Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#1

Post by palidanx » Fri, Jul 12, 2013, 6:55 PM UTC

I have a SAAS site where small food producers can create nutrition facts labels online (http://www.menutail.com). They have to subscribe to a monthly plan to use the service.

However after that first lead, I ran into a problem immediately on how to get more clients.

Farmer's Markets - In Person: The first thing I did was to hit the ground and visit all of the farmer's markets around Southern California. Luckily there are quite a few here because of the great weather. But as you can probably see, this yields to a scalability problem where if it is just me, there are only so many leads I can pursue.

From visiting about 5 farmer's markets, I did yield one new client. But what made the trips worthwhile is I talked with a vendor who won some food award which brought me to their website. Amazingly, the website had a list of all of the vendors who applied with their e-mail address.

Data scraping: The next thing I proceeded to do is to scrape all of the food award websites which had e-mails on it. With that I generated my first list of contact e-mails. I sent e-mails soliciting my product to them, and continued scraping different lists and sending e-mails.

From there I acquired my third and fourth paying clients with pretty minimal work just by sending the e-mails and fielding some questions.

Re: Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#2

Post by palidanx » Fri, Jul 12, 2013, 6:56 PM UTC

(More info continued from main thread)

My 2 cents:

+ If you are starting a b2b saas app, immediately think about how you can generate some e-mail lists to hit. I know it's crude, and we hate getting e-mails, but it can work in outreacing to customers. I actually got a sale not from an e-mail, but from a recommendation from someone who received an e-mail.

+ Selling a subscription is much different than selling a single product. It may take days up to a month for them to think about their needs and to see if your saas fits their needs. Treat all your leads nicely and help them even if it doesn't get you a sale. They may come back.

+ I wasn't able to get any leads from LinkedIn groups or connections yet.

+ Be very upfront about your value proposition in your e-mail to the point where they don't even need to click to view your website. What I found most effective was stating what we do (Nutrition Analysis for $40/month), and attaching a sample pdf so they can see what they are getting.

+ Still hit the pavement and visit as many clients as possible in person. You may not get a sale, but you may learn information on how to get a sale through other means.

+ Fiverr ROCKS. There were some sites I needed scraped, and people did it there for a great price.

Next steps:

+ Currently I am a little overwhelmed in managing all of the client lists and conversations. I'm thinking of investing in a customer relationship management app, or spinning something simple up myself.

+ I need to move away from the archiac method of sending e-mails through gmail. I already got my gmail account suspended twice. I'm thinking about integrating Mailchimp into the CRM workflow

The first client: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5628779)

Re: Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#3

Post by cdvonstinkpot » Fri, Jul 12, 2013, 7:01 PM UTC

palidanx wrote: post #2

(More info continued from main thread) My 2 cents: + If you are starting a b2b saas app, immediately think about how you can generate some e-mail lists to hit. I know it's crude, and we hate getting e-mails, but it can work in outreacing to customers. I actually got a sale not from an e-mail, but from a recommendation from someone who received an e-mail. + Selling a subscription is much different than selling a singl…

Congrats on your success! As for GMail, my 2 cents is that it's an unprofessional image to project using anything other than your own domain for email. I use Fastmail with my own domain right from the start on my projects. Get a domain for a year & add it to a 'Professional' Fastmail account & set up an alias. The initial 'Professional' account setup is the expensive part if there is any to be considered expensive. I think it's worth while.

Good luck, however you do it.

Re: Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#4

Post by palidanx » Fri, Jul 12, 2013, 8:56 PM UTC

cdvonstinkpot wrote: post #3

palidanx wrote: post #2

(More info continued from main thread) My 2 cents: + If you are starting a b2b saas app, immediately think about how you can generate some e-mail lists to hit. I know it's crude, and we hate getting e-mails, but it can work in outreacing to customers. I actually got a sale not from an e-mail, but from a recommendation from someone who received an e-mail. + Selling a subscription is much different than selling a singl…

Congrats on your success! As for GMail, my 2 cents is that it's an unprofessional image to project using anything other than your own domain for email. I use Fastmail with my own domain right from the start on my projects. Get a domain for a year & add it to a 'Professional' Fastmail account & set up an alias. The initial 'Professional' account setup is the expensive part if there is any to be considered expensive. I…

Thanks! I actually use google apps for domains, so it shows the company domain. But I definitely need a more robust e-mail campaign service as I always seem to be hitting the limits.

Re: Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#5

Post by Bluz » Wed, Jul 17, 2013, 3:54 PM UTC

palidanx wrote: post #2

(More info continued from main thread) My 2 cents: + If you are starting a b2b saas app, immediately think about how you can generate some e-mail lists to hit. I know it's crude, and we hate getting e-mails, but it can work in outreacing to customers. I actually got a sale not from an e-mail, but from a recommendation from someone who received an e-mail. + Selling a subscription is much different than selling a singl…

Hey, contgrats man, it's far then most of us have so you should be proud.

Regarding the Email issue - Use Mandrill (http://mandrill.com/ - from the creator of Mailchimp) it's perfect for transactional emails like yours and they allow you to send up to 12,000 emails per month for free :D

Good luck with your venture man.

Re: Show HN: I just got my fourth paying b2b client

#6

Post by palidanx » Fri, Jul 26, 2013, 4:13 AM UTC

Bluz wrote: post #5

palidanx wrote: post #2

(More info continued from main thread) My 2 cents: + If you are starting a b2b saas app, immediately think about how you can generate some e-mail lists to hit. I know it's crude, and we hate getting e-mails, but it can work in outreacing to customers. I actually got a sale not from an e-mail, but from a recommendation from someone who received an e-mail. + Selling a subscription is much different than selling a singl…

Hey, contgrats man, it's far then most of us have so you should be proud. Regarding the Email issue - Use Mandrill ( http://mandrill.com/ - from the creator of Mailchimp) it's perfect for transactional emails like yours and they allow you to send up to 12,000 emails per month for free :D Good luck with your venture man.

Thanks bluz! I def will be checking out mandrill!