Ben Orenstein

123: Customer Service as a Competitive Advantage

February 27th, 2020  |  34 mins 23 secs

Ben put big and new priorities to the side to cover support for Tuple. By doing so, he discovered different opportunities to reduce the number of support requests received. It’s challenging to work on the right things in a smart order.

122: SaaS Sales with Matt Wensing

February 20th, 2020  |  40 mins 48 secs

Even if a product, such as Tuple, is good and people don’t need to be convinced to buy it, there’s still plenty of work to be done. It involves communication, coordination, and collaboration. Ben’s perfect sales pitch and ultimate goal: Sell once, revenue forever.

121: Futureproofing Your Business

February 13th, 2020  |  30 mins 41 secs

Ben never wants to stop working on his startup company, Tuple. Despite some stress, it’s successful and satisfying. However, team members may be added to take over some of Ben’s responsibilities. Based on the book, The Great CEO Within, Ben continues to provide feedback and to document standard operating procedures, policies, and other information to handle the challenge of knowledge management.

120: Product Pricing with Adam Wathan

February 6th, 2020  |  1 hr 8 mins

When’s the last time you read a manual or document to know how to use product features and functions? Ben’s new mantra: Write it down! Rather than repeat expertise, reuse content. Currently, Tuple’s most unreliable part is its online users list. Beat the competition by doing what others can’t do

119: Undoing a Twitter Addiction

January 30th, 2020  |  28 mins 40 secs

If you’re spending too much time on Twitter, Ben shares some helpful advice. Fully lock and block it by setting parental controls and content restrictions. While attending Big Snow Tiny Conf, Ben’s awareness of his Twitter addiction could no longer be denied. He successfully resisted being lured back into the app. Also, Tuple launched its Apple Pro Display XDR stand giveaway. So far, a sense of humor has generated a positive brand impression and collected more than 900 email addresses.

118: Reliability and Minimalism

January 16th, 2020  |  33 mins 18 secs

Ben’s back from Tuple’s ski trip retreat, where survey responses were reviewed for strategic planning purposes. Turns out that those who value pair programming actively use Tuple. What’s Tuple doing well? Latency and low friction. What can be added, changed, or improved? Free text, and make the basics a bit more stable and reliable. Ben knows it’s expensive and annoying to run tests all the time, but it’s also possible to mess something up that’s good.

117: Our 2020 Roadmap

January 9th, 2020  |  34 mins 31 secs

New Year’s Resolutions? Ben’s goal is to drink less coffee and get a survey out to Tuple customers. What do they want in the future for Tuple features? Are people using Tuple for reasons other than original core assumptions? Ben is looking forward to collecting customer insights to determine if they are on the same product development roadmap.

116: Should We Be Setting Annual Goals?

December 26th, 2019  |  27 mins 41 secs

In the last episode of 2019, Derrick and Ben focus on reflections and projections. Should they set goals for the coming year when it comes to Tuple and StaticKit? After all, nobody can predict the future, and hard work doesn’t always lead to perfect products and startups. But it’s been an amazing year for Tuple, which went from zero to hundreds of customers. What’s next? Adding cross-platform operating systems and going with freemium pricing model? Always looking ahead, how good are Tuple founders at predicting the future? Time will tell, once they receive their delay emails.

115: Debunking the Arrival Fallacy

December 19th, 2019  |  23 mins 51 secs

Ben has turned out to be a terrific tweeter about Tuple on Twitter. So far, more than 750k impressions have been made regarding his post about the enterprise sales process. He also shared that Tuple’s scaling issues appear to be resolved and fixed. He gave a shout out to the team at You Need A Budget (YNAB) for consistent and concise support. Plus, Ben has started using Anki flashcards to spark his memory and recall names via mnemonics.

114: Building Today For Tomorrow's Growth

December 12th, 2019  |  27 mins 30 secs

Ben describes how a recent Tuple tweet led to thousands of impressions and mentions, as well as possibly increased free trial sign-ups. Ben is experiencing the enterprise sales process where he could make a good deal of money from a large company, if he chooses to meet its numerous demands. Also, Tuple is making progress with scaling challenges by addressing related Heroku and Ruby issues. Tuple’s smallness is a strength!

113: Rounding out the Product Roadmap

December 5th, 2019  |  29 mins 51 secs

Derrick shipped a few things for StaticKit, including Mailchimp and ConvertKit integrations. What’s next? Stripe integration. For now, Derrick is targeting more technical users comfortable with code. At some point, he will involve “no-code” users who can easily drop-in Derrick’s plug-in. He’s done all the hard work for them. Check out new content he created, such as guides and features-specific landing page for opt-in forms.

112: The Evolution of Product Positioning

November 21st, 2019  |  29 mins 45 secs

Ben announced the release of a new version of Tuple. The app includes improvements to its Webcam feature and requires less CPU usage and bandwidth. Also, Ben decided to turn off payment notifications from Stripe. Thankfully, too many emails created too much noise. He understands the value of not sending lots of emails, but the right emails to educate Tuple’s target market. Tuple’s pricing page and corporate swag will be released soon.

111: Continuous Improvement for Growth

November 14th, 2019  |  24 mins 14 secs

Derrick shipped a revamped version of StaticKit’s homepage and plans to add a payments section soon. He’s eager to conduct another round of customer development calls. If you want to chat about your experience with static sites and help shape product direction for StaticKit, schedule a call with Derrick on Calendly.

110: The Importance of Mentors

November 7th, 2019  |  29 mins 53 secs

Derrick shipped config file for StaticKit’s UI migration and shifted his focus to other areas of the product. He plans to deliberately and consistently test email messages to determine which generate response and interest in StaticKit. He continues to connect with TinySeed mentors.

109: Split Test = Optimization

October 31st, 2019  |  27 mins 35 secs

Some podcasts present terrible sound quality, yet garner tons of listeners. Ben and Derrick are professionals, and care about the sound quality of their AoP podcast episodes.

Despite audio difficulties, Ben and Derrick are back. They sound good, and they’re ready to rock their updates on StaticKit and Tuple!

108: Getting Back to Growth Planning

October 24th, 2019  |  36 mins 51 secs

Derrick returned from JAMstack Conf with a jolt of energy and excitement thanks to face-to-face conversations and strategic connections with potential StaticKit customers.

Ben expressed interest in once again speaking at developer conferences. After all, he has plenty of worthwhile information and lessons learned to share about Tuple.