S2E27 The 12 Most Shocking Surprises on Our Way to $1M ARR

Resources mentioned:

• 12 most shocking surprises on our way to $1M ARR Linkedin Post

About this episode

It took eWebinar 18 months to go from idea to product launch, then another 36 months to hit $1M ARR; this is the core theme of this season. That's a total of 54 months from incorporation date.

You might have read about companies that get to $1M in a year, much less now with AI startups and the world riding that wave. Those are outliers and not the norm. 36 months to $1M is actually the median, even for funded companies.

“Normal” is not newsworthy and doesn’t get the media spotlight it deserves so you might feel like you’re moving too slow even when you’re in the right place.

On this season finale episode, Melissa and Todd dive into the 12 most shocking surprises on their way to $1M ARR after everything they tried, learned, and failed, which formed the foundation by which they continued to iterate on the business and product.

Thank you for tuning into Season 2 of ProfitLed!! Your support is deeply appreciated.

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Takeaways:
• Things they thought would have a huge impact, but didn’t
• Assumptions that made them think they’d get to $1M faster
• Things that took a lot more effort and time than anticipated
• Why you don’t need fancy metrics to prioritize roadmap
• Why $1M is not the magic number even though it seems like it is

Connect with Melissa

• Follow Melissa Kwan on LinkedIn where she share stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Find her on @themelissakwan on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

About ProfitLed

On Season Two of ProfitLed, Melissa (CEO and Cofounder of eWebinar) and Todd (COO) goes in-depth on one topic per episode on their "Journey to $1M" at eWebinar.

They share war stories, mistakes, and lessons learned as they grew the company to a million in ARR over 36 months. Their goal is to demystify bootstrapping by sharing their experience of it, and tell you what it’s really like to figure things out as you go.

ProfitLed is a podcast by and for founders brave (and crazy) enough to grow their startups to profitability without venture capital.

Learn more about the ProfitLed Podcast and tweet us at @profitledfm.

Learn more about eWebinar.