For the first six years, we ran our company out of offices. We’ve experienced everything you could out of an office, from expanding into bigger spaces, growing the team, launching products, hitting milestones, etc. For the past two years, we decided to make the drastic switch and ditch the office to become a fully remote company. After comparing the two experiences, I can confidently say that there are clear overall company benefits of working remote.…
Since I started being more active on social media, many people have been asking me “why do you blog and podcast?”. My answer is an important lesson that I think several people can get value from. First, one of my jobs in running a SaaS company, is developing strategy. A lot of my own strategy and thought-process is done through writing. I’ve been writing for several years now. It helps me absorb my thoughts and…
I recently attended a live podcast panel discussion in Toronto, hosted by Drift. The main focus on the discussion was on marketing, specifically branding. The topics really resonated with me in my current journey and stage with Web4Realty. In most cases, startups don’t think about branding in the early days. The early days are all about the grind- selling, gaining traction, building out your team, looking for efficiencies in your processes, and more selling. Assuming…
There are very few things that can make me lose sleep at night. One of those things are negative reviews. Although negative reviews in our company are very rare, they always sting- really, really bad. Each negative review is even worse than the last. Reading a bad review feels like getting punched in the gut. Negative reviews suck, and they always will. However, negative reviews are inevitable. As much as you strive to be the…
When you’re several years deep into your startup and becoming more mature as a company, it’s very easy to lose sight of what got you to where you are - your early clients. The clients you acquire in the first two years of business, are all taking a chance on you. They know you’re a startup and anticipating issues, yet for some reason, they’re giving you their business. They’re investing their time and resources into…
Throughout the years of managing a growing team, there are a number of observations you make and situations that arise that get you thinking about people, in general. When your company‘s headcount starts growing, you naturally start observing character traits, mindset, and psychology of people, among many other things. One of those thoughts is the question of work ethic versus skill. When you’re in a dynamic startup-type environment, there are several ups and downs which…
Some people are born with certain skills and intuitions that come naturally. There are no guides, rules, or courses for managing cash flows in a small business. Although there are certain things anyone can do to help with cash flow, the majority of it is through intuition and deep understanding of the business. I also believe it would be very difficult to train someone to manage cash flow successfully. Below are 10 tips on how…
Since day one, we’ve always preached that our company’s bread-and-butter was our customer support. That sentiment holds true, nearly eight years later. The evolution of our company’s support department has been one of the most challenging to execute, and the most rewarding. In a very competitive industry, one of the differentiating factors you can provide your clients is amazing customer service. If it’s relatively easy for clients to move to another provider, going above and…
Remote companies and company culture usually don’t go hand in hand. When you think company culture, the thoughts usually consist of an open office environment, daily huddles, a nice lunch area to hang with your co-workers, cool boardrooms, and of course the company ping-pong table. When we took our company remote, we didn’t really know what to expect. As with most of our business decisions, we usually use our instinct and do what feels right.…
In the last couple of years, I’ve become a pretty frequent podcast listener. Podcasts are particularly great, because they allow you to absorb an incredible amount of content, while doing other things at the same time. Unlike watching a YouTube video, where you have to focus all of your attention on the video, podcasts allow you to listen while doing other things like working, travelling, or working out. Since I run a SaaS business, I…