Oli Gardner. He’s the co-founder of Unbounce. He’s seen more landing pages than anyone in the planet. He’s a prolific international speaker and he’s on the mission to rid the world of marketing mediocrity by using data-informed copywriting, design, interaction, and psychology to create a more delightful experience for marketers and customers alike.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – How to Deliver a TED Talk
What CEO do you follow? – N/A
Favorite online tool? — UsabilityHub
How many hours of sleep do you get? — Maybe 3 hours
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Learn how to make decisions”

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:10 – Nathan introduces Oli to the show
01:49 – Unbounce is a SaaS business and a conversion platform for marketers which started as a landing page platform
- 02:00 – They just expanded to convertibles that have overlays that captures more leads and signups on the website
02:17 – Unbounce was launched in August 2009
02:33 – Unbounce has 6 co-founders
- 03:11 – Oli was broke and filed for bankruptcy
03:26 – Unbounce was initially funded by friends and family with $15K CAD
03:38 – Unbounce had a seed round and Angel round and has raised a total of less than 1 million CAD
04:12 – The 6 co-founders are all equal
- 04:22 – All are working full-time
- 04:50 – They’ve figured out a rough valuation
- 05:25 – 5 of the 6 co-founders are still active
05:41 – Team size is 184
- 05:49 – Members are based all around Canada and some in South America
06:14 – RPU is $93 CAD a month
07:05 – Unbounce lets anyone in for at least 2 years
- 07:11 – Their plans have been restructured in a way that is most beneficial
- 07:38 – Their $10-plan has been removed
07:57 – Unbounce now has professional marketers
08:10 – As Unbounce continues to grow, they’re trying to scale with their customers
08:33 – Unbounce currently has 14K active users
08:42 – You can create a demo account but you can’t get your own domain with demo
09:13 – Average MRR is just under $1.4M
09:47 – Unbounce had a problem with churn, like what most SaaS businesses have encountered
10:03 – “We know that you need landing pages for everything you do”
10:55 – 5% is the problem churn with Unbounce
11:30 – If Salesforce or Marketo have been integrated, the company is a larger company
- 11:47 – Overlays have been successful and there’s so much traffic and data
- 12:09 – Overlays are called overlays because they are similar to popups
- 12:20 – “We’re trying to be responsible with the technology because technology is not the problem, we are”
12:52 – Oli respects Bounce Exchange when it comes to the overlays world and they’re doing a lot with machine learning
13:06 – The biggest difference in using Unbounce is you will feel that you’re not using templated overlays
13:40 – Unbounce’s value is different from SumoMe and their targeting is getting smarter
13:55 – Most services like Unbounce charge $250-5K a month and Unbounce starts at $99
- 14:06 – There are cheaper ones in WordPress, but they’re not really good
14:21 – Oli is primarily a public speaker now and spends most of his time on the road
- 14:25 – Oli was actually scared to start public speaking years ago
- 14:33 – Nathan recommends watching Oli speak in public
- 15:15 – The rest of Oli’s time is spent with Unbounce’s marketing team and data scientists’ team
15:48 – Unbounce just got engaged with a new marketing agency
16:03 – LTV
16:14 – Unbounce had one marketing guy and he left, so they switch to a 5 digital local agency
16:33 – CAC
16:43 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Being broke should NOT hinder you from starting a business.
A great product with a reasonable price will always attract more customers.
Learn how to make decisions and don’t hold back.

Resources Mentioned:

The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
Organifi – The juice was Nathan’s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia
Klipfolio – Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books
Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t 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

661: How Unbounce Hit $12M/Year In Revenue, 14k Customers, Very Little $$ Raised with Co-Founder Oli Gardner

SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders