Startups For the Rest of Us

What’s it take for a bootstrapped SaaS to beat a competitor with $10M in venture funding? In this episode, Rob Walling talks with Laura Roeder, founder of Paperbell, about how her lean, fully-bootstrapped team outlasted and outperformed a VC-funded rival. They discuss what the venture-backed company got wrong, how Paperbell focused on the right customers, and why efficiency still beats funding. Topics we cover:  (3:52) – Competing against a $10M-funded startup (8:45) – Why “self-serve SaaS on hard mode” was worth it (14:36) – How over-investing in engineering killed their competitor (19:04) – The real problem with under-investing in marketing (21:19) – Why some SaaS markets can’t scale upmarket (24:13) – Why some markets are perfect for bootstrappers (28:42) – How big funding rounds create false signals (30:24) – The behind-the-scenes of a potential acquisition deal (33:26) – How Paperbell became the market leader Links from the Show:  MicroConf Mastermind Matching