Escaping Web Design to Build a Thriving Software Business, with Edger Co-Founder Laura Roeder — The Busy Creator 79

The Busy Creator Podcast with Prescott Perez-Fox

Laura Roeder (@LKR) is the co-founder of Edgar, a social media scheduling and management tool. Laura began her career as a web designer, moving first to solo practice, and then to social media consulting.

From this conversation, you'll learn how Laura transitioned away from work-a-day design and into entrepreneurship, how her team at Edgar manages their software development, and some of the philosophies behind their hiring and company management.

One thing we don't cover are the features of the software itself, and the idiosyncrasies which separate Edgar from competitors like Hootsuite or Buffer. To learn more about Edgar itself, scroll down to the show notes for examples of Laura explaining in further detail on other podcasts, and some embedded videos showing off Edgar itself.

That said, Laura and her team have offered listeners of The Busy Creator a free month of service for Edgar. Sign up before May 31, 2016 and use the code SUNANDSURF.

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• Download The Busy Creator Podcast, episode 79 (MP3, 49:06, 23.6 MB)
• Download The Busy Creator Podcast, episode 79 (OGG, 49:06, 25.0 MB)

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Show Notes & Links

• Laura Roeder describes Edgar in greater detail on Smart Passive Income #132
• ... and on EOFire #802 ... and on Online Marketing Made Easy #35
• Laura describes herself as the founder of Edgar, at least today
• Laura started as a web and graphic designer, worked at a design agency when she was a fresh graduate
• Her rationale for leaving her agency job was largely that it would take a really long time to get to do the work she fancied.
• 10,000 hours
• Laura was inspired more by business owners than design practitioners
• Chamber of Commerce

  "I felt like a fish out of water because I was so much younger."

  —Laura Roeder

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• World of Warcraft is the New Golf
• Laura replaced her salary the first year, then doubled her earnings the following year.
• The transition from Paid Services ? Packaged Services ? Retail Packages

  "It felt a lot easier to sell an online class than to get individual clients."

  —Laura Roeder

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• Gary Vaynerchuk
• Laura's clients were asking about social media; there was a swelling
• Biography from A+E
• The Dash was the newsletter from LKR Social Media

  "It was always a business. I didn't start with a blog."

  —Laura Roeder

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• Laura's team works remotely
• Lean Startup Methodology
• Laura's husband Chris is the lead developer/CTO for Edgar
• Ruby on Rails
• The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss On Amazon and On Audible
• Edgar is 16 people strong (development, marketing, customer service)
• Team Edgar doesn't use Sprint/Agile methodology. They simply make priorities and do them.
• Edgar ties their QA into Customer Service

  "We don't make major changes to our software. We're focused on iterative improvements to what we already do."

  —Laura Roeder

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• DIY Network/HGTV
• Mike Holmes
• Amazon tests features very carefully

  "Always run split tests on the home page and signup page"

  —Laura Roeder

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  "I wasn't that passionate about design. I was interested in other elements."

  —Laura Roeder

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• False Negatives in hiring
• The Narcissism of Minor Differences

  "If you're talking to the HR Manager, you're doomed."

  —Prescott Perez-Fox

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• The Edgar Blog
• Laura Roeder on Twitter
• Laura Roeder on Facebook
• Laura Roeder on Instagram
• Laura Roeder on LinkedIn
• Edgar on Twitter
• Edgar on Facebook

Tools

• Skillshare
• Edgar
• Slack
• Trello
• Flow
• Google Hangouts
• Confluence
• Kissmetrics
• Jira
• Mailchimp
• Visual Website Optimizer
• Evernote
• Google Docs
• Pocket

Techniques

• Think of the "Worst Case Scenario" before you quit
• Start with freelancers before hiring full-time staff
• Create a Wiki for shared information (customer service, company values, etc.)
• Methodology is more important than software
• When A/B testing, use dramatic comparisons; two completely different versions

Habits

• Have a planning meeting every Monday and retrospective meeting every Friday
• Always write multiple subject lines
• Make lists in Google Docs (don't overcomplicate it)