In this episode you will discover important strategies that drive a business forward. Procedures such as the importance of customer feedback to create a product or service that they really need, using automation to speed up repetitive chores, and developing a remote work culture that embraces the team spirit.
Listen in as Peldi explains his thought processes on boosting productivity within his fully remote workplace and reveals the one important skill that everyone needs. He walks us through how he and the team at Balsamiq do more with less.
In this episode you will discover important strategies that drive a business forward. Procedures such as the importance of customer feedback to create a product or service that they really need, using automation to speed up repetitive chores, and developing a remote work culture that embraces the team spirit.
Listen in as Peldi explains his thought processes on boosting productivity within his fully remote workplace and reveals the one important skill that everyone needs. He walks us through how he and the team at Balsamiq do more with less.
Ben (00:00):
Hey, I'm Ben and you're listening to Get More Done a YouCanBook.me podcast. Each month. YouCanBook.me, Saves tens of thousands of customers and millions of users. Time by automating their scheduling needs avoiding back and forth emails and miscommunication. Because of this, we wanted to explore other aspects of productivity. Each episode, we talked with business leaders to learn how they do more with less leverage automation and ultimately help their team get more done. On today's episode, I caught up with Giacomo Guilizzoni, you may know him by his nickname, Peldi. Peldi is the founder and CEO of Balsamiq, a wire framing tool that speeds up the prototyping process. During our conversation, we discuss, how over the last 14 years his team have used the power of customer feedback to improve Balsamiq and he shares some ideas on how to build a good remote culture. Enjoy.
Ben (00:59):
Awesome. Welcome back to the, Get More Done podcast where we talk about all things productivity and getting, getting things done and crushing goals. Today I'm sitting down with Peldi from Balsamiq Peldi, the legendary Peldi. Thank you for, for coming on. It's awesome. To awesome. To talk with you.
Peldi (01:14):
Thank you guys for having me. I'm always excited to, uh, support a new podcast.
Ben (01:18):
Yes. Great. And we're, we're happy to have you. So we typically start these conversations with an icebreaker question and this one for you this week is, one, I think, you know, you'll, you'll knock out of the park because you've been around and, you know, so much. So what is one important skill you think everyone should have?
Peldi (01:37):
I think it's, uh, a minimum knowledge of a scripting computer, not programming, just scripting, just automating those tedious tasks that everybody has to do in their life. Just the other day, I had to create 33 spreadsheets that were all similar to each other. And instead of doing it manually, I created a ripped in an hour and a half and now forever a test that used to take me two days will take me two minutes. So I wish that they spend more time in high schools, teaching people the basic of just plain, uh, boring, uh, scripts.
Ben (02:20):
Yeah. And I'm, I'm keen to learn more on that. How would I, and more about, about scripting? What do you, what do you recommend? Well,
Peldi (02:26):
I mean, um, I, I was thinking about actually looking up, uh, if there are any, uh, classes, uh, uh, dedicated to that because you don't really need all of the knowledge about programming. Um, it's really very, um, procedural, right? Do this and then do this and then do this and this. So I think you can start, you know, the, if you're on an apple machine, there are tools that allow you to kind of script everything you do, uh, on different apps. This particular example was, uh, Google, uh, drive, uh, go, it's called Google apps, uh, scripting where you can let you can instrument any Google docs or Google spreadsheets to do stuff. Uh, and it's really easy and basic. The documentation's actually pretty good. So I guess I would, uh, take a look at any repetitive task that you have and see if, uh, it can be automated.
Ben (03:26):
Yeah. That's a great, great advice. And I'll, I'll be sure to put something up on the blog about, about where people can get some more information on that cuz saving time is what we're all about here and, and making
Peldi (03:36):
That's easier, everybody.
Ben (03:38):
So, so of efficiency, you know, you've mentioned that you've been obsessed with efficiency ever since you were young. So do you have any good stories from when you were a boy of where you've like created some process or you've created some efficiency from back in the day?
