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Oleg Campbell. He was born in Ukraine and starting working as a programmer at the age of 19. He moved to Canada when he was 22 and founded his first startup at 24 successfully. Then at 27, he founded Reply.io and he\\u2019s currently living between Ukraine and San Francisco building this company.

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? \\u2013 Losing My Virginity
• What CEO do you follow? \\u2013 Jason Lemkin
• Favorite online tool? \\u2014 Chart Model
• How many hours of sleep do you get?\\u2014 6-8
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? \\u2013 \\u201cBe more fearless\\u201d

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Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 00:45 \\u2013 Nathan introduces Oleg to the show
• 01:28 \\u2013 Oleg is a programmer and read Kawasaki\\u2019s, Rich Dad Poor Dad, and Tim Ferriss\\u2019, 4-Hour Work Week, which influenced him to build a software for himself
  • 01:58 \\u2013 Oleg found out that his first business was a lifestyle business when they failed to grow it
  • 02:02 \\u2013 The technology was built on top of QR code
  • 02:22 \\u2013 The highest revenue the company reached was $150K annually
• 02:32 \\u2013 Oleg put the business in autopilot, took the money and invested in a new venture
• 02:28 \\u2013 Oleg has never saved any money, but just invested it into businesses
• 03:21 \\u2013 Oleg founded his first startup while he was working full-time
• 03:37 \\u2013 With Reply, Oleg invested what he took from his salary from his previous startup
  • 03:45 \\u2013 Initial investment was around $30K
• 03:55 \\u2013 Oleg hired 2 developers to build the product and Oleg started working on marketing and sales
• 04:08 \\u2013 The developers are in Ukraine and it cost Oleg only $2000 per month
• 04:46 \\u2013 Oleg found the developers through online job postings
  • 04:58 \\u2013 There are websites in Ukraine where developers hang out
• 05:18 \\u2013 Reply focuses on replacing routine sales tasks with AI and automation
  • 05:25 \\u2013 Reply now automates sending emails, follow-ups and initiating phone calls
  • 05:44 \\u2013 The development team is building more features to automate more sales tasks
• 05:53 \\u2013 Reply is a SaaS business
  • 05:57 \\u2013 Plans start from $25 to $120 per user
  • 06:03 \\u2013 Average pay per user is $90 per month

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• 06:14 \\u2013 Reply was launched in 2015
• 06:18 \\u2013 Current team size is 34
  • 06:28 \\u2013 There\\u2019s a sales team in Canada and the development and marketing teams are in Ukraine
  • 06:50 \\u2013 There are 15 developers
  • 07:20 \\u2013 Reply spends an average of $4K for developers
• 08:04 \\u2013 Reply has 1000 customers right now
• 08:15 \\u2013 Average MRR
• 08:21 \\u2013 Reply just hit $100K in monthly revenue
• 08:42 \\u2013 Reply raised capital a year ago with a small $400K seed round
  • 08:54 \\u2013 One of the investors reached out to Reply and to raise a round
  • 09:13 \\u2013 It was on a convertible note
  • 09:17 \\u2013 It was in March 2016
  • 09:24 \\u2013 Reply is now close to closing a big round of funding
• 09:34 \\u2013 Oleg decided to find out when it would be a good time to raise money
  • 09:42 \\u2013 Oleg reached out to some investors and used his software called Outreach
  • 10:03 \\u2013 In 3 weeks, Oleg met 15 investors
  • 10:11 \\u2013 Oleg then found out that they were still early for a round A
• 10:32 \\u2013 The sample email Oleg sent to the investors
• 11:26 \\u2013 Reply has been profitable for the last 4 months
• 11:38 \\u2013 Oleg has been operating at right around zero
• 12:08 \\u2013 Most of Reply\\u2019s money is spent on headcount and they\\u2019re just starting with advertising
  • 12:18 \\u2013 They are now spending on AdWords
• 12:43 \\u2013 Churn is, in terms of numbers, would be close to 5% and in terms of revenue sharing, it would be closer to 3%
• 13:12 \\u2013 Reply\\u2019s customers are adding more seats
• 13:39 \\u2013 CAC would be around $200 but will still varies and organic is definitely lower
• 14:03 \\u2013 LTV is if you just take all our customers, it would be close to $100
  • 14:19 \\u2013 But in terms of bigger accounts, it will be much lower to a few grand at least
• 14:36 \\u2013 Reply launched in Product Hunt some of their free products as lead generation tools
  • 14:59 \\u2013 They have a great number of fans in Product Hunt
• 15:09 \\u2013 Reply also creates content and promotes it
  • 15:16 \\u2013 Reply recently interviewed a lot of sales experts and they created articles
• 15:43 \\u2013 After the launch in Product Hunt, Reply had 10K visitors and 600 signups
  • 16:02 \\u2013 In terms of LTV, it will be close to 60K which is added from the Product Hunt launch
• 16:25 \\u2013 Oleg won\\u2019t sell the company for a million
• 16:32 \\u2013 Oleg\\u2019s valuation is around $20-30M
• 16:47 \\u2013 Oleg has a co-founder and the split is around 60/40
• 17:27 \\u2013 Reply provides equity to employees who have been with them for a year
• 19:12 \\u2013 The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

1. If you want to put your money to use, you can continue to invest in different businesses.
2. Outsourcing developers from other countries is more cost-efficient.
3. Be more realistic and be fearless.

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Resources Mentioned:

• The Top Inbox \\u2013 The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
• Hotjar \\u2013 Gives Nathan a recording of what is happening on a website or where are people clicking and scrolling on the website
• Organifi \\u2013 The juice was Nathan\\u2019s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia
• Klipfolio \\u2013 Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
• Acuity Scheduling \\u2013 Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
• Host Gator\\u2013 The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
• Audible\\u2013 Nathan uses Audible when he\\u2019s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books
• Freshbooks \\u2013 Nathan doesn\\u2019t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives