What's up, everybody?
This is Cortland from IndieHackers.com, and you're listening to the IndieHackers podcast.
More people than ever are building cool stuff online and making a lot of money in the process.
And on this show, I sit down with these IndieHackers to discuss the ideas, the opportunities, and
the strategies they're taking advantage of, so the rest of us can do the same.
Today, I'm talking to Molly Wolchanski.
Molly is the founder of a company called The Agent Nest.
It's a SaaS application that helps with social media marketing.
In particular, she helps real estate companies automate their Twitter posts, their Instagram
posts, and their Facebook posts.
You sort of popped onto my radar because of this post you made on IndieHackers, I guess,
last month or the month before.
And it was like growing from $145 a month to $7,500 a month in revenue since January
of last year.
And it was kind of like just the brief outline of your story, and you just kind of took questions.
What motivated you to make that post?
So my co-founder, who happens to also be my boyfriend, actually started posting on there.
And he told me, you know, you should really go for it and start telling your story, especially
since I am a woman in the SaaS industry, there's not many.
So he thought that it would be beneficial for me to just tell people what's been going
off my business, and because it had grown so much because we started, like you said,
in January of 2020, from, you know, March to April, we jumped from 500 MRR to 2443.
So it just kind of grew so fast, and I was really happy about it.
I am really happy about it.
But it's also a very intimidating kind of thing, because this is my first SaaS business.
And you know, my co-founder has a lot of experience running a SaaS.
He's had his for about eight years now.
So I'm very grateful that he was able to kind of guide me through.
I think your business is called The Agent Nest.
You had another business before that called Mo Realty Marketing.
Oh my gosh.
I really don't like that name.
You talked about that in your post.
You said you didn't like the name.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I just, it doesn't, I don't know.
I was trying to incorporate my name, Molly, into real estate, and then I don't know what
happened there.
And then it happens and you're stuck with it.
Whatever name you choose, it's on all your business cards, it's your domain name, it's
the name you've told everybody, and it's so hard to change it.
How did you come up with a name for The Agent Nest?
That's a really good question.
I just did a lot of brainstorming.
I did want Agent in my name due to SEO and everything.
And I am a big fan of birds.
I actually have some bird tattoos and I have always just been fascinated by them.
And a nest to me means it's a very safe place and it's a place of growth.
And so I wanted to incorporate nests into my name because of my personal connection
and feeling.
There's a guide online, it's sort of like a legendary guide to naming.
It's called the Igor's Guide to Naming.
It's from some branding company called Igor.
And I look at it every time I want to name anything.
It's always like a grueling process because you sit down, you start spitting out names.
Like, at least when I try it, most of the names I come up with just aren't good.
And then it takes like a day or two of doing it before I'm like, okay, I like this name.
But kind of the entire time through the process, I always feel like I'm never going to have
a good name.
I have like 15th name suggestion, it still sounds horrible.
But they and their guide, they kind of break it down into like, they kind of like analyze
all these different names.
And they break them down into I think four categories.
So they have like functional descriptive names.
So that would be I think kind of similar to what you have.
Because your company, the Agent Nest, deals with agencies, like you have agent and the
name, right?
It's very obvious.
It's like clear, you're speaking to your customers, etc.
They have kind of invented names.
So a lot of times like these name generators will do this, it'll just come up like a completely
fake word like Aquiant, you know, and like, okay, that sounds cool.
But those names, like the upside to that is it sounds cool.
And there's like no negative connotations.
But the downside is that there's no positive connotations either.
Like when you hear that name, it might sound cool, but it doesn't make you feel any feelings.
It's not associated with anything.
So you guys spend a bunch of money and time trying to like infuse that brand into people's
minds.
The other type of invented name is like invented names that just kind of sound cool or like
feel cool to say like Oreo or Snapple or Google and like those are like the best kind because
like they just feel like something.
The other couple categories, I feel like it's just worth going through in case somebody
out there is trying to name their business and they want to know like what the options
are.
Experiential names, these are names that like connect to something real or something like
a lot of internet browsers are called like Safari or Navigator or Explorer or something
like that, like kind of imaginative.
And then the last type of names is the evocative names.
And so these are like even more one step removed from what's going on and they kind of cause
you to like think.
They kind of talk about like how you want people to feel about your brand rather than
like describing exactly what it is that your company does.
So this would be like Virgin Airlines or like Uber, like Apple or something.
You know, like very like it's kind of like it makes you think for a second like what
is that about?
But then you can kind of infuse a lot of like emotion and feeling into those words or maybe
they already have them.
And so they talk about like evocative names being like the best or the most ideal but
like often, you know, other names from other categories can be even better.
Anyway, you've got your business, you've got a very functional name, the Agent Nest.
It's doing super well.
It's grown to kind of the magical mark that most funders are trying to hit is like $10,000
a month.
And you're like on your way there, you're like 80% of the way there.
Yeah.
So I have this written on my whiteboard I have, I will get to 10K by July and like giant
letters.
And of course, like some months are really awesome.
And then some months, you know, we kind of stay around the same same MRR.
And those months that don't grow, I get really discouraged because I'm like, I'm not going
to meet my goal.
And some it's okay.
If you stick around the same MRR, if you're not losing a ton of customers, I think it's
okay.
I've had to kind of tell myself that because we're not always going to meet our goals all
the time.
So as far as getting to 10K by July, maybe that will happen.
Maybe that won't.
If it doesn't, it's on a whiteboard so I can just erase July and then put October or something
like that.
And we're good.
Thank God for whiteboards.
That's the cool thing about being your own boss too is like, okay, you could just erase
the goal off the whiteboard.
Like no one's going to come down and you know, like there is no one above you who will get
mad that you didn't hit that goal.
Like it's just you.
So if you feel good about it, then it's totally chill and things are fine.
So you're around $8,000 a month in revenue, what are your expenses look like?
What does your team look like?
Is it just you and your boyfriend?
So yeah, so right now our expenses, so I did go through expenses recently.
It's definitely necessary software like Butter CMS ConvertKit.
We also use Stripe for our payment processing, Auth0, Netlify, and then just kind of integrating
all that into ad spend, probably spending around $1,800 per month.
I have not hired anybody yet.
I have, I actually did include that in my post because I'm kind of on the fence about
hiring somebody and my thoughts were I'm going to hire somebody once I get to 10K MRR and
I don't know if that's a good idea or not because right now, so it is just me and him,
but he's very, very busy.
So he's the one who did all the backend and everything, he's a computer programmer.
So for me, I'm doing all the marketing, doing the design, customer service, kind of the
whole shebang.
So in order to kind of alleviate some of that stress, I have hired some freelancers to help
me with graphic design and to help me with marketing, but as far as a hire, I have not
made one.
So right now, it's me and then he does about 15% of the work, so only in emergency situations
where it involves coding or yeah, coding basically.
So are you both, are either of you full time on this or do you have other things going
on?
So this is the only thing that I do right now.
So it would be full time.
And I had an issue with trying to do too many things at once, because I always said yes
to everything.
And a really important thing I learned throughout the process of owning my own company is you
don't have to say yes to everything.
So I would get emails from real estate agents asking me, you know, hey, can you build my
website or can you create this for me?
And I would always say yes, and then I'd get really overwhelmed with how much I needed
to do because I was trying to manage the agent nest and I was trying to build websites and
I was trying to make sure individual social media looked presentable.
And before, you know, mobility marketing, before it kind of transformed into the agent
nest, I was doing working for individual agents.
So I would post directly onto their social media for them, I would create events for
their open houses and their listings, and it took a lot of time.
And one of the biggest issues that I ran into with that business is since it takes a lot
of time, I have to charge more, because I feel like my time is valuable.
And a lot of times with agents, they weren't able to afford the $450 around there that
I was charging per month.
I kind of got the idea for the agent nest after thinking about that because I, you know,
there are a lot of agents who can't afford that, especially ones who have just come into
the industry, they're brand new, they're trying to figure out how to market their business.
And so one day, I'm just like, I need to create something that everybody can afford that everybody
can have access to at the same time where I'm not doing everything myself.
So let's talk about your first business where you're doing all this manual, one-on-one work
with these real estate agents.
I know nothing about real estate, and I know nothing about what real estate agents are
worried about.
Why would they come to you?
Was it just because they had trouble finding clients?
Beginning of 2015 is when I started creating the business.
And let me preface this by saying I've always been a business owner.
I've always had a business owner mindset.
When I was six years old, I would create these boats out of foil.
And my sister and I would sit on the side of the road in front of our house selling
foil boats.
We were having an issue with nobody buying them.
So I'm like, you know, what we should do is we should fill up a cooler with water, and
then put the boat on top of the water so we can show people that the boats actually work.
We made 50 cents, so that's cool.
And then after that, during college, I ended up starting an Etsy business, and I created
products for people.
That was another business where it took a lot of time because I was painting on coffee
mugs and creating t-shirts and doing so many different things to where I got really overwhelmed
and almost burnt out, I think, from doing the same thing over and over again every day.
And then after that, so my mom, going back to your question, my mom is a real estate
agent.
So she was needing my help with her social media.
And I was like, okay, well, let's do this thing.
And I've always been so I did all my own marketing, all my own design for my Etsy business.
So I experienced with graphic design and marketing at that point, I kind of taught myself how
to do it.
And so I started posting on her social media.
And then people were asking her, hey, where are you getting all this great content from?
And so she told them, and then they told their friends, and then I started having people
email me, and then the light bulb went off, and I'm like, all right, time to name this
thing.
And then I did it too fast, and I came with it anyway.
And you get mobile team marketing.
Yeah, yeah, that's where that came from.
I thought it meant that it was like more realty, like more realty, like more realty, but I
didn't realize I was supposed to be Molly.
Yeah, I know.
And nobody, why would anybody know that?
You know what I mean?
So I started posting for individuals, creating individuals content for about five years.
It became a little bit too much for me for a couple of reasons.
And it got to the point where I couldn't manage that many people.
And I have a problem with saying no to things, as I kind of mentioned earlier, I kept saying
yes to everything.
A new person would email me like, hey, I need help with this.
Yes, I'll do it.
And then I ended up having like 19 clients where I was trying to manage everything all
at once.
And it just got to a point where I couldn't do it anymore.
And then I actually ended up making my first hire for that business to kind of help me
with posting and everything.
The hire that I made lasted three days.
So that's why I'm so scared of hiring somebody now.
Because it just didn't work out, it didn't work out.
So many people have this experience with hiring where like, if you have a really bad hire,
it kind of scars you for life.
You're just like, oh my God, this is so expensive and so much time and so much emotional effort.
And it was so horrible to have to like fire this person, et cetera, et cetera.
How does anyone ever hire?
How could I trust anybody to do anything?
Like when I'm the one who's done it all successfully.
But then people often have the opposite experience.
If you make a really good hire, where you feel like anxiety, like, I don't know if it's
going to work, like I'm giving my baby to this person.
And then they just go like above and beyond expectations.
And they're like doing things you didn't even think of.
And they're amazing.
You're like, hiring's amazing.
And whenever you have that experience, you're like, okay, I get why people hire, et cetera,
et cetera.
But like your first hire kind of shapes how you feel about things until your mind is like
eventually changed.
With my first hire, I think I didn't do enough research on the individual person.
As far as her experience goes, I really liked her.
But at the same time on the first day of work, she showed up 45 minutes late.
So that was kind of a red flag.
The second day, she took a two and a half hour lunch break, and didn't come back until
like 2.30 PM.
And I'm like, hey, so I'm not very good with confrontation.
Let me just put the, let me just throw it out there.
I need to be a bit, a little bit better about that.
Oh, hey, what's going on?
You know, why'd you take a two and a half hour lunch break?
And she's like, oh, I had some stuff come up.
And I was like, okay, instead of saying something.
So yeah, so that's something I need to work on.
And I am working on.
I definitely have become more confident in my own skin, I suppose, since with growth,
you know, comes more confidence, I believe.
And mistakes too, like doing things, doing things wrong and like making the hiring mistakes
like we've all done and then realizing like, actually, your business is fine.
And it will leave live to see another day and things are fine.
Like it kind of helps you build like a little bit of that like thick skin toward like it's
okay to experiment.
It's okay to try with things.
It's okay to make mistakes, you're probably still going to keep going.
Well, there were there were definitely some mistakes made and different aspects of it,
but they were all learning experiences.
And so as far as with the individuals that I was working with, they started asking me
for more things.
And they started emailing me more and saying they needed this and this and this and this
when we had agreed upon, you know, I'm only doing social media posts.
And then they're like, he created a postcard for me real quick, can you create a flyer
for me real quick?
And I would say yes.
And then I would get so bombarded with all of these things.
And I was just like, I need to fix this, I need to do something to where number one,
I can handle an infinite amount of customers.
And I also need to be able to put a little bit less of my time into talking and posting
to people's social medias.
So I had to figure out how can I alleviate all of this stress?
And how can I fix this?
And I did a lot of had a lot of brainstorming sessions, I like to meditate.
So you know, that helped a little bit too.
And kind of kind of transformed into the agent nest from here.
So tell me about that process, because I think you could have gone in so many different directions,
you could have been like, you know what, I'm gonna get better at saying no, I'm only gonna
stick to social media posts.
And that's how things are gonna be.
Or you could have been like, you know what, I'm just gonna embrace the scattershot approach
and just start doing any and everything with my agency.
Or you could have been like, you know what, I'm getting out of the real estate business
for good.
This is too stressful.
I'm tired of it.
I don't like it.
Let me do something new.
Like, how did you decide I'm going to build a SaaS application that serves?
Well, maybe we haven't even described what the agent nest does.
What is the agent nest exactly?
And how does it help real estate agents?
The agent nest is a platform where people can sign up for a membership at $32 a month
or $59 a month, depending on what plan they go with.
When they sign up, they have access to social media posts that they can edit through Canva.
And they come with captions and hashtags.
We also do have postcards, flyers, listing videos, listing presentations, open house
promos.
So basically, anything that an agent needs, digital or print, they can get it in one place.
So with a $32 a month plan, they get access to all that, $59 a month.
We actually white labeled with a company.
So we were able to give the agents an option to schedule directly to their social media,
which was a huge thing for us.
We implemented that, I think, around May of 2020.
And we did see a lot of growth from that, and we still are seeing growth from that.
Going into something new is always scary.
And I did want to quit.
I'm not going to lie, because I just felt, I don't know, I wanted to quit and I wanted
to give up for a few reasons.
One being, I kept on looking at other people, and I kept on seeing their success.
And I kept telling myself, I will never be like that.
I'm never going to be that successful person.
How can I compete with that?
How can I do that?
So I did want to quit, and I'm a writer, and I love to write.
And I have written plays, and I've been published in magazines, and I've helped publish books
and everything.
So I kind of wanted to focus on that.
But at the same time, I really like marketing.
I really like content creation.
I do like working with real estate agents.
And I had to figure out what my passion was.
I had just turned about to turn 30 years old, going through not a midlife crisis, obviously,
but kind of like an existential one, like, what am I doing with my life kind of thing.
And I'm sure maybe some people can identify with that.
And I was just like, you know, I like what I'm doing, I just need to tweak it.
And after walking through what to do to fix these problems of time, and how many people
I could handle, I thought about it.
And I talked to my co founder about it.
And I said, Hey, I have this idea.
Is it possible?
Can you help me?
So we actually started with a no code solution to our platform.
And I created the website myself.
And he worked on the back end of the website.
Now we use, you know, we're coding C sharp and using view.
Custom development.
Yeah, I was just talking to a buddy who wants to start an app.
And he's like, well, how do I raise money?
You know, I got to talk to investors, etc.
I'm like, what do you need to raise money for is like, I need software engineers and
designers, etc.
I'm like, no, no, just like start with something super simple, because I know I talked to so
many founders who are not technical, or you get started with something, you know, using
no code or using like an email list.
And they eventually step by step, you know, as they make more money or find more success,
build it up into something bigger and better.
But you don't have to start with the custom coded web app from day one, like there's really
no reason you have to start there just because that's where you want to absolutely and it
does cost money and it does, you know, if you don't have the money to start it, I think
that's a deterrent for a lot of people.
So like, you know, I need all this money to do this and you and you don't.
Because for me, I'll tell you, I was not doing well, I was broke, like I didn't have money,
even after handling like 19 clients, I still didn't have the money.
Because I was paying, I had a lot of bills, you know, you know how life is.
And so that was another thing where I talked to my co founder about like, Hey, how can
we do this for the least amount of money possible.
So whenever I started, I only invested about $500 into starting the company.
And how I grew it to be from from January, just say the April from like 100.
So January, I had like four signups.
And I'm so hard on myself.
I'm like, Why am I doing this?
How am I my boyfriend's like, you got four signups?
Like that's awesome.
People don't get their first signup for like two years.
I'm just like, No, I need to be better.
Well, let me ask you, it's like, what what is driving you to need to be better?
You're talking about looking at these other people who are so successful and thinking
like you're not going to be that successful is like, what is what is your goal?
You know, what do you want to accomplish?
I've always just kind of been perfectionist where I have to be good at everything.
And that is also a big problem.
Because I have not done a lot of things in my life that I wanted to do because I was
afraid of failure.
And I've wanted to write a book, but I'm afraid it's not going to be good.
Like, I'm like, I'm no I'm no George Orwell.
I'm not Ernest Hemingway.
Nobody's gonna want to read my book.
You know, I'm comparing myself to these amazing people.
And it's, it's okay to compare yourself.
But it's not okay to stop doing what you want to do.
Because of that.
I just had a lot of a lot of issues with that.
And it does pop up sale sometimes, because we're having other companies that are similar
to mine, like our competitors and everything.
And there was one day when I was looking at one of my competitors, and I noticed that
she had just gotten to 1000 customers, and was talking about our social media.
And I was just like, I am not doing this anymore.
I'm never getting to 1000 customer, I can't believe this.
And I have learned to not be so hard on myself and to celebrate my successes, I need to make
sure that I do celebrate even the small ones, because that's how you keep going.
That's how you keep moving forward.
Yeah, I'm wired kind of the same way as you.
When you talk about being a perfectionist, when you talk about being self critical, and
like wanting to do more and do it better.
And it's like a it's a double edged sword.
Because obviously, like, there are limits to how self critical you should be.
And you can just beat yourself up, you can get to a state where you're actually doing
really well.
And like, you know, you found your first four customers in the first month, that's better
than a lot of indie hackers who start off.
But then you're not happy, because you're just thinking about how much better things
can be.
But I think the advantage to being a perfectionist is that a lot of people, especially when they're
crafting a product or like some sort of art or some sort of book or anything, just aren't
realistic with themselves in terms of evaluating what they're doing and whether or not they're
doing a good job, which I think sometimes prevents them from fixing obvious mistakes
and flaws.
And I've all the perfectionists I know, like, that's never the case.
We're like very good at saying like, you know, this could be better, here's what needs to
be improved, etc.
And I think that realism, if you can channel it and hone it into like, you know, a limited
surface area, if you can be a perfectionist over just like one very specific app, or one
very specific piece of writing or one very specific thing that you're working on, then
you can really make that take that thing and make it much better than I think the average
person can.
That is a really good way to put it because if you're trying to be perfectionist in every
single aspect of your life or every single aspect of your business, it's not going to
happen.
But if you if you focus on the one thing, I mean, and there's actually a book called
The One Thing where it's saying like, you need to focus on one thing at a time, if you're
doing too many things, then you're not going to be good, you can't be good at everything.
So there was a time when I was trying to be good at everything.
But like you said, there's a point where you're like, okay, I need to focus on this.
And then we'll get to the other thing next.
And it's hard to do when you start a new company, because like every blog post you listen to
or every blog post you read, every podcast you listen to, every book you read, like they
have like a million different tips and tricks like do this, do that.
What about SEO?
What about ads?
Why aren't you on Facebook?
What about Instagram?
And it's like super easy to think like, oh my god, I'm like not doing enough.
But like the real answer probably in the early days is like, you should only be doing like
one or two things like tops, like two things might be too many.
And if you're doing any more than that, even though it feels like that's what you should
be doing, because that's everybody says you should be doing, that's probably not the right
way to go.
And when I look at like your early growth for the agent nest, you know, you start the
SaaS company in January of last year, you made looks like 145 bucks your first month.
And next month, you more than doubled, you're like, you know, about $400, then $500.
And then in April, suddenly, you go to $2,500 a month, like you basically quintupled your
revenue.
I'm going to guess that that probably wasn't from doing like 15 different things.
I'm going to guess that's like something worked really well.
I don't know, I could be wrong.
But like, what changed from January to April?
Interesting, because starting a business in 2020 was definitely scary, due to the obvious,
you know, everything that was going on in the world.
And so in March, when the pandemic hit, I was like, this business is gonna fail.
I'm not going to be able to do this, nobody's gonna sign up, people are trying to save money.
So I did actually decide to give my product away for free, to everybody, to all the listed
agents for 30 days, and I said, I made an ad about it.
And I said, you know, I know there everybody's going through a hard time.
So here's my website, sign up for free, it's yours.
And after I did that, I had a lot of people actually sign up for paid afterwards.
And I didn't I did not expect that to happen.
I did.
I really didn't.
Another thing that was really beneficial for me was I have had a lot of former clients.
I've probably had about 100, a lot of them come and go, you know, so I did email each
and every one of my clients, just said, Hey, how's it going?
You know, I haven't talked to you in a while, told them about my new business.
And this was all in March, too, I was just really determined.
So I emailed all these people, I said, Do you know people, other real estate agents,
we have a referral program.
So if you want to refer somebody over to this, and we'll give you this amount of money.
And so I emailed them, and I also emailed in the past, I was invited to teach classes
at Keller Williams, real estate agency.
And so I have taught a lot of classes around the Dallas Metroplex to Keller Williams agents
about how to market their business, how to create a Facebook page, how to use the internet,
I'm not joking.
So there were a lot of different classes, some some people did not even know how to
use the internet, that's okay, you have to be really patient for things like that.
So after teaching those classes, I had an email list of those people, and I sent out
a mass email to them.
So after doing that, and after running the ad, that was really well perceived, I don't
I only spent about $400 on that ad, my click per cost was, I think, two cents.
So after that happened is when we started seeing a lot of the growth through a lot of
the work that you basically spent years doing in real estate world, with your marketing
agency with like the classes that you taught, like you built up this huge network.
And that came in handy later on, which I think speaks to why it makes sense to, you know,
when you're sort of searching through the wilderness trying to figure out what to do,
and you wanted to quit the decision to stick with that niche to stick with what you felt
comfortable with and like the connections you built in the real estate agency seems
like a paid dividends.
Because like if I tried to like start a real estate, you know, marketing business, like
I know nobody.
And as the other people have absolutely nobody on an email list that I could email and be
like, Hey, are you interested in this?
Like, I would get crickets, you know, like I said, I did it for five years.
So I did have a lot of contacts, and I'm very lucky that I did and I'm also very lucky that
I wrote down the contacts, I actually, I actually didn't implement them into any kind of system
like MailChimp or anything, I just had this notepad full of emails.
So I had to go through and type them all out and do all that.
I also went to a few real estate conventions and got some emails from there as well.
My advice for conventions, I won't go on a rant, but I will tell you, before you decide
to pay for a booth at a convention, do research on that convention, because there was one
that I went to that probably had about 50 people show up.
So I need to do research on the things that I'm investing my time and money into.
That's important.
That's just another thing you can add on to the list of mistakes, it's okay.
Tell me about this ad that you ran that you spent, what, $400 on and you were getting
like clicks for two cents or something crazy?
Like, where did you run this ad?
It was like a Facebook ad?
Yeah.
So I ran it through Facebook.
It's really difficult because back then, I was able to target real estate agents and
job titles, realtors and everything.
So at that time, I did target real estate agents, and I target brokerages, I targeted
people in the United States and also Canada.
And on the ad, I had a graphic on there that said 30 days free in big letters.
And then in the text box, I said everything you need for your real estate business, we're
giving it away for 30 days free for a limited time to help you during this difficult time.
And people just click started clicking on it and signing up and I was happy.
I was really happy.
And the thing about Facebook ads is Facebook ads have made my life a lot more difficult
now, I will say, because there are a lot of restrictions that they put up about probably
nine months ago, where you are not allowed to target job titles if you are in the real
estate industry.
And so anytime I try to run a Facebook ad and don't check off housing on there, then
I get flagged in the ad does ad gets rejected.
So I've had a lot of challenges with recreating an ad that's able to target that many people.
And I think that's one of the things I'm still working out, like I'm able to target zillow.com
pro and realtor.com pro and multiple listing service, but I can't target specific job titles.
And that is that has been a challenge.
So after that, I decided to move on to Pinterest and run Pinterest ads, you know, I've been
working with Pinterest for a really long time, I didn't run a lot of Pinterest ads, I decided
to just post some of my content on there for free and said, you know, sign up for this
email to receive 10 free social media posts with captions and hashtags.
And through the Pinterest ad, it started getting a lot more traction too.
So then, in May, so from April to May, we went from 2400 to 3500 just from running the
Pinterest ads.
So I've been kind of sticking with Pinterest and I have about 100,000 Pinterest views on
my profile each month.
So yeah, I really enjoy using that platform as well.
I want to talk about like your your sort of like continued growth, because would you say
that Pinterest ads have been sort of like the crucial or ads in general have been like
the crucial linchpin in your growth strategy since then because in April of last year,
you hit $2,500 a month with a sort of like free promotion and like these ads today are
like three times that what's contributed to that growth.
So definitely ads, I usually stick to Facebook ads and Pinterest ads.
And also Instagram as well has been a really big outlet for helping my business.
And I know you're really big on Twitter, I'm trying.
I'm working on Twitter, but as far as Instagram goes, you know, I have almost 13,000 followers
on Instagram.
And in order to target my specific audience, I go through Instagram, type in the hashtag
realtor, and then just start liking and commenting on all posts with the hashtag realtor on it.
And that has also helped me tremendously.
But it also takes a lot of time as well, because I am trying to do, you know, I'm trying to
market my business as well as create content like I already, but what helped with that
growth is number one, yes, ads, Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook are the main ones I
go for.
Number two, we did add a new plan was scheduled posting.
And I looked at all my competitors.
And we're the only company in the industry right now that offers scheduled posting.
And since we're white labeled with another company, we're able to give people analytics
and we have RSS feeds in there.
And that's been really helpful to them.
So just adding on that other plan really helped with the growth to also just increasing my
ad budget.
So I started my MRR started going up.
So I started to increase how much I was spending per month.
Now I'm spending around $1,000 per month on ads.
And that's okay.
You know, a part of me just wants to spend all of it on ads, like I need to just throw
it all in there.
There's an entire month's worth of MRR for an ad to see what happens because it's okay
to spend your mark your money on marketing because that is the number one way you're
going to get customers is through marketing.
And I think that should be in my opinion, that should be the biggest budget for any
company that's trying to grow.
And even if you you feel like, Oh, I didn't make any money this month, it'll be okay
because you're getting more or as far as me, I was getting more signups.
So now I'm averaging around 60 signups per month.
Just starting this year, last year, it got a bit slow.
And I got stuck.
And I feel like a lot of people get stuck at a certain amount.
So I got stuck at 5000 MRR for a while.
And even I was even running the ads, I was even doing everything that I was doing before.
And I just was like, man, why am I stuck in this one spot, I was like, I have to do something
to figure out how to get me out of this little rut I'm in.
So I decided to reevaluate my marketing strategy, I decided to reevaluate my ads, I created
new ads, I also started running ads on Google for the first time, I had never done that
before with this business.
So I decided to go the Google ads route.
Also worked on the SEO for my website, which was kind of faltering a little bit.
And that's how I kind of got out of that 5000 rut was I just kind of switched around the
strategy that I used for marketing.
So I was like, it worked before, it's not working now.
So let's let's change it and fix it.
You know, there's so many advantages that you have in the situation, I think by being
a marketer, because most of the people that I have on the show, they're like software
engineers.
They come into every problem with their software engineer hat on, they say, I'm not getting
enough customers, I'm not getting enough signups, like, it must be a problem with my product.
If only I spend the next six months building this feature, I tweak these colors, I move
this button over here, then something better will happen and I'll magically start growing.
And because your co founder is a software engineer, and he just sort of plugging away
working on that, you're free to think with only your marketing hat on.
And that's something that a lot of people who haven't like actually gotten started doing,
are totally afraid to do, like probably the vast majority of indie hackers have never
even tried spending a single dollar on advertising, which is probably one of the easiest ways
to get users because you just show them a thing and if they like it, they click it,
you know, it's like it's pretty straightforward.
So again, your particular situation, you're only trying different marketing approaches,
you're only trying like different ad channels, etc.
And like if it turns out like that's the actual thing that's caused you to plateau, then like
you're going to succeed because you're trying this thing that other people don't even attempt
to try or might be scared to try.
So I like the division of labor between you and your co founder.
And I like the fact that like you're willing to spend money to make money.
I'm curious now that you're you know, you're pretty close to your $10,000 a month goal.
What are you going to do to get there?
What do you think is the next hurdle you need to overcome?
To get to my 10,000 MR actually revised my ad yesterday, I am keeping on my free trial,
I do want to eventually drop the free trial.
I'm going to continue to run Facebook ads, I actually upped my budget for my Facebook
ad to $30 per day.
And I'm focusing on that one ad because right now it's doing very well.
And I also would really like to market more on my Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.
And by market more, I mean by posting every single day going through each hashtag and
commenting and liking on people's pages.
Because whenever I did that, whenever I interacted with my target audience on a daily basis,
I would get multiple signups.
And then I started getting too busy to do that.
But that's something that I can do from my couch, or in my bed, you know, it's something
that you don't have to be sitting on a desk to do.
And it's easy.
And it doesn't cause you know, it doesn't, I don't have to think a lot about it.
All I have to do is just go through realtor hashtag realtor, they say, I made a sale and
I comment and say, congratulations, this is amazing with a heart emoji.
And then you get a follower and you potentially get a client or a member.
So I need to focus more on just talking to my target audience, and being more available.
And I think that if I keep doing that, then I will get to my 10,000 MRR.
Once I get to my 10,000 MRR, that is when I will hire somebody to do all that work for
me.
And make another post on Andy hackers about how you got there.
Yes.
Oh my gosh, of course.
Yeah, I have come across a few communities that I have not felt as welcome in.
And whenever I posted on there, everybody was just so nice, and so welcoming and wonderful,
and so supportive.
And I've had people message me or send me an email, or contact me through Instagram
asking me questions on how I got to where I am.
I just feel so honored.
You made a really good post.
I think it's like the formula is pretty straightforward, you be transparent, you actually tell your
story like a story form, you don't hide the bad stuff, you don't only show the good stuff,
and you did all of that in your post.
So it's, I think, hard for people reading that who are going through the same journey
that you are, not to want to connect to you, and not to want to empathize with you, and
not to want to reach out to you.
So it was really cool to see that.
And you've done the exact same thing in this podcast, hopefully people will reach out to
you as well.
I ask everybody who comes on the show the same question at the end, which is, what's
your advice for other people who are just getting started?
Now, a lot of people are trying to do what you're on the verge of doing, getting to this
like $10,000 a month revenue mark.
What's your feedback for them if they're frustrated and just getting started?
So frustration is something that's going to happen.
And your feelings are valid, I just want to tell you that.
My advice would be don't let other successful companies in the same field become a deterrent
to your success.
Because a lot of times I would look at companies that were similar to mine, I would see how
well they were doing, and I would say, you know what, I'm not going to get there.
I can't do this.
And I think it is so important to tell yourself I can, I can do this, and I will do this.
And just focus on your business, focus on what you care about.
And if you do become discouraged, don't stay in that discouragement.
Use that discouragement as fuel to grow and to get better.
All right, love it.
Don't let other companies become a discouragement to your success.
And honestly, it makes perfect sense because so many of the founders I've talked to are
starting companies that are solving similar problems to companies that are much bigger
and more established than theirs.
You know, they're just coming at it from a different angle with a different creative
solution or different customers.
And they weren't deterred by the fact that someone had already done it in a different
way before them.
And so I like the fact that you're doing the same thing, you know, like you're not the
very first person to ever help real estate agents with their social media marketing,
and yet you're still crushing it and doing a great job.
So...
Thank you so much.
I really appreciate that.
Yeah.
Thank you for coming on the show.
Can you let listeners know where they can go to learn more about you and what you're
up to?
Well, you can...
My website, so it's just theagentnest.com.
And then all of my social media handles are the AgentNest.
So Instagram, the AgentNest, Twitter, the AgentNest.
That's another marketing tip for you.
Make sure that all of your social media handles have the same exact name.
That's really helpful.
Yeah.
You can contact me or molly at theagentnest.com.
That's my email.
So don't be afraid to reach out.
All right.
Thanks, Molly.
All right.
Thank you so much, Cora Lynn.
Thank you so much for coming on the show.