Our Future Podcast
00:07:53 · Simran Sandhu
[00:07:53] S1: Yeah, totally. And I think what's great is like the flexibility you have with the integrations as well, right? So I get a little bit of a Stripe like feeling from this, right? Like the ability to embed it. It's fully integrated within your payment process, right? On your website. But you can choose, you can do no code, you can do low code, an API integration, or like actually go all the way. And so this is really good for maybe a B2B business who is on the fence, right? For them to change their entire financing process or for them to change their entire payment process, that's a big initiative, right? And that comes with huge risk. So this is a great way for you to be able to kind of dip your toes in the water, right? Where it's, Hey, let's just help you use offline payment links, right? That's the no code play, right? And you just get kind of used to using slope and it kind of makes you comfortable, right? And then once you feel like you have a good grasp there, your customers feel good about using it. Now you move to the next level. Now you move to the level after that. And then before you know it, Slope is like fully integrated with your entire payment workflow.
00:08:58 · Michael Sikand, Simran Sandhu
[00:08:58] S0: Right, right. I love so I mean, we've talked about this before. Yeah. Right? In software, you have to build a ton of different features to add value to really kind of own this very particular part of the business cycle with your software. If you look at Oracle and SAP, they do so much. I mean, there's a reason why Seamus became a millionaire at 23. Right? It's because he was training companies on how to use this ubiquitous software, Salesforce or HubSpot, that you would think would be, like, quite intuitive and easy to use. I mean, it's sales. Track your prospects and send them messages. But there's just so much that goes into this. There's actually just so much bloat with these big enterprise companies. I really like how Slope started with this beachhead market of the invoicing process and buy now, pay later. That's a really, really strong pain point for businesses. It focuses on a very the most integral part of the business, which is cash management and, you know, getting paid on time, right? [00:09:50] S1: Yeah. Yeah. [00:09:51] S0: So that's the most that's priority number one, right? So when I think about building software, I think of go for massive need priority number one, and then build in the other features to truly carve out a diversified platform that can have a greater market share in comparison to the giants.
00:10:06 · Simran Sandhu
[00:10:06] S1: You have to get the beachhead right, though. Right? It's the equivalent of, like, how important it is to pick the right market. Right? It's the same kind of thing. You have to pick the right problem to solve within the market. And I feel like you can really hurt yourself if you're not very intentional. Like when this is a big initiative, right? The ability to like be able to provide these terms, right? Let's say you're building a B2C style software of some kind, right? So you want to get single player right before you jump into multiplayer, right? And you start thinking about like, how can the team collaborate and use this function and all that stuff? Like get the first thing right before you move on to the other things. And I wish there was like a specific metric or like framework you could use to say, okay, now it's time to move on to the next thing. But I think that's kind of an innate feeling in the same way that like product market fit is. Like, you'll just know when you have it. Yeah. And like churn is starting to get lower. People aren't complaining about it as much. People are actually saying like, Wow, where were you guys ten years ago? I think when you start hearing those kinds of things, you know you've probably done a good job at what you started out with.
00:11:11 · Michael Sikand, Simran Sandhu
[00:11:11] S0: Yeah. The more I learn about business, the more I learn that communication and education are like the hardest parts of the game, right? Able to explain your offer to a sales prospect is very, very difficult to help them truly grasp what you're doing. And there's few industries that are more complex than technology and software, right? So being able to communicate this to business owners is difficult. And that's like what we've talked about, right? Like building niche software for specific kinds of businesses and tailoring towards their needs and making things super easy for them to make more money, right, and to improve their processes is I think where the money is getting made right now. You know, we're seeing a reversion away from one size fits all, right? We're seeing it across every category. We're seeing verticalization and a niche, niche, niche, niche, niche approach, right? Think about all the credit applications and products we've seen for specific kinds of businesses, whether it's our boys over at Yassine at that one company that offers credit to e commerce companies in particular. How about Carrot, specifically for the content creator market, right? So they've really understood this particular kind of customer that relies on hard inventory and needs to offload it and can't really afford to pay it upfront. So they found a pretty [00:12:26] S1: to me, though. Right? Like, this isn't a vertical play. It's any kind of b two b company is primed to use this platform. Would you would you agree with that?
00:12:26 · Simran Sandhu, Michael Sikand
[00:12:26] S1: to me, though. Right? Like, this isn't a vertical play. It's any kind of b two b company is primed to use this platform. Would you would you agree with that? [00:12:34] S0: Yeah. I... I'd say it's definitely more for physical goods companies as is what I see and what I've read about Slope, as opposed to services businesses like with an agency and that, you know, you'd probably, not be it's for actually buying something, right? So it's not like you're purchasing software through this platform. It's typically like physical goods. So I feel like in industries like that, people typically aren't as technologically advanced. The tech stack's a little bit more ancient, right? And it's very important to build kind of a platform that understands that customer's needs very intently. Not that they couldn't expand into more services. I mean, buy now, pay later could be used in any business. But I think in particular, it's for companies with very tight sales cycles dealing with physical inventory that needs to get offloaded and then paid for on the back end. [00:13:20] S1: That makes sense. Yeah. And it also makes me think of kind of those hybrid businesses too, which are tech enabled and they have a big software component. But at the end of the day, maybe their hardware is a bigger piece, right? Again, way more expensive, deep tech kind of plays. This could make a lot of sense for.
00:13:20 · Simran Sandhu, Michael Sikand
[00:13:20] S1: That makes sense. Yeah. And it also makes me think of kind of those hybrid businesses too, which are tech enabled and they have a big software component. But at the end of the day, maybe their hardware is a bigger piece, right? Again, way more expensive, deep tech kind of plays. This could make a lot of sense for. [00:13:36] S0: Yeah. I mean, I'm buying a robot, I mean, would be nice to pay later for it. Like, okay, dollars 100,000 for a little Boston Dynamics dog that's going to lift my packages. Yeah. Think about the productivity gains that could come with that, right? Yeah. Cut my payroll down.