Podcasts Business SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders 750: How to 3x Customer Revenue, Be More Than Just Document Signing

750: How to 3x Customer Revenue, Be More Than Just Document Signing

Published: Aug. 13, 2017, 9 a.m.

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Mikita Mikado. He\\u2019s the CEO of PandaDoc, a company founded to accelerate the way organizations transact. He\\u2019s an entrepreneur, engineer, and executive focused on creating self-sustaining companies.

Famous Five:

  • Favorite Book? \\u2013 Pitch Anything
  • What CEO do you follow? \\u2013 Satya Nadella
  • Favorite online tool? \\u2014 Google Calendar
  • How many hours of sleep do you get?\\u2014 8
  • If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? \\u2013 Mikita would tell himself that he doesn\\u2019t have to focus on making so much money and just focus on learning as much as he can

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Time Stamped Show Notes:

  • 01:24 \\u2013 Nathan introduces Mikita to the show
  • 02:03 \\u2013 Jared Fuller was in episode 193 of The Top and is still part of PandaDoc
  • 02:25 \\u2013 PandaDoc helps organizations the way they transact
    • 02:39 \\u2013 all kinds of transactions
  • 02:52 \\u2013 PandaDoc focuses on deals that have substantial value and paperwork
  • 03:06 \\u2013 PandaDoc can build proposals, quotes, contracts and close deals in a digital fashion
  • 03:30 \\u2013 PandaDoc\\u2019s RPU has increased since last year
  • 03:56 \\u2013 Annual deals
    • 04:10 \\u2013 Average customer pay
  • 05:10 \\u2013 PandaDoc gets most of their customers from word of mouth
    • 05:32 \\u2013 Using SEO to expand operations
  • 06:15 \\u2013 PandaDoc gives their small customers templates that they can use in their deals
  • 06:58 \\u2013 The marketing team finds keywords that are most popular and relevant to them
    • 07:20 \\u2013 They use Moz and other tools to find keyword
  • 07:59 \\u2013 PandaDoc isn\\u2019t built on top of PDF
  • 08:03 \\u2013 The templates from PandaDoc are in HTML and not PDF
  • 08:41 \\u2013 QuoteRoller was the first product that was launched in 2011
    • 08:56 \\u2013 Pivot to PandaDoc at the end of 2015
  • 09:06 \\u2013 Team size is now 106
  • 09:23 \\u2013 The last year total raised was $4.5M in cash and $2M in debt
    • 09:41 \\u2013 Currently, debt has been paid
    • 09:50 \\u2013 Total amount raised is $19.5M
  • 10:17 \\u2013 PandaDoc has more than 7K customers
    • 10:30 \\u2013 2 different cohorts of customers
    • 10:55 \\u2013 PandaDoc has a legacy product and a new product
  • 11:22 \\u2013 Gross churn is satisfactory
    • 11:50 \\u2013 From last year\\u2019s revenue churn, it was 9%
    • 13:21 \\u2013 Some inbound marketers use PandaDoc to close a deal then will stop using it
    • 13:50 \\u2013 5% monthly logo churn is high for Mikita
  • 14:38 \\u2013 PandaDoc has around 100 team members and 2 are focused on target customers
  • 15:13 \\u2013 CAC and LTV varies
  • 16:00 \\u2013 Mikita is trying to get under 12 months of payback period
  • 16:29 \\u2013 Fully weighted CAC can be $1200
    • 16:48 \\u2013 How Mikita assumes CAC
  • 18:47 \\u2013 The industry\\u2019s rule of thumb for payback period is 1.13 of ACV or 14 month payback period
  • 19:05 \\u2013 PandaDoc has channels with a payback period of 6 months and 2 years
  • 19:29 \\u2013 PandaDoc has an outbound sales team that is their delta force
    • 19:54 \\u2013 The outbound sales team finds the industries that PandaDoc should target
    • 21:05 \\u2013 Paid spend total is under quarter of a million
    • 21:19 \\u2013 PandaDoc is closed to hit a million in MRR
      • 22:08 \\u2013 \\u201cWe want to make an impact\\u201d
      • 22:22 \\u2013 This is a horizontal product
    • 23:47 \\u2013 PandaDoc focuses on workflow and the actual collaboration on the workflow
      • 23:58 \\u2013 \\u201cWe want to system of records for deals or transaction\\u201d
    • 24:05 \\u2013 PandaDoc isn\\u2019t going to the CRM space
      • 24:18 \\u2013 Mikita has been in the CRM space before
      • 24:43 \\u2013 One of the challenges of CRM now is the emergence of AI
    • 27:12 \\u2013 Mikita\\u2019s consideration on price of acquisition
    • 30:20 \\u2013 The Famous Five

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3 Key Points:

  1. Create a product that can serve a different market and fill the gap that the others haven\\u2019t seen.
  2. Let your goals guide you, but also keep in mind that having a business means being responsible for your employees.
  3. Multiple revenue cohorts will lead you to multiple marketing and sales strategies.

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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
  • GetLatka - Database of all B2B SaaS companies who have been on my show including their revenue, CAC, churn, ARPU and more
  • Klipfolio \\u2013 Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
  • Hotjar \\u2013 Nathan uses Hotjar to track what you\\u2019re doing on this site. He gets a video of each user visit like where they clicked and scrolled to make the site a better experience
  • 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

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

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