Ruben Gamez

How does a founder actually learn the skill of product? In this episode, Rob Walling talks with Ruben Gamez of SignWell and Bidsketch to answer listener questions that turned into a much deeper conversation than expected. They cover why friction works well for one of Ruben's products and kills conversions on the other, how to think about trial length and onboarding when users need more time, and what it actually takes to develop product instincts as a bootstrapped founder.  Want to get your question answered? Drop it here. Topics we cover: (4:00) – Friction in trial funnels: Bidsketch vs. SignWell (8:26) – When to test friction vs. trust your gut (10:44) – Testing with low volume (16:56) – Trial length for project management SaaS (18:47) – How do you learn product? (21:39) – How Ruben developed product sense on the job (23:21) – The two core product skills bootstrappers actually need (29:42) – Product management vs. UX (31:46) – Why product sense doesn't transfer between products (34:07) – How fast you can build product sense Links from the show: SaaS Institute Cancun Retreat – Dec 5-7, 2026, exclusively for 7 & 8 figure SaaS founders | Waitlist: tracy@tