00:23:30 · Ben Pfisterer
[00:23:30] S0: I mean, there's definitely that. The good thing about experience, we knew what good rates were. So our cost base is better than, I think, any other financial services business in the world. We had to be efficient on that Yeah. On that front. But the awesome thing about our products, particularly more so on the payment side of the terminals than on the banking side with the transaction account. But we had branded cards going around, so people were seeing them every day. We've got terminals everywhere now. Know, tens of thousands of them in the Australian market, so people were seeing it. So although the terminal markets moved more towards where we are now, our device looked quite unique when we launched it. So it was kind of like an eye catching thing. Then the interface we worked a lot on. So the cardholder, even if they didn't... Because they shouldn't care about payments as they're buying something, but they kind of... Something piqued their interest, whether it was the UI that was, you know, quite special, a little bit moving in a different way or simpler or clearer, etcetera. So that ability to to start getting exposed, like, the numbers of people that have seen our terminals or transacting on them is exponential. So whilst you don't care about it if you're a cardholder, if you're a business and you're thinking about changing or starting a new business or wanna better service a provider, you might even know it, but you've already got that sort of inside your awareness. So when you see an ad, it's like a reinforcement thing.
00:24:45 · Adam Miller, Ben Pfisterer, Sachin
[00:24:45] S2: It's also... Yeah. There's those multiple channels looking together, and it's also not minimalist. Like, when you see a Zeller terminal, it's big. I was out for drinks on Saturday and I saw one when I was buying my hard solo and it was like big and I was like yeah maybe it was just a spot off effect because we're interviewing you today that I noticed it but it was like very salient. [00:25:05] S0: Spot off. Got like that. Yeah. Hopefully, you see him a lot more, around because I think it is a bit that when you see it once you start noticing it. So if you're a merchant and you're in the market for this or thinking I need to change, that effect absolutely happens. So there is that brand awareness out there all the time. [00:25:19] S1: So from what I hear, it seems like a lot of things went right here when it came to product, sales, building out the team. Were there any nights where you literally couldn't sleep because you were so stressed about anything that was happening on the horizon? Like, what were the sort of low points of Zeller? I
00:25:36 · Ben Pfisterer
[00:25:36] S0: struggle with this question because I think I've got an ability to forget quickly. Yeah. I think... So I go back to my... With setting up Square in Australia, it was phenomenally hard. That was the most taxing, awful experience for the first two years of getting that going. So what I did in getting through that, I learned an enormous amount about myself and resilience and how you get through obstacles, the impossible obstacles as well. So when it came to launching Zeller, I I had the advantage of bringing together the right people, the right strategy, the right approach, the right founder, the right investors. So a lot of the pieces were in the right spot. But I think... I mean, we we... We're no different to every other startup in terms of we have issues every single day. Every single day something pops up that you have to deal with and problems big or small. So it's definitely got those. I'm not saying it's perfect way, any stretch. It's not. But we have such a good team and good approach to things in place that we can just move through them quickly and solve them. Probably the one moment which I really kind of got a bit nervous was the the launch night. So... Because you... But we... When we raised funds at the start, like, shortly after a few days or weeks, COVID hit. Right? So suddenly... Actually, there's nothing. Suddenly, everyone across media and tech was telling us that face to face transactions, face to face experience e commerce was disappearing overnight. Everyone was moving to ecommerce or QR codes or some new thing. So our business was predicated on face to face and digital banking space. So I was like, woah. This is this is big. This could be a little bit different. But I don't think we blinked. I think we kinda saw it. We thought that's not right. Like, they... Like, we don't know. We're no experts in this space, but COVID will come and go. Humans love interacting. Face to face transactions will absolutely be a thing and come back. And we believed in it, and we kept going. But that moment when COVID hit and locked down, oh my god, what's happening here? This is gonna pull our funds, etcetera, etcetera. So there's a lot of, like, moments then. And then when you're launching, you're so in the echo chamber of the team is that you think everything is gonna work before you've launched.
00:27:37 · Ben Pfisterer, Adam Miller
You've got nothing to measure yourself apart from the pace of execution. So that day before we we we launched, we were pretty much through the night, but, getting ready for that, I remember going to bed that night and just going, oh, shit. Is this thing gonna work? I've told so many people this is this is absolutely the solution. You know, you... You're saying the story to the investors and the team members and new hires and everyone to keep them motivated. But, yeah, before you launch, you know you... There's there's one inescapable thing is that you will be measured by the sales you do or the onboards you have or the downloads you have. So suddenly, was gonna measure. I remember thinking, well, I'm about to find out whether my hubris and belief in this business and this and this vision is right. But, yeah, we were very lucky in the first month. 1,500 businesses signed up, and then that sort of doubt went away, we moved forward. [00:28:27] S2: Ben, I think the thing... I always have a key takeaway from each episode, and I think already this one is, like, speed and execution velocity. If you were to advise a lot of the young founders that are starting in Australia right now and are trying to get up to that speed and velocity, what are the ways you operationalize that? What are the ways you actually... I know, like, you can compress timelines. You can do all these kinds of things, but how do you actually build that culture of speed?
00:28:51 · Ben Pfisterer
[00:28:51] S0: So the... I'm a very firm believer that general advice should not be taken by everyone. So what I did and what we do is not what everyone should do. But what we did, there's kind of a few different things here. One is every little bit of saving or or expediting a process or stripping out bureaucracy, every little thing is gonna add up to a lot of things. So if you could strip out little things, you're gonna get faster and more efficient all the way. So all the things from, like, I don't believe in one on ones, don't don't have this. I don't wanna look at meeting rooms and see them full of people just having one on ones updating each other on what they're doing. Complete waste of time. Get together a bunch of people, make sure that you're updating collective together. But also when someone says that I can deliver by this date, you say, well, how do we do it faster? What do you need to do it faster? And so that never settling for that that urgency. When people say, hey. I'll set a meeting up with you next week. I said, well, why don't you walk up to my desk and ask me now? Let's solve it right here. Let's just keep moving. So that urgency and little things, a little examples keeps going, but also just the ability to see it that it's that it's working, I think the team has really regenerated off that. So they come... Might be a little bit doubtful about it at the start, but I'm saying don't build a massive GAT chart. I don't want someone spending three months building a GAT chart down to all this minutiae and detail, and then suddenly have to readjust it every day to keep up with the pace. Like, just just get a general idea of when this is gonna be done, and go for it. Run as hard as you can at it. Have no excuses. Give it your best shot. If we don't get there, we don't get there. But if you need help, let us know. We'll add more resources or we'll move things quicker or unblock blockages. So just that constant sort of hustling along. Also, too many posts... Reading too many posts on LinkedIn. Like, it's such a... It's an amazing asset, an amazing thing to get information, but it can be demoralizing because you constantly... People are saying, do this, do that, and you have to... To be a leader, you have to go this way and you... And and not believe in your own vision or make sure it's a collective decision or etcetera.
00:30:47 · Ben Pfisterer, Adam Miller
So, like, just come up with your way of doing it, and then just go hard at it. Absolutely push as fast as you can. And then, yeah, you... You're the only person that's gonna succeed or fail on how you do it, so do it your way. [00:30:58] S2: How do you think you tread the line between pushing someone to that capacity and then not burning them out?