First to market strategy

In 2019, the California Consumer Privacy Act was scrutinized by a co-founder of CCPA TollFree. Recent studies evaluated 500,000 businesses would need to comply with the new lawstarting in 2020. The current software solutions available in the market for similar laws to CCPAwere not self-service, and complex to on-board customers. This study and evaluation of themarket sparked the idea to create a self service platform to comply with the CCPA. We wouldmostly target SMBs looking for a turn-key solution and subscribing with a credit card.

Being first is a great advantage in terms of SEO. Customers started finding us by searching ongoogle “solutions”, “software” or “tools” for the CCPA. In this particular case, the CCPA requireda toll-free number, and therefore, the website also focused on this requirement.

CCPA Toll Free provides a recognizable toll-free number (866-I-OPT-OUT) to customers. Othercustomers can find us easily if they google where this number came from, a similar viraltechnique to having backlinks.

How did we build CCPA Toll Free? Part 1

On one hand, we had strict product requirements to satisfy complying with the law. In order torelease as fast as we could, we started with a shared toll-free number. All customers signing upwould have 866-I-OPT-OUT and a service code, like an extension #109. By restricting theproduct requirements, we were able to move faster than the competition, and be the first to havea self-serve platform.

Following the first few months of business, to our surprise only enterprises signed up, and noSMBs. Our roadmap completely changed in order to serve the market we were attracting. Webuilt dedicated phone numbers for customers who couldn’t use a shared hotline. We built a lot ofsecurity features like 2FA, SSO via SAML 2.0 (Think Okta) and Oauth 2.0. We added net-30invoices instead of just credit card payment. And we streamlined the security questionnairesfrom enterprises’s vendor management systems. And lastly we increased our pricing to reflecton all the enterprise features we have built.

How did we build CCPA Toll Free? Part 2

The other requirement was to have very low operating costs. That means automating as muchas possible, so the founders could focus on sales.

1. New customers are funneled to a free trial.
2. After the trial, customer can subscribe
3. Delinquent customers would get multiple emails and be canceled if they haven’t paid.
4. Any action other than canceling can be done via the customer dashboard:
   a. Provisioning more phone numbers (for customers with more than one brand)
   b. Customizing webform or phone number flow
   c. Inviting new team members to the dashboard

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We also built an admin platform to search customers, and have the ability to login as them (afterwe get their permission) in order to help certain customers accomplish what they need via thedashboard. That’s a great technique instead of rebuilding capabilities in an admin platform.

Having a low operating costs in terms of man hours was pivotal for us as we simply don’t havethe team in place to support a high number of signups.

First to market + automation = scale

This strategy we employed is textbook startups SaaS. Since we were first, self-serve, and hadall the features customers needed early on, we ended up with a very sticky product thatcustomers love, and a growing ARR.

First to market is helpful if an emerging requirement, like a law, or a new platform like when theiPhone or the internet was first created. Other businesses who are not first will require the“automation” part of this strategy. Automation is the key to scaling any large operation.

Automation includes any action the customer can take without needing your help. Automationalso can mean automating at a high scale the business analysis. That’s what machine learningis. And finally, today with Chat GPT we also have labor assistance automation.

Contact us todayIf you haven’t already, book a free consultation with us today on our calendly, and we canexplore what strategy is right for you.