Bootstrapping to $10 Million Using Services: Sameer Maggon, CEO of SearchStax (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What was the pricing?

Sameer Maggon: The first offering that we sold was for about $10,000 a year. 

Sramana Mitra: How did that business ramp? When you start off with a bootstrapping with services model, your services revenues far outpace product revenues. Gradually, it starts to tilt.

Bootstrapping to $10 Million Using Services: Sameer Maggon, CEO of SearchStax (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What go-to-market strategy are you following? Is it a SaaS product that you go to market with?

Sameer Maggon: SearchStax, at a high level, is a search company. We offer Search-as-a-Service. It’s a SaaS/PaaS offering that is provided for mid-market to large enterprises on a subscription basis. 

Sramana Mitra: So it’s a SaaS product.

Bootstrapping to $10 Million Using Services: Sameer Maggon, CEO of SearchStax (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

Excellently navigated journey!

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, and in what kind of background?

Sameer Maggon: I grew up in Delhi. I did my engineering in Computer Science from Pune. Then I came back to my hometown to work for a document management company. Then I decided to learn more. I came to USC in Los Angeles and did my Masters in Computer Science. Since then, I’ve been in LA and worked in a variety of startups and larger companies in the greater Los Angeles area. 

12 Udemy Courses with Entrepreneurship Case Studies

Entrepreneurship is not a career. It is a way of life.

For me, this journey began as a graduate student at MIT in 1994. The world watched Netscape go public that spring, and the Internet swept over us like a virus. As I wrote my Masters thesis, I also wrote my first business plan. We were, as a generation, shaping the Internet during those early years, and, my degree in hand, I was ready to jump into the unknown – from then on really, I have been jumping into unknowns at every turn.

Entrepreneur Couple Bootstrapping an E-Commerce Business Using a Paycheck and Crowdfunding: Nomad Lane Co-Founders Kish Vasnani and Vanessa Jeswani (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What kind of jobs were you doing?

Vanessa Jeswani: I was doing marketing consulting, primarily for a PR firm.

Kish Vasnani: I was doing a lot of sales and business development work for a marketing agency. They had a lot of inbound interest but never had anyone take those leads and develop them further. It was about 10 to 20 hours of work. I didn’t even get paid for that. I made a deal with the owner. I said, “I’ll dedicate this much time. Can you please pay for my and Vanessa’s insurance?”

Entrepreneur Couple Bootstrapping an E-Commerce Business Using a Paycheck and Crowdfunding: Nomad Lane Co-Founders Kish Vasnani and Vanessa Jeswani (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Was Nomad Lane started as an Etsy store?

Vanessa Jeswani: It was called something else. When we noticed that it was travel-related items that were kicking off, we rebranded it to Nomad Lane.

Sramana Mitra: This was 2016?

Putting the Freshworks IPO in Context (Part 4)

Global Impact

The other thing to note is the globalization of entrepreneurship aspect of the Freshworks story.

Girish has proved “Made in Chennai” is possible. Unlike other Indian CEOs running SaaS companies, he never shifted the center of gravity of Freshworks away from Chennai.

Putting the Freshworks IPO in Context (Part 3)

Broader Implications

I have been watching with delight how the Indian startup ecosystem is celebrating the success of Freshworks. 

Indian entrepreneurs have found their celebrity role model in Girish Mathrubootham.