Nick Francis - Baremetrics Japan

This week I talk with Nick Francis, Founder of HelpScout! In this episode we talk about being an entrepreneur as a kid, how a laptop change Nick’s world, working in the music industry, working with his co-founders for six years before starting HelpScout, becoming a B-Corp, focusing on culture and brand and so much more!

Show Notes

• 00:52- A month long sabbatical
• 3:00- Prepping for the sabbatical
• 4:36- A company thriving in your absence…strength of leadership
• 5:30- Ownership
• 8:00- Childhood
• 10:09- Inspiration for entrepreneurship versus getting a job
• 11:00- Different ways of learning
• 12:27- Getting into technology
• 14:36- Reason behind going to college and studying music business
• 18:23- Transition from finishing school
• 20:00- Working with creative people to bring out their best
• 20:19- Transition from artist management and web design
• 22:12- Passion for the web
• 23:45- Starting a company in 2004
• 25:40- The repetition of consulting work
• 26:35- The idea and inspiration for HelpScout
• 28:00- RSS feeds and the early days of Twitter
• 29:25- Email support and sharing an inbox
• 31:32- Making support system software a reality
• 33:00- Managing clients
• 34:02- A high level of confidence
• 34:45- Favorite thing about the customer service market
• 35:22- Risk threshold
• 37:20- Do More Faster by David Cohen
• 38:25- Techstars and working in Boston to build the company they always dreamed of
• 39:30- Biggest positive of being “all in” for 3 months
• 41:32- The year after Techstars
• 42:41- Defining your voice from a content marketing standpoint and betting the business on content
• 45:02- Pitching HelpScout early on
• 46:49- Taking a different approach to the business
• 48:06- Growing a product versus growing a team of people working on it
• 50:12- Fundraising 6 million dollars
• 51:19- The cool thing about making a lot of mistakes
• 53:30- Going all-in on hiring with the money raised
• 55:10- Content marketing pays off
• 56:25- Raising another round of 6 million dollars
• 58:06- Qualifying to be a B-corp
• 1:00:48- Making a great product and making HelpScout a great place to work
• 1:02:34- Becoming deeply passionate and wanting HelpScout to be a model company
• 1:03:28- The next year for HelpScout
• 1:05:27- The idea of building a brand versus building a product

Get in touch with Nick: helpscout.com, @nickfrancis