Amit Shanbhag, co-founder of RocketReach.co, a company that allows users to lookup email addresses, phones, social links, etc. for over 250 million professionals worldwide. Amit bootstrapped to RocketReach from zero to over a hundred thousand customers including Apple, Google, and Morgan Stanley to name a few. He has more than a dozen patents and started his professional life writing code for geo-stationary satellites. He loves open water swimming, watching cricket, and spending time with his 4-year old son.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – N/A
What CEO do you follow? – Marissa Mayer

Favorite online tool? — Google Drive
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Live the moment and enjoy what you have”

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:53 – Nathan introduces Amit to the show
02:33 – RocketReach is a sales management tool
02:54 – RocketReach was founded in 2015
03:03 – Amit and his co-founder used to work for a SaaS business
03:15 – They tried to get information from www.data.com for user acquisition
- 03:25 – They realized that the data is 85% inaccurate
03:31 – They tried different tools
04:25 – Team size
04:40 – Completely bootstrapped
04:51 – They tried to raise a small round
- 05:18 – Went to institution investors
- 05:27 – The terms were not profitable
- 05:40 – Amit stopped fund-raising after 6 months
05:58 – They had 10,000 customers in March
06:40 – Companies that are the competition
07:35 – RocketReach is SaaS and has monthly subscription
- 07:40 – Plans are $ 49, $ 99 and $ 299
- 07:46 – Salespeople and recruiters are the biggest user base
- 08:30 – Most of the users are from the $ 99 plan
09:10 – MRR
09:40 – They were doing a lot of outbound in January
10:04 – Most of their users now are from SEO
11:18 – Customers who buy access to RocketReach API
- 11:38 – They are considered as competition
12:29 – First year revenue
- 12:45 – Total of $ 15 from October 2015 to December 2015
13:02 – March 2016 is when the growth started
13:40 – Did a deal with 500 startups companies
14:40 – Gross monthly churn
16:40 – Lifetime value
17:17 – Company expenses
18:09 – The quality of data that RocketReach has sets them apart from their competitors
18:30 – Comparison of RocketReach and Email Hunter
19:50 – Goal for 2016
20:53 – Decent offer in the SaaS space
21:15 – 2-digit percentage average monthly customer growth
22:15 – Connect with Amit through his website and Twitter
24:00 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

First year revenue is not always what you’re expecting.
Improve your product to the point it makes your competitors, your customers.
Live for the moment and enjoy what you have.

Resources Mentioned:

Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers.
Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible.
Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts.
Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+
Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email.
Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel.
RocketReach.co – Amit’s website
@RocketReachco – Amit’s Twitter handle
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

EP: 465: 120,000 Customers, About $200k MRR, $10M 2017 ARR Goal with RocketReach.co CEO Amit Shanbhag

SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders