Matthieu Jost, who founded his first company when he was 17 and exited it when he was 21. Most recently, he started Misterb&b in 2015 and has become the world’s largest gay hotel brand in the world. Listen as Matthieu shares how he managed his first business at an early age and how Misterb&b grew exponentially in less than 4 years.

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – N/A
What CEO do you follow? – Brian Chesky

Favorite online tool? — RJ Metrics
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Being less naïve maybe”

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:31 – Nathan introduces Matthieu to the show
02:00 – Matthieu’s first company that posted TV series was sold to PlanetSeries (French equivalent of IMDB) for about $1 million
- 02:33 – The team composed of 4 people
- 02:53 – The company sold series’ merchandise
- 03:18 – Matthieu built the company
- 03:38 – Matthieu studied Computer Science for two years to work in a radio station
04:38 – Matthieu shares how Misterb&b is different from Airbnb
05:00 – Misterb&b is a marketplace
05:25 – The sellers are the homeowners
05:36 – “It’s not only for gay men, we are open to everyone in the LGBT community”
- 05:45 – There are straight women using Misterb&b because they find it cool and much safer
06:10 – Misterb&b is taking 4% from the host and 12% from the traveler
06:27 – Average booking for 3 nights is $300
06:40 – Misterb&b was founded at the last quarter of 2014
06:50 – Misterb&b was bootstrapped for 6 months and went on raising capital
- 07:02 – Total funds raised was $5 million
07:10 – Team size is 22
07:44 – Currently, there are 80,000 hosts in Misterb&b in over 135 countries
08:00 – Misterb&b has an average of 80,000 bookings per month
08:22 – Most of the travelers are solo travelers
09:16 – First year total transaction volume is 300K
09:35 – Total transaction volume for 2015 is $3M and 2016 total transaction volume goal is $7M
09:58 – Misterb&b is seasonal
11:00 – Misterb&b’s 2015 average revenue is $480,000
11:12 – Misterb&b’s 2016 revenue aim is $1.3 million
11:24 – Misterb&b is working on different types of ads
12:05 – There are around 300K people on Misterb&b’s email list
12:12 – Average opening click-thru rate is 14%
- 12:50 – People are paying Misterb&b a flat-rate and they are getting 15,000 clicks
- 13:00 – Misterb&b also works with non-media companies
13:46 – 40% of Misterb&b’s travelers are repeaters
14:28 – Follow Matthieu’s company on Facebook and visit the website
16:33 – The Famous Five
- 17:16 – RJ Metrics was at The Top Episode 233

3 Key Points:

It is always advantageous to start your business as EARLY as possible.
Life is about making a choice; don’t be afraid to step out and make that decision.
Misterb&b is about building a worldwide community that promotes safe travel without discrimination.

Resources Mentioned:

Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel
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 the quality of Toptal
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.
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
Facebook – Matthieu’s business Facebook account
Misterbandb.com – Matthieu’s business website
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

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EP 500: $5M Funding, $1.3M Revenue For LGBT Lifestyle Traveling like AirBNB with CEO Matthieu Jost