SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders
804: SaaS: Yapp Passes 80,000 Events Powered
06 Oct 2017
Chapter 1: What is Yapp and how many events has it powered?
founded Yap.us back in 2012 since they've published and worked with over 80,000 different events.
It's a SaaS business ranging from people, you know, people pay 400 bucks per app per year and they pay for anywhere between one on the small end all the way up to their largest account, which is 50 apps per year, ranging from real estate conferences to pole dancing conferences to sales conferences and events. She's hustling. She's making it happen with her team of five that is virtual and remote.
This is the top.
Chapter 2: How did Maria Seidman transition from Warner Bros to Yapp?
where I interview entrepreneurs who are number one or number two in their industry in terms of revenue or customer base. You'll learn how much revenue they're making, what their marketing funnel looks like, and how many customers they have. I'm now at $20,000 per talk. Five and six million. He is hell-bent on global domination.
Chapter 3: What types of events does Yapp serve and who are its customers?
We just broke our 100,000-unit sold mark.
and i'm your host nathan latka many of you listening right now don't have time to listen to every b2b sas ceo that i've interviewed if you want to get access to the database i've created with year-over-year growth rates customer accounts margins and many many other data metrics and data points you can go to getlatka.com here's the thing though this that database I keep it to myself.
It's so freaking valuable. And to preserve the quality of the data and make sure that the people that have access to it have a true advantage, I'm only letting 10 companies on each month. So we're full this month, but you can go to getlatka.com to get on the waiting list for next month. And look, there's big people on the waiting list. I mean, the biggest VCs you've ever heard of.
You've probably heard of them. They're big, private equity, billions and billions under management.
Chapter 4: What is Yapp's business model and pricing structure?
So it's an impressive waiting list. Go get on now at getlatka.com. Hello, everyone. My guest today is Maria Seidman. She's the CEO and co-founder of a company called Yap, the top platform for event applications. Prior to Yap, she was GM for mobile and the VP of new business for Warner Bros Digital Distribution. She has her MBA from Stanford and her BA from Yale and resides in New York City.
Maria, are you ready to take us to the top?
Yeah, Nathan, thanks for having me.
You bet.
Chapter 5: How does Yapp manage customer churn and seasonal demand?
Thanks for jumping on. Okay, you said the top platform for event apps. Back it up with numbers. What makes you at the top?
Well, Dakin, as I told you by email, we're not going to share numbers. We're a private company.
Hey, Maria, listen, share anything you want, but I can't put in your bio that you're the top app for events if you can't give me some statistics. Even if it's number of events per year, it doesn't have to be revenue, but I can't say that without you giving it some kind of number.
Sure. So since we started, we've had 85,000 apps published on our platform, mostly around events and groups.
Chapter 6: What unique marketing strategies has Maria used to acquire customers?
Great. And when was the company founded?
We were founded in 2011. We launched in 2012.
Okay, got it. And take me through some of the backstory here. So what were you doing? Obviously, it sounds like you were at Warner Bros. right before this, or is there something between Warner Bros. and YAP?
Chapter 7: What are the future goals for Yapp and its product offerings?
Sure.
There was a hiatus period. I left Warner Brothers in 2010. We moved to New York City as a family. I was doing some consulting and I had the idea for Yap. I found my co-founder in 2011 and we launched in 2012.
And what so, you know, someone thinking about the app and how it was just described in the bio might be going, well, look, I, I kind of use Facebook events for for like, you know, live events and things like that. So give me a use case of a customer and kind of why they're choosing to use you or how they've used you instead of a Facebook apps or maybe one of your other competitors.
Yeah, great question. So real conferences don't really use Facebook events for their events.
Chapter 8: What advice does Maria have for her younger self regarding risk-taking?
As you know, use it for social things. Hey, we're getting together in the park, etc. The market we service are professional events. Sometimes it's called the mice industry, the meetings, incentives, conferences, etc. And so what we're doing is we're providing event technology for organizers. They could be inside of the corporation. So think, you know, Capital One having a sales training meeting.
Or for associations, think the National Funeral Associations of America get together in Las Vegas.
Maria, you're really boosting up the energy here with these funeral examples this morning. I know. How about our customer, the National Pole Dancing Championship? There we go. There we go. There you go. Exactly.
You know, they just had their national championships. They took it around the country, around the world, and they had a YAP app for each of those events. So it can really, really vary. But really, we're about professional corporate events or nonprofit events, not the kind of casual stuff you do on Facebook. And so the event platform is a lot more robust. You know, you're talking about schedules.
You're talking about... connecting, networking, you're talking about polling, data, going back to the event planner, et cetera.
And what's your business model? How to make money?
We're a SaaS business. We charge annually for a subscription. You buy a package of apps that you're going to create. So it's either one app and our largest package to date has been 50 apps.
Okay. So let me ask you a question. Like one of my big struggles on my first SaaS company, Heyo, which was a kind of a campaign tool, was it was so seasonal. It was very difficult to manage churn because you'd have Black Friday events and then Easter things that people would use it for, but they'd churn in between.
I imagine you see that problem even at a bigger scale for people that only do one conference a year. How do you manage that?
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