WingNews logo WingNews GitHub [2]
top | item 7667901

Baremetrics for Buffer

172 points| zrail | 12 years ago |buffer.baremetrics.io | reply

53 comments

order
[+] kyro|12 years ago|reply
I'm not a huge user of Buffer, but I really like them because they've given us great insight into running a startup that's not a smash-hit-media-darling. VCs weren't knocking down their doors with truckloads of cold cash, they weren't beating journalists off their backs, etc, you get my point. They've had to stick to business fundamentals from day 1, methodically approaching issues like profitability, marketing, business development, growth, with only $500k of investment. They've been up and running for a few years now with a team of ~17 who're being paid competitive salaries. They've no doubt learned a lot and have been open about it. And this is just another example of their strategic biz dev, marketing and transparency they've become pretty masterful at.

I should add that this is also a great move by Baremetrics, who are likely to gain much more out of this.

[+] muratmutlu|12 years ago|reply
It's been a great insight for me and helped with putting together the deck and approach that landed us some Angel funding.

The other part of it is now we want to help people too, so we've written a few posts about our own spending and metrics. Great to be able to shed some light on early stage questions.

[+] huhtenberg|12 years ago|reply
I would gladly pay for this dashboard if it were an installable product, but there's no way I would ever share our vital financial stats with some random company in exchange for pretty graphs. This is just so out there, it's beyond any discussion.

If you are reading this, Baremetrics guys, do consider making an installable version, e.g. in a form of a VM appliance. Feel free to charge monthly, but it should be in a form that allows retaining full and close control over all data your dashboard pulls off Stripe servers. Just look at what AeroFS did if you need some inspiration and validation.

[+] Shpigford|12 years ago|reply
Thanks for the feedback! Sounds like Baremetrics might not be the right product for you. :)
[+] zrail|12 years ago|reply
I just wanna say congratulations both to Baremetrics and Buffer. You're both an inspiration to bootstrappers like me.
[+] joelgascoigne|12 years ago|reply
Thank you Peter! Let me know if I can ever help you with anything :-)
[+] alooPotato|12 years ago|reply
Doesn't this expose who their customers are (in the live stream)? I'm all for transparency, but it doesn't seem like the customer list is theirs to share.
[+] brandon272|12 years ago|reply
The customer names have been changed.

> Note: The transactions you see throughout the dashboard are real, but we've used fake customer names to keep them private.

[+] smileysteve|12 years ago|reply
This seems like a slightly faux concern considering that any post (Twitter / Facebook) made with Buffer says so.
[+] xpose2000|12 years ago|reply
This is an absolutely brilliant move for both companies. I imagine baremetrics will double or triple their revenue by the end of summer because of this.

Well done.

[+] Shpigford|12 years ago|reply
I'll be giddy if that happens. ;)
[+] nodesocket|12 years ago|reply
Kuddos. Honestly I didn't even you could pay for Buffer. It is really impressive they are willing to be so transparent with their financials. It probably helps that they haven't raised any institutional investment[1] and thus don't have any external pressures about releasing these details.

[1] https://angel.co/buffer

[+] zaroth|12 years ago|reply
Thank you guys for sharing this.

I noticed 30,000 failed charges in one year. I'm not sure if that's interactive failures, as in users actively trying to complete a transaction, which is much less important than the recurring failed charges, as in money you thought you were going to get but didn't, for no other reason than the payment network.

I hate seeing those failed charge notifications that go out every morning when you try to bill that day's batch for the next month of service. And then wondering how much that's pushing up your churn rate, how much effort should you spend trying to get updated billing info, etc. Buffer is mostly $10/mo, so I would imagine not much chasing is going on beyond a few automated emails... but it's enough to make you want to switch to ACH!

Does Stripe handle auto-updating credit card details when a card expires like some companies seem to be able to do? With the massive leaks lately, and so many card numbers getting cycled, it definitely hits the bottom line.

[+] rsobers|12 years ago|reply
I don't think Stripe auto-updates. There's a service called Churnbuster whose sole purpose is to deal with this issue: http://churnbuster.io/
[+] brianbreslin|12 years ago|reply
I'm curious how big their staff is, what their burn rate is, etc. I also am curious if they have 22k paying customers, how many are free tier?

That seems like a very healthy business right there, which might be able to squeeze a bit more growth out of its free tier.

[+] buro9|12 years ago|reply
Great dashboard.

Would love to see it work for more than just Stripe.

Perhaps for a variety of backends, or an aggregate one like Xero so that it can get insight into payments coming in from sources like PayPal and direct bank transfers too.

[+] Shpigford|12 years ago|reply
Right now we're focused squarely on Stripe. They make it stupid easy to build on top of (thanks to Stripe Connect). May expand way down the road, but that's waaayyyy down the road.
[+] alanmeaney|12 years ago|reply
This is a great partnership and I can't wait to see what comes next.

I've watched and enjoyed reading the Buffer story since the early days. In fact it probably played a small part in my path towards quitting work last summer and starting my own thing.

I'm considering doing an 'Open blog' for our enterprise start-up http://www.fundrecs.com like the guys did with Buffer.

Trying to weigh up whether it would limit us or enable us to do more. My gut is saying go for it but my co-founders aren't convinced.

[+] joewee|12 years ago|reply
I stopped using buffer, but I think I will start using it again. I plan to run my next startup with as much transparency as they do.
[+] latraveler|12 years ago|reply
You have to respect a company thats not afraid to open up their numbers like this. I love this trend of financial transparency for startups. Numbers are the clearest way for me to crystallize things as an entrepreneur.
[+] dosh|12 years ago|reply
This is really helpful.

+ I've been using Buffer for few weeks now and it's really a pain killer. Hope they can make 'locale/language' setting available for Facebook Pages tho.

[+] Major_Grooves|12 years ago|reply
This looks stunning! When I clicked through the first time it said the MRR was about $250k which surprised me. On refresh it went back down to $9k.
[+] rsobers|12 years ago|reply
No, Buffer's MRR is 250K. Baremetrics' own MRR is $9K. Both dashboards are public. You might've been toggling between them.
[+] shravan|12 years ago|reply
This is a great marketing move. Honestly, this is the first time I've signed up for a service immediately after seeing how it works live.
[+] presty|12 years ago|reply
$140k in refunds the past year

do you know what are the main reasons?

[+] mtrimpe|12 years ago|reply
They focus very hard on customer service so I guess that plays a part.