Pietari Suvanto, cofounder of the company, Vainu. Vainu was founded recently and is a tool that defines piles of data from the web and turns into fact check and actionable company information. His vision is to understand more organizations around the world more than anybody else and his company currently has about a thousand customers in Europe, including FedEx and Santander Innoventures.
Famous Five:
Favorite Book? – How to Win Friends and Influence People What CEO do you follow? – Mike Bloomberg Favorite online tool? — Zoom Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Be a bit more braver”
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:12 – Nathan introduces Pietari to the show 01:50 – Vainu is a SaaS business model 02:40 – Pietari shares a company that is searchable in Vainu 03:06 – Salesforce has a lot of organizations around the globe 03:50 – The uses of companies’ data in Vainu 04:12 – Vainu gives the company’s in-depth data 04:30 – Salespeople are the ones who uses Vainu 04:49 – Vainu’s revenue stream is from the subscription per seat 05:05 – Average customer pay per month is €400 05:21 – Vainu was launched in 2014 05:33 – Vainu hasn’t raised capital 05:37 – Vainu is based in Hilsinki, Finland, Amsterdam, and New York 06:00 – Number of paying customers is 1000 06:30 – ARR in 2016 €4.5M 06:55 – MRR goal in 2017 07:20 – Vainu is finding their customers through their software 08:07 – Pietari shares how they find the companies 08:50 – Vainu can check the company's’ data in preview 09:30 – The number of salespeople in Vainu’s team 09:55 – Gross customer churn is 1% 10:05 – CAC 10:24 – Assumed LTV per customer 10:40 – €20K-30K 11:04 – Pietari is hoping to raise capital 11:36 – Pietari would likely to raise €5-10M 12:30 – Pietari shares how they are different from their competitors 13:20 – Vainu hasn’t bought any API access to any data providers 13:30 – Everything in their system is owned by them 13:50 – The best asset of Vainu 14:50 – Pietari shares how they access the revenue data 15:50 – The Famous Five
3 Key Points:
Be the BEST in your market, having an asset that will set you apart from your competitors. Raising capital is always an option, but not always a necessity. Be brave—step out and believe you can do it.
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 Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket 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