take anything useful out of this thread? Perhaps you're much smarter, more talented, educated and experienced than all of us.

Or perhaps you're a 42 year old with a superiority complex that likes to start fights on the internet, perhaps...

 

[AnneC]

Dane,

I really enjoyed your podcast with Pat Flynn this week. I felt like I was meant to hear that message at this point in my life, while I am in the process of reinventing my identity.

As a former engineer/MBA (valedictorian, 99 percentile SAT, got into MIT, all that fun stuff), I have been fighting the perfectionism problem for a long time, but I wasn't aware I had that problem until very recently. It's amazing how many limiting beliefs we store in our system that go unnoticed by the conscious mind, but that are painfully ingrained in the subconscious.

I used to be one of those people that would always try to get the scientific facts straight... you know the type: the annoying guys that burst your bubble by replying back with Snopes links or cite scientific studies why magnetic therapy is bunk. My mindset has completely shifted. I feel that there are things out there that science has not yet explained.

I loved that quote you included from Jeff Bezos. And as you said in the podcast, we should be focusing on the results. If something produces results for you, then keep doing it... no matter how weird or wonky it sounds to the outside world. I just got Rolfed today. My husband produces brainwave entrainment albums. I have personally tried or witnessed acupuncture, laser allergy treatment, homeopathy, past-life regression, energy healers, eye deeksha and more. Some of it works for me, some of it doesn't, and that's okay; I am on the quest to become my best self, and I do so with an open mind.

For the past 5 years, I have been able to make a living without a job, thanks to real estate... but also to Tony Robbins, NLP, Harv Eker, and he-who-shall-not-be-named-on-this-forum. But it's only been enough income to pay the bills, because that was all I was possible (until I read MJ's book). In the past few months, I realized that it was all I unconsciously wanted. I couldn't figure out why, but am beginning to uncover some of my serious limiting beliefs underlying it all.

I'm going to through The Work, that you mentioned in the podcast. Are there any other resources you would recommend for discovering and battling limiting beliefs, as quickly and efficiently as possible?

With sincere gratitude,
Anne

 

[ZaneN22]

Awesome! Thanks for jumping on here and sharing your knowledge. It sounds like you've had an incredible journey so far!

Here are the questions

4) I see you mention a lot about preselling companies. I understand getting them on the phone, but how do you convince them to pay you and wait for "x" months until you have a product ready for them?

5) How do you guarantee they will actually purchase once they said they would? Do you put contracts in place or is it just word of mouth?

 

[DeletedUser2]

Dane!

Great to see you here!!! Thanks for showing
We appreciate people here, like you, who go out of their way to share info.


Thanks again

Z

 

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[loop101]

Yeah, weird timing to have a student one day, and the teacher the next day.

 

[M&N]

1. What's more profitable for you - SaaS or the Foundation (software company vs educational company)?

2. As far as I don't see any problems with selling a software company, I see some issues regarding the exit of an educational company. Do you think that a business like the Foundation, which is highly attached to your persona, might attract buyers?

PS. It'd be great if you could share some thoughts on running a software vs educational company in general.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Looks like Dane bailed

There was no time specified for his contribution other than a starting date of today, and whatever time was convenient for him.

 

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[D. Maxwell]

Hello Dane, welcome to the forum and thanks for doing this. My questions:

- When offering any sort of coaching, is there any advice you have regarding disclaimers? Have you ever had any troubles with customers despite clearly stated TOS and how to deal with it?

I'm working on a self-help program (dating), should the note that it expresses personal opinions and is for entertainment purposes only be enough? Refund is a non-issue, I'm curious about people who would want much more than just a refund, or would claim my responsibility for their actions.

- One of my big and established competitors is very open to cross-promotion. Should I reach out to them when my product gets big as well, or as soon as it gets decent traction so that it's clear it's a winner? And should I reach them at all if my product is directly competitive to theirs?

No, I don't have any advice regarding disclaimers. That's an interesting situation you've found yourself in.

On your second issue, that seems more like an attorney question?

For the competitor, as soon as you have conversion numbers with 95% confidence (sample size of 25 conversions) - I'd go after them. You should absolutely cross sell, as your customers are usually aware and will often buy if you don't promote, so you might as well do it and take the moola.

 

[Mike39]

Not sure if you're going to be back online Dane but I have some questions if you get the chance, feel free to answer whatever you feel is the most important or useful if you are limited on time:

Could you shell out a general timeline for a product launch such as one for the foundation or even just talk more on launching the course.

What did the year leading up to launch look like? What were some unforeseen problems you encountered at launch that you learned and will avoid if you were to do it again, etc? How big of of a core team did you have working on this? What were some marketing tactics that killed it and others that didn't work so well?

Anything on the actual launch of the foundation really, I don't think anyone could disagree that your launch seemed VERY well done from the outside looking in.

