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Sharat Potharaju and Ravi Pratap Maddimsetty, co-founders of MobStac.\\xa0

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? \\u2013 Traction
• What CEO do you follow? \\u2013 Ed Catmull who wrote Creativity Inc for Ravi
• Favorite online tool? \\u2014 Rapportive
• How many hours of sleep do you get?\\u2014 5
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? \\u2013 \\u201cThat entrepreneurship is a very, very painful journey\\u201d

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Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 02:07 \\u2013 Nathan introduces Sharat and Ravi to the show
• 02:23 \\u2013 Sharat and Ravi were classmates since fifth grade and were roommates in college
• 02:53 \\u2013 MobStac is trying to solve the problem of online to offline device connections
  • 03:04 \\u2013 They use the technology of WiFi, bluetooth and beacons in mobile devices
• 03:17 \\u2013 Beaconstac is one of MobStac\\u2019s products
  • 03:22 \\u2013 It is a SaaS-based product that uses Bluetooth beacon technology
  • 03:29 \\u2013 It allows businesses to gather analytics
  • 03:34 \\u2013 It charges monthly
• 03:47 \\u2013 Beaconstac is MobStac\\u2019s main revenue stream
• 04:08 \\u2013 Businesses use bluetooth beacons that can be deployed to physical stores
  • 04:18 \\u2013 Beaconstac\\u2019s platform can then be used to track marketing and analytics
• 04:27 \\u2013 Pricing starts at $49 to $99 monthly
  • 04:34 \\u2013 The price will vary depending on the number of beacons deployed in any physical location
  • 04:45 \\u2013 Average cost per beacon is $5 monthly which is on top of the starting price
• 05:25 \\u2013 Beaconstac has a mixed group of customers, from mom and pop stores to enterprises
  • 05:57 \\u2013 Some would pay $50 a month and $5000 a month for others
• 06:04 \\u2013 There are currently around 10K beacons deployed in total
• 06:27 \\u2013 MobStac is a software company
  • 07:03 \\u2013 MobStac has partnered with a Chinese OEM who makes the hardware
• 07:35 \\u2013 The pay for the hardware is a one-time cost
  • 07:40 \\u2013 \\u201cYou own the beacons once you pay for the beacons\\u201d
  • 07:43 \\u2013 Charge per beacon is $22
  • 07:50 \\u2013 The margin is very small
• 08:07 \\u2013 They make revenue mostly from the software and not from the hardware
• 08:15 \\u2013 MobStac was launched in 2010
  • 08:24 \\u2013 It was focused in building products in the mobile space
• 09:20 \\u2013 After pivoting, first year revenue was not zero but it was small
• 09:35 \\u2013 2014 revenue was less than $250K with 10-15 people on the team
  • 09:54 \\u2013 Current team size is 20
• 10:00 \\u2013 The company is based in Bangalore, India but Sharat goes to New York as well
• 10:17 \\u2013 Last month total MRR is close to $25K
  • 10:22 \\u2013 Target ARR by the end of 2017 is 500K
  • 10:37 \\u2013 Which was only from the Beaconstac product
• 10:56 \\u2013 Beaconstac currently has 100 customers
• 11:12 \\u2013 One of Beaconstac\\u2019s biggest customer is Google India
  • 11:14 \\u2013 Google has deployed over 2000 beacons at 117 train stations
  • 11:28 \\u2013 It is the largest public Wi-Fi project in the world
  • 11:32 \\u2013 The beacons are used to send notifications and awareness to people who are waiting at the stations
  • 11:46 \\u2013 Sample notification
• 12:20 \\u2013 MobStac has raised $3.5M
• 13:07 \\u2013 The strangest customer acquisition strategy they\\u2019ve done
• 14:10 \\u2013 Google has made the beacon technology compliant with the chrome browser
  • 14:23 \\u2013 Someone who is near a beacon can receive a notification as long as he has a chrome browser and bluetooth on; no need to download an app
• 15:15 \\u2013 One of their customers is a freelancer who bought a beacon so whenever he goes to an event, the beacon will send a notification to other attendees to market his services
• 15:56 \\u2013 MobStac isn\\u2019t spending anything on paid marketing
  • 16:01 \\u2013 Ravi does some content marketing for the company
• 16:37 \\u2013 Cap table
  • 17:31 \\u2013 Sharat and Ravi still own more than half of the company
• 19:00 \\u2013 The Famous Five

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3 Key Points:

1. Don\\u2019t be scared to pivot if it is for the betterment of your company.
2. The easiest and cheapest way to market your product is by using it.
3. Entrepreneurship is definitely not an easy route\\u2014prepare your mindset for a rough (but worth it) journey.

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Resources Mentioned:

• Simplero \\u2013 The easiest way to launch your own membership course like the big influencers do but at 1/10th the cost.
• 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