Peldi (03:53):
Yeah, it's interesting. You know, my, uh, my wife calls me Rainman sometimes <laugh> I think it as accomplishment. Yes. Yes. Um, but I've always OB been obsessed with, uh, uh, I'll tell you one story when I was, uh, maybe 10 or 11, I would go to school on the bus and I had to walk home from the bus, uh, stop every day and I could go three different and they were more or less the same in terms of distance. So for days and days I would, uh, walk home counting the steps and trying all the different ways until I found one that on average took less time and less fewer steps. And then from then on, that was my route home for years and years. Yes. So I don't know what it is. I find it fun. Um, I find it frustrating to see when, uh, people waste time on things that could be done so much better. And I love seeing people who say, oh my gosh, this is magical. You know, this was so painful and now this, I, I can go home and with my family instead of, uh, wasting my time doing it. So I love to do it for other people, but I love to do it for myself too. Yeah.
Ben (05:10):
I totally know where you're coming from of just that like itchiness when things are, you're doing it over and over again, or there's an easier way to do it. And it's kind of, some people say call it the lazy person, but really you're just, and you're like, I don't wanna do that work. How could we do it or take those steps in your
Peldi (05:25):
Example? Yeah. I mean, uh, there's a, there's a, there's a threshold though. I feel like for instance, the, uh, spreadsheet example for, uh, for years we did it manually and it was fine cuz we had, we started with 10 spreadsheets, uh, and the format was kind of still not solid. So automating it too early is also a problem. It doesn't really make sense to automate something if you're gonna do it once only, you know yeah. Better to spend some time learning and letting the dust settle. And then when you know, that automation really is going to be, uh, a game changer that's I feel like the, the right time to do it. Yeah. Not too soon.
Ben (06:07):
Yeah. That makes total sense. Cuz you wanna get the process in place and then automate it. Yeah. When it sound. Yeah. And you know, speaking of doing things better, uh, background of, so of you were working for another company you saw a need and you just went and built, built the company and you were profitable within a few weeks, which is, which is wild. And the company's been growing ever since this, we mentioned, you know, as we, you and I were talking a bit earlier, do you wish that you started the business sooner? Uh,
Peldi (06:33):
No. At some point I did have in my career year, I did have sort of a niche because I was living in San Francisco and it's pure madness there. So if you're not starting something you're a total loser <laugh> uh, so I got sort of, uh, trapped in the, in the trap for a bit, but um, so I thought maybe I'll start something, but it was clearly too early. The first thing that I did when I, uh, had the idea was to buy a business book and this was called, uh, you have to be a little crazy, the truth behind starting your own company. And I made it to page 16 before I realized that I was not ready. This was not for me, so not attractive at all. So that kind of stopped me for, uh, three or four years before I, uh, I was, uh, I thought of, of starting again, but it's interesting cuz even Al was started as a way to reduce in efficiency. Mm-hmm <affirmative> because I was, uh, spending a lot of time. Uh, we were wire framing on a whiteboard in a, in an office and uh, I would've to go back the sec the next day or later after the meeting and copy everything from the whiteboard to digital. And I thought this is so slow. I'm just making a copy of something that already existed. If we had started digital already, I wouldn't have to spend this hour doing this. So that's how, kind of the, the idea started really.
Ben (08:02):
Yeah. And that that's, it's amazing just to see that need and you're like, there has to be a better way. It's like the infomercial where it's all black and white and you're like, no, there has to be a better way. And you're like, but wait, there's more. Yeah. But we'll just build it, build it out and, and all now. Yeah. And the wire framing tool, I mean, it's so easy to use and I love, uh, like the not, not rudimentary, but just low fidelity, low fidelity, exactly low fidelity. So then people aren't caught up in just making it look exactly like this is just the prototyping phase and I love how, you know, you niche down into that. Well, that's
Peldi (08:33):
Really what I was trying to do. I was trying to replicate the whiteboard. Yeah. That, uh, uh, as close as possible, there is a lot of you in, uh, uh, making it look like it was hand drawn because people then don't get fixated on colors or yeah. Uh, the size of the logo or, you know, pixel perfect design. There's a time to do that later. But initially when you're just hashing out the structure of each webpage or screen, you really want something that looks really, uh, sketchy. Yep. Uh, sketched out, uh, so that, uh, you focus on the structure rather than, uh, the details.
Ben (09:08):
Yeah, exactly. It makes so much sense. So, you know, you've grown ball from just you and the early days. And I think brought your wife on early on too, to, to help out in a little bit. And now how, how large is your team? How many people you have on your team now?
Peldi (09:21):
Uh, we have 33 people probably gonna hire a couple more next year, but we haven't hired anybody in a couple of years, which fills me with joy. It means that we are finally reaching our, uh, natural size, ours, sustainable size. And I gotta say, uh, everything is easier if you, uh, are not constantly, uh, hiring, uh, or you know, churning, uh, employees, uh, because people learn how to work with each other much more. There's not any sort of jostling for position or giving people, um, delegating, uh, after a while it kinda stabilizes and, uh, and people can just focus on doing the work. Yeah.
Ben (10:01):
And, and tell, tell us a little bit about how you're keeping the team that small. So I assume you have some internal processes that help you all do, do more at scale and kind of be, be super efficient. So any, any big process that you have in place that, that helps your team save a ton of time?
Peldi (10:15):
Sure. Well, um, where can I start? We, we, everything we do, it seems like as a CEO, a lot of my job is to spot inefficiencies and help get rid of them, help, uh, make it better. And sometimes it's via software, sometimes it's via process, but you know, for instance, one, one area where a lot of companies grow once they scale is, uh, the support team, which I think you come from. Right? Yeah. Uh, originally now in our case, I've always been afraid of that. And so we've always prioritized bugs over new features because we really want our product that is super solid. Uh, if there's something that causes a, the cause of support, we'll fix that first, we'll drop everything else and fix that first. And so after, you know, 14 years, we have a very solid product and we're able to support a million plus customers with six people, which also do support kind of part-time they also do other things. Yeah. That I'm really proud of. I feel like that is a very efficient way to, to, to run your company. And it's not that hard. You just have to make sure that you, uh, you prioritize, uh, bugs over, uh, other things, uh, even just a little bit, but over time it adds
Ben (11:33):
Up. Yeah, absolutely. And, and how do you, how do you build those feedback loops? I mean, how does, how does that communication go from the support team through to the product team and then
Peldi (11:41):
Engineers? Well, uh, we have a tight feedback loop with our customers, which is the most important thing. If customers don't care, they don't tell you about the bugs. You're not gonna know about them. And so that's, that's the main problem. So you have to make sure you cultivate that, uh, very well. And we do that by offering, uh, a lot of different channels to contact us. We have forums, we have, uh, a forum on the website. We have emails, we have phone, uh, we have a slack community and we listen on Twitter and, uh, all sorts of, you know, anywhere where people mention were listening, then, uh, the support team, uh, we have, uh, a, um, sort of a, a bug tracker, uh, called, uh, pivotal tracker, which is very lightweight, is really just like a list where you can rearrange pretty much. So it's very easy for, uh, for or team to add things to it, uh, to make us more efficient.
Peldi (12:37):
I wrote a little Chrome extension that, uh, allows people to file things into pivotal tracker, from the forums or from wherever they, they find it, whether it's a tweet. So it adds the link and, uh, the form, you know, it's very easy. So that's how the, we, we capture everything and we have a culture about capturing more is fine. Even if it's already filed, don't worry about duplicates, better to have a duplicate than not capturing it at all. And then we have a process where each, uh, product team, we have different product versions. So each product team meets once a week, it's called the priority review board, uh, and it's, uh, engineering, lead, product management, QA, and support. And we go through whatever was filed in the last week. And then we decide, okay, is this worth, uh, fixing now? Or do we put it in the future bucket?
Peldi (13:32):
We tag everything, make sure that we can, we can find in the future. And so that's how we stay aligned and, uh, aware. Now, if it's something urgent, we have a slack channel called fires. Yep. <laugh>. And so if, you know, the server goes down or something, the support team chats in there, they have the phone numbers of all the people that are engineers that are on call. So it, it kind of depends on, on the priority or I think, but we have, uh, you know, a lot of different ways and we're, we, we think that, uh, you know, because we prioritize bugs over everything else, we really value the opinion of the support team when it comes to, uh, making roadmaps, for instance, uh, every quarter we have a roadmap meeting and every team proposes, what, what should we work on next quarter? And we have the support team and what they say usually goes <laugh>, uh, you know, even more than me as the product manager, I usually add my stuff last, uh, because I feel like, you know, we'll do it. If there's time, if it's solid enough, then we'll do it. Otherwise we'll focus on bugs and
Ben (14:41):
Chores. Yeah. That, that's amazing to see that you are just focused on that core and fixing those bugs and that feedback loop and that prioritization and aggregation happening all the time. And everybody involved in that conversation. That's really, really awesome. So I don't think a lot of software companies will do that cuz they'll be focused on the next big thing, the next shiny thing rather than stabilizing everything.
Peldi (15:02):
Yeah. Well, I mean, it depends on, uh, when, uh, your, how young is your product, right? But because if it's, uh, if it's so young that you haven't found product market fit, then, um, you know, you can be, you can have a, a perfect, super solid product that no one wants. So of course you gotta prioritize some features too, but those come from support too. Mm-hmm <affirmative> support tells you what are the features that people are asking for, right. Yeah. So I think it depends for us, uh, being a, sort of a mature product. Now we, we, we like to do a mix, uh, of things, but we do a little more bugs rather than other things. Yeah. That
Ben (15:45):
That's really cool. And you, you spoke briefly about that Chrome extension that you, that you built out. How have there been any other like experiments or things that you you've kind of built that you are you're proud about that has, has helped your team?
Peldi (15:57):
We have, uh, maybe seven or eight internal tools that we built to work better. Some of them are very small, like taro extension. I built another Chrome extension that helps, uh, with our sponsorships people on the way website submit a form that goes into help scout. And I wrote this extension that scrapes the help scout data and puts it in Google spreadsheet with two clicks, right. So simple things, but also another giant internal tool that we built is called dacha tie. And it's a full blown project management tool with, uh, you know, who's working on what project, you know, it's, it's, it's a, it's a full on product, but it's built specifically for the way we work, which is kind of flat, not really deadline driven, but anyways, if we can't find anything on the market, that is, uh, exactly what we want. We're not afraid of building a, a little version of it. In fact, <laugh> maybe I shouldn't say that, but we built a little scheduling tool <laugh> uh <laugh>. Cause you can book me was great, but we were using, uh, a 10th of it. And so, um, and then it was missing one tiny little feature. And so instead of, uh, switching to another big rich tool, I spent five days for fun and I built a little internal version as a, kind of as a learning experience. And, uh, it just does what we need and nothing more. Uh, and, uh, we like it. Yeah.
Ben (17:32):
<laugh> well, speaking of to, in your improvement after this, I'll, I'll get what that feature is and I'll, I'll prioritize that for you, get it, get it built in <laugh>. Um, but that's awesome that you are, you are building up those internal tools just to help, help your team along. And I know that comes with the whole, uh, set of headaches where it's like, you're trying to update those and keep those in place. So it's, you know, it's, if the need, is there you feel it with the tool and kind of manage that yourself?
Peldi (17:55):
Yeah. You definitely have to resist the, not invented here, uh, uh, syndrome where, uh, oh, we only use our own thing because, uh, because we're better than everybody else. These tools require, uh, on the maintenance security patches, uh, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's it's a whole product. So, um, so do it, do it carefully, but I feel like people are sometimes too careful where they will be happy spending another $15 a month on a third party tool where, where really they could spend $1 a month with a five day investment of development, you know, mm-hmm <affirmative> yeah. And there's also a, a thing about, uh, privacy with, uh, GDPR and everything. We've really decided that we want to compete on being the most privacy conscious, uh, company. And so the, we actively try to reduce our, uh, list of third party vendors that get our customers data, because if they get the, the shortest, the list, the less the risk of a breach for our customers.
Peldi (19:04):
Yep. Right. And so that's why now we replaced some tools that we used to pay for, for, with internal tools, because that way the, the data stays with us and no third party, uh, company, uh, gets it and you know, that's nice, but it's not a great news for our industry as a whole. Right, right. Cause, um, cuz that, I think it, it, it means that there's gonna be some consider where, you know, in our, in our case we've switched things to AWS because they have a, a, a similar tool than what we were using. But since we already have AWS on the list and since they're known and accepted, you know, it's the new IBM people used to say, no one got, ever got fired for choosing I B am. Yeah. Over another vendor. Right? Yeah. Now AWS or Google or Azures, they're the big gorillas. And I feel like they're eating a lot of the little, uh, infrastructure kind of tools, uh, out there, which you know, is sad for, for little industry, especially for bootstrap little companies.
Ben (20:09):
Yeah. But that, I mean, that vertical integration may makes sense, cuz you're saying, you know, you're already using this tool, expanding into their other offerings, just keeps that data in one spot. And you know, like you mentioned, it is a bit of consolidation people getting to this first party data, avoiding third parties just to mitigate that risk, which is imperative. And as long as you're updating those internal tools, then you know, it's all all good to, to keep things, keep things is close to the cuff. Like you mentioned, for sure. So, you know, you are famously relaxed and informal and super transparent. And you've also mentioned, you know, multiple times that you are trying to figure things out and you're not the expert, but is there anything that you actually insist on in your company, anything that has like the PEL D stamp that, that has to be done this way? <laugh>
Peldi (20:52):
Well, first of all, nobody knows what they're doing. That's one lesson that I've learned over time, especially the ones that say that they do, that's the side of insecurity right there. <laugh> so, you know, if you're listening and you feel like a fraud, don't worry about it. Everybody's the same. So that's an interesting question. I think that I can answer that by saying, what are the things that I'm still doing that I've, that are the, the last ones to delegate? Uh, right. These are the ones that I want to keep, uh, uh, working on directly. And, uh, I'd say the first one is the company I'm still the CEO. And um, so I ultimately responsible for the company, company culture and, uh, vision and direction for the company itself. Similarly, the main product, I'm still the product manager for the wire framing editor. I feel very strongly about what should go in and what shouldn't. And then, uh, I guess in a lesser extent, kind of what kind of marketing we do, uh, is still something that is on my plate. The fact that we're people driven conversation driven rather than data driven. That's something that I've had to kind of fight tooth and nail to maintain. But again, I feel like this is one of the things that I might hire someone to take over next year. So that's, uh, that's one thing where I feel like I'm, I'm getting ready to let go a little more.
Ben (22:25):
Yeah. And on that, I mean, you've mentioned that you wanted to step away even further and remove yourself entirely for the business, but it sounds like that's, um, an uphill battle cuz you're still involved in so many things. So how, how
Peldi (22:36):
Is that? Well, it takes time. Yeah. It takes time. So the reason I wanna, uh, quit so to speak is, uh, that I don't actually want to quit, but I wanna make sure that the company can work well, even without me, because the main goal is to build a multi-generation, uh, business. Uh, if I'm able to do that, I feel like I will have left the legacy in my life and not just for the business for the sake of itself, but because we clearly have a mandate from the market that there is a problem that needs, which is, you know, conveying your ideas in the early stages, right. People have this problem and will have this problem forever, cuz there's always younger people that, uh, come out and, uh, and have new ideas. Right. So I feel like if I'm able to build a business that is able to solve this problem for a more than my lifespan than I will have done a good job, I, I will have left the world in a better place than, uh, than I found it. So that's what I'm working on. And I feel like to do that. I have to be able to, uh, step away completely. I see it as a five year project. Uh, I think we're in year two, two and a half. We think halfway, uh, hiring someone to do takeover marketing is gonna be a step in that direction and then eventually, uh, hire someone to take over product and et cetera, et cetera. We'll see what
Ben (24:05):
Walk us through. What three years from now, what does that look like? What are you spending your time doing then? I think,
Peldi (24:11):
Well, first of all, if I'm not needed anywhere, it gives me the freedom to work on what I want to, whatever I want, which is awesome. I can imagine actually myself spending time going, uh, one to on with each employee and seeing how they work and seeing what they're doing inefficiently <laugh> and fixing that for them. Yeah. <laugh> absolutely whether with, uh, you know, teaching them some tools or building some tools or just coaching them on how to work in a different way. Uh, I've been around for a long time and uh, I I'm pretty fast. So I feel like I have a right now, I don't have the time to do this kind of coaching one on one coaching. So if I'm free to do that, I would like to spend time doing that. And then I can see still being involved in the, you know, roadmap, uh, and the company kind discussions, but maybe once a quarter until it's no longer needed. Right. Who knows?
Ben (25:12):
Yeah. Do you think your, your team will do, do well with you over the shoulder, helping them, helping them out or <laugh>?
Peldi (25:18):
Well, I think, uh, I've done a few of these sessions and they've been well received. Uh, so I'm not, yeah, I guess we'll see. Yeah. We'll if I I'll have to do it the right way. Right,
Ben (25:29):
Exactly. And, you know, speaking of your team, you know, your, your company is one of the first, fully remote companies. So how do you all maintain a strong culture and kind of strong bond as being a fully remote company for the last 14 years now? Well,
Peldi (25:43):
Uh, it takes work. It takes effort. Uh, you guys have remote too. So, you know, in fact bridge and I did a session at business with software, a workshop, uh, a few years ago, specifically on this, where we listed a number of different efforts that we, uh, we do for, uh, for, uh, sort of creating a sense of teamness, uh, when everybody's remote. So we do things well, clearly we do, uh, uh, in person, uh, company retreat once a year. Uh, we haven't done it in person, uh, because of COVID the last couple of years, but we've done virtual ones where, uh, for a week we kind of get together on zoom, but not to talk about work. Instead we did like, uh, uh, we do like, uh, eighties aerobic, uh, uh, dance class. We've done a, uh, facials, uh, spa treatment. Uh, we've done, uh, yoga classes, meditation classes, a lot of cooking classes.
Peldi (26:42):
So we try to do, um, a lot of these kind of, uh, these kind of things online. And then we do different programs that might last for a while. And then they go away. For instance, for a while we had, uh, what we call the, uh, Friday fun time. So every Friday we would put four people at random, uh, from the comp, uh, into a zoom for half an hour to discuss weekend plans and just, you know, spend time with people that you don't normally work with. So we did that for about a couple of years and then, uh, people lost interest. So we stopped. So we came up with another thing which was, uh, personal Petta CCHE. So every ACHA is a format, a PowerPoint where it's 20 slides, 20 seconds each, and they, um, advance automatically. So the whole thing is maybe seven minutes.
Peldi (27:32):
And so each person would create a presentation about whatever they wanted personal. I did one where I took photos around my house to show people here's my office. Here's what I have my coffee in the morning, you know, simplest things. And then some people instead did things about their father and, uh, you know, inspirational. And we left, we cried, then we, we grew, uh, closer together because of these things. So we did a whole cycle of those and then we stopped. So basically there's a lot that you can do, uh, and you should always look for something to do. Uh, always have a couple of programs going at the same time and, and, uh, over, uh, over time. Uh, it helps.
Ben (28:15):
Yeah. I, I love the idea of just new things and that spot native, getting people together. Uh, we do something similar like that, of, uh, anything but work calls. So we have a, you can book me page or you can book anybody in the company and it's supposed to be for 15 minutes, but usually it goes for 30 or 45 minutes, cuz it's just nice to connect and, and talk with everybody. So, I mean, speaking to you personally, as being like a CEO and working fully remote, how do you combat just like maybe the loneliness that, that settles in from that experience?
Peldi (28:44):
Yeah. I used to joke that working remotely is great for the first couple of years and then it gets really tough and, uh, and it's true, but I feel like maybe after eight years it gets <laugh>, it gets easier again. <laugh> so, um, I think what you develop, uh, you, you understand that work cannot provide you with the same things that it provides. If you go to a physical office, if you go to a physical office, you don't only get colleagues, you also start making friends with your colleagues. You go out after work, uh, you go to lunch together every day, right? That unfortunately the remote experience a doesn't offer. So you have to do two things. I feel like one is kind of accept this reality and uh, um, accept, you know, grow a little bit more detached from your work than you would normally be.