 

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[1step]

Thanks for doing this Dane its been awesome.

I followed your launch closely last year and had a question.

I remember two applicants you profiled last year, one had sent a looong handwritten letter to you about why he wanted in the program, another chased you on FB trying to get accepted into the program. What were their results with the program?

 

[Vigilante]

Dane, thank you for doing this AMA.

Questions:

What is your refund policy, and what percentage of each Foundation class has asked to be refunded?

He pretty much answered that question already above. Please read the rest of the thread.

 

[MikeC]

Can you go a little deeper on your freedom = kindness philosophy?

 

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[theag]

He has not built software, but instead is becoming a software consultant to completely build your MPV in 3 months or your money back. He's working with foundation clients as a coach.

So he built his own mini-foundation. Sounds like thats the way to go. :fastlane:

 

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[M&N]

If all of my businesses burned to the ground and I had to start from nothing, this is what I would do.

Thanks once again. Actually the way you described the whole process is very similar to something I plan to do . Also I was thinking about releasing an infoproduct for my chosen niche before getting into software development. That way I could get some initial funds, trust & authority and testimonials for my business. You've started with an information product (for brokers) before building SaaS too, am I right? Is it still selling?

PS. Do you think these business owners care where my business is located? I mean, I'm from Europe, this will be my first B2B startup and I wondered if US companies have any issues with doing business with offshore guys like me.

 

[Execution=King]

Thanks again for this thread.

Sam Ovens is pounding me with retargeting ads making the point that the foundation doesn't really work as advertised (and positioning his consulting infoproduct as the solution.)

Frankly, I'm surprised he would take this tack with his marketing (though I'm sure it's effective.)

Questions:

1) Have you and Sam had a falling out?

2) Do you feel that he has a valid point, and if not, why?

 

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[Bigguns50]

ok...since Vigilanti fessed up, so will I. I was also skeptical at first..VERY skeptical. And the video...I was thinking 'guru' and shaking my head no no no. BUT, your words seem sincere and from the heart. I didn't read anything where you dodged any questions.

I'm still not sure about this 'limiting beliefs' stuff....but I have an open mind and have been thinking about it. Life has taught me anything is possible and I should keep an open mind and think about everything.

Nice to have you here and thank you for contributing.

 

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[evlttwin]

There are some solid gold nuggets from Dane in these posts. Unbelievably valuable. Actual SPECIFIC answers, instead of vague replies. You rock dude!

I have one question i guess. Are you a fan of Mind Mapping software, or do you do idea extraction in a group on a white board?

I'm only asking because I just recently found out about this stuff, and it's almost addicting.

 

[Charles]

You are missing something.

Something significant. Something so large that even though I don't know you, I question your reading comprehension.

MJ emailed you?

I just had to look at your supposed age...due to your childish immature response...43? You are right you do not now me and the likelyhood is you never will ....lucky me. Reading comprehension? Then you think MJ personally emailed me? Really

I had a quick scan over my emails, then had a quick scan over the thread...I made a mistake and to be honest I am very busy and looking at the emails for a 'break'. Some of us are too busy working the dream than sitting in front of a screen dreaming?

May I suggest you go and play on Facebook, Twitter or something! Maybe watch American Idol or Celebrity News?

Thank you to Allen Crawley for pointing me in the right direction.

 

[Execution=King]

Dane, thanks again for doing this AMA. I greatly appreciate it. I've also listened to several of your podcast interviews and have learned a ton.

I do think you skipped my question regarding Sam Ovens, your key case study. (I'm not counting the reply by the new account "Tank".)

Anyway, Sam Ovens has apparently launched a bizopp infoproduct based largely on his assertion that the Foundation doesn't work as advertised & the SaaS apps can't really be funded with presales. (Ironically, his ads are being injected for me into Fastlane Forum's adsense slots):

I'm seeing tons of these. (I'm half wondering if Sam has made this thread a managed placement in Adwords.)

I'm wondering if there was there a falling-out? More important, is Ovens wrong when he asserts that the funding-through-presales model is largely unworkable, and if so, why?


On another topic, you're very clear that writing even a single line of code pre-Foundation is grounds for automatic disqualification from the Foundation. But if that's the case, how does Renata, who apparently failed to come up with a SaaS business, count as a Foundation success story?

 

[exige]

Also, Dane, do you have an affiliate program or JV page for The Foundation?

 

[1step]

Anyway, Sam Ovens has apparently launched a bizopp infoproduct based largely on his assertion that the Foundation doesn't work as advertised & the SaaS apps can't really be funded with presales. (Ironically, his ads are being injected for me into Fastlane Forum's adsense slots):

He should really add a frequency cap to his retargeting ads, I've probably seen it 100 times today

 

[pisco]

Thx for these great replies?

I have already send 1000 mails to doctors, and got around 80-90 answers. However, the answers are roughly,

I do not use the computer, however, I have problems with not paying customers, Time managment.

Software building is not the problem for me, I can build everything. For me the problem is to convert somebody who is interested in a paying customer?

So my question is:

How to convert an interested customer into a paying customer?

I really appreciate your answer Dane!

 

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[D. Maxwell]

Definitely one of the best threads on the forum.

How did you first sell the foundation? What was the process of getting leads and then converting them to sales? Did you do ppc? Google, facebook? I am in the process of converting from doing my thing to teaching others how to do it. So this IMO is a crucial step.

Did you test out different sales pages? Offers? etc?

Did you start with a free product or free offer?

And thanks again. Some great stuff in this thread.

We launched brilliantly in my opinion using the podcast channel. 90% of our sales came from Mixergy, SmartPassiveIncome, and one other top podcast that is slipping my mind. 10% from affiliates. We had a few sales from Facebook PPC.

Find places that have an audience, and do an interview.

Did we test out different sales pages? NO. I did an interactive offer asking people questions along the way so I didn't have to guess and launch with a winning sales letter.

Did I start with a free offer? No, but it could have helped. I went straight for the sale on the first version of the foundation.

 

[supervagabond]

Hey Dane,

Thank you so much for doing this AMA and giving your advice. Your freedom=kindness philosophy makes me think that someone being kind (and giving advice) also pushes me to being kind and giving advice to people around me.

Say I have found my market and have several pre-sales that validated the idea. Now I have to build the software.

Now what are specific steps to take here?

From what I understood:

1- Sketch out on paper how the software will work. Every screen every action. (ok, done)
2- Translate these into HTML/CSS to have the UI ready
3- Hire a coder and build it

Could you go into details on the steps 2 and 3?

Where do you hire the coder? What programming language to develop my app in? Once I hired the guy, what should I tell him to do first?

In your projects, when the coder is working, what is your involvement? Do you let him 100% freerange as long as it's in the budget and timing, or do you tell him things to do 1 by 1?

What is the typical breakdown of the 12 weeks of programming, in terms of milestones and tasks?

I have 8,400€ of "6 months advance" presales in my hands, is that enough to start and focus on dev?

Dane thank you so much for doing this AMA and take care

Cheers,
Valentin Van Nhut

PS: If you come to Paris, you're always welcome at my place!

 

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[ricktx]

That last post by Dane on idea extraction is gold! BTW, this process is applicable to more than just SaaS, these are some of the core skills in complex solution selling and consulting as well.

Agreed. I have been a Information Technology consultant for 25 or so years of my life, and the process Dane has explained sounds a lot like IT consulting. Matter fact it sounds exactly the same to me.

The only real differences are, instead of creating a custom solutions for his clients and charging them just once for software they end up owning. He creates SaaS applications and sells them to the original client at a discount (for the seed money) in a subscription based model, and resells the same products to others with the same problem for profit.

A very interesting Business Model to be sure.

 

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[D. Maxwell]

Also, Dane, do you have an affiliate program or JV page for The Foundation?

Exige, email daniel@thefoundation.com - if you're a good fit, which I'm hoping you are, he will hook you up with an affiliate link.

We also have this page: http://thefoundation.com/partners/

 

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[KC Dash]

Here is the entire script. You're welcome

---> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...1dloPrc18/edit

You are the man! Good stuff.

 

[D. Maxwell]

When you kick out people. Do you do refund a payment?

No. You'd be the one who didn't follow directions

Haha... we've never had to kick anyone out because of this.

 

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[D. Maxwell]

Thanks for the AMA, Dane. Very enjoyable and insightful.

I estimate that I about a month away from launching a niche dating site (assuming my programmer completes the last set of code modifications on time). My dating site remedies several (heretofore unmet) pain points in the niche ... some of which, cannot be easily replicated by my competitors without a major re-design. I am optimistic and excited.

One of the questions I am wrestling with is "how long" to afford new members a "free trial" membership (before compelling a sale) in the early stages of the launch. Sure, I could look at what some of the more established sites are doing, but these sites already have a substantial number of users to dangle as a carrot, whereas I have the unique challenge of building the herd. So by solving their (unmet) pain points, I enter the marketplace with an advantage. But terms of numbers of active users online, at the outset, my established competitors clearly have the advantage.

My initial plan is to test different "free trial" periods with different groups, assess the conversion rate, then modify accordingly. I am also tempted to offer a discount to the initial paid adapters (not sure on this one yet).

Once I have solid numbers on the site, I doubt I will have much difficulty setting the free time period ... but the initial stages of the launch is a little tricky. I need members ... but I also need cash flow.

I am open to suggestions and would love to know your thoughts on this topic.

Any general advice?

What is your U.S.P. for your customers? What are the un-met needs you are solving?

Your decision sounds solid enough. The worry about giving away too much I understand as well. Curious to hear your reply.

 

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