Vlog #32: Are phone calls dead?

Founder of Classpass swings by TechStars and asks Ryan if phone calls are dead

Full Transcript:

Ryan: What’s up guys, we got our iced coffee from the roasting plant. I’m in the uber on the way to the office, we're going to get there - a little late, it's like 8:47 so I...instead of walking. It's going to be a good day. Yesterday we had a massive day of sales today pretty to continue that momentum. We could have some massive stuff - today, we're in try to get some tactical things out like some cold calling, subscribing; see you guys at the office. Where is everyone, it’s like critical… Very frustrating [yeah] but did you say [??? 0:59]

[Also something that--]

Ryan: Really nice to have. [al right] So is that happening? [??? 1:08] [...like what does that even mean] What...got stuck, it is heavy rain here - our - got stuck sometimes due to water enter the office, it’s resolved now. [??? 1:25] Where’s the - T-shirts...John. Hello, it’s Ryan talking, I’m gonna have John one of our accounting executives also join us as well. You know we're getting a ton of businesses, a ton of agencies that are switching over from legacy systems. ...phone calls as well. Currently, phonewagon has 53 paying customers 5k MRR and we're adding like 10 new customers week.

Payal: Well I guess my...in my head - like...industry and I...would be like every day is...even though you have a phone line. [???2:15] seeing like a lot of...that way. So like I don’t have…. [alright, cool] … [laughter] And I went down to...and everyone - at the party and all these folks were building like gadgets and apps and I was like what? You do this full-time like it just wasn’t something any of my friends were doing so I kinda felt strange for me really...a tech company. And I was like I’m gonna do...so I gave myself two weeks to come up with an idea and... 36 hours later I was searching for a ballet class too - online and I was miserably frustrated. So I didn’t quit my job for another six months. So I spent that six months sort of like doing research, seeing if I was...you know if I can do a little bit of...customers...products...did [??? 3:14] I don’t believe in like doing...behind the screens…. I am like I know I'm a little bit more customer-centric, I just like I didn't know, I’m just a little. With that being said like I think most people...forget - a customer's or my partner's do.

[....when you were...disappointed...how did you maintain those relationships so that you know when your product was ready...while you're expecting--

Payal: [??? 3:43] people’s classes like we know we messed up...times and it's really important in the beginning for them to know that you’re small...something...feel like...like talk to them, like making sure you'll meet them in person. We literally, we do, there were days that I did like four classes just to like to make sure people like knew that we care; you know what I mean. It’s like kind of important for them to know that your...customer and you’re not just trying to make money...business. I make sure like all of [??? 4:17] Are we building like - wanna do till my death like literally...in my...because life is short…. [thank you so much for…] [applause]

Michael: ...reach out to like four or five people...did [??? 4:47] Probably doing something already...same time you’re saying...because the...is usually like pretty…. So like every time like a few people had to...inside...to have...right now.

Ryan: See I like these a lot where there’s like little like stories of us. Yeah this is a good one. [yeah do that as the teaser] ...as the teaser, okay. Yeah….a couple things, one I really wanted an in-house person so that was like the one thing that I was like discussing with the team here. This role is is really the SDR position or the OTE, so basically they...salary. That was the SDR candidate that he’s actually been...with me, he’s really really…. I kind of like him, the only reason I didn't want to hire him at first was because he’s gonna be remote, he's like on top of…. I think he's super fuckin’ hungry, so I think he could actually be really really good so I told him that would give them an answer today he can start on Monday. I'm going to bring him probably to New York for like maybe next week and the week after for like two weeks for like training and stuff. ...phone joke. [??? 6:22] [making phone jokes] I’m making phone jokes...Mike Horton - reporting in a lot of numbers so I said they call them like Horton. Look, I have our metric dashboard right here. I just need one more sale today to go over 4,800, if you're our guy, I think you're our guy; you'll be our guy, I appreciate it. Did you watch our blog today, did you watch our blog? If you subscribe to YouTube...get push notifications, don't worry I'll send you the link though. [ [??? 7:07] ...it goes to you first] And the second thing is-- [??? 7:19] Oh that’s why - does like stats...43…. Guys I know what you're wondering you're like Ryan how many sales did you get today and the answer is three. Okay we got three sales today, we got four yesterday were at seven for the week - our biggest week so far. It could be the biggest week so far. We have seven in two days with the run rate five days it's at least 14 plus 3.5 so we're on a - rate of 17 sales. We only have 53 customers which means we can increase our customer base by like 20% just this week; we have a massive pipeline bill. I'm super excited so you know what I'm going to do right now, go to a - rooftop because that makes the most sense. No but real talk like thank you guys for following along because I'm starting to hear like a lot of people that were in conversations with have actually liked watching the vlog and are like wanting to do business with us because they respect what we're doing seven days a week every single day because they're Wagoneers; they're Pioneers and they like our building businesses as well. So it's working and I want you guys to put out your own content, like just document what you're doing like I don't really know what we're doing but we're like doing it consistently; so that's the one thing consistency. The second thing is just document what you're doing because it can be kind of interesting for other people and not everyone's going to watch it every single day they're gonna be able to watch it like some days they’re gonna are watch - like 2/3 episode - like oh those guys are like legit; they're doing their thing. Then they'll pop out, they probably won't follow it then they'll want to jump back in. By the way what we're going to do starting tomorrow we're going to start sharing our metrics. We're going to start every single day, we're going to share our revenue metrics, number of customer metrics and we're going to tell you each day how many new customers we got and how much new revenue we got. we're going to be really really transparent with all of that stuff. I'm going to tell our guy today, I'm going to hire him for next week; have another guy coming in the office soon. So a lot of cool things are happening but that said you still have to make time for the gym today so you got to make time for health, got to make time for yourself while still hitting it, grinding, seven days a week. [...] This is awkward. Appreciate you guys, if you guys are new here my name is Ryan Shank, this is our journey building phone wagon from the ground up; no outside funding we're out here seven days a week blogging our journey through TechStars in New York City. Okay, hope you guys are out there working hard being Pioneers, being Wagoneers. Wait - like literally in front of the-- I'm like by the yoga instructor. [...keep…] And then? [and then i...here..I’m hiding from you and your camera]