Peldi (29:41):
I think that's healthy to do that. And the other thing is replace these social interactions with, uh, something else. So we, uh, give people, uh, we expect that people will spend five hours every week during work time to do exercise. And we often, we, uh, uh, encourage people to take up, uh, sports, uh, team sports, uh, or team activities like Zumba or, you know, whatever group classes rather than individual things. Uh, because as humans, we really need the human interaction. I joined a book club, uh, for instance, and that's where I get my intellectual stem and human interaction that is not about business and not about software. Right. So I feel like over time, uh, we've all learned how, uh, to do these kind of, uh, these kind of remedies, uh, for loneliness. A lot of us have, have pets. Uh, you know, I have a dog with me in the office all day and a lot of us, lot of employees do as well. So I feel like you, you start learning, um, looking for the connection outside of work. It, I think it's an opportunity for, uh, some businesses, right? This is gonna be more and more of a, of a need of people. So if you can build something where it's easy for people to make friends or get out of the house and do something social, you know, I took a bunch of, uh, woodworking classes, uh, and, uh, I'm gonna start a ceramic class too. And again, try to take group classes rather than individual classes.
Ben (31:15):
Yeah. Kind of get out there, get, get in the mix and, and get that. Cuz like you mentioned, you don't get that in a remote environment cuz you don't have those spontaneous meetups and everything. Yeah. Um, really awesome. So one thing that's always been interesting to me as I was doing some research is that throughout the growth of your business, you've been really transparent and documented everything on your website. So how have you seen that level of candor impact the relationships with your customers?
Peldi (31:41):
Yeah, when I started in 2008, it was because my goal was to build a single person business forever, a small, small micro, uh, software vendor. And so, uh, I didn't expect to have anybody to, uh, help me think through things. And uh, I have to either have a conversation or write things down in order to really think through things. I can't really, um, predict things in my head without verbalizing them. And so at the beginning I would blog sort of as a, as a tool to help me think and to genuinely it was a cry for help from people who, anyone who's reading this, please tell me what to do. And so, so I did it for myself, but also for, because I believe that when every relationship with a customer is kind of like a long term relationship. And so you wanna base those out of, uh, trust, mutual trust.
Peldi (32:40):
Uh, and so I didn't, I never wanted to lie. And even if when I was a one person company say, you know, oh, we have a department that does this. Right. Uh, I, I never wanted to look bigger than I was because I felt like I was lying to my customers. And that's no, that's no basis for a long term relationship. I would rather, you know, exactly who I am and how I work that way. I don't have to, uh, it's a lot less effort <laugh> right. I just have to be myself. And so back in 2008, when I started that it was radical and I got written up in the New York times because I was writing everything now, building in public is, uh, trendy and kind of expected. Uh, so I'm glad to see that because, uh, as a user, uh, I feel like there's a lot less posturing, uh, around.
Peldi (33:30):
And uh, and um, I think the world is better because of that. So I think we've always had a, a good, honest, uh, transparent really with our customers. And I feel like that's part of our reason for our success because it really cultivated this tight feedback loop that you need so much. Uh, cuz we know exactly what we need to work on next. Our, our community tells us loud and clear and we, so we haven't had a, a, a problem, uh, creating a roadmap for 14 years. We know exactly what the roughest edge is now. Right. If we didn't have that, that we'd have to look into analytics, the crystal ball and uh, you know, um, instead I feel like if you start on the right foot and are transparent, people will get on board the same train that you are going to, they start rooting for you and they will help you along the way. And it's just so much
Ben (34:28):
Simpler. Yeah. And that, and that trust, I think, is solidified when you're like pushing out changes that they're asking for. And they're like, I'm, we're listening to you. We're responding to you. Absolutely. So, so, you know, let's, let's talk really quickly about the future of a, where do you see what's on the horizon for you? What's on your next roadmap? What are you, what are you all excited about?
