Lately, I’ve been very fortunate to join some awesome podcasts for great conversations about my career path to Bigfoot, debt financing, business relationships, and more. It’s been fun to get out here and tell more folks about Bigfoot.
Below you’ll find the links to the podcasts if you’d like to listen, plus a brief recap of what to expect in each one.
Founders & Friends with Scott Orn of Kruze Accounting
Scott and I talked all things capital formation. We dug deep into why there’s a need for SaaS debt options beyond just venture debt. With funding types continuing to diversify, SaaS companies have more options than ever to consider. Whether you bootstrap or lean on banks, traditional VC’s, or venture debt, knowing all the different objectives, approaches and structures each one offers is key to choosing the right form of capital for your business.
Founders should also beware of the equity raising hamster wheel. Where one company follows the typically suggested 18 month cadence, realistically it’s an artificial benchmark that doesn’t apply to everyone. It drives short term thinking, unnecessary pressure, and distraction from the longer-term value creation.
Lastly, you can’t just kind-of sort-of raise capital. As I’ve written before, it won’t work if you’re casual about it. Know why you’re raising capital in the first place and build a strategic plan that includes reaching out to the market to get more customers, hiring the right people and paying for the right programs to help you. (Capital raising pitfalls is actually a favorite topic of mine, which will be deployed into an upcoming eBook.)
SaaS Acquisitions with Andrew Gazdecki of Microacquire
Andrew and I had some friendly conversations about debt financing and some lessons I’ve learned during my career. Two key takeaways from our chat are that relationships matter and that you have to learn to enjoy taking the long view.
Relationships are important when we’re selecting companies to invest in. There’s the company and then there are the people. At the end of the day, Bigfoot is growing alongside a lot of the companies we’re funding as their peers, so we like to run a concentrated portfolio that we can pay attention to and provide ample support.
It’s also important to remember that startups and growth can take a while, so have that manifest in the way you want to build your company, always looking forward while executing in the now. It won’t all happen overnight, so try to enjoy the process as much as you can along the way.
Founder Chats with Brian Sierakowski of Baremetrics
Brian and I took a stroll through my career path, what led to starting Bigfoot Capital, and drilling down to the core of what we do.
An important takeaway from our chat is awareness; knowing where you’re at in your process. Whether it’s in your career and knowing when to take a leap to the next thing or knowing where you’re at in your startup cycle and what you need to do next. I’ll say it again, just in case you haven’t heard it before and it’s one of my go-to phrases, “Casualization is not Capitalization. You’re either raising or you’re not.” And remember, when you raise it, the clock is ticking whether you think it is or not.
Another big theme throughout my career, especially what we do at Bigfoot, is relationships. As you may have noticed, this comes up a lot in my conversations about business. I got my first shot at being a CEO because of a relationship I had made and maintained from a previous endeavor, and Bigfoot’s portfolio is built on relationships as well. We aren’t just working on a transaction, we’re here to be a partner.
If you’re interested in chatting about any of this, grab some time, plus we have more stuff like this in our monthly newsletter if you want to subscribe.
