Gavin Zuchlinski, the founder of Acuity Scheduling—the slickest way for businesses to automate and manage their appointments online, allowing clients to schedule themselves. He’s a self-professed tech geek and an espresso-maniac who wholeheartedly believes that business should be totally fun.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Anything You Want
What CEO do you follow? – Andy Grove
Favorite online tool? — Canary

Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “8 and a half hour is my ideal number”
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “Spend more time doing the things you enjoy doing.”

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:37 – Nathan introduces Gavin to the show
02:09 – Gavin is on his 4^th espresso for the day
02:25 – How Acuity Scheduling generate sales
- 02:30 – SaaS to manage scheduling appointments online
- 02:48 – Developed for Gavin’s mother
- 03:00 – 2006 started
03:21 – Start of Gavin’s business
- 03:48 – 2007 first year in business
- 04:05 – Only a side project
- 04:54 – First year revenue
05:21 – Transition from working as a government employee
- 05:50 – Organic search results and SEO
- 06:24 – Had friends’ sign up on private link
- 06:45 – 2013 decided to shift
- 07:15 – Hired the first employee
- 07:50 – “Keep things small”
08:20 – Number of users on free trial
- 08:50 – Number of users at the moment
- 09:25 – 10% month over month increase
- 09:50 – Number of users in the past week
10:54 – 85% active users on paid accounts
11:46 – Most SaaS count their total base
12:57 – Growth from organic results and referrals
13:54 – “When the rate of growth gets too high, that’s when I need to hire”
14:07 – Total team size
- 14:18 – Everyone is remote
- 14:40 – Support works for only 6 hours a day
- 15:18 – Team size question is Gavin’s pet peeve
16:06 – Growth customer churn is about 8% per month
- 16:18 – Dashboard churn
16:40 – Current customer acquisition cost on average
- 16:55 – 10 dollars to acquire for paid acquisition
17:12 – Total marketing spender
18:07 – Total expected earnings from a new unique customer
- 18:58 – Monthly RPO
19:37 – Gavin’s bootstrap
19:50 – Goal for the company
- 20:08 – “Create a company where I enjoy working”
20:47 – Connect with Gavin thru his website and LinkedIn
22:40 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Sometimes, you just have to choose – and choose what makes you happy.
Small team has advantages too – it’s easier to manage.
Just be patient and let things grow slowly.

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 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.
AcuityScheduling.com – Gavin’s website
LinkedIn – Gavin’s linkedin account
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

EP 429: SaaS w/ 16,000 Customers, 2007 Launched to Help Schedule, with CEO Gavin Zuchlinski

SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders