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Picking 1 Idea Out of 1000

Many ideas will make money. People should ask themselves first, What are the things that make me happy?
Melissa Kwan

Melissa Kwan,

Cofounder and CEO of eWebinar, ProfitLed Podcast

Resources mentioned on this episode

About this episode

Melissa founded eWebinar two months after her last startup (real estate SaaS software) was acquired. This episode is the origin story of eWebinar: how she finally settled on eWebinar vs all the other ideas she had, and why she was determined to bootstrap this startup over raising venture capital.

Melissa talks about the importance of choosing an idea/product that makes you happy over what you have experience in and why the traditional model of building a career on top of your education is counter-intuitive.

Todd (co-host and COO of eWebinar) tells his story of working with startups that never took off, and why he still decided to take a chance in eWebinar from day one, long before there was a product. He shares insights around what it takes to recruit your first hire who is an experienced, high-paying, seasoned executive.

About Melissa Kwan

Melissa Kwan is the Cofounder and CEO of eWebinar, an on-demand video software with chat that lets companies run their demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions without anyone having to be there live. The idea came from her previous SaaS company, where she delivered the same sessions live for years and could only ever reach a fraction of her prospects and customers. She founded eWebinar to help people grow their business without growing their workload.

Melissa is a three-time bootstrapped founder with 15 years of startup experience. Specializing in B2B sales and business development, she has built companies with very few resources by automating what she could, outsourcing wherever possible, and inspiring talented people to join her with shared focus and enthusiasm.

Her previous company, Spacio, was the leading open house lead generation software in real estate, acquired by HomeSpotter in 2019 after four years. Before Spacio, she founded Flat World Apps, which built marketing apps for real estate developers selling residential pre-sales. She started her career selling real estate in Vancouver, then spent time in international trade in Hong Kong before moving into enterprise software. At 27, she left her job as an inside sales executive at SAP to start her first company.

That path through manufacturing, real estate, enterprise sales, and SaaS shapes how she thinks about building businesses. Over the last decade she has come to believe that happiness should be the foundation of a career rather than the result of one, and that it comes from designing your life with intention.

Melissa writes about bootstrapping with limited resources, on-demand delivery, product-led growth, life design, and the founder journey. Her writing has appeared in Forbes and Business Insider. She hosts the ProfitLed Podcast and writes a weekly Substack newsletter, "your founder next door," where she documents building eWebinar without outside funding.

She's a digital nomad who travels 10 months of the year and calls Amsterdam, New York, and Hong Kong home.

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.

Next episode

S2E3
S2E3: Why Bootstrapping Over Venture Capital Funding
Why Bootstrapping Over Venture Capital Funding

"The biggest misconception about bootstrapping is that there is zero capital. Founders invest their own money and can raise from friends and family."

Melissa Kwan
Melissa Kwan
Cofounder and CEO

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