How a Small Business Software PayByGroup.com is Planning to Become the Paypal of Vacation Rentals
Building a software service isn’t all about the bells and whistles.
Imagine coming up with a killer small business software application. You spend countless hours testing and writing to get all the aspects of the software working flawlessly. After you nail down what you know to be a functional application, you pitch it to people hoping to rake in the clients. The problem is, nobody needs this software.
Part of the software development process should be finding a market to support it. Camilo discovered a need and went about trying to find ways to satisfy it. This is a great episode for any entrepreneurs looking to get into the software business; in fact, it’s a great episode for any new business hoping to better understand and cater to their audience.
Listen now and you’ll hear Camilo and I talk about:
- (2:30) Introductions
- (4:30) How did you come up with the idea for your startup?
- (7:30) How did you develop the first prototypes?
- (10:30) How did you know your prototype was getting traction?
- (12:30) What step did you take after you got early validation?
- (17:40) What happened after you moved to Mountain View?
- (19:40) What turned out radically different from the original vision?
- (21:30) What are you doing now to cause growth?
- (24:50) What was the first step you took to land homeaway.com?
- (28:30) How much revenue were you doing at this point?
- (30:30) How much have you needed to raise so far?
- (31:30) What are some of the big lessons you’ve learned from fund raising?
- (33:10) How did you begin the fund raising process?
- (34:50) How did you cover the legal bills for fund raising?
Resources Mentioned
More About This Episode
The Bright Ideas podcast is the podcast for business owners and marketers who want to discover how to use online marketing and sales automation tactics to massively grow their business.
It’s designed to help marketing agencies and small business owners discover which online marketing strategies are working most effectively today – all from the mouths of expert entrepreneurs who are already making it big.
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About Camilo Acosta
Before starting PayByGroup, Camilo worked with Frank on Root Orange, a VC-backed domain name startup that split domains by city. Previously, he worked for his family’s government communications firm, and in best practices consulting at the Corporate Executive Board, both in his home town of Washington, D.C.
Camilo is actively involved in organizing alumni gatherings for his school (Sidwell Friends School) and his college alma mater. He also hosts fundraisers for education reform organizations such as KIPP, and political candidates that support the cause. He enjoys driving on sunny days with the windows down and music up, and doting on his chocolate lab, Kipper.
Camilo holds a B.A. in Politics from Princeton University.
