We’re championing our SaaStock Founder Members. The leaders and experts building the SaaS companies today that’ll shape our industry and the world of SaaS tomorrow. In this series, we’ll be profiling some of our SFM members who’ve been a part of the membership to help them scale their SaaS. They deserve the spotlight, so let’s get right into it.
Today’s post features David Henzel, a CEO, an entrepreneur and a SFM member.
1. Who are you and what does your SaaS do?
My name is David Henzel, entrepreneur. I have been in the entrepreneurial world for over 20 years, and I have a portfolio of businesses under one umbrella name – How We Solve.
One of those businesses (upcoach.com) is a SaaS that is designed to help coaches, educators, mentors and businesses run their coaching business in one platform, deliver amazing results and experience for their clients.
2. When did you start your business? Did you do so alone? Explain why.
upcoach was founded in 2019 and initially it was built to help me facilitate my group coaching program that I started at that time. So all features, in the beginning, were developed to support the Managing Happiness (MH) group coaching course. I had a DIY online course before but the completion rates where only at 7%, which drove me crazy. My main goal with MH is to have a positive impact in people’s lives.
Switching to group coaching turned the completion rate on its head. We are at 93% right now!
All development was initially done by my business partner Mert Hurturk who is our CTO.
My plan was to only use this tool internally but it got better and better and at some point I showed it to Todd Herman who is the OG of coaching. I had met him at a dinner hosted by my friend Eric Siu (Quick shout-out. Eric throws the best entrepreneurial dinners ever!)
I told Todd something along the lines of “I’m not a coach by trade but I have built a coaching software, what do you think about it?” His response was: “This solved 90% of the pain points in my coaching business. Can I invest and be your biz partner?”
I said “yes of course” since Todd is an amazing human being and I love having a real domain expert in every business that I start.
Imagining customer pain points or talking to them is one thing but having a partner in the biz who has felt these pain points for 20 years allows you to take product market fit to another level.
3. As a SaaS founder, what’s that one challenge you are facing in your SaaS at the moment?
We have a pretty clear product roadmap ahead of us, in terms of what we want to build but what do you build first and what do we build ourselves and where do we partner with somebody else.
Another challenge was finding affordable and scalable software QA.
4. How are you looking to overcome this?
The product problem was solved by hiring a rockstar head of product and I’m happy to pass these problems on to him 🙂
The QA problem was solved by starting a new business called uberQA. I love scratching my own itch and turning it into a business.
5. If you had a magic wand, what would you change (about your SaaS or externally) to enable faster growth?
I’d wave the magic wand and fix all the small bugs and improvements that we have on the platform and improve the overall quality and experience for our users.
6. What do you wish you were told before you started/founded your company?
I cannot think of anything I wish I would have known before starting upcoach but I would have LOVED to know about the entrepreneurial operating system (EOS) 20 years ago. If you have not implemented this in your biz yet, do yourself a favor and do it ASAP.
7. As a SaaStock Founder Member, what are the key learnings you’ve gained so far to get you closer to $10MM ARR?
There are so many. I love peer learning. There are always a lot of nuggets in the conversations that you have with other founders.
8. Finally, what do you aspire to become, personally or professionally, within the next 12 months?
I have a very detailed plan on what I want to accomplish personally and professionally.
This is part of my managing happiness group coaching. I will list only a few things 🙂 I want to get to 1000 employees in my BPO businesses, turn managing happiness into the toastmasters for personal development, have visible abs and go on 5 more trips with the fam this year.
If you are looking to achieve success all year round and be put in the spotlight, check out the SaaStock Founder Membership:
A private community of ambitious SaaS founders scaling to $10MM ARR. Get a support network of peers, connect with likeminded founders around the globe, and learn proven strategies from industry experts to help you scale up your SaaS. Apply now.
