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Home/The SaaS Podcast/Episode 405
How Building in Public Fueled Bootstrap to Profitability
Guillaume Moubeche, lempire

How Building in Public Fueled Bootstrap to Profitability

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Episode Summary

Guillaume Moubeche launched lemlist with $1,000 and a bootstrap to profitability mindset. Today, lempire generates $26 million in ARR with a team of just 90 people and $10 million in EBITDA.

But the path from surviving on pasta in a 28-square-meter apartment to running five profitable SaaS products was anything but smooth. His first business - a t-shirt company with his father - sold exactly six shirts and nearly destroyed their relationship. His co-founders left unexpectedly after a $30 million cash-out. And critics called his acquisition strategy senseless.

Guillaume Moubeche is the founder and CEO of lempire, a suite of products that help B2B businesses grow, including lemlist, lemwarm, Taplio, Tweet Hunter, and lemcal.

Guillaume's entrepreneurial journey began with a painful failure. A t-shirt business he started with his father sold only six shirts, straining their relationship for nearly a year. Undeterred, Guillaume joined a B2B lead generation agency, where he learned about cold email prospecting. This experience sparked the idea for lemlist.

In 2018, with just $1,000, Guillaume and two technical co-founders launched lemlist. The early days were grueling. They worked tirelessly, with Guillaume often surviving on pasta and isolating himself from doubtful friends and family. To acquire customers, Guillaume provided free services, trading lemlist accounts for essential tools he could not afford.

His persistence and build-in-public strategy eventually paid off. lemlist's revenue grew 30% month over month, hitting $1 million ARR in less than two years. Guillaume's bootstrap to profitability approach meant the company never needed outside capital to fund operations.

By 2021, just three years after launch, lemlist had reached $10 million in annual recurring revenue. This rapid success attracted investor interest, leading to a $30 million cash-out for the founders at a $150 million valuation.

But the celebration was short-lived. Guillaume's co-founders unexpectedly left. Suddenly, he was alone, managing all aspects of the business, including unfamiliar technical areas. Despite this setback, Guillaume made a bold move to expand lempire's product suite, acquiring Taplio and Tweet Hunter. Critics called the acquisitions senseless, but Guillaume pushed forward, convinced these tools would create a powerful B2B growth ecosystem.

Today, lempire serves tens of thousands of customers in over 100 countries, generating $26 million in annual recurring revenue with a team of 90 people. They achieved their bootstrap to profitability goal with $10 million in EBITDA - proving that a lean, self-funded approach can compete with venture-backed competitors.

Topics: Bootstrapping|Content & Inbound Marketing

Key Insight

Guillaume Moubeche built lempire from a $1,000 launch to $26 million ARR with $10 million EBITDA and only 90 employees by combining relentless build-in-public content with a product differentiation strategy that focused on solving the one problem customers actually cared about - getting replies to cold emails.

Key Ideas

  • Launched lemlist with $1,000 by trading product licenses for tools instead of paying for them
  • Grew 30% month over month for three years by documenting real cold email results publicly
  • Built a "warm outbound" process - reaching out to people who engaged with content - that dramatically outperformed cold outreach
  • Acquired Taplio at $20K MRR and scaled it past $4-5 million ARR by leveraging existing audience and influencer network
  • Maintained $10 million EBITDA at $26 million ARR with just 90 people by staying lean and profitable

Key Lessons

  • 💰 Bootstrap to profitability requires creative resource swaps: Guillaume traded lemlist accounts for data tools and software instead of paying cash, stretching his $1,000 launch budget by eliminating most operational costs during the critical early months.
  • 🚀 Build in public to bootstrap to profitability faster: Documenting real results - including exact email templates and reply rates - created a virtuous growth loop where social proof attracted customers, who then generated more shareable results.
  • 🎯 In a crowded market, find one differentiator instead of matching features: lemlist did not try to replicate competitor feature sets. Guillaume focused on personalized video and logo insertion, solving the core problem of getting replies rather than building a generic email tool.
  • 🤝 Deliver human-touch service to compensate for early product gaps: Guillaume set up campaigns for free on live calls, providing $1,000-$2,000 worth of agency services to make up for a buggy product that lacked follow-up sequences.
  • 📉 Co-founder departures do not have to kill growth if fundamentals are strong: When both co-founders left unexpectedly after the cash-out, Guillaume spent 18 months rebuilding while still growing lempire from $10M to $26M ARR.
  • 🧠 Focus on output, not outcome, to build a content habit: Guillaume coaches his team with the "rule of 100" approach - post every day for 100 days, measuring effort rather than reach, because consistency builds the skill that eventually drives results.
  • 💰 Acquire products your customers already need to expand revenue per user: Guillaume bought Taplio and Tweet Hunter because his warm outbound experiments proved that content-engaged audiences convert far better than cold prospects, creating a natural product ecosystem.

Watch the Episode

Chapters

00:00Introduction
03:23Welcome and five-year anniversary
05:17Overview of lempire and its five products
07:09Business metrics - $26M ARR, 90 people, $10M EBITDA
08:11The failed t-shirt business with his father
11:15From agency to SaaS - the origin of lemlist
12:36Finding co-founders by helping people for free
15:17How lemlist was built with $1,000
16:43First paying customers and 30% MoM growth
22:23Using product trades to avoid spending cash
25:21Finding lemlist's differentiator - personalized video
27:23Crowded market vs new market validation
28:44Documenting real outbound results as a growth engine
33:40Trust triangle and building in public
37:18The $30M cash-out at $150M valuation
40:23Co-founders leaving and rebuilding alone
42:08Acquiring Taplio and Tweet Hunter
44:12The warm outbound discovery
48:21Practical advice for founders creating content
55:06Lightning round

Episode Q&A

How did Guillaume Moubeche launch lemlist with only $1,000?

Guillaume used AWS startup credits for hosting and traded lemlist accounts for data provider tools and other software he needed. He did all customer acquisition through outbound using his own product, eliminating marketing spend entirely.

What differentiation strategy helped lemlist stand out in a crowded market?

Instead of building all the features competitors had, Guillaume focused on one unique capability - personalized video and automatic logo insertion in cold emails. This "wow effect" feature directly addressed the core problem of getting more replies, which was enough to attract and convert early users.

How did Guillaume Moubeche's bootstrap to profitability approach drive 30% month-over-month growth?

Guillaume documented his real outbound campaigns, including exact templates and reply rates, and published them weekly. This build-in-public strategy created a virtuous cycle - users shared their results, which built social proof, attracted new customers, and generated product feedback that improved the tool.

What happened when lempire's co-founders left after the $30 million cash-out?

Guillaume was suddenly alone managing all aspects of the business including unfamiliar technical areas. He spent the next 18 months rebuilding, describing it as extremely hard on a personal level, but ultimately restructured the company and continued growing.

How did Guillaume Moubeche grow Taplio from $20K MRR to over $4 million ARR?

After acquiring Taplio and Tweet Hunter simultaneously, Guillaume leveraged his team's existing LinkedIn audience and influencer network to drive adoption. Because his team had already been trained in content creation, they could demonstrate the product's value through their own profiles.

What is the "warm outbound" strategy that Guillaume Moubeche developed at lempire?

Guillaume extracted people who engaged with his LinkedIn content, filtered them by ICP criteria like VP of Sales or founders of 100-plus person companies, then created lemlist campaigns targeting them. Response rates from this warm audience far exceeded traditional cold outbound.

Why does Guillaume Moubeche believe bootstrap to profitability beats raising venture capital?

lempire reached $26 million ARR with $10 million EBITDA and only 90 people. Guillaume argues that profitability removes pressure, gives founders control, and proves the business model works. After the cash-out gave him financial freedom, he chose to keep building rather than raise more capital.

How did Guillaume Moubeche get his first 100 paying customers for lemlist?

Guillaume personally onboarded beta users on live calls, setting up their campaigns for free - a service he previously charged $1,000-$2,000 for at his agency. He prioritized exceptional human-touch customer service to compensate for an early product that lacked features and had bugs.

What content creation framework does Guillaume Moubeche recommend for SaaS founders?

Guillaume recommends the "rule of 100" - post content every day for 100 days without worrying about reach. He also advises founders to find posts they agree or disagree with and rewrite them in their own words, building the writing muscle without starting from a blank page.

Book Recommendations

The Alchemist

by Paulo Coelho

Links

  • lempire: Website | X
  • Guillaume Moubeche: Website | LinkedIn | X
  • Omer Khan: LinkedIn | X
Full Transcript

Omer Khan [00:00:00]:
Welcome to another episode of the SaaS podcast. I'm your host Omer Khan and this is a show where I interview proven founders and industry experts who share their stories, strategies and insights to help you build, launch and grow your SaaS business. In this episode, I took to Guillaume Moubeche, the founder and CEO of Lempire and a suite of products that help B2B businesses grow, including Lemlist, Lemwarm, Taplio, Tweethunter and Lemcal. Guillaume's entrepreneurial journey began with a painful failure.

Omer Khan [00:00:42]:
A T shirt business he started with his father ended up selling only six shirts, which strained their relationship for nearly a year. Undeterred, Guillaume joined a B2B lead generation agency where he learned about cold email prospecting and this experience sparked the idea for Lemlist. In 2018, with just $1,000, Guillaume and two technical co founders launched Lemlist. The early days were grueling. They worked tirelessly, with Guillaume often surviving on pasta and isolating himself from doubtful friends and family. To acquire customers, Guillaume provided free services, trading Lemlist accounts for essential tools.

Omer Khan [00:01:23]:
He personally helped set up campaigns for early users, often going above and beyond to ensure their success. His persistence and build in public strategy eventually paid off. Lemlist's revenue grew 30% month over month, hitting the first million in ARR in less than two years. After launch, the growth continued at breakneck pace. By 2021, just three years after launch, Lemlist had skyrocketed to $10 million in annual recurring revenue. This rapid success attracted investor interest, leading to a $30 million cash out for the founders at a $150 million valuation. But the celebration was short lived.

Omer Khan [00:02:06]:
Shortly after the cash out, Guillaume's co founders unexpectedly left. Suddenly, he was all alone, managing all aspects of the business, including unfamiliar technical areas. Despite this setback, Guillaume Moubeche a bold move to expand Limpire's product suite, acquiring Taplio and Tweethunter. His critics call the acquisition senseless, but Guillaume pushed forward, convinced these tools would create a powerful B2B growth ecosystem. Today, Lempire serves tens of thousands of customers in over 100 countries, generating $26 million in annual recurring revenue with a team of 90 people. And they're profitable.

Omer Khan [00:02:44]:
In this episode, you'll learn how Guillaume turned early failures into into valuable lessons that shaped his entrepreneurial journey, why building in public was crucial for Lemlist's growth, and how you can implement this strategy in your own startup. How Guillaume navigated the sudden departure of his co founders and managed to grow the Business. Despite this major setback, we talk about why focusing on profitability allowed Limpire to maintain a lean team while scaling to $26 million in arrival. And how Guillaume balances running multiple projects and what his approach could mean for your SaaS company.

Omer Khan [00:03:23]:
I originally interviewed Guillaume in 2019 on episode 227. A lot has happened with his company since that interview, so I invited him back for our five year anniversary. So I hope you enjoy it. Guillaume, welcome to the show.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:03:39]:
Thanks a lot for having me. Omer, it's our five year anniversary, so it's a special date.

Omer Khan [00:03:45]:
It is, yeah. I should say. Welcome back. So you and I were just talking before we started recording and we originally did the first version of this interview, the V1, back in September 2019. And so we're coming up to five years and I think it's a great time to get together again and talk about everything that's been going on. And I think your story is very inspirational. I think also that you are very.

Omer Khan [00:04:13]:
You're an open book, that you talk about your, you know, the revenue and the metrics and all that stuff, but also the struggles. And my hope is that we're going to have lots of founders who are going to listen to this, get some inspiration, get some ideas, and hopefully accelerate their journey to, you know, whatever they want to get to.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:04:33]:
That sounds awesome.

Omer Khan [00:04:35]:
Cool. So let's going to ask you the question, do you have a favorite quote, something that inspires or motivates you that you can share with us?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:04:42]:
A quote I love. I think it's like the best way to predict the future is to create it.

Omer Khan [00:04:47]:
Love that. Yeah.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:04:48]:
And for me, what it represents, it's like usually people are going to be telling you that you can't achieve some stuff just because they believe that they know you. But the reality is most of the things that we thought were impossible to achieve were achieved by people who were just big dreamers and optimistic. So if you have an idea, if you want to go for it, just go for it. You know, life is. Is way too short to. To waste it on other people's dreams.

Omer Khan [00:05:17]:
This is a little bit of a challenge because most of the time I talk to founders and it's like one business, one product, a very easy conversation. But you're now in a place where you're running Lempire and it's made up of five different products. Just tell us about overall. What does the business do? What are these five products? Who are you trying to help?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:05:40]:
So Lempire is like a street of products that help B2B businesses grow. So it's like pretty simple. Like we really focus on the how do you acquire customers from how do you find like a potential prospect to the closing. So that goes through obviously like the outbound part with lemwarm and LEM list. So lemwarm is basically a tool that makes sure that your message ends up in the inbox rather than in the spam.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:06:07]:
Lemlist allows you to find the right decision makers at any company and reach out on multi channel like emails, LinkedIn and phone call. And after that we have Taplio and TwitterHunter which are like two tools that help you build an audience and build a lot more trust. So eventually the type of rates that you get when you're doing outbound will increase a lot when you have an audience and you can build more trust.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:06:33]:
And at the end we have lemcal that is a competitor to Calendly but that helps you reduce no shows because when someone books a meeting and don't show up, it's really like a pain. And we wanted to solve that.

Omer Khan [00:06:46]:
Cool. It's kind of funny that Taplio and Tweethunter have kind of broken the branding with limited something. You know, it's like I'm surprised, you know, Taplio is not LEM linked, which would be a terrible name I think. But anyway, it's like so give us a sense of the size of the business. Where are you in terms of revenue, size of team, customers?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:07:09]:
Yeah, so we have like we are at 26 plus million dollar in annual recurring revenue. We are in more than 100 countries. It's like tens of thousands of customers worldwide. We target mainly like SMB. Our mantra, I would say internally is that we help ambitious businesses turn into big names. So typically, for example, we have some B2B businesses that are brand of water and that are launching internationally and we want to help them become, let's say the new Evian or whatever water the that could be huge.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:07:47]:
And we do that in many categories where basically we build product for innovative teams and helping them grow as fast as possible. And in terms of team, we are very, very lean. So we are around 90 people, which means that at the end of the year we will be at $10 million in EBITDA. So profit before tax. If we simplify this.

Omer Khan [00:08:11]:
I think what's, what's kind of really cool about this story is that it all started with lemlist back in 2018, 2019, which you started that business with $1,000. Right. So super humble Kind of, you know, scrappy start. But before that you had a couple of other previous attempts at trying to build businesses which didn't go too well. And one of them was this, this T shirt business. So maybe you can start by telling us you know, that story and you know why you, you started that business and what you were hoping to achieve.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:08:51]:
Yeah, of course, like the first failed business, to be honest, was, was quite hard for me because it was a business I started with, with my dad. So to give a bit more context, like I don't come from money like my parents, they don't have degrees. My grandparents are farmers and immigrants in France. So essentially both my parents sacrificed a lot so my brother and I could study, get a good education, etc, and eventually I became an engineer. But my heart has always been into business.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:09:20]:
So once I had my master in engineering, my parents were, you know what, like if you want to study marketing, now that you have an engineering background, it's fine, like you can do it. So I went on it but with in mind, you know, like to be able to make money on the side. So I was like, okay, like I'm going to launch a business. My dad basically like prints on fabric. So I was like, okay, like let's start a T shirt business.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:09:44]:
You know, it doesn't cost a lot of money, we don't have much, but I'm sure we can do something great. So I built a community around like Paris, you know, like art, etc. Etc. And I just thought that through that community I would be able to sell thousands of T shirts. So I put a lot of pressure on my dad on you know, like printing as much T shirts as possible. But when we launched we actually only sold like six T shirts. Now from, I can laugh about it now, but six. Yeah, six.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:10:19]:
So yeah, that was like the worst conversion rate I think I had in my entire life. I would definitely do things like totally differently if I had to start all over again because I think I spent way too much time trying to develop the perfect website. The community was totally irrelevant with what we were doing. The T shirts were too expensive. I did not know. It was just lots of learnings.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:10:44]:
But eventually I kind of got a bit like the relationship with my dad kind of suffered because I think I was young at the time and also ambitious and you know, I would put my own failures on my dad like saying like, hey, we didn't invest enough. So that's why, you know, like we're not, we, we don't have money to do ads. So Obviously, we can't sell. So I would find, like, a lot of excuses. And eventually, like, I stopped talking to my dad for about, like, almost a year. So it was.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:11:15]:
It was really tough. We stopped the business. And a friend of mine at the time was, like, seeing me, you know, like, grind and hustle to try to, like, have this business work. And then he told me, like, hey, I'm launching, like, a B2B business. I was like, what the fuck is B2B? And then it was like, business to business. I'm selling leads. And I was like, okay, can you tell me more about it?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:11:38]:
And it's like, yeah, essentially we're doing, like, cold email sales prospecting to book meetings with potential prospects for customers, like, anywhere in the world. So we started doing this and actually it worked out pretty well. Like, we started making, like, I would say, like, a bit of money. So that was quite cool for me because I was closing companies in the US In Australia, et cetera.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:12:03]:
And I started learning about sales prospecting, about how to find anyone's email address, how to reach out to people, how to write sales campaigns for different type of industries, different type of Personas. So it was really, really interesting. But eventually, as the agency scaled, because we were, I think, around like, 10 people with, like, freelancers, et cetera, I started thinking, you know, like, I want something that can truly scale, and I love software, so I think I'm just gonna go and start my own software and my own company.

Omer Khan [00:12:36]:
Okay. So the idea for Limbless came from what you were doing at the agency, and you identified a potential need I want to get into, like, how you got started with that and, you know, built the product. But the first question that sort of hit me was the experience you went through with building that T shirt business. It wasn't just something a business that failed. It caused a lot of problems between you and your father, at least for a while.

Omer Khan [00:13:09]:
And how did you recover from that mentally and get the confidence to go out and say, okay, I'm going to try and build another business.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:13:18]:
To be honest, I think the more people started to doubt about my capacity of becoming successful, because the reality is, in France, I did basically the best engineering school and the best business school so people wouldn't understand why I was not making money and trying to launch businesses and eating pasta. So my mom is Italian. So for me, eating pasta is like, it's my life. It's still my life. I love it. So I was fine with it.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:13:51]:
But the reality is, like, I feel the more people doubt about What I can achieve the more motivated I am. And you know, I would have like my parents asking me, like, you know, during like family dinners, like, when are you paying yourself? Like, is the project working? Like, why don't you find a job, etc. Etc. So eventually I just, like, I stopped talking to a lot of my friends and family for about a year and a half. So I was just into grind mode. I would work a lot, but my learning curve was exponential.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:14:27]:
I read so many books, watched so many videos, tried so many different things. And eventually when it started working, I knew I had proof to everyone without it that I, I could actually make it. And I think that was like, the best rewards. The best reward is showing to people what you're capable of.

Omer Khan [00:14:48]:
Yeah, that's a great driver, I think. So how did you get started and build a product? Because $1,000 to start a business is not a lot. Many people would say, I can't do this, I can't code, or I don't have a technical co founder or a whole bunch of reasons why they can't do this. But how did you get started? Like, did you go out and do any kind of validation? Like, did you build the product yourself? You know what happened?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:15:17]:
So the first step is it was to find like, people who could actually like, ship the product. So what I did is I started helping out people for free. So my goal was to get like the biggest network possible. So I would help out people on growth strategies, et cetera. Especially after the agency where I had come. Like, I had built a lot of skills in acquiring customers. And eventually I started helping two brothers who were really good at tech.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:15:45]:
And I started showcasing how they could grow their company and all the things that they could do. And eventually they were like, okay, we love that, but we're not going to be able to implement any of the stuff that you said. It looks good, but we can't implement it. We're not these guys. And I say, okay. We started working a bit together on side projects and eventually they were like, okay, you said that you had an idea of a software. Our software is not working that well.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:16:13]:
Maybe we can start building it and see how it goes. And that's how it started. And very quickly they basically saw that I could bring tens of customers even on a shitty product. So eventually it started building up and we got a bit of traction. And every month, you know, like from the start, I think it took us, like, we started in January 2018 and the first paid customer out of beta was maybe like, In April, so like four months.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:16:43]:
And since then, you know, like, we were growing at like 30% month over month for about like two or three years, like up to almost like 10 million in annual recurring revenue. So obviously, like, they were like, highly motivated to. To continue, like, developing the product when. When they saw the results.

Omer Khan [00:17:01]:
You said earlier that you. You decided to start helping people for free. Where were you finding these people?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:17:12]:
So it was a bit of a mix. I was a lot in, like, different Facebook communities at the time. It was like a big thing. I think it's still a thing, like on some topics, but I would go, like, to. To communities on Facebook. I would go to, like, Reddit, I would go to is there indie hackers where I would. So people asking questions and just. I would help out.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:17:35]:
And I would also do it in Paris in a very famous stereotype incubator where people would be asking questions, et cetera, and I would just spend time helping out people. But to be entirely honest, I still do this. If someone sends me a message or an email with a very specific question, I will always answer and spend the time to answer. If you look at my WhatsApp, I even have a rule where people can send me very specific.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:18:03]:
They give me the problem with as many topics as they can, and then I send them voice notes in asynchronous. That way I have time to think about how I would do it, et cetera. And for them to be able to ask me other questions, they first need to take action on the advice I gave them and then they can come back with more stuff. And I still do it. To be honest, it's something I like. I think it's cool to help out. I wish someone could have helped me that way when I was younger.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:18:34]:
So, yeah, I do it as much as I can.

Omer Khan [00:18:36]:
So I love that. And I love the fact that you just started going out and connecting with people and just finding ways that you could help. And you said build your network, but you also mentioned that you had your parents constantly asking you, why didn't you get a job? When are you going to pay yourself? How are you going to make money? And so did you feel a lot of pressure there in terms of, yeah, I'm going out and helping people, but I'm not getting paid for that either.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:19:07]:
Yeah. To be honest, it's like the reality is, for me, I felt like when I was helping people in, even in the early days, I could feel how helpful and useful I was, and I felt like I was doing the right thing. You Know, I think like a lot of people, you know, whenever they say, like, hey, like you're giving money to a charity, etc. Etc. I think like when you give money for, for a charity, of course, like you do it to help people, etc. But you, in my opinion, you're doing it for yourself.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:19:39]:
You know, it's like it makes you feel good to do good. And at that time, because a lot of people were doubting me and I would feel bad about them asking all these questions because obviously I had my friend and my family, but I also had one girlfriend at the time who was paying the rent. We were living in 28 meter square, the two of us. So the pressure was real. It was a real struggle, really hard. And sometimes I just wanted to be helpful and to know that it was basically like a confident boost.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:20:15]:
Because if you help people and you see the true value of what you bring, you build in a lot more confidence in the skills that you have developed and you know that your project will eventually work and that you just have to put your head down and do the reps and eventually it will all work out.

Omer Khan [00:20:33]:
So you team up with the two brothers who basically become your co founders. You build the first version of Lemlist. How long did it take to get those first 10 customers? I know you said you got the first one in April, about three, four months after you launched.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:20:54]:
Yeah, before that I would say we had like maybe like more than 100 people on beta. So we had like different steps. First I would really reach out to other person I had helped and then I would onboard them on the product. So I would be on calls and I would have them create an account on calls just so they sign up and they actually see the product. So I would really have them create an account.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:21:23]:
And what I would do is back in the days I would charge maybe $1,000 to $2,000 per clients with the agency to set them up and do the entire copywriting. But with Lemlist, I would do it kind of for free. So that was kind of my trick to have as many people get on the product and start seeing results. Because the product was buggy, it was really shit. The first version didn't have follow ups.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:21:50]:
And at the time, even though it was maybe not the same industry as it is right now, the expectation from people were high because we had already tons of competitors. So I would just try to give more the human touch. And a lot of people believe that software is all about tech, et cetera, but it's not like if you have an exceptional customer service. And in that case that was me delivering top notch service. Of course people gonna remember it and of course people will pay whenever you ask them to.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:22:23]:
So for me that was kind of the trick. And I would basically use also our own product to do my outbound because this was the only thing we were not paying. So if you look at the $1,000, a bit of money would go to the server, but that was pretty cheap because we could get AWS credits for startups and I think they give you 12k for the first two years. So for us it was basically free for us and then after that we would just buy data.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:22:53]:
But it was also pretty cheap because I would go to data provider and say, hey, by the way, you can get a free Lemlist account and we do a trade off. I would trade a lot Lemlist against the software I would use and people would be fine with it. Because what founders don't like is when you ask something without giving anything in return. But if you go and you say hey, you know what, I have that product that does xyz, can we trade licenses? I don't have much money, but I'm just starting.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:23:21]:
But I love what you do, is that fine. Usually they give it to you for free and you can just use it and, and that was enough for me.

Omer Khan [00:23:28]:
Okay, so one of the things you said was like, hey, the product didn't do much, it didn't have follow ups. It kind of was shit. Yeah, a lot of founders are really scared of that, right? They, they don't want to get a product out there and for, they sort of feel like hey, if customers experience this and it's a bad experience, that's it, they'll, they'll never work with me again. And so I've got to make sure that it's really good and I've got to make sure that it has all these features.

Omer Khan [00:24:04]:
So maybe I'm going to spend two years building this, this product and it's understandable, right? I mean, I think you want to make sure that you get a good product out there. You sort of, it sounds like you sort of balance that by saying, okay, I'm going to provide such great customer service and build relationships with these people that they'll, they'll put up with some of the, you know, the issues with the product because you know, they know me, they like me, they trust me, that kind of thing.

Omer Khan [00:24:33]:
But if the product doesn't have the features or is, doesn't, isn't Working well enough for them, there's still a risk that people are going to churn, right? Even no matter how much they like, you know, Kyom, they're going to say it just doesn't work. So how did you get over that? How did you deal with that?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:24:50]:
So I think I would take the problem and split it into two different options. Option one, you are in a crowded market, meaning people's expectations are extremely high. So that was the case with lemlist. And for that, even though you don't have all the features that your competitors have, you need to have one unique differentiator. And what you said about the product not being ready, et cetera, the only thing you need is not all the features, it's that differentiator. And this is how you validate the traction in the market.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:25:21]:
In our case, when I was running the agency, I would see that whenever we would personalize the outbound with either a video with the name of the person or adding the logo of their company, etc. It would really increase the reply rate. So within Lemlist we built this video feature and this basically automatic logo pull out feature that was quite easy but it gave like the wow effect and that was enough for people, you know, like to be interested in the product and at least testing it.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:25:55]:
And the second thing is like if you're not in a competitive market, in that case all you need is solving one specific problem. So we launched another company, you know, that was like one of our other products, lemoire the Gorse was really, really rapid because no one thought of warmup, no one thought of having a tool that will help you improve your deliverability. No one was talking about it, but I knew it was a pain because in our community people were talking about it.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:26:28]:
So I just decided to build a very simple version that initially was actually like something done with like Google spreadsheet, etc. Like something very like scrappy. And very quickly I started seeing people pay, but the value was there and it was enough. So what you need to validate is if you're in a crowded market, is your differentiator good enough for people to pay? If that's not the case, it means you need to find another differentiator. And two, if you're not in a crowded market, is the problem you're solving big enough for people to pay?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:27:00]:
Because the reality is people talk about product market fit, but if you're in a crowded market, the product market fit already exists. It's just like maybe people don't like your product. Don't like what you build, but if others are successful, there's no reason for you not to be. And the only reason why you're not successful is because your execution skills are not good enough versus your competitors, in my opinion.

Omer Khan [00:27:23]:
How did you figure out the differentiator for Lemlist? Was this about. Did you go out, like talk to, to customers and figure out what, what was sort of missing from the other products? Was it just about your experience of looking at the market?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:27:39]:
I just, I just started like with the first principle, which is what's the main problem people face whenever, like they do like outbound. And you mentioned it to me actually, like just before we started the show. So it was quite fun. It's like when you start sending cold emails, the number one thing that people struggle with is getting replies. So I started from, okay, like, the struggle is about getting replies and getting meeting booked. So now I'm going to look at all the things that could help people get more meeting booked.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:28:09]:
And that's the kind of product I want to build. And I want to build my differentiator around that main pain point. Because every time you tell people that they can get more replies, obviously there is like a light bulb and they're like, oh, yes, that got my interest, you know, like, how exactly am I going to get more replies?

Omer Khan [00:28:26]:
I love that what you just said is so simple, but it's so, I guess, profound. Like, because the goal for customers is not to send out emails, the goal for them is to get a reply. Right?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:28:41]:
It's like, yeah, exactly.

Omer Khan [00:28:44]:
So in those first few years, like, you know, once you got those initial customers, it started to grow very quickly and I think you hit the first million in ARR. Like under two years.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:28:54]:
Yeah, two years. I think it took us. Yeah.

Omer Khan [00:28:57]:
What was driving that growth was it just this combination of like you spending a bunch of time, you know, being the support the customer success guy and all of this stuff and just using Lemlist to just do outbound or were you doing anything else?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:29:10]:
Yeah. So it's a bit of a mix. So, you know, like, I started using Lemlist for, I would say the first 100 paying customers, I would do outbound and I would test very, very different, like, type of approach. I would test like the very like straight to the point approach up to the one with like very long emails. Image. No image. Videos. No videos. And I would receive like positive replies and I would also replies, receive replies like, fuck off, French motherfucker. Like, that's a really mail. I started like receiving.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:29:45]:
So to be honest, like I went through all the ups and downs like sales rep can go through. And what I would do is for all the campaigns that would give me like good reply rates, I would document everything. So I would start writing, I would, I was actually the first one to actually showcasing the email templates I would use and the replies I would get.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:30:07]:
Because if you type like cold email templates online, you're going to end up on like HubSpot article that has been written by their SEO team who has like never done outbound in their entire life. And if you start using these templates, obviously it's not going to work out. So I would really like start from a pain, which is everyone is looking for templates, but the one that are online are not good. And because we all know that SEO is something that can be manipulated, eventually the results that people see are just not good. And people.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:30:39]:
It's basically super deceptive. So I just saw a gap and I was like, okay, I'm just going to document my life. I'm going to show the exact results, the exact replies. And eventually I started doing this like weekly. So I would do like the, the weekly template, weekly cold email template. And it started getting quite a lot of engagement. And as we started having more and more customers, I would start asking people like if they were willing to do the same and that they would be exposed to our audience of tens of thousands of people.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:31:08]:
Obviously at first I, I changed a bit the number because you have to increase it so it's worthwhile for people. But eventually people wanted to be part of what I call the lemlister of the week. So it would build a lot of trust because it's a social proof of people using your product. Then it shows that they are successful. So more people want to be successful exactly like them. And at the same time it actually shows the insights of someone who's really sending out some cold emails.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:31:36]:
So all of this was kind of like a virtuous circle because based on people's campaign, they will also come back with feedback. Based on the feedback they gave me, I would also improve the product and change kind of like the roadmap, et cetera, based on the community feedback. Then with the new features, I would eventually launch new campaigns and showcase how to use it. So more people would come from these features, more people would get better results and so on and so forth. And it got kind of like an exponential growth from there.

Omer Khan [00:32:07]:
Where were you publishing this stuff? Was this all on LinkedIn or somewhere

Guillaume Moubeche [00:32:11]:
else at the time, yeah, I published a lot on LinkedIn. I was publishing on our blog, also on the Lemlist blog back in the days. I would also publish because we had a lot of founders also in our customers in the early days. So at the same time I would do what I call the Marco Polo strategy. So Marco Polo, you know, is like famous for discovering like the Silk Road. But the reality is like it did not discover it actually like thousands of people discovered it before him.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:32:41]:
But the reality is it was just like a merchant. But he was the first one to actually document it. And because he was the first one to document it, everyone still remembers him to this day. So my idea was like, okay, I'm going to document, you know, like, how did I get my first 10 customers, my first hundred customers, how did we reach $250,000 in annual recurring revenue, how did we reach a million, et cetera, et cetera.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:33:05]:
And I would document the highs and the lows, the mistakes I've made, be super transparent about it, and eventually it builds a lot of trust. And I think people over complicate any business, but for me, it's the foundation of any business is the trust. In B2B, when you're selling like a product or a service, you're selling a solution to a specific problem. And for people to accept working with you, they just need to trust you.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:33:40]:
Because if you go back to any work from an agency, a SaaS or whatever, if you're in B2B, you do two things. Either you help people save time or you help them make more money. But essentially it's all about like a return on investment. Everyone wants to save time and everyone wants to make more money. The only reason people decide to work with you versus another person is whether or not they believe that you'll be the right person to drive to the promise that you made.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:34:08]:
And for that, the trust, in my opinion, it's like you take it, it's like a triangle where you have like emotional connection. So some people, for example, right now they're listening to the podcast and they might say, oh la la. Like, gee, with his French accent, like, I can't understand him, I don't like him. Or they might say, well, he looks like someone pretty cool, like from France, and he's done quite some cool stuff. So that's like emotional connections. That's the thing that you don't actually decide sometimes.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:34:35]:
You know, it's just like your name reminds them of someone they hated, etc. Or sometimes it's the same name either cousin that they love and it's already like a direct connection, then you have like credibility, which is like, what have you achieved in your life that make you in a credible position to do what you're offering? And finally, reliability. Can you deliver on the promises you've made?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:34:56]:
And whenever you're building in public, this is when you're basically like adding all these three parts of the trust triangle and building like a lot more trust that will help you increase, you know, all your conversion rate on all aspects whenever you're doing outbound or any sales.

Omer Khan [00:35:15]:
I think you've done a great job with this whole idea of, you know, building in public. On LinkedIn, you're still very active all the time. I just looked it up. You've got like 50, 55,000 followers on there. And that has played a big part in, in continuing to grow this business and get exposure to new people, new customers. One of the things that founders are often reluctant to do with the building in public is I'm going to tell my competitors everything as well and it's going to benefit them in some way.

Omer Khan [00:35:53]:
Has that been an issue for you? Has that resulted in a whole bunch of copycat type products? Has that been a problem? Or just you're like, whatever, it's like, let them do it.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:36:03]:
To be honest, yeah, we have a lot of copycats. I think most of the players are, the new players are copycats. But in the end, I take this as a compliment. It means that everything we've done is actually great. And the reality is you will never stop people from copying you. So whether or not we share our numbers, it's gonna bring like new people.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:36:29]:
And the reality is like, if people keep copying what you do, they are, you know, educating the market for your product because you will always be the best version, you know, so it's for me, it's like it's never a true problem.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:36:44]:
And in reality, like, I think people are a lot more scared about being copied than they should because the reality is like, even if I give you right now the best business idea ever, and we have like hundreds of thousand people listening to that podcast, I'm not even sure one person will actually spend the time to work on that idea. So sharing things in public, people have their day to day life. They might say, oh, yeah, we must do this, but eventually when it's time to take action, usually people don't take action.

Omer Khan [00:37:18]:
Yeah, yeah, that's a great point. Super great point. Okay, so I want to get to the point where I think it's about three and a half years later that you guys cashed out with the business. Just in terms of timelines, were you still just working on Lemlist? Had you created any other products in those three and a half years? And did Taplio and Tweethunter happen after that or before?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:37:45]:
Yeah, so essentially I think it was around three and a half to four years after we started the company. So three and a half years after the first paying customers and four years since first line of code, I would say we reached $10 million in unrecorn revenue with Lemlist and Lemwarm and we cashed out $30 million at a $150 million valuation. Before that, we also had a side project called Lempod that we grew to $600,000 and that we sold. So at that time, I wanted to call myself, I guess like an Exit SaaS founder.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:38:24]:
And it was quite hard to work on multiple projects because I didn't know how to scale the team. So we decided to sell that project so another company could grow it. But eventually I was like, okay, it was not a good idea. I think I prefer running multiple SaaS myself because I know that the benefit can be huge in the long term. So, yeah, that was kind of like the vibe where we at that time.

Omer Khan [00:38:52]:
Okay, just for people who don't understand, just explain what cashed out means and what investors actually get for that.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:38:59]:
Yeah, so cash out is also called sometimes secondary. So basically like an investor, whenever you see articles about fundraising, they usually put money directly on the balance sheet of the company. So the, the money goes to the company's bank account, which basically for us is pretty useless because we were already profitable and we don't needed more money on the company's bank account.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:39:26]:
However, at some point, the more you grow your business, the more pressure you have because you kind of see the value of your business growing, but you as a founder don't get the same amount. So let's say we were at 10 million in annual recurring revenue growing like more than 100% every year. So I was like, okay, technically that means the company should be valued anywhere between, I don't know, like 80 to $160 million since we're profitable. So I was like, okay, like that's a lot of money.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:40:01]:
But we don't have this money, you know, as founders. So the cash out is basically when founder, when a gross equity firm or it's often like private equity firm, they're going to basically like buy shares from you directly and give you money to your own personal bank account instead. So at that time, basically, like, my. My two co founders left and.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:40:23]:
And I stayed in the business and we kind of like, rearranged everything, but we each took a $10 million home, which basically put me in a position at that time where I was not in the need to work another day in my life. And I decided to continue because I'm passionate about what I do, and I want to continue helping as many people as possible.

Omer Khan [00:40:44]:
Yeah, okay, so now you're in a position where you're like, hey, we don't have to worry about money. We actually got some of that. So without that on the back of your mind, I can now focus on this business and growing it even more and without, you know, these sort of pressures kind of, you know, keeping me awake at night. And your two co founders were like, great, but we don't want to work on this business anymore. We're going to, you know, whatever decision they want to make that's right for them.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:41:12]:
Yeah, no, it didn't really happen like this. It's. Yeah, it's more that eventually, like, they, they. They had some, like, personal issues, and initially they were supposed to stay in the company, but because they had, like, personal issues that we kind of like, discovered after the cash outs, like, they decided like they were two brothers and they decided to leave. But it was quite hard because it was very unplanned.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:41:38]:
So from one day to another, I had to essentially manage all the tech, all these kind of things, like making sure that all the projects were going well. And, you know, like, sometimes you discover also, like, a lot of stuff afterwards that were quite tough and challenging. So, yeah, I would say that I spent the 18 months after the catch out were extremely hard on the personal level, but eventually it all worked out.

Omer Khan [00:42:08]:
Okay, so then let's talk about which was the first acquisition. Was it Taplio or Tweed Hunter?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:42:15]:
Yeah, we bought them at the same time, actually.

Omer Khan [00:42:17]:
When did that happen and why did you make those investments? And I know from reading one of your LinkedIn posts, even the critics were like, it doesn't make any sense why these companies. Right, so just explain why you did that and what the thought process was.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:42:39]:
Yeah, so the first thing is, I've been a user of Taplio and Twitter initially just like, tweet Hunter, because when we acquired Taplio, it was like, very small, but it was basically a copycat of Twitter for LinkedIn. So I was a user of both. And something. I always experiment new stuff. And something I tried was to essentially Because I post a lot of content, I would want to engage with people who have interacted with my content, people who liked or commented my post.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:43:10]:
So what I did is I took these people and I decided to put them in Google spreadsheets and filter them based on the ICP I wanted to have discussion with. So let's say VP of Sales or founders of company with more than 100 people. And then I decided to create Lemlist campaign and see the results I would get from reaching out to these people who basically kind of know me or at least know the content I produce versus a very cold audience. And the results were just like, insane.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:43:44]:
And because I had also trained my team to create content. So if you look at all people in my team, most of them are actually like, creating content, building audiences. We decided to do the same with a few other profiles and we got the exact same results. And this is when I came up with this warm outbound type of process, which is if you reach out to people who are interacted with some content that you master, and you also have an audience that can build trust.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:44:12]:
Basically, like, the results you get to your outbound are just insane compared to someone who's just doing like cold call or cold outbound every single day. So from that moment, I was like, okay, this is it. I haven't disclosed anything yet, you know, because I didn't want the word to be out. But I was like, I need to acquire these companies. So I had a chat with the founder, we had a lunch. They were trying to sell the company. They gave me the offer that they had, but it was really crap.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:44:41]:
So I was like, okay, give me 24 hours. And I came back with an offer and then the deal was made.

Omer Khan [00:44:49]:
And then what did you do there? Did you let them kind of operate as independent businesses or did you get more involved in running and whatever? Because I think you said Taplio was fairly small at the time, but it grew pretty quickly after the acquisition.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:45:07]:
Yeah, but the reality is, like, as a team, we were not super big on Twitter. I was just like, trying out Twitter and I think I grew my profile pretty quickly. But then it was a bit too much work because I was handling way too many things. And I just focused a bit more on LinkedIn. But the team was really good on LinkedIn. So essentially when we acquired it, it was a lot easier for us to leverage our network and also all the influencers we knew to kind of push the growth.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:45:36]:
So I think I acquired Taplio. It was at 20k in monthly recurring revenue, and it crossed 4 or 5 million recently. So it's quite insane in annual recurring revenue.

Omer Khan [00:45:50]:
So you've got the. You know, you've got a team of about 90 people now. You've got these five different businesses. Your co founders moved on, so you're basically the only founder of this business. I see you on LinkedIn and all the stuff that you're posting and these videos you're creating and your YouTube channel. How do you. How do you find the time to do everything?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:46:19]:
Yeah, I get this question asked a lot, to be honest. I guess it's just a matter of. I started doing it since day one. So for me, everything is easier now. At first. If you go back to my first YouTube video, I bought a $15 iPhone, kind of. I don't know how we call this Tripods, and just a microphone on Amazon. And I would do the videos, I would edit them myself so I could see what I wanted to kind of change.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:46:52]:
And eventually I did so many of those that it got better and better and better. And at first it was really crap, I can tell you. And for writing, it's more or less the same. At first you struggle to write. Eventually you feel confident about the tone. I. I like writing the way I talk. So for me, it's like, super easy. And eventually, you know, like, I have a place in Taplio where I just, like, put all my ideas.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:47:17]:
And from my ideas, I would start, like, writing posts, and then I schedule them, and then it's fine, you know, like, it's just a matter of, like, building that muscle. So for others, it looks hard because they've never done it. But if you look at the pieces of content I've created, it's in the thousands. So obviously for me now, everything is a lot easier than when I got started. And I just think it's about building that habit that will help you get better and faster at it.

Omer Khan [00:47:47]:
So if there's a, you know, founders are listening to this and saying, I love the idea of building in public, maybe I should get More active on LinkedIn or Twitter. But, you know, they. They have this reluctance because they think their content is shit or, you know, they're not very good at creating videos or writing or anything like that. What practical advice could you give them in terms of, you know, how they could just get started, like, some simple things that they could do.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:48:21]:
I would say there are two advice that I can give and that will help people maybe, like, start thinking about this in a. In a different manner. The first one is if you Take like, artists who, in my opinion, you know, like, if you take painters, for example, they are the one with sometimes, you know, like a huge ego and they want to be like the most unique person doing their art, etc. Like, or at least that's the way we picture them. But they all have learned to paint the exact same way.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:48:51]:
They took like a canva and they were looking at a painting that was done before them and they tried to reproduce it. So in content, it's exactly the same. Like, list the people who you like the content, who you like the tone, and if you agree with one post that they have been writing, rewrite it in your own words. So you take the entire post, you copy, paste it, and then you rewrite it. Rewrite every single line and try to make it your own.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:49:19]:
If they have posted something you disagree with, take that exact same post, rewrite it, but saying the opposite, and just do that to create your content at first. That way you will start learning the muscle of rewriting something and you don't start from a blank canvas. The second thing I want to say is focus on the output, not the outcome. So the outcome would be getting millions of views and the output would be writing one LinkedIn post.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:49:54]:
You don't control the reach that you will have, but you can control how many posts you write and what I always tell my team, because I've coached essentially in my team maybe like 30 people to write content. And you can see some of the profile in my team have even a bigger audience than I have now. And the reality is, what I always tell them is it's the rule of 100 for 100 days. You need to post each day. And you don't have to write every single day, but write in batches.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:50:25]:
But you have to do it every day. You have to make that post because at first it's not going to be great, but eventually it will get better. And after 100 days, I can tell you that you will have built that muscle that makes you kind of like writing content, because you would see the improvement. And it's the same thing with everything in life. Like, if you want to start playing guitar, at first your fingers are going to be in pain, like, it's going to be like, so painful, et cetera.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:50:52]:
But as you start getting it, you know, like, you will see, like, oh, I can actually, like make chords, it looks a bit nicer now, etc. Etc. And after 100 days, you will see that you're much better and you have a lot more confidence. So for me, it's like, build that muscle, build that confidence. Focus on the output, not the outcome.

Omer Khan [00:51:09]:
I love that. I love that. And I think that, you know, I've seen some of the people on your team who have been active on LinkedIn as well, because I think when you engage with their posts, I see a lot of those. And it's one thing to look at your following and say, oh, you know, G kind of has been doing this for a long time and he maybe, you know, he either got lucky or he's just good at this or whatever.

Omer Khan [00:51:35]:
But then to repeat it over and over with people in your team, it shows that there are some principles here that if you can learn and you can apply and you can build that discipline, then you can also repeat that success to some level. In addition to creating content, we often hear about, especially on LinkedIn, like, hey, you got to spend time engaging with other people's content and commenting and all of that stuff. Is that something, do you think is also just as important as creating the content?

Omer Khan [00:52:07]:
And would you recommend that founders also spend time doing that?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:52:11]:
I think it depends where you at in your journey. If you're like in the, you know, like early days of your journey, I think it's for a lot of people, it's actually a great way to build confidence because you comment on something that someone has created. So it's a lot easier, you know, to comment on something rather than create something from scratch. So I would say, like, yes, because most people, when they comment, they don't spend a lot of time commenting. It's not like, very thoughtful.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:52:35]:
So if you spend a bit of time, you will stand out and your comment will be seen by a lot of people. So eventually what I would advise is, yes, you can comment. So spend time when you comment, like, don't just put a heart or exceptional post or these kind of things. But what you can do is write something pretty long if you have something to say or engage with other people comments.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:52:57]:
Because if you engage with people who have commented, you engage basically with people who are active on commenting on LinkedIn, which means that when you post, these people will know who you are and also engage with your content. So that's kind of like an easy way to build the early traction and eventually afterwards, you don't really need to do it anymore, but you can. It's kind of like up to you personally.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:53:19]:
Like, I don't have the time to do it, so I don't do it unless I see something, let's say, like, I'm in the bathroom and chilling on LinkedIn and I want to comment because I'm seeing something, but otherwise, no.

Omer Khan [00:53:32]:
Yeah, I mean, it's something that I've been trying to do as well. Like, I never really spent much time on LinkedIn and I guess about five, five months ago, I just said, okay, I'm going to start posting, you know, four, five, four, five times a day. You know, my following is about like 10% of yours, probably even less than that, I think. Right. But anyway, the thing that I really enjoyed was the part about creating content, hearing people talk about problems and trying to find something that might help them.

Omer Khan [00:54:02]:
The thing I've always hated is this thing where people say, I spend every day leaving 100 comments on other people's posts. And to me it was like, it doesn't feel genuine, it doesn't feel authentic. If I leave a comment on somebody's post, I'd like to do it because I like the post or I wanted to share something. And it's just, I think there's just this. There's this web kind of system I think some people are trying to use to sort of gain this game, how LinkedIn works, that it sort of put me off a bit.

Omer Khan [00:54:38]:
Right. It was like, if I have to do that to be able to do that. I'm not really sure I want to spend that much time on LinkedIn. But it's good to hear you say that.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:54:45]:
I know a lot of people who've been like, super successful with, without commenting, so. So it's like, to be honest, it's really like up to where you at in your journey, but in your case, because of all the great content like you can create, I would just like focus on creating content rather than on commenting. I think your time would be like a much wiser investment on that end, to be honest.

Omer Khan [00:55:06]:
Well, now that now I've got your approval, that's the strategy.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:55:11]:
I'm going to take unsolicited advice. Sorry about that.

Omer Khan [00:55:16]:
No, I think it's great. Appreciate it. Yeah, look, I would love to keep talking. I could happily talk with you for hours and hours, but, you know, it's. We should wrap up. So let's do the lightning round. You've. You've done this before. I'll go back and compare the questions to see how they've changed since the five years ago. Okay, so what's one of the best pieces of business advice you've received?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:55:40]:
I think, to be honest, was to build in public. Like, I haven't invented that, but for me it's like no matter what happens to your company and sometimes companies fail for things that are totally outside of their control. But who you are, what you stand for, your brand and the community you've created is something that you will always keep with you. So if you do it early, you're building basically an eternal asset. Tomorrow, for example, if all my companies are dead, I could do consulting for, I don't know, $1,000 an hour.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:56:11]:
That would be pretty easy. So it's like build it because it's something that should keep your entire life.

Omer Khan [00:56:17]:
What book would you recommend to our audience and why?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:56:20]:
I think I'm gonna do like a non business book. I love the Alchemist from Paulo Coelho because it's like I think this is the meaning of life. You know, like life is all about the journey. We all focus, especially with press and things like that that are showing, you know, like overnight success and the get rich quick type of things and all this short form content that makes you believe that life is easy and that you're going to get something that will make you happy eventually.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:56:48]:
The reality is like all the things that you believe that will make you happy in the future, like the fancy car, the, the, the model, the, the nice house, etc, they want, it's all about enjoying the process. So make sure you're actually on the right track and on the right process because life is about the journey and this book is a, is a beautiful reminder of it.

Omer Khan [00:57:11]:
I love the Alchemist. I think it's an amazing book, but actually I'm going to make an unsolicited recommendation as well. The book that I, that I love even more now after reading it. I don't know if you've read it is like Manuscript found in Accra, which is also by Paulo Coelho.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:57:29]:
Oh, nice. I'm going to type it. Yeah, I will type it.

Omer Khan [00:57:32]:
It's, it's, it's a very similar, but a very kind of a different take on the same sort of ideas. But yeah, what's, what's one attribute or characteristic in your mind of a successful founder?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:57:44]:
I would say like discipline because like discipline for me it's like the, the purest form you know of, of self love. Because it's basically like you sacrifice your current state for your future state. Discipline is all about, you know, like doing the things that you don't feel like doing because you know that in the long run it will pay off. And if we want to be scientific about it, we can all look at the studies about like delayed gratification. Or what people call, like, the marshmallow theory, where, you know, like, they.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:58:17]:
They've tried, you know, kids, where essentially, like, they would give to kids two options. Option A, it's like, you can eat the marshmallow now, or if you wait for 15 minutes, you will get another marshmallow and all the kids that will actually wait for another 15 minutes. So who have mastered delayed gratification, they are tremendously more successful in life than all the others. And for me, this is the quality of a founder, because you're going to be struggling, you're going to go through the toughest time.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:58:48]:
But if, in your mind, you start enjoying these tough times because you know it's part of the process to be successful, and you know that you must go through all these hard things to get to where you want, then you'll be successful. Like, there is no way you won't be successful.

Omer Khan [00:59:04]:
I love that. I love this idea of, like, you know, purest form of self love. That's awesome. What's your favorite personal productivity tool? Or habit?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:59:15]:
I would say it's a habit, and by far, like, the most efficient one. It's like, to sleep eight hours. Like, I don't put alarm anymore. And to be honest, like, I know that when I'm well rested, I'm 100 times more efficient and more productive. And it's better than any tool, any app or whatever that I've used in the past.

Omer Khan [00:59:35]:
I read a LinkedIn post from somebody in your team. I can't remember who it was, and she said that it was a story about how she overslept and was late for work. And. And her CEO said, well, that means you're, you know, you didn't. You're not getting enough sleep.

Guillaume Moubeche [00:59:53]:
Right.

Omer Khan [00:59:53]:
And was. Was that about you? Was that a real story?

Guillaume Moubeche [00:59:56]:
Yeah, yeah, it was. Yeah, it was a true story. She came home and I. She came, like, to the office and it was kind of like, yes, she was not sleeping enough. And I just told her, like, no stress, like, if you want to come, like, I don't know, to the office at like, 11 or whatever, like, just sleep, you know, like, it's.

Omer Khan [01:00:13]:
What's new? What's a new or crazy business idea you'd love to pursue if you had the time.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:00:17]:
I think if I had the time. And it's on a totally, like, different topics. It's. It's basically like a sports app. I. I do believe, like, sports is the foundation, you know, of health, like exercise, like, super, super important. And I don't think there is an app right now that's like good enough to be like your, your life coach on how to have fun in creating like a super cool exercise to train, workout and achieve your goals and set goals also like for you that are quite ambitious.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:00:46]:
I think like if people, you know like would set up some physical goals like I don't know, it can be some stuff simple, you know, like running five kilometers or these kind of things. The fact that you can easily see the progression and the transformation that is both like physical and mental when you do sports. I think it gives you a super strong foundation for everything else in life.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:01:09]:
And I think like people underestimate the power of sports in our day to day life and I think it would be a great way to impact people's life and do also a fun project.

Omer Khan [01:01:21]:
Yeah, that's awesome. What's an interesting or fun fact about you that most people don't know?

Guillaume Moubeche [01:01:27]:
I think very few people know that I traveled the world for a year with almost like zero money and the only way I did it was using social network to stay at people's for free. So I would use like a couch, surfing, woofing, tinder, any communities about traveler and I would just like hack my way through to people's home and and just like document like a bit of it.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:01:55]:
I don't know if we kept the page because I did that with my best friend and at some point we were like okay, maybe we, we will not keep all the info. But yeah, it was really fun.

Omer Khan [01:02:03]:
Love that. And finally, what's one of your most important passions outside of your work?

Guillaume Moubeche [01:02:08]:
I'm currently training actually for an ironman so. So that's triathlon is taking a lot of my time and I love like music or spending time with friends also like that's the thing I love G

Omer Khan [01:02:20]:
thank you so much for joining me and coming back for this five year anniversary. I appreciate you making the time. Congratulations on everything that's happened. I think when we talked in 2019, it was still pretty early in the journey, right? It was like you'd got to seven figures. But I had no idea what was about to come right just around the corner.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:02:45]:
Me neither.

Omer Khan [01:02:48]:
So maybe Instead of waiting five years, maybe we do a V3 in a couple of years because of the way you guys are going. Maybe there'll be an even more interesting story to tell. If people want to learn about all the products, we'll include the links to all five products in the show notes. For now I would just say maybe they just go to lempire.com.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:03:10]:
yeah, lempire.com is good. And if people have questions, you take my first name, guillaumempire.com and you can send me specific questions, and I'd be happy to answer and help you out in the best way I can.

Omer Khan [01:03:28]:
And he means that it's like you actually do that, which is awesome. Gee, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure. Great to catch up. Congratulations again on everything, and I wish you and the team the best of success in the coming years.

Guillaume Moubeche [01:03:42]:
Thanks a lot, Omer. It was really fun.

Omer Khan [01:03:44]:
My pleasure. Cheers.

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