In the season four finale of the Acquired podcast, hosts Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal, along with guest Rahul Vora, CEO of Superhuman, delve into the intricacies of creating the fastest email experience ever. Superhuman's recent $33 million Series B funding led by Andreessen Horowitz, following rapid growth, is discussed alongside the company's algorithmic approach to achieving product-market fit. Pilot, a comprehensive accounting service for startups, is highlighted as an essential tool for outsourcing non-core tasks, allowing companies to focus on what makes their product unique. The episode also explores Vora's entrepreneurial journey, from his early venture Reportive and its acquisition by LinkedIn, to the founding of Superhuman and the methodical process of refining the product before a public launch. Vora shares his insights on persistence, the importance of targeting a passionate user base, and the potential for Superhuman to become a lasting franchise in the productivity software space.
"Today we are covering superhuman, the fastest email experience ever made. This show was originally going to be a limited partner bonus show with superhuman CEO Rahul Vora on understanding his algorithmic approach to find product market fit. But we realized that superhuman was a perfect way to round out our trilogy on the modern productivity stack on the heels of our Zoom and Slack IPO episodes."
The quote explains the episode's focus on Superhuman and its significance in the context of modern productivity tools, as well as the relevance of CEO Rahul Vora's algorithmic approach to product-market fit.
"Pilot is the one team for all of your company's accounting, tax and bookkeeping needs, and in fact, now is the largest startup focused accounting firm in the US."
This quote highlights Pilot's role as a comprehensive financial services provider for startups, emphasizing its position as the largest in the US in this sector.
"So reportive was basically started to satisfy my own need. It was a classic case of scratching my own itch."
The quote summarizes the origin of Reportive as a solution to a personal need Vora faced, which is a common catalyst for entrepreneurial ventures.
"I couldn't find, I couldn't think of anything bigger than that to do."
The quote reflects Vora's realization of the massive impact potential in improving the email experience for professionals worldwide, leading to the founding of Superhuman.
"I think that's a good sign. When you can't stay away from an idea, it's a strong indication that you should probably go and do it."
The quote emphasizes that an idea you keep coming back to might be a sign that it's a compelling concept worth pursuing.
"So superhuman is the fastest email experience of all time. Our users get through their inbox about twice as fast compared to in Gmail."
This quote highlights the core value proposition of Superhuman, which is speed and efficiency in email management.
"Speed was a value prop from very early on. And I think as I introspect this, it came out of some of the frustrations developing reportive on Gmail."
The quote explains the origin of the focus on speed as a value proposition, based on the speaker's previous experiences with Gmail.
"So for us, one such event was when mailbox was being shut down."
This quote describes a strategic opportunity that was capitalized on to attract early users by creating content related to a relevant event.
"The only way to win, and I think it's Reed Hoffman who popularized the following statement, is to be contrarian and right."
The quote reflects the philosophy behind Superhuman's pricing strategy, which was to be contrarian by charging for what was typically a free service, and to ensure the product justified the price.
"I first started sketching out the concept and the business model for superhuman in February of 2014."
The quote marks the beginning of the Superhuman project, indicating the start of the concept and business model development.
"So, for example, the money, that initial $750,000 that was raised in 2014 for superhuman was raised on the basis of primarily one slide where I took a screenshot of Gmail, and I just redlined out everything I didn't. Like I said, I'm going to make this pretty and fast."
The quote explains the minimalistic approach Rahul took to raise funds, emphasizing the concept and his track record rather than a detailed business plan.
"He took a perverse sense of enjoyment out of sending me abusive and insulting emails. But fortunately, I didn't have to deal with this myself. I hired an expert broker to go after the domain."
This quote illustrates the difficulties Rahul faced in securing the domain, highlighting the importance he placed on the domain name for branding and signaling seriousness to stakeholders.
"Most importantly, this is a sign to the world that this flywheel is moving."
The quote signifies the domain name's role as a symbol of momentum and credibility in the early stages of Superhuman's development.
"You are the Tesla. Not the. What was Tesla before it was Tesla? What was the name of the company? The e one or something?"
This quote contextualizes Superhuman's strategy to position itself as a premium, high-quality alternative in an existing market, similar to Tesla's approach in the automotive industry.
"It is a very, very difficult thing to build an email client that people actually want to use. And it does take more than two years. I challenge anybody to do that faster."
The quote emphasizes the complexity and challenge of developing an email client that meets high user expectations, justifying Superhuman's extended development timeline.
"Every single week we just pick a number of users that we will onboard the following week, and that's how we grow."
This quote explains Superhuman's controlled growth strategy, which involves a deliberate and measured approach to user onboarding to maintain quality and fit.
"I remember staring at this definition through tears in the summer of 2017, thinking, oh, no, oh boy, we don't have this. And we are so far away from having this."
The quote reflects Rahul's realization that despite the progress, Superhuman still had significant work to do to achieve true product market fit, which required a systematic and measurable approach.
"So, our board formally at the time, was Bill Trenchard from first round, who's been incredible to us and informally. I would speak basically every two or three days with Ed Sim from bold start."
This quote highlights the informal yet supportive nature of the board relationship, particularly with Ed Sim, who was in regular communication with Rahul.
"Yes. They actually wrote the first check in. Yeah, that 1st 750 was from them... And then I went away and made some progress and I came back like, I'll have another 250 now, but it's had a more expensive price. And then the next 250 was at an even more expensive hashtag."
The quote demonstrates Rahul's strategic fundraising method, where he incrementally raised funds at increasing valuations, reflecting his savvy as an experienced entrepreneur.
"You simply ask your users, how would you feel if you could no longer use the product? And you measure the percentage that say very disappointed."
This quote explains the core question used to gauge product market fit, which is central to Sean Ellis's method and pivotal for startups to understand their user base's commitment.
"You can use it to come up with a systematic methodology to numerically optimize product market fit. Which sounds crazy, but it's true. You can actually build this thing."
The quote captures the innovative concept of creating a systematic approach to optimizing product market fit, emphasizing its feasibility and potential impact on product development.
"So we then have a four step engine to systematically generate your roadmap and increase product market fit. And the four steps that you go through are, number one, segment. Number two, analyze. Number three, build. And number four, repeat."
This quote outlines the SABER method, which is a structured approach to evolving a product based on user feedback to achieve better market fit.
"Many startups will run out of money before they finish this process. Many co founding teams will have disagreements and fall apart. And many teams will just get tired and go, you know what? I can't do this anymore."
The quote highlights the harsh realities that startups face, which can prevent them from achieving product market fit despite having a methodical approach like SABER.
"Every single founder needs to exhibit unnatural levels of persistence, I think. Again, to quote Paul Graham, he talks about grimly determined founders and how during the days when he was operating YC, he would see these people come out of college and they're like, they're super nice and bubbly, and then like a year or two later, they're just these sort of grimly persistent people who will stop at nothing."
This quote underscores the importance of persistence for founders, drawing on Paul Graham's observations of the transformation startup founders undergo as they face and overcome challenges.
"Choose the latter. Not all ideas of that type are good startup ideas, but nearly all good startup ideas are of that type."
The quote relays Paul Graham's guidance, which Rahul endorses, on focusing on a narrow user segment with a significant need for the product, as this is a common trait among successful startups.
"You get to work with me, for better, for worse, all day, every day, on building the fastest email experience of all time."
This quote reflects Rahul's invitation to potential candidates to join the team and contribute to the company's ambitious goals, emphasizing the opportunity to work closely with him on product development.