#283 – Making $8k/mo Targeting $100M/yr with Lukas and Liz Hermann of StageTimer.io
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It's up to.

yeah what's gone on, man.

who would we got today? Liz and luis hermit, i'm excited about the harmans. You know what i'm decided about?

Look and his wife is there is sort of a team running company together, their APP. I think they make eight thousand dollars month, not back in january, so maybe more. Now they have like this, very simple too, that I think anybody will look out a bit.

I build this like a weekend. No, I can build this. And like usually it's on a week, like six months or something, but I could build this very easily by myself.

But they're may even like a hundred k year from IT, right? And also like that's like I mean, he was working as a software engineer and thinking to college of the engineers because like A D K A year start up, you can underpaid by I start up. And he quit that and now is making more than that as an any hacker from something very simple that he boost strapped with his wife. And you know, anybody, anybody is basically free. He's living the andy hacker dream.

Yeah yeah. By the way, I feel like that detail of like literally simple on the from the surface i've been seen everywhere lately, like I, we posted a couple of stories of people that are building A I companies and every single comment section has one, two people. Go on, wait minute. This is just two A P I calls that yeah.

a super simple AI is like next level, like I was posting about A I I think a couple days ago because I ve got the same new boat or Anderson kubot new best crees like A I journalists sends us like little reviews of people, submission the I and tell us how what .

ratio of your time you're spending figuring out the names of these botts first .

is actually like fifty, fifty. I would say it's hard to come with the good bot names, but I.

why do you use the bottle to name the box?

I should. I ve tried IT. I sort of got to put names in the GPT for IT sucks.

I mean, tried to use IT for creative writing. It's not that good. Now coming up like create writing is that that could be funny.

It's part is in the problem but yeah created right?

Yeah it'll it'll like get your creative just following is a good for brain storming. But anyway, I mean, I posted about this bottle and people keep asking me like, oh, open source IT right? A guide.

Like, no, no, no. Like it's like not that much good, like the vast majority is by OpenAI. So there's a lot of cool stuff to build nowadays, super simple.

You know what also is cool about, uh, lucas and his life was not just that they're building something really simple, but that they are incredibly ambitious. So here, let me see this thread. I think you see this thread, so a twitter thread very first week of this day. Yes, i'm going to get rich and this is i'm gna do IT he's he's not like, oh, no, I hope to make some money. He like, now i'm to get like, insane, wealthy and like, I like the baby of pointing to the outfield exactly where is going to .

hit the ball he's he's not hey, guys, I made something, has tag golding in public.

Here is what's up with us. I like guys. We were just talking about your thread, luis. And I think it's amazing the vast majority of my d hackers are not that ambitious.

Like Shawn party for my first meeting came on our show like very recently, he was kind of like you guys to do a small boy stuff, you know, were all about big boy stuff on in my first million and like I look at your tweet and like you're like the same attitude, right? You've got this APP it's very cool. You're just getting started though.

I mean, even you're twitter background, you've got like these three mountains and the first mountains is like a little stick figure walking up IT and it's like a million dollars a year in revenue. And there's another mountain after that is little bigger and it's like a hundred million dollars a year in revenue. And the third mountain is like something crazy.

And then even like your progress bar, like every ne hacker is like the same progress bar under like your twitter profile where you've got like the boxes and on the left is like zero dollars on the right to your goal, you color the boxes Green the further that you get. And most of us are like, yeah, ten thousand dollars a mouth. This like my goal are, you know, twenty thousand and years is like a million dollars. So city.

they were like one. And by the way and by the way, we can't we can't let them like I I want to like read a couple of highlights from the sick thread. So number one, you're like I cancel my interviews.

I still look for work because you're to gotten let off, you know? Like but i'm going to be a rich first. I'm going to stop selling my time for money that all boodle p of a product i'll scratch my age. You can like go through.

I'm going to a make a lot of money, then i'm going to start my second company and then you do something that so funny, which is you predict a point that happens in a lot of people's journey that they always blind size them. You specifically go, then i'll have a midlife crisis. What am I even doing?

I reach my body goals. I've living the life my parents retirement I secured. What next that I remember? Like now I have my financial freedom. I'm excited about my space sex, right? Like you, you completely draw this thing out in a way that like even the people who do reach these goals, don't see like all the steps coming the way that you've like, laid IT out.

Yeah, it's prety cool.

The funny thing here is we are big fans of my first million. And then one day out of the blue, sam started falling. And i'm a big sam fan, and he is a big show. And then other that follows me and I even tweet, or I think was by mistake but and then he answer, sam answers, said, no, no, I like what you are doing and that's why I followed you. And then a few weeks later, he tweet itself and actually saying, and then i'm going to be interviewed on my first movie and that was always started following him as, okay, yeah on the pair to you yes.

I must go as like, i'm gonna this kilo tweets and I even looked up the disney story spine that's like you things all the time and then happens this and then have insist but one day and then have and it's like, okay, I am going to write a tweet exactly like the the pixar story, the big and entirely work so let's .

let's clue people under what you guys to do in here, your APP. As I mentioned earlier, it's very simple, but it's very good. It's called stage timer dot IO. So let's say i'm running a conference or an event. I've got speakers.

I want my speakers all know like pretty simple how much time do they have left in their talk is ten minutes, is thirty minutes, uh, and I want you to be like on some sort of laptop or screen or ipad that they can see what they're talking so they don't go over the top. But I want to also be able to control that, putting much everything about the time from, like the comfort of my seat. I know one actually running up to the stage telling and how much time has loved to pressing pass on the screen.

And so that's basically what stage timer I O is. You basically sign on to your website, you create a timer. You hold dash port of all these school controls to control the timers.

I can add time to IT reset IT, make IT flash. I have multiple timer, can show message. This is what or whatever I want I can do.

And then there's another link I can give people. It's A A special view to the timer that I said for my speakers. And I will just show them the timer and I will just show them any messages I send the timer that I can control. And that as far as I can tell that pretty IT. And I you charging like one box a one thirty box a month for this and you are last I saw eight thousand dollars a month in revenue.

Yeah A A more already.

Yeah, I am just talking. Everybody wants to build something to it's easily understand but that like makes you living and you're making more from this and you're making at your start up job yeah.

it's actually a bit of while you think if if you think that countdown timer like the the most unlikely think that anybody would pay money for makes me more money. So yeah, I saw supposed to actually where .

you I talked about coming up with your idea, I think is really fun. Y, I came about the idea because this is like the most generic started advice that was like, keep your eyes open for problems in the world and the one day you'll find a problem for solving and solving, and like almost nobody does that is so hard to do that. It's incredibly hard to just stumble across an idea.

But that's exactly what you did. You are at, I think, look, is a friends recording studio yeah and then you saw them like start a time on their ipad and then run to the control area to start controlling you. Like he didn't have a remote. He did like physically spend across the studio to do this .

timer exactly yeah. Like I I see him running, running in, you know, like clicking this one button on left of running back out. There must be a Better solution for this. You know, many people say, like, scratch your own edge, you know, make big business that did do yourself like and I looked around like, I wanted to somebody else is each, you know, I see this guy like, can I build something that that is a solution for inverse? I thought shurely somebody else has has made has made something I feel like whenever you look in the world and this, there's such an obvious solution to this problem that maybe you see because you have the background and everybody else just like doesn't know that that's the perfect business. And I like gona build in one weekend and of course, like you know like just very simple, put on the internet, put on read is like, you know who care to see if people want this, if people want to use IT.

I I get like, I get sceptical when I see things are obvious. I get this Better in a week. And somebody has to have already solved this problem, like he must be my friend who doesn't understand he's like running from the time of the control. Like he doesn't understand he's never to google this but like there's no way. You know it's two thousand and twenty three and nobody he's built like a timer that you do any research as you go back and to find out like he like does this exist?

yes. So I like on the very spot I try to find this solution and I couldn't just a simple website that you open half timer um that is remote controlled. So I build IT and afterwards I find like two or three solutions that are all the windows apps.

What's interesting .

is you did you did something at the opposite of what program said just a couple of days ago, he tweed, when Young founders built something that they don't want themselves, but that they believe some group of other people want, ninety percent of the time they're building something that nobody wants. And even then, you must responded, yeah, I was like like true.

But I I would say also, this is the thing about percentage is right. There is a still the thing of percent, he said night. So there is a still that first right. And i'm not saying that other people should do with, but i'm just saying that the smart thing in in lucas case that he he always summarizes, you know, of course, so so the story goes first.

But the truth is that he went on on read and he asked, you know, if if he could use count timer that would be controlled remotely, what would this need to have? And from that feedback actually created the first one. And then we went back to reit and told people that he had created that. So that's how he got the first user.

So I want to to be a different light and grain. He's right. I feel like in our tech bubble, everybody knows about this tech.

Things like all the tech problems have been solved with open source code and and five times already. But then you look at other industries, especially old industries, is made in meddle manufacturing, in this case like event organising, media recording. There's so much low him fruit that you as a, as a developer coming from. When I start up, you look at this like, I would automate this, I would change this, I would make this Better. There is so much loading fruit, I feel there's a lot of like remote problems to be solved for developers .

and other things .

until today. They see that all the time that people actually write us because they love so much the interface of stage time. They write and say, okay, do you have something like stage time before this industry?

So we get emails all the time. People asking like, okay, but do you have something like stage time before teleprompter? Do have something like stage time, you know? And then they are always mentioning things.

And we, like a man, are so many things that we could do in this industry. Again, these are low hanging fruit. There are still there to be taken.

It's faster because it's like in the world of technology, like if you are developer, the building tools from the developers, you are going to get up this like millions of products, like programmes ourself get every single little thing about every single thing. And somebody builds a library and somebody comes another library to solve problems of that library. And it's just like tones and tons of stuff.

So even if software engineers and andy hackers, i've already gone to some other industry like, let's say, insurance, and they have already built some tools there, they haven't built anything near what they built for software engineers. And so there's like guaranteed to be like something that you can build. And sometimes this is obvious is like, hey, like you should be able to control this timer with a remote, and this old city windows APP not good enough. But sometimes it's a little bit deeper. And I think that people can explore a little bit more here and try to figure out what's going on other industries.

absolutely. And there is, of course, is that the week, the big industry problems that probably are worked on, but there's always this little niches for the hackers. There are little problems that nobody really wants to solve because it's just not enough money in IT. But for a single person like like me, like us, like IT perfect and enough to grow a good business.

What was a Patty eleven had A A really simple APP for teachers. I forget what it's called yeah they go back in two thousand and seven and IT was the exact same story where it's not a super, super sophisticated product. And when he is talking to developers, architects like eyebrows go up like really you you're making a product out of that.

And the thing that he hammered the drum about all the time is like, look to us, this is just a simple APP. But to teachers are people who are not technical. This is magic.

right? Yeah, a little ally creating bingo cards by hand for these kids, taking them hours. We can know, use code to do this.

And like, no one's doing IT for them because programmes are only making apps for other programmer. You mentioned that you launched on redit because wasn't just like a singular moment. boom.

E, in an APP. I was like a six months process, and I found the post where you launch some read. I thought I was so smart how you did IT. Because the vast majority of indicators like ah you can't launch on redit, you can't advertise on redit, you're going to get banned. I've been kicked out of so many subjects bar blah, but I think I just do what is wrong. And I think, lucas, the way you did IT was the right way so you went to this is serve that it's called such r commercial AV and you made this post all advice for presentation timer APP in the making and just with your title, like I think you you killed IT because you're like, you know OK everybody come used my thing and advertizing ing blab ba blast famous famous family really and he needs some advice all of you like smart genius s people out there. I could really just use something like some tips so it's like disarming and away and then your post, you kept a real short and sample like everybody and building a presentation time after the runs the browser blab a blaw can give me some feedback about the features necessary question APP here's the current version and then you like literally put a link to your rap so you done like all the things you need to do. You put a link to your APP, you tobe what you're building IT and now you get like all this free feedback from people and probably like some of your first users and just that one post.

So I actually, first of I had to look for the separate is so hard to find the separated, if you're not knowledgeable. I found this too.

working, put connection to to.

yes.

like a look so cool, like a map.

Reit is amazing. And so I go there and exactly, I thought, okay, how do you can you post this so people actually wanna read IT and wanna respond, right? Read, you can exude, ate quickly and funny.

There's another tool, another timer, that launched like a year later in the same separated. And I I read these posts and I was aborted well. And he posted first one, everybody was excited.

And he posted, like every single, like every week he posted. And he Peter out, you can do that on ready is like, you ve got one post. You make IT sure you make to the point to ask for questions. You don't advertise, you got IT and then like, six months later, I like, okay, now I did IT hey with you, your help, I did IT a check IT out. What do you think .

mark IT was paid version that we launch paid .

version and I didn't paid version. I just like, thanks for your help. I build this thing and now it's a thing and it's awesome.

This hilarious comment on the your first dit post that I liked. I was like someone someone was basically talking about a different time. Rather, they found where you know, a speaker might have ten minutes, but you can actually speed up the timer.

So really only nine minutes go by, but the count down looks like it's cutting to ten. And it's like the most amazing trick for basically making serious speakers dung over time and everything runs smoother. You guys that you end up adding that feature to this.

literally the one oldest feature in our backlog. And I have I have not build yet because it's such a mind buckling .

hard task on a did .

we get some very funny request, actually, but we also get some ultima? Not anymore. But in the beginning, I was really funny building stage timer, really listening to the the users because we did not know any Better, right? We didn't know how this industry works.

So I remember the first time I got an email and the person satellite, oh, can you add this and this so I can build a run down with stage time? And and I like a run down. Then I asked to him the idea.

So he was really funny, entering in the story with no prior knowledge. But then also the user being right, teaching us and educating us. There was this one guy that was really funny.

I think he was one of our first early subscriptions. And he wrote LED, very like stanford. And he said, I love stage timer. And here are the things that I would like to see on stage timer. Because if you don't have these things by next year, then i'm not going to .

renew my subscription. I just gave your money and I have this next year guys like a lot.

the .

little yeah, you will know some because then we had exactly what a promoter d needs. You know, he was really organized and he mention the most important thing and we are very thankful for the the input of this guy and many other people that wrote us because we didn't know what they needed for the event production space.

We just hoped in a call. Hey, kid, can you ever, dear, can you tell us what do you actually doing? They just show .

and of course, the cool things that when you are dealing with early adopters, they are super excited, right? So they were actually thanking us for the time they were feeling so good, you know, for talking to to people that work for stage time. Until today, we get messages and even people saying, please send my thanks to the team, you know and then I just turned to look good, thank you. And that say, because people actually believe that we wear a larger team and recently, you even made a person than the person said, oh, you are one of the engineers and although, yeah well, a little more than it's .

cool because like what you're doing is basically proving that you don't have to solve in your own problem, right? And I think solving your own problem is a little bit overrated. Because the end of the day, like you trying to find like other customers, right, and they are going to be different than you no matter what.

Like even if you know an area inside now, other people are going to be different than you. And if you don't keep your ears and eyes open to listen to what like they have as problems on what they want, you're going to be debt and see. So didn't have to doing that from day one by solving like other people's problems.

And I like that you posted on the separate. And like you said, you posted like again. So you later only came back and you're like, okay, hey, spend six months.

Here's link to my old post. Thank you. And you're a super smart again.

What how you did IT like. Thank you so much for the advice you so great. It's so helpful.

Just see you you know like here's what the new product is like with all your advice added. So you're not like advertising. You're just like participating as a community member.

I tried to get people to do this from andy hackers for so long. It's so hard. You get like a group of ni hackers for founders together, put him on a forum.

Everybody just wants to advertise, and they think everybody cares about what they're doing and nobody cares about what are doing. They get about themselves. They want to feel smart, they want to feel important and they want to feel helpful. And like if I in one of the few people who did that, right and so I think that second red posts when you get when you got your very first paying customer.

yeah so I push out on twitter and I had like three hundred followers at that time. Like OK, nobody is gonna ad IT. But you know, that's what you do.

Build the public puit out, you know, treat IT out. And but the same night somebody purchases this is incredible. You know your first on online is some metric moment like them.

I contact the guy. I write him when twitter is like, he, like, why did you buy my thing? So I know from the first red edit post, and I just followed you.

And I, I love you. I love new things. I love what you doing a body right away and not me off that is from this first Better post. Actually, somebody purchase you guys.

Are you like how much to tweet? I know we reading that one twitter thread that you have, but I haven't really like I just followed both of you. How big is twitter? And you like marketing and grow strategies?

nothing. Because all the people twitter like this in the when diagram between the people on twitter and people that were a video, video life, video recording and an events is like this two over. Ch.

yeah, we just created actually now a twitter first stage timer. But IT is not at all our is not even a com acquisition channel for us, so is not a focus at all for us. And and then as luka said, the first users came from reit and then the coolest parties that I grew mainly through word of mouth in the beginning. So because this industry is so tightly mitted, so it's is just the way is for there as soon as they find something, they tell orders. And the most amazing part about this, the industry is, as you can imagine, they are great with video.

So I think ninety percent of these people are actually youtube s so what happened is that people started making videos about stage timer and and then we have these really cool videos made about stage time and that we didn't even commission is just because they are excited and they want na share with other people so every now and then we get an email from a user said, oh, I just saw that so and so mentioned you and then they send the video with a minute already you know that I should watch and is becoming this this tool in the space where people even reference already as if is like a uh house brand and and then for exam the other day, I saw that a be created in the space that he mentioned stage timer actually he he was using stage timer and then he mentioned that he wanted to do something related to a timer. And two people on the comments on the live on youtube set, yes, but you should check because stage time I actually allows you to do that was such a lot for me because I all look at that. They actually mentioned stage like me, is like nike, you know, it's like the nike of those space. And just like you don't have to say anything else, it's just stage time that is really cool to see that is developing like this in the industry.

That's awesome. And word mouth is minutes. I think it's the best type of marketing because it's your customers aren't market at the downside of IT is that it's relatively slow. And so you had your first you had your first redit customer, but what were you doing while your revenue grew by word of mouth? And like, look, I say, I know that at first you're working on to start up this is what were you doing?

So actually, I only joined a few months after he created the the paid version before I was working in in humAnitary arian work and ah I was working social development and so on and when I joined lucas in september one, I started helping him exactly to grow to one thing that look as was a and this again comes from the way he functions is that he called the big stage time is just like calling a clock o'clock, right?

So because he called the stage time, stage dimer S E O came by default, right? So when people a stage timer, then you would show we were already on the first page printing fast because of that. So this was already as you el then became the the largest actually word of mouth was the second largest growth channel, so to say.

And then since we saw that S, U, O would be the way for us, then we started tackling S, U. O more intentionally, and found out that the best way, because is such A A technical industry, is to just do technical logs or documentation even Better. Because these top of fun of silly blogs, you know, that usually you can do other project doesn't work in this case.

Because if I make those, we bring the wrong traffic. These are the people that won't convert because they don't need such, such a complex timer, right? So only enough.

One of the the things that brings us the most paying customers is a documentation about how to use a condom timer with O, B S. So we started to realize, okay, we have to go very technical, which is hard because we don't know the technicalities of the industry so well. But that's how we we then started growing, of course, then ads and and we keep expanding to to get more and more customers as a petting .

back a little bit, right? You ask, what what do you do with your time now? And I was in the same position. problem. Many people in the same position like our first dollar.

What do you do? What do you do?

Uh, so as one does I go on twitter and I ask, how do I do marketing for this tool? right? What articles do I population or annoy? And somebody said on the genius, they said, you know, some products are so simple, like if you're sell a horse, just say horse for sale, just say what IT is like yeah, I think my is so simple. So I I just created blog post of kind of documentation that says, here's how you use my two first step, this step, this step, click this button to this thing in order and and this are today the most kind of click and converting articles that we have.

Yeah I think I I run an airbnb and it's kind of in the same same like bucket, like the easy thing i've ever result like i'm just like, hey, I got a place you can sleep in IT and cost this much per here five thousand dollars th instant and it's so much easier than selling link the vast majority of like super complicated tech products like everybody's addicted to making like he saw stage time. You want to time your events like here IT is it's literally called stage timmer. You said you're killing to s like google stage time and you get the number one result is a pretty good place to be.

It's also one of the benefits of moving into a nt that doesn't have a lot of competition, right? You actually can get that, for example, that domain exactly.

I mean, the flip sides, you go on a reds, you look for your keywords and there's like c or traffic, but just like almost nobody's ranking for IT. And then you kind to start doing content and you realize OK there hundred, two hundred, three hundred people coming and they have be high purchasing intent. So these are enough for us.

So what's like working together as you two? You're married, right? Yeah yeah. China, I aren't married, but we're related.

Some doesn't want to kill each other, you know, works out really well, I think like the the most other typical advice like don't you know get into business with your friends and your family all for us didn't like literally the exact opposite. You too seem pretty happy. You vote, smile and in a mutually complimentary I haven't killed each other yet.

has a going well, I think I can I can say more about that because because of the point look at is loving this government and follow the other day, I even made fun on twitter and said like that is awesome.

You know, being married to your coal founder because you can have meetings as you go for walk or or as you go out to eat and then some very patronizing guide comes to me and says, like, yeah, once the pee colored glasses you'll fall, you're going to be part. We ten years married for seven and had worked together since the day one, because we met while volunteering. So I soon mad.

We started working together, and we did a lot of projects together while we were working in human eti an aid. Look, us came to brazil. We work together. So this is not our forest staying. And I think he works so well exactly because of that, because we tested the waters in like low risk environments before, and we knew that we work well together. And then when look is invited me to just join, and each time I was, I get this, this is tried and testing.

I mean, I had to do a calculation, right, because I might IT her eventually. And it's like, wise idea is a good idea. I know you can step back from bed. yeah. I A D and cold fond of your wife.

So I thought, you know, when when you look at families, most of them that the kind of you give up the different jobs and they lose of the things that talk about, and they are talk about. Is a watch on and then they get kids and didn't talk about the kids. And we know I thought, you know, if we do work together, we have something like we have a common interest of common topic.

So like a world that overlap s that we can use for dinner position and IT works great. Just an example, one exercise that we do when we want, we take a walk outside and and we see businesses like, you know, old selling cheese or selling me or something. And we think how we how do you revitalize or how do you grow this business? Just this child gives this channels to each other. And because we were both in this world, the other one came like, I do this. I think I do this.

I don't even know what other couples talk about. The we we do talk about series, okay, we just finish our favorite serious a succession and we talked .

about IT all.

But the the truth is that because we have the same interest to grow this one business, you know we have way more things to talk about and he's more far, they know to be in in each other other's company. And this game that we do, we have been doing that for quite a while already in this game of just looking around and seeing how we would improve, how we would cause.

Sometimes we see a business fail and you like, what could we have or how could we actually take advantage of this network effect here, you know, and we are all the time playing this game. And I see that this is also what makes us because we are we have side projects, stage timer, and we we usually get these ideas from these exercise and these conversations. So it's pretty .

one thing you said that's really underrated is it's not merely that both of you had tenure relationship, that you you knew what I was like to live together and you know just be together. It's that you also started specifically you did volunteering work together.

And so I think that one of the things when IT comes, like what we know working with friends, working with family and they're being tension that mum arises, is because you have totally different types of relationships with people. And so you might be like actually speaking your friends. Courtland Vincent woo one, a friend of the pod and and a friend of both of ours, used to run this, this company where called coder padd, where we talk people how to code.

And he taught his girlfriend had to code, and according to him, not to know if i'm able to share this, but like that ended up being like this huge transition in their relationship. They ended up not working out well. And I asked him for advice.

I said, hey, my girlfriend wants to learn how to code. Should I teach her? Do you have any advice for me and he just looked at me across the table was like, yeah, don't.

don't do and anyway and I what .

I say that was a useful conversation because I was like, hey, not leave. Here's love vince in told me we're going to put like a three months window on this. And I kind of like, know what of created all of these copia ts in the up, working out well.

I ve got to say the other thing also is that is not like I was employing, you know, and then look, us convinced me to become an interpreter. R, I think that's the other part. Sometimes when I twit about, you know, how code is to be made to a co founder, people say, ah, how can I convince my girlfriend? And I think this is the problem.

Mr, I think he was ellam ted through on the interview, like recently when people say, what what would you say to to like incentives if I to encourage a person to become an entrepreneur and he was like, no, if you need encouragement, become because doesn't work and I think is the fault you need to convince your partner to do, then IT doesn't work. I had businesses of my own. I'm from brazil.

So my businesses were in brazil in the past. So i'm not coming like, oh, let me give this a try. And my husband convinced me, and I think that's another important point here, is just that we are already had prior experiences working together. We already had started things of our own and together. So we have been testing this concept for quite a while and was fine too.

And I gonna get, this is credit here, because I was working for a start up, and they kind of rolled a roll down and like, like, stop this project I was working on, and they gave me a few months extra pay to to fight in your job or find. And this kind of was the one that contritely hate. You have this perfect opportunity now to go full time on your own tool, right? I was very small.

I didn't make a lot of money back then, but I thought, what? I have a few pay month. now.

Let let's use IT. Let's do IT. And he was the one I, without her encouragement, I might have not done IT, and we might not. So this is a good, good.

So you guys have a bunch of kids, and you're basically the family on succession. And you got kids fighting .

for your that then we talk so much about bad funy enough, the things that I never wanted to, to actually have kids of my own ah so we we had to talk a lot about even you know having kids of our own. I always wanted to adopt and we keep postponing.

So we having married, as I said, for seven years and he's always like I think in two years, we can we think and we are the both to to start you know like talking seriously now and we just talk less week that but let's have a two years so ever keep postponing. We do anna approach IT like a business to be ordered. I think you ouldn't be any different for us. I really hope that we don't end up having four kids like in procession .

because that I really is I.

I don't the show.

I yeah loving the show and emulating IT wildly different things. I think, yeah, I really love the idea of working with the people that you like like, I never go with my brother or mom, always like to tell them and chat out. Two of you work together.

I just like surrounding myself of the people that I care about, you know and like one of the biggest reasons that companies fails because coeneus don't get along right, like they don't compatible and not good at problem resolution or it's like just like the two of you guys had like, yeah practice right, china and I have practice. Like we fought for years and resolved everything. Like actually you will get pretty like no matter what happens.

Like we're not going to like break up over money. Like we're going to always be brothers. And so I want succession and I thought as far as you guys that you you finish to show, i'm like i'm taking my sweet time.

I don't want to be where you are. I don't want to be like done. But I watched like this whole family and it's like the terribly diffunce tional.

It's awful. Like it's really a show about bad people. But also, I like, I would be so cool. I had like all these people around me, he, I don't have to convent them to join my stuff like they all want to be a part of the thing that I created because it's so bad as I .

don't wanted spoil how he goes but like, I think you're are going to read three things .

that once you get to like everybody dies .

I haven't seen a single episode of that show court and you've convinced me. I think you've I think you've got good like TV show tests, so i'll check IT out. But one thing I do know is that I think probably mom hasn't seen IT either, but you probably loves the idea of that show because until you watch that show, I was convinced that you never wanted to have kids. And now this this like bug of, I just want to run my own family empire. I know because of that show.

like you brought all the most, I don't like the ten worse reasons to have kids. It's like just like ridden in number eleven, the bottom of the list of home when I want succession and IT was great. So I think you have another property that I think another actually be that anything is similar to like the family from succession, which is like this raw ambition.

So we I think chatting was like reading parts of your tweet earlier. But I want to read like I to read like actual tweet that you vote like a more detail because it's it's I almost want to just read like your whole twitter thread and then we talk about the old things. So you said, i'm going to get rich and this is, i'm onna.

Do IT, I don't get me wrong and my rich yet. And you eat. At this last march, I was Better year again. So I did my C. S. degree.

I were to the software developer, just like my parents expected every day, worked for my A D K year start of job in the last month. I was laid off because of that. I started looking for another job, but I don't want to have another job.

Working for someone else makes me miserable, so I cancelled my interviews. And you are talking about, your finance is right, like you don't have a tony money in the bank, right? It's not enough to make you rich.

So I onta become rich. And the first, on a stop selling my time for money, i'm going to boot shop a product. I'm going to scratch my own edge and to make a little money at first.

So do some francy, but only so so i've enough energy to improve my product. There are Better ways to make more money more quickly, but i'm not going to do this way. This critical teach me about how to onto company, build a product and how to do marketing.

It's a long term game, and i'm gonna arn. The rules after two years, making enough money, money to get by because that i'll stop financing and live in cheap, no car, no frills. So yes, the two of you are living cheap.

And then i'm going to start my second company. I look for a good market. I think about distribution or scratched somebody else is IT what we talked about, you scatchy somebody else is own.

And i'll do the thing that founder is supposed to do, a build a markable product. There are more lucar businesses I can build. I don't care.

I want learn how to many people, how VC money works and how to egg IT. I'm going to grow this business of ten million dollars a year. That's ambitious.

Take the VC money once I find a way to grow reliably, hire people who hire people until I finally a big exit. I'm now rich. Shawn and sam, for my first million, will invite me to the pot.

Life is great. Then is chatting with generly of a midlife crisis or not even doing. I reached my money goals and live in the life.

My parents retirement secure. What's next? Now I remember, now I have financial freedom. I i've experiences, I have a bank account. It's time for the final step to build my company.

And I think this is the third mountain in your twitter profile, the one that's like the moon shot a company. I'm excited about my own space ex. This company will be a lot of I think should exist, but nobody's willing to build or invest into the three printer, the atmosphere at carbon scriber, the photosynths script miner.

Then I am really, truly wealthy. Don't get me wrong. I don't care for rhes.

I just can't work for somebody else. New chAllenges get me out of about the morning. Getting rich is just a side effect. Follow me if you want to see me to see the fail. I love that.

That's like the most bad sweet to read a lad on the show every single part of IT a silicious fun and and you're GTA doing that. I mean, you're like on the path you're on dating statement. MERS is the one that get .

you to ten million dollars here. No one. I think one mail is possible. And and I have I have next one in in the world. I mean, they are there to hold for more like way I could be potential. But I also believe in the industry that we know now, and I believe I can we can build the product in this industry that makes that kind of money.

How do you get stage timer to a million right now? You're IT, you know a little over eighteen month. I think a million is like a magic nebba and hacker nose.

Eighty three thousand, three hundred and thirty three dollars a month. That's a million. So basic tenets, which is not crazy, right? That's a release to go one order magazine, you have a point to get there.

So this have a protection in our in our crushed and we say, okay, what was kind of the growth rates per month and we applied them into the future. And we basically hit the mark this month by like by like fifty dollars.

keep a heading and actually passing the the mark. And so we have a quite predictable growth right now. So yeah, we shouldn't be too far from that actually. So yeah, days.

of course, there's A A ceiling when you do mr right days like you have your journ rate and eventually, because your journey applies on the entirety of of your customers, eventually your turn rate, you can cloud your new customers and you and your little off.

So we thought, what what can we do? And one approach we will take is, is go into that kind of ad on an enterprise style, right? So instead of you just having in for yourself, say, okay, you want to show with your team, so so make an plan, right? A team plan trying to get more from one person than than having been having a cheap one and trying to get more and more customers get more money from one customer.

This is yeah we we have a few enterprise deals already, but we had already deals falling through because we don't have all the legal stuff that is needed. So that's why we are just giving a few more months worth to finish some other features and some other things that are important for the industry. And then we want to actually work on that side of the business so I can do more interpreted deals. So that would be another way also.

So that was a serious talk. Now let's go back from the very beginning. I always said this is gonna a game like like every game and you have to learn the rules.

There's probabilities. There's like Better street as right, once you, once you hack the rules, you objective be Better than others. And life is the same.

Life is a lot of rules. Very hard to learn, but you can learn that. So I say I wanted learn the rules of business.

How does the south business? How does does the online business with protesters work? And that what we are doing this stage time for, sometimes you just throw IT of spaghetti st.

The wall and see if IT sticks with marketing and this and that and and I think this is kind of part of you say, okay, we have done, you know like sell service. Now let's try enterprise. We don't know if that works. IT could fail.

IT could be terrible.

There is only one way to find out, way to find out, only teach us a lot about our next products.

The thing that we are very big into trying stuff and and just seen how far we can we can grow IT. So for me right now is is, is like that everything we have been doing, all the side projects, everything is just to test a bunch of things and see what can we do, you know, what can be accomplish, how far can we go with sound.

So I recently started a side project, and I told the lucas, I wanna hack social media marketing like, I just wanna know and do IT like so well that I can do whatever one. So I started my project, and I grew my d two instagram account. I started a to see business, and then I grew my instagram account from zero followers to six thousand in less than six months. And now I can see, I can do IT. I'm going to know for this thing.

So I to say, there's no pictures of her. Yeah, I never shown my.

yeah.

I never. I never .

showed my face. I never found in front of the camera like this. And is really, this is how we we work.

You know that how we function, we tried things just because we we like to excel things. We like to push as far as you can get, you know. So that's certainly what we are going to do with stage time.

But he was from the beginning, not the beginning, the beginning, beginning. We didn't even think that this would go anywhere, but as soon as we know that this could go somewhere, we said, okay, we just want to make a comfortable living with stage timer. So IT allows us to pursue other you know, interest and things that we want to try.

