PODCAST · business
Above Board
by Fathom Analytics
A podcast exploring running an indie + bootstrapped software (SaaS) company. Follow Jack and Paul (the co-founders) in their journey of building and growing Fathom Analytics. Published every two weeks, listen in on lively debates about profit, customers, software, and how they’re working to keep their business in line with their values.This is a podcast from Fathom Analytics (usefathom.com).
Episodes
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Paul has retired
In this episode of the Fathom Analytics Above Board podcast, hosts Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis dive into a significant transition—Paul's retirement from the company. The conversation is both heartfelt and insightful, reflecting on the bittersweet nature of this change. Key Highlights: Retirement...
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Why Google search is failing us
In the latest episode of The Above Board Podcast, hosts Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis discuss the decline of Google as an effective search engine, particularly in light of its increasing reliance on AI-generated content. They share personal anecdotes about their frustrations with search results,...
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Fathom updates and WP drama
Jack and Paul discuss what’s new at Fathom Analytics recently, like the ongoing refactor project. This paves the way for great new features, including entry and exit pages. They also give their opinions on the recent drama in the WordPress (WP) community between Automattic and WPEngine.
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Jack and Paul talk politics
In the latest episode of the Above Board Podcast, hosts Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis discuss various topics, with a significant portion of the conversation focuses on the recent arrest of Telegram's CEO in France (Pavel Durov), exploring the implications of privacy and censorship, encryption, and…
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Small updates, big progress
Things are humming along at Fathom Analytics - we’ve released several new features, have more in the pipeline coming soon, and the redoing of our internal processes is going quite well. Jack and Paul also discuss the Stripe acquisition of LemonSqueezy, the CEO of Paddle stepping down and finally,...
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New Fathom UI, who dis?
Jack and Paul get into updating the application’s interface design and how that paves the way for new features coming soon. They also discuss why no one should trust Google’s business model (and their penchant for killing off popular products like Universal Analytics), the lengths Fathom goes to…
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Exploring the Ethics and privacy implications of AI
The conversation delves into the ethical implications of AI, the use of AI in software, and the impact of AI on various industries. It also explores the challenges and limitations of AI technology, as well as the importance of privacy and data protection in AI development. Takeaways AI has the...
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The problem with big projects
Today Jack and Paul discuss what's not been working with getting the next version of Fathom Analytics launched. They come up with a plan, in real-time, to overcome this hurdle and get back to a regular cadence of releases (i.e. not a big project). They also come up with a set of rules to govern...
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The art of progress
Software is complex. This episode goes into the pros and cons of how Jack (developer) and Paul (designer) work in terms of how they each make progress in huge projects, start and execute tasks, and deal with analysis paralysis that comes with complicated things.
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The road to version 4
It’s been a while since Jack and Paul have recorded an episode of this show, so there’s a lot to catch up on! A new marketing site was launched, we’re still a small team navigating focus, we’re working on a brand new version of our software, and we’ve prototyped a new ingest to be the fastest...
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Version 3.5 and the shape of things to come with Fathom Analytics
Last week, we released several new features in our software and a fresh coat of paint in the UI. Jack and Paul discuss these features and how they relate to what’s coming up next, and they chat through the pricing increase that happened simultaneously. Lastly, they talk about why analytics…
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Dealing with negative feedback
What do you do when you can’t always please all your customers? Jack and Paul discuss how they deal with negative feedback, the different types of negative feedback, when it’s valuable (and when it’s not), and even how they deal with negative feedback internally in the company.
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SaaS founder time machine (questions)
Jack and Paul get into what’s going on inside Fathom Analytics right now, and then answer some questions about what it was like starting the company, what they’d do differently (or the same), and if there’s anything they’d change if they had to start Fathom again. Special thanks to Ben and Adam...
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Vacations for bootstrapped founders
Can bootstrapped founders take time off for vacation? Is that even legal? And under what circumstances is that possible? Jack and Paul dive into vacations for indie founders, as well as a short update on what’s going on with Fathom Analytics on this episode of Above Board.
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Paul’s perfect day (for productivity)
Jack and Paul dive into Paul’s routine and how he approaches tasks and work that needs doing. They chat about motivation, complex work, focus and so much more.
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Consultants for Startups
Is it harder for startup founders to hire consultants when they’re used to being the ones who do all the work? Why hire a consultant in the first place? Why not hire full-time instead? Aren't good consultants ridiculously expensive? Jack and Paul dive into these questions and more on this episode...
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Justin Jackson and Paul Jarvis chat about starting and maintaining a SaaS
Old friends Justin and Paul catch up for the first time in years and catch each other up on the state of Transistor and Fathom. They cover lots of lessons for new and veteran entrepreneurs, spanning their decades of experience in the world of indie software: cofounders, markets, surfing,...
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Is a lot of startup advice incorrect?
Maybe it’s not even that advice is “incorrect”, maybe it’s just that it’s simplified to the point of being uselessly reductive. Regardless, Jack and Paul get into dissecting popular business and startup advice found online, and see what fits, what doesn’t, and where nuance and reason should be...
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What does retirement look like for a SaaS founder?
Can we retire? Do we want to retire? Can we adjust our work now (pre-retirement) to get the most out of life while we’re still young (ish)? Jack and Paul dive into what retirement looks like both for each of them, but also what their retirement from Fathom could look like too.
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What’s important when everything’s important in your company?
Jack and Paul get into a discussion about what happens when the company you started begins to do well, and you have to prioritize things that all seem equally important, and all seem like they need to get done at the same time. While they may not have any answers here, they do discuss what’s…
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No more branches, ever!
Jack and Paul discuss changes to how Fathom Analytics develops features, moving from long-lived branches to "continuous development." Why did we start doing this? What are the benefits? And most importantly, what could go wrong?
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The saga of building our Google Analytics Importer
Universal Analytics is dead. GA4 is a dumpster fire of complexity. So what what did we do at Fathom? We build an importer to save your historical data from Google. How’d we build it? Why’d it take so long? What worked and what didn’t work? Jack and Paul get into the whole story about building one...
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How our SaaS company approaches marketing and promotion
Back in 2020, we recorded an episode about all our marketing efforts to grow our software company. In this new episode, we look at what we’ve changed, what’s still the same, what we’ve abandoned in terms of how we promote our bootstrapped company, and look ahead at what our marketing strategy…
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Ruben Gamez on marketing, long-term success and making the right decisions as business owners
You don't need to have a huge audience or social following to start and build a successful and sustainable business. People have started companies this way for centuries. Jack and Paul speak with Ruben today on how marketing and sales work at his companies, how he's managed to succeed long term...
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How to build a multi-million dollar SaaS without funding (an interview with Rob Walling)
Jack and Rob Walling get into the nitty gritty of running a SaaS company with an honest and transparent conversation, based around Rob’s new book: The SaaS Playbook. You can learn more or pick up a copy of the book at https://saasplaybook.com/.
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Silicon Valley Bank and bootstrapped companies
In this episode, Jack and Paul chat about what happened with SVB, if they feel that more banks are going to fail, how it affected and could affect indie or bootstrapped companies, and how they’d (this is not legal advice, just opinions loosely held) fix things if they were in charge.
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Matt Wensing on Product Market Fit, raising money and enterprise sales in SaaS
Our guest today was Matt Wensing, the founder of Summit. Jack and Matt get into an in-depth conversation about: What things do many entrepreneurs get wrong? How to pivot well, starting a business with slow funding. Why crowdfunding may be a bad idea for investors. How his SaaS excels at…
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Can makers become managers?
Jack and Paul discuss changes at Fathom Analytics. What used to work in the past in terms of workflows and specs is no longer working and actively blocking them from moving forward as quickly as they’d like. So, they sat down, formulated a plan, and shared it on this episode.
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Are programmers going to be replaced by OpenAI?
In today’s episode Paul and Jack get into using AI to help write code for software. Is it useful? Is it accurate? Can it be used to write entire applications? And most important of all, will OpenAI tools like Github’s CoPilot eventually replace developers and take their jobs?
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Jack and Paul answer your questions (Pt. 2)
Listeners and customers sent in their questions for us to answer, and we did just that! Questions about burnout, Google Analytics importer, our new hires, and more.
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Jack and Paul answer your questions (Pt. 1)
Listeners and customers sent in their questions for us to answer, and we did just that! Questions about our brand, infrastructure, upcoming features, and more.
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Paul and Jack are back
Jack and Paul catch up on the last few weeks. They cover a wide range of topics including: Do you really know what your weather forecast means, dots on charts, T-Rexs hunting you at coffee shops, wobbly desks, hiring our first customer support person (exciting!), Peppa Pig Land, North Korea,...
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A brief history of (Fathom Analytics) time
In this episode, Jack and Paul look back to the beginnings of Fathom Analytics (which started in 2018). There was no big break here or instant success. Instead, it was a series of small bets, iterations, and tiny risks. Thankfully enough of them paid off and moved us forward enough to go from a...
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Can bootstrapped startups survive a recession?
When the economy is hurting, do small businesses have to suffer? Jack and Paul discuss how Fathom is (hopefully) built to be able to weather financial storms by not growing beyond our means at any given time and because we optimize for where we’re at, not where we hope to be if things go well.…
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The art of making great decisions for your business
It’s no secret: Fathom Analytics is growing. So what are Jack and Paul deciding to do about growth regarding development, support, and the business in general? How do they decide how to make the best decisions for the growing business and its long-term sustainability? Tune into this week’s…
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When the business itself becomes the distraction
Today Jack and Paul get very candid about what’s going on with Fathom Analytics lately, specifically regarding distractions. At the beginning of a bootstrapped business, other things are distracting (like how you make the bulk of your revenue). But eventually, as a bootstrapped business grows, it...
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Can Matt Damon save Coinbase?
At the time of recording this episode, Coinbase just laid off 18% of their workforce and they rescinded all job offers that had already been already accepted. Jack and Paul have a lively discussion about fast-growth, Big Tech monopolies, and whether or not the best way to compete with monopolies…
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Does Jack Scale?
Jack and Paul talk about a wide array of topics related to running a growing software company. From how the job of cofounder changes as a company grows, from using your skillset to becoming more of a manager; to how their minds are changing about enterprise plans; to ensuring a product company...
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Dr. Sherry Walling on the mind of entrepreneurs
Jack and Dr. Sherry Walling dive deep into our minds to discuss burnout, depression, the benefits of neurological diversification, the mental health fallout from Covid, psychedelic assisted therapy, and more for people who work for themselves. They also get into the mindset, values and traits of...
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Is Google Analytics 4 a middle finger to SMBs?
Universal Analytics (the version most people use) of Google Analytics is being sunset shortly. And worse, there's no path to migrate that data into GA4 (their new product). But even worse still, they'll be deleting all Universal Analytics data as well. Yikes! Jack and Paul ruminate on why Google...
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Jordan Gal on competing with giants
Jack and Jordan share stories from the front lines of indie companies. Starting and running a software business, mistakes made along the way, exiting a company built from the ground up, living with bigger competitors who get all the industry press, and so much more. They also get into the rise…
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Is product market fit really just luck?
Jack and Paul briefly chat about launching a few small features in Fathom Analytics: search filters, event currencies and a graph update. They also try to think through whether or not validating "Product Market Fit" is something you can plan for, just luck into, or if it's simply a trailing…
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How we've failed
Jack and Paul discuss our business failures... past, present and possibly even future ones. Even with Fathom, there was a point were it was only doing a couple grand a month and didn't feel like a success (so why keep going with it?) The answer to that and much more in this episode. Jack also...
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Growth is testing Fathom
How a higher than usual growth rate has been affecting Fathom Analytics.
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How can small businesses make a difference to Ukraine?
Businesses aren’t people, but they’re run by people. That means your own values can help inform actions and stands you take. With Fathom, we’ve always been a values-driven company and don’t shy away from letting our customers and audience know how we feel about certain topics, so when Russia...
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Should we take funding? (feat. Rob Walling)
See: https://usefathom.com/above-board/rob-walling
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When to spend money
Often in business, people talk a lot (or only) about the money they make and not about the money they spend to run their business. And it’s important to consider how much of your revenue you should be spending, what to be spending your money on, and how to best prioritize what expenses should...
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What it took to get Fathom off the ground: Jack and Paul interviewed
In this episode we were joined by our buddy Brian Casel, the founder of ZipMessage, to interview us on the backstory of Fathom and what it took to get Fathom off the ground.
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EU Ruling: Google Analytics is now illegal
In this episode Jack and Paul talk about the ruling from the Austrian DPA stating that Google analytics is illegal. Who does this affect? What can be done? Did Fathom Analytics have the inside scoop on this, and that’s why they created EU Isolation in 2021? All this and more in today’s episode."
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
A podcast exploring running an indie + bootstrapped software (SaaS) company. Follow Jack and Paul (the co-founders) in their journey of building and growing Fathom Analytics. Published every two weeks, listen in on lively debates about profit, customers, software, and how they’re working to keep their business in line with their values.This is a podcast from Fathom Analytics (usefathom.com).
HOSTED BY
Fathom Analytics
CATEGORIES
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Above Board have?
Above Board currently has 97 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Above Board about?
A podcast exploring running an indie + bootstrapped software (SaaS) company. Follow Jack and Paul (the co-founders) in their journey of building and growing Fathom Analytics. Published every two weeks, listen in on lively debates about profit, customers, software, and how they’re working to keep...
How often does Above Board release new episodes?
Above Board has 97 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Above Board?
You can listen to Above Board on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Above Board?
Above Board is created and hosted by Fathom Analytics.
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