Peldi (34:45):
All right. So there's always two products. One is the product. One is the company. So, uh, product wise, uh, we're in a very good place right now because, uh, we're not doing anything big. We, uh, we spent five years rewriting the whole code base and, but that's done. And we shipped that a couple years ago. We fixed all the bugs in the new code base. Now we are back to a very healthy, uh, mix of new features and bugs and chores and, uh, and it's great. Uh, it really feels, uh, really fast because people can see, uh, what we're doing, the release notes, uh, you know, show that a lot of what we do before, when it was mostly bugs or chores, the release notes were short. Then people thought that we were going slow, but we were actually going fast just doing invi invisible things.
Peldi (35:35):
<laugh> mm-hmm <affirmative> so product wise, uh, we are, uh, shortening the to-do list. Uh we're we're finally, uh, uh, shipping all the features that people have asked for for many years. Uh, and one by one we're we're getting them out there. So, uh, there's still a lot to do, but the product is pretty mature. So, uh, a lot of these things are, uh, there's few are big things that we have to do. Uh, so that's kind of going, uh, very well. And, uh, and it's a fun period right now that said, I do see something on the horizon that might be big, another big effort, which is that we might have, uh, messed up our, uh, business model, our pricing model because we, we, uh, price our, uh, SaaS by project, but everybody else in the market, uh, prices it by user. And so our customers are very confused when we say unlimited users.
Peldi (36:32):
They're very confused. Of course, we think that if you have more users, they want more projects. And so it's really the same thing, but because we're kind of odd, the odd one out, uh, I feel like we're hurting our customers, uh, our prospective customers, uh, with that. So switching to a user based, uh, uh, business model is a big effort, uh, much than, uh, than you think, uh, at the beginning. So who knows maybe next year, we'll start, uh, making a roadmap to tackle that. Uh, and that could be another big project for the next couple of years, then company wise, uh, we are in the middle of where, you know, progressing in the, in my effort to, uh, be able to, uh, to, to not be so critical. And so we are in the middle of a process to, uh, uh, create these, uh, groups and areas, uh, and teams, and basically the, the main, uh, uh, new thing is that we're finally gonna have, uh, people, managers, official people, managers, which is something that we have been, uh, we never had before. And, uh, we've been sort of lacking. Uh, so that's, that's going well, that's a nice, slow process because when it comes to people, things it's better to go slow. I've learned that <laugh>, but, uh, we're making good progress there.
Ben (37:54):
Yeah. Sounds, sounds like an exciting times ahead with adjusting the pricing model and, uh, getting your to team kind of in a, in a, in a, a stronger spot. That's really great to hear. So where can the audience go to learn everything that you
Peldi (38:06):
Are you're working on? We have a giant website, we just added another 50 pages all about our company culture and how we do things. It's b.com like the vinegar, but with a queue instead of a C at the end. And, uh, I was just looking, it has 777 pages and about 800 blog posts from 2007 on. So it is a GI website. You can find a lot of, uh, pretty much everything we've learned, uh, on there. And we have a office hours program where, uh, you can, uh, sign up to meet with, uh, one of us to discuss various things. Um, so I encourage people to, uh, do that if they're interested.
Ben (38:51):
Yeah, very cool. We'll throw that up on our blog as well, to link to your blog and, and everything. And there's a lot of great information on there. So anybody listening, be sure to check that out at, uh, B Balam with the q.com. Awesome. Pedi. It's been great to talk with you. Thank you so much for coming on, get more done and sharing, you know, your insights of growing your business and everything you've been working on. Really exciting to see, and your set up for success. Can't wait for you to be out of your, and still having your business grow. So thank you
Peldi (39:17):
So much. Thank you, Ben. Thank you for this podcast. I'm excited to start listening. It's uh, you know, yes, right at my alley. Yeah.
Ben (39:23):
Efficiency. That's what we're all about. Absolutely, sir. All right. Thank you so much. Have a good rest of your day. Bye. We appreciate you listening to get more done. Be sure to subscribe on your favorite platform and feel free to leave a review also of this episode with anyone in your network that may benefit from the conversation. If you or someone you know, would like to be a guest, please reach out to community@youcanbook.me, visit, get more done. You can book.me, find us on twitter@youcanbookmeortheforumforumdotyoucanbook.me. I'd love to hear your feedback, catch you on the next episode.