So this is what we are doing already because he pays for for our life, even paid for our world trip these last six months. And and now that he pays for our lifestyle, we can try other stuff. So look at already starting a new business with your friends and I I have this this other side project and so on. So we are costly, pushing the limits, trying to see how far can we go.

Look, as I saw you made a tweet where you're like, look, we glorify the solar. Prenez al life, right? Everyone who's getting started their like, man, I just want to live that to rem where it's just me and my computer in my business and every day is just going to be the best day my life and you're like, well, but you know most days are crickets, right? Most days, if you if you do something good, there's no one to pat you on the back.

You don't have this big team. You're working in silence. And it's funny. What you just mentioned is almost like a reaction to that. It's like a way to solve that problem.

It's almost like you find ways to turn IT into a game I almost call IT game ful design where like you, you're always uh, finding something new to learn. You're finding something something new a master and then to bring you back to rupert murdoch. So I haven't watched succession.

I haven't seen that show, but I do have A A book kind of like a biography I recommended. It's called the murdoch method like his one of his be twenty years long advisers or consultants kept enough of a distant relationship with them that he didn't have to ask permission til I write down everything that that he knew. One of the things that he says about Robert murdoch is like the way that he's reached that third mountain of being this massive billion era with this of the huge media empire, is that he just fucked in the loves what he does.

He's it's like, number one, he's super competitive. They said that he stocked the wall street journal for many years. He wanted the new york post.

So he was like, I I wanna beat the new york times. And that was a game and enough itself to him. He's also just really, really curious. One of his friends is like, no, he just knows you'll never ever get the same topic with him and that's key to running a news empire.

And so I think that the sort of funny catch twenty two is that if you want to do something where it's like sustained run and going to climb this huge mountain IT almost has to be the case that you're not doing IT so that you can get to the top of the mountain you're doing IT. You like to get there. You have to just really, really love like these weird, you know turn off and you know sort of experiments and small things that you master that step one and .

then step two is you have to have absolutely no succession planning for who your successor is going to be, and then encourage your children to find. And people need to be years excess.

which is .

exactly riber mura has done, and you know who also did that game is calm and like a whole group of other crazy people through our history. I don't know why that's so common. I don't know why .

people do and this is true for many like inventors. If you like Edison, if you read the verge of him. He he loves eventing. He just he believes his in his workshop is like he's never at home. His wife hates him for that, but he just laughs inventing.

And i'm reading right now a book about that, just finding out things like, how does the human body to work? How would like, how does glows flow? How do you pain something? And he, he, so far, he, once he figured something out, he doesn't want to finish painting. There are so many unfinished painting of being under binchy because it's just as soon as he find out the method, as soon as he figured out of painting is like he gets boring.

Anyone use the original in the hack or just kept starting side projects that never never launching them?

You mention that um as he didn't convince you and you can't convince someone to do something like this. And i'm i'm interestingly, i'm also it's the isac and alterius s and biography of of the venture, right? So i'm reading that too and it's so funny when you look at these, pretty much anyone who's done things that people consider them great for, I put people into three buckets in terms of like their relationship to their work.

You have in this spy numbers. You have the one tens. The eighty twenty in the fifty fifties, fifty fifty is like, we will see how I feel about this thing.

Eighty twenty is the parade of principle is like, know, how do I be efficient? What's my? How do I do the twenty percent of the work that can get eighty percent out but all of these other people, the murdoch, you know that the adventure is pretty much anyone that you know who is doing something great there, the one hundred and ten percent right the funny thing about the venture is each paint landscapes and he would um you know sort of go and learn about a certain bird and he would always travel to the location.

He would like go ross country and and go visit the thing when they had like atlases and they had images like there's a way that he could study IT and he very specifically when someone question him, like why you just look at the, you know, why don't you just read the you the encyclical apeda on the thing and is like you should never read in the cyclist dia when you can go and see the thing in real life, right? And almost certainly that's highly inefficient, right? Like they are return on an investment like coral dimension. He had tons of like wasted images, but like he was all .

in we we actually appreciate a lot this this kind of mentality. And I think is this curiosity, you know, one thing that we always tried to every ladies is being curious, when I read about the people that now I I admire after reading about their lives and so on, is always these very curious people. They never stop asking questions. And and we have been trying to to really become more and more like this. You too seem naturally curious.

You seem naturally interested. You seem naturally really excited to be entrepreneurs to launch the side projects, grow your Normal thing, hopefully have you to back on when you you hit your million, a dollar, your goal, when you hit ten million, one hundred million, and then when you got your own space sex and you get two beliefs right here, I think you're going to get there. You tell listeners where they can go to find out more about what rup to you with stage timer and your rather projects as well.

So I think the best .

ways to follow on the yeah go come on twitter at underscore l herman one, two name but you will find .

that yeah and I think I am at least .

so perfect. Thanks again again.