Way of the SaaS - execution, lessons, fears, limiting beliefs and more

[Krzysztof]

It's time to make sure I'm moving forward and keep myself responsible! As I've written 2 months ago in thread https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/co...ling-yourself-i-know-i-was.56787/#post-419200, last year I did really great keeping myself busy... Unfortunately not on the tasks that I should focus on...

Therefore, this year I am focusing on two things:

• My current business that is earning some money from time to time and I believe that has potential to earn me a living if I increase my sales skills. This business is definitely not my passion, but at least provides some income without draining too much time. It will not be covered in this topic.
• Building a SaaS business. I will gladly share my progress, lessons learned, blocking points etc. with the hope that it can be of benefit to you. I will even be admitting publicly to my limiting beliefs . It will help me keep myself responsible as well as expose myself to potential advice – I will appreciate it if you share it with me!

I’m currently in the idea extraction phase, so it’s just the beginning. However, first interesting things are starting to happen. As I’ve always been a bit afraid of making phone calls, I started with sending emails. I’ve read some blog posts written by people from The Foundation stating that some people prefer calling right away, while others do good with emails, which gave me a perfect reason to postpone the calls… I bought a database of companies in my target industry and started my mailing. The emails are along the lines of (obviously they are in Polish ):

Subject: Can you help me Mr. (or Mrs.) FIRST_NAME? [in Poland it is seen as rather rude by most people if you don’t know them and address them “Hi John”]

Mr. (or Mrs.) FIRST_NAME,

My name is Krzysztof and I came across your COMPANY_NAME while researching industry INDUSTRY_NAME. I’m a software developer and entrepreneur. I’m trying to learn about the pains in the industry, to see if I can identify any common problems that I could solve with a tailored solution. I’m not affiliated with any company and not selling anything. I’m just driven by solving problems and making people’s lives a little easier.

Could you please tell me what are the biggest problems/frustrations with managing your business?

Krzysztof
Phone number
LinkedIn profile​

I’ve emailed 119 companies between 20th and 28th of January. Response rate has been extremely poor in my opinion, however stay tuned for the best part. Of those 119 (more like 110, because a few companies turned out to be out of business since the DB was created) I’ve received:

• 3 emails grumbling about competition, taxes, no support from government etc. I’ve tried to follow up on these and seems that I will be able to extract some info of greater value than “competition and taxes are killing us” from one of the companies. The owner is however unavailable until Friday next week, but is supposed to drop me a line when she’s back.
• 2 emails stating that they have no problems and are very happy with their businesses – good for them .
• 2 people interested.

Yesterday and today I’ve sent reminders to those that did not respond, next week I will be starting phone calls (time to get past my fear…).

The best part are the two people interested. I have to admit one thing though – the emails I’ve written them were completely different . I’ve found four major associations in my industry in Poland and have written to their chairmen:

• 1 has not replied yet – I will send a reminder tomorrow.
• 1 has replied that he’s extremely busy with software deployments in his company and asked me to get back to him in August.
• 1 was interested in my initiative and decided to discuss it during the association’s meeting that took place yesterday evening. His idea was for me to provide a few sentences of introduction and a list of main questions that he would share within the association and ask for replies. As I didn’t want to push too much at this stage, I gladly agreed to his offer. I’ve prepared the questions both as a Word document and a Google form for responder’s convenience. My intention is to treat this as a starting point and then schedule calls with those that will provide their feedback.
• Last but definitely not least, on Tuesday 10th of February I have a face to face meeting with chairman of the last association. He’s one of the people who contributed most to development of this industry in Poland in the last years. I’m simultaneously exhilarated and scared to death

Let me finish with a short summary of observations, lessons learned, fears, etc.:

• Main observation – it’s much easier to get attention of the movers and shakers in the industry than average business owners. Even though I was not able to get average business owners’ attention for now, it’s still awesome. If I manage to keep these people excited with my initiative, they can easily open many doors for me. Moreover, after I find a real need in the market (hopefully!) and solve it, I will be able to get the best recommendations possible from the very beginning.
• Main fear 1 – phone calls!
• Main fear 2 – I’ve spent some time looking through main industry-related websites and stumbled across different software solutions. Even though one of the “green lights” for an industry is if it uses software solutions already (as they’ve got computers/tablets/smartphones in place, are tech-savvy and do not have to be convinced of benefits of using software), I still get uneasy feeling in my stomach saying “what if everything they need already exists?”
• Limiting belief 1 – “I am not enough”. Specifically in terms of the meeting with the chairman of one of industry associations. This is a person who accomplished a lot, is running a few companies etc. Who am I to take his time?
• Limiting belief 2 – “Will I be able to push through to the end?”
• Limiting belief 3 – “I am not an entrepreneur. Whole my life I’ve been trained to be great in the corporate rat race.”
• Main change to increase productivity and mood – wake up at 6:30am, eat breakfast, drink coffee, star working around 7:30am! I always was (or better to say I thought of myself as) a night owl, working until late and waking up 10-11, even later if possible. However, in that scenario I would start working after noon with the dreadful realization that “It’s already almost 1pm and I’ve done nothing!!!” That would really mess with my head and resulted in low productivity. Now, starting to work around 7:30am I have a lot of things done by noon and my mood, productivity are both much better.

I have to deal with those nasty limiting beliefs ASAP!

All the best to you and good night! (It’s already 11pm in Poland)

 

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[TylerBiz]

Keep it up! widzę, że Polacy uwielbiają SaaS, nie dziwię się, mechanizm jest super! Trzymam kciuki!

 

[Krzysztof]

I'm so excited and nervous at the same time! Chairman of the main industry association in Poland (the one whom I sent a reminder today) invited me to see him next week! This means next week I'm having two face to face meetings with probably the two most important people in this industry in Poland! At least to my current knowledge . Please keep your fingers crossed!

As a side note, let me tell you that I cannot recommend enough having two tools:

• alarm clock app requiring accomplishing math tasks in order to switch off the alarm. If I just get awoken, I am in a half-dream with no willpower which results in snoozing the alarm a few times. However if I have to focus to do the tasks, I am ready to get up right after that.
• any app blocking access to specific sites within a specified timeframe. I've put Facebook, news sites, nba.com and other time drainers (including The Fastlane Forum ) on the blocked sites list with working hours set to 7am-9pm Monday-Friday. During that time the app allows me to spend only up to 10 minutes a day on those sites. The best part is that before I just HAD to check fb and boring news all the time. Now, as I know they are blocked, I don't feel the need at all. Even though I could easily use my mobile to browse the web. It works miracles

 

[tafy]

Keep it going!

It seems your trying to break into an industry you dont know anything about? This is difficult, unless you have a really good friend or relative who is in that industry to really help you out.

 

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[Krzysztof]

Thanks @tafy and @TylerBiz!

You're almost right @tafy. I don't have good friends in the industry, however I am a small client for them in my current business. Not that it helps a lot . Nevertheless, I believe the two meetings next week can make it or break it. They can either open a lot of doors for me or decide they don't care and make it much harder. The worst that can happen is that I learn and move on to another industry, possibly one where I have some connections. The issue is that as I've spent most of my life preparing to be a good corporate employee and then being one, 99% of my social circle are employees.

I'm on the SaaS adventure with a friend of mine who works in real estate (his mother has an agency) and my first idea when taking him onboard was this industry. Especially seing many real estate SaaS software in the USA. However, according to him, there are too many legal as well as trust issues to make it work in Poland. E.g. all documents have to be signed by hand so Paperless Pipeline would not be viable here.

 

[tafy]

according to him, there are too many legal as well as trust issues to make it work in Poland. E.g. all documents have to be signed by hand so Paperless Pipeline would not be viable here.

Sounds like opportunity to me

 

[Krzysztof]

Could you please elaborate on what you mean? If it is required by law to have every document signed by hand, how is that an opportunity for a software solution?

 

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[axiom]

Could you please elaborate on what you mean? If it is required by law to have every document signed by hand, how is that an opportunity for a software solution?

I believe he means that it is a barrier to entry, discouraging potential competitors.

 

[tafy]

Could you please elaborate on what you mean? If it is required by law to have every document signed by hand, how is that an opportunity for a software solution?

You have an INSIDERS as a partner and have seemingly dismissed a solution because of some hurdles. Now your trying to find a need in niches you have no experience with.

Trust me its nearly impossible to build something amazing when you don't have the experience in the field, not saying it is impossible.

Go back and look again at the solution without letting a small hurdle get in the way. You still need saas even with real signatures, every business needs a solution.

What they are using now wont be used in 5 years time, will your saas be the next wave?

 

[Krzysztof]

Thanks a lot @tafy, I'll talk to him about it

 

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[Krzysztof]

Short update before I go to sleep.

Want a shortcut to get into an industry? Find main associations and write an email to their chairmen. Is it really that simple? I dare to say it is! Here's why:
- they are the most involved people in the industry,
- they are actively thinking about next steps. Sometimes they just need someone to act as a catalyst to help move forward with their ideas (they are big business owners as well, so might not have time to pursue everything themselves),
- they can easily connect you to many business owners in the industry,
- they will respect you for having the guts to get in touch directly with them and being proactive.

During last two days I've had meetings with two such persons in the industry of my choice. Both were very open and helpful. They have already set up two more meetings for me with the right people and will be spreading info about my initiative. As of now I have no idea how it will turn out in the end, because a few very different routes have appeared already. It may be SaaS, it may be a bigger solution probably in cooperation with the chairman of one of the associations (which would mean I get a perfect partner and mentor), some kind of combination of both or maybe something totally different. Too hard to say at the moment, especially after todays' meeting. The following two weeks should make the route appear more clearly.

As for my feelings - I am both excited and scared. However, seeing how well these two meetings went, I got a great boost in my confidence. Being able to speak almost as an equal and a partner with people having big businesses and being very accomplished in their industry made me realize one thing - if you believe that you can do it, people will believe it as well.

@tafy, having a good friend in the industry would no doubt be helpful, however I strongly believe that making the above-mentioned contacts means a whole lot more to the success of the whole initiative.