NoBoringDesign

Hey everyone!

Happy Monday and welcome back to another episode of Building in the Open!

For a more detailed dive, check out our latest video update here: https://youtu.be/ibl9_va5GUY

Updates:

*Revenue Insights: This week saw a 4.2% increase in week-over-week revenue—definitely a win. However, our Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) dipped by 1.5%, primarily due to pro-rated amounts for mid-month sign-ups.

*Net Revenue Retention: Holding strong at 100.3%. This metric is a big deal for us as it not only reflects customer satisfaction but also our success in upselling, helping our clients fully solve their design needs.

What I'm Nervous About: Our new paid ads program is in its infancy, and the slow initial progress is a bit daunting. Patience is key, but it’s challenging!

What I'm Excited About: The incredible sales conversations sparked by our recent launch with Exit 5. There's a lot of potential to expand our impact and help more brands shine.

To wrap up, I’d love to hear from you! Got questions? Let me know what you’re curious about, or if there’s anything you’d like me to clarify in our next update.

Cheers to a productive week ahead,
Eli

Hey everyone!

Happy Tuesday! 🚀 Let's jump right into this week's update.

I've included a full video for those who want to dive deeper, available here: Video Update

Updates:

• Last month, we doubled profit at NoBoringDesign from $19k/mo to $59k/mo.
• I anticipate our net margin might decrease to mid-30% due to some key investments in our team, however this will only be a temporary dip and the investments will unblock our push to $75k/mo in profit.
• Excitingly, we achieved a net revenue retention of 100% thanks to account expansions, which perfectly counteracted a bit of churn from last month.
• A peek into our giving back initiative: We're donating 5% of April's profit (and every month thereafter), currently totaling $2,950, to various charities.

Challenges:

• With the recent shifts and expansions, there's a realistic chance our EBITDA might drop, settling in the high 30s or low 40s by the end of May.
• Balancing the new investments with maintaining profitability is a challenge I'm closely monitoring.

Life as CEO:

• This past week, I achieved four out of five personal goals, though I fell short of my mountain biking target, clocking in only 2 hours instead of 10 — a reminder of how hectic things can get!
• This week's theme is "Ship It". I'll be on a family vacation for most of the week, but that won't stop us from rolling out a significant customer launch. This client is well-known, and we've just revamped their branding and website — super excited to see the impact it makes!

Goals and Feelings:

• Feeling determined to keep pushing towards our target of hitting a $1 million profit run rate by year's end.
• Also, I'm focused on ensuring that our sales bookings meet our ambitious goals, which is a bit of a stretch right now.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and answering any questions about our journey and strategic decisions. Drop your questions below or on the video update, and let's keep the conversation going!

Cheers,
Eli

Ok fine, that is a bit click baity BUT, we're on track to hit $10M in profit across both my agencies since 2020, working 25h/wk. So that's pretty fun.

Ok anyway, back to the good stuff:

Full video update with all my (previously) secret metrics here: https://youtu.be/CCp6T6soDeg

Updates:

1. This month we'll hit record revenue numbers and last month came in at 19k/mo in profit, goal is to hit $55k/mo by end of Q2
2. I've committed to post updates here and on Youtube every Monday. So no more ghosting this thread - I'm back baby!

Challenges:

1. We had a huge stumbling in Q3 last year and lost a bunch of customers because of it. We spent all of Q4 fixing the broken bits, hiring the right team members, and adding in processes that have led us to hit 100% NRR this month - super proud of the turn around on that front.
2. We hired a sales guy and realized he wasn't the right person for the role after missing our targets for the past 4 months. That said we just hired a new rep and I'm bullish on the change.

Vibes:
Ready to crank! I'm super excited to be back at it and share the journey with you all.

I'm planning to share deep dives on our numbers, strategies, and tactics over on YouTube so feel free to check that out and subscribe if you're interested in coming along for the journey (I'll still share the summary videos here tho).

Cheers!
Eli

Hey hey!

Coming back to you with a long overdue update. Turns out having a baby can slow down some of your aspirational goals (like posting weekly updates here... hah!).

Full behind the scenes video update here: https://youtu.be/W3bR8KBdJVc

Updates:

1. Had a baby (she’s 5 weeks old as of this update)!
2. We’ve surpassed 20 customers, next major milestone is 50. Keeping tabs on churn, which is currently low.
3. My growth model was a bit over-confident and ill-informed. I’m pulling back and reframing my growth mindset to be optimized for a long term outlook.
4. Team is up to 10, with several key hires planned for the next few weeks.

Challenges:

1. Revenue imbalance from W&B work makes it hard to predict contraction, need to focus on driving retainer signups.

Feelings:

1. Focused. I know what we need to do to get to 50, now we just need to execute consistently.
2. Excited. I’m excited to see how the paid campaign benchmarks shake out.

I’m curious to hear what questions ya’ll have about the building process - leave a comment here or on the video update so I know what to cover in the next update.

Cheers!
Eli

Coming back to you all with my first post-launch update.

Full behind the scenes video update here: https://youtu.be/8aSXoLv3vL0

Updates:

1. We've surpassed the first half of my initial goal which was to land our first 10 ecstatic customers, representing north of $20k/mo in revenue. Are they ecstatic? To early to tell, but it feels like we're on our way.

2. My long term goal was to get to a place where we were closing 1 customer per week, 4 per month. After running our first campaign two weeks ago, we've already closed 6 new customers, and based on the current pipeline I'm fairly certain we will close 8 by the end of May, fully doubling that initial goal of 1 per week. That said, this was campaign driven, so likely not the same as consistently closing 1 per week due to a predictable GTM flywheel. More on that in the video below.

3. Until yesterday we had 0% customer churn since inception. Our first customer canceled their plan, which, on its face feels bad, however he told us up front he just wanted a brand and web refresh, which we delivered a while ago, so if I only look at the facts, he actually stayed longer than he told us he initially would.

Current Challenges:

1. I'm realizing our business model needs to be split into fixed and retainer clients to account for folks like our first customer, who truly only want a specific end result and don't plan to keep us on retainer. This presents some interesting team/talent forecasting challenges that I've been working hard to model in an objective and predictable way. More on that below.

2. I'm working on settling into the reality of owning two agencies. With NBD starting to get some legs, it requires a tremendous amount of focus to do both well.

Feelings:

1. Excited. I'm pretty sure we'll hit $50k/mo in revenue next month with minimal investment in top of funnel.

2. Curious. I'm curious to see what the unit economics look like once we do begin to experiment into traditional paid channels.

3. Nervous. Honestly, the split retainer/fixed client base makes me a bit nervous, but if done correctly, one is lead-gen for the other.

That's all for now. More updates coming soon :)

TL;DR Backstory:

My current company did just north of $5.8M in revenue last year and was ranked among the top 100 fastest growing companies on the Inc 5000.

My last two companies were acquired (the first was a VC backed software company, second was a self funded eComm business).

I’ve decided to start a side hustle as a creative outlet leveraging all of my prior learnings, mistakes etc.

All revenue will be Stripe verified.

My Backstory:

Before jumping into the world of entrepreneurship, I waited tables and was a struggling artist in LA. After reading the four hour work week, I decided it was time for some change in my life.

To this day, I attribute much of my success in business to the lessons learned waiting tables and cold calling folks to fundraise for my art projects.

This new side hustle will be going back to my Four Hour Work Week roots. LFG.

My plan & approach:

I’m committed to spending 3h/week working to grow my new side hustle: NBD (NoBoringDesign).

One hour on growth initiatives, one hour taking sales calls, and one hour on all the misc brainstorming and automation work that takes time to design and implement. That’s it.

I recognize that I’m in the unique position of not having to rush the process. I still own and am growing my primary business, which means I don’t have to rely on the revenue (or lack thereof) from NBD to put food on the table. This means I can say no to work that doesn’t align with our vision, and produce work that pushes boundaries. This means I don’t have to be interested in quickly growing a customer-base doing templatized work. I’m not interested in burning the midnight oil, or grinding my team to the bone. There are enough folks out there trying to build DesignJoy 2.0. And frankly that model is awesome for folks who want to do their solo thing and make $500k/yr. Total respect to them and that model. But that’s not for me.

I’m an impatient guy who likes to win. So today begins the sprint to hit $100k/mo on the stripe dashboard. And by the end of 2024, $200k/mo+

Some of you might be reading this and thinking - hey - $100k/mo with this model means you’re going to have to pay a team and won’t really be taking home $100k/mo.

And you’d be completely correct. But for me, taking down half of that without having to ever take a single customer call is well worth giving up 50-75% + of the revenue. Also, working with a team gives me energy. Grinding by myself, after a while, is a lonely venture. Making money loses it’s luster if you do it in a dark closet by yourself, and lose yourself in the process.

So here we go, another wild adventure ahead. I hope you’ll join me and share in the high’s and low’s together.

Below you’ll find the internal brainstorm document that outlines my thought model for NBD in practical form.

Guiding principles I will follow:

• Produce a “product” people find tremendous value in
• Produce brave work that pushes the industry forward
• Do ZERO “work” personally (defined as customer facing work)
• Have non-referral channels drive more business than referral channels
• ABP (always be profitable)
• Over-compensate team members via geographic arbitrage
• Have fun

The feelings this business will reinforce daily (for me):

• Valued
• Fun
• Creative
• Hustle
• Diversified

My measures:

• Near Term: 10 ecstatic customers
• Mid Term: full team structure solidified, SOPs clearly defined
• Long Term: close 1 new customer per week

A note on work / life balance:

• Many entrepreneurs struggle with work life balance. I don’t. In fact, one of my greatest skills is operationalizing my companies so I can maintain incredible work / life balance.
• With the goal of helping others achieve this balance, I will also share openly about my journey and learnings in creating space for life outside of work.