Michele Hansen
Co-Founder of Geocodio & Author of Deploy Empathy
Appears in 118 Episodes
Applying the Five Steps to Finding an Audience
Software Social listener Rossveth Lopez joins the show. Michele and Rossveth workshop her business together, exploring where she decided on an idea and what she's work...
Customer Interview Part 2: The Debrief
Colleen and Michele talk about last week's customer interview and what Colleen learned from it.
Customer Interview Part 1: The Interview
Michele interviews one of Colleen's customers. Next week, Colleen and Michele will debrief on the interview.
Communication, Empathy, and Flexibility
Michele and Colleen discuss some lessons for bootstrapped entrepreneurs from Morgan Housel's Psychology of Money. Plus, a numbers update on how Colleen's new SaaS is d...
MicroConf On Air + Software Social Crossover
ICYMI: Colleen and Michele talked with Rob Walling of MicroConf On Air on March 3.
To Take Funding, or Not to Take Funding
With the new crop of bootstrapper-focused funds, taking funding is possible for bootstrappers in a way that it just wasn't even a few years ago. Colleen and Michele wo...
Giving Up On An Idea
When should you give up on an idea, and what does "giving up" mean? Michele and Colleen talk about Colleen's ideas that didn't pan out.
Raising a Business
New signups are exciting, but how do you deal with the hurt that comes when one of your few users churn? Colleen and Michele talk about how the things that are hard no...
First on Google
Colleen's committed herself to doing more marketing -- and it's already paying off.
Getting to 100
Colleen's been working for months to get 100 users of her SaaS so it can be released into the Heroku marketplace. Did she finally do it?!
Prioritizing Features and Yourself: An Conversation with Danielle Simpson, Co-Founder of Feedback Panda
Danielle Simpson, co-founder of Feedback Panda, joins Colleen and Michele for a conversation about Feedback Panda's ingenious prioritization system, the psychological ...
What to Work On Next
Colleen gets her first paying customer! But what should she work on next, and which kinds of customers should she focus on?
Wading Through Feature Requests
Once you get your customers to talk to you, how do you sort through that and make sense of it? Colleen and Michele talk about how Jobs to Be Done thinking and tactics ...
Getting People to Reply to Those Critical Early Feedback Emails
Colleen and Michele dissect why people stopped replying to Colleen's welcome emails. Later, Michele dives into Jobs To Be Done.
Competing with Huge Companies as a Bootstrapper
Michele talks about how the entry of a huge company into the geocoding space impacts their business strategy.
Getting Really Excited
Colleen shares the findings from her customer interviews, and Michele talks about how behavioral economics influences how they think about free tier abuse.
When Competitors Are Nipping At Your Heels
Michele reflects on competitor activity, and Colleen takes a moment to enjoy how she's finally launched a product after so time wandering through the proverbial woods.
Workshopping User Onboarding Problems
Colleen has people using her service...but there's a big drop-off, so Michele and Colleen workshop how to fix that. Also, some exciting news: we were nominated for Bes...
Snowballing One Project Into Another
When you're bootstrapping, it can he helpful to snowball one project into another until you find something that works. Today we dive into the nitty gritty of how a mob...
Choosing a Pricing Model
Colleen and Michele workshop what the pricing model should be for Colleen's SaaS.
Raising and Setting Prices
Colleen and Michele talk about how to (and how not to) raise prices -- and think through how to set them in the first place for Colleen's new product.
Who's the villain?
Somehow, despite a tumultuous week, Michele and Colleen still get things done. Michele talks about figuring out business incorporation from abroad, and Colleen talks t...
Founder/Business/Lifecycle Fit (aka "The Feelings Episode")
Michele and Colleen dive into striking a balance between business, founder, and lifestyle fit, and the trade-offs of running your own business versus working for someo...
Vendor Lock-In, Heroes, and Timezones
Colleen considers the benefits and risks of changing vendors. Michele talks about a struggle they've had in the early days of their transition to being a remote company.
Health Insurance for Bootstrappers
Health insurance is complicated and expensive in the US...especially for bootstrappers. Michele walks through their own experience buying health insurance and gives a ...
Bootstrapping a Company to 130 Employees
We chat with the humble and impressive Michelle Penczak, CEO of Squared Away.
Documentation as SEO, SEO as Documentation
We continue to chew on this quote from Alex Hillman: "When done well, marketing and teaching are nearly indistinguishable from one another."
Something Boring, Something True, Something Alluring, Something New
Michele talks about the unexciting but necessary parts of running a business, and Colleen experiences one of the most exciting things -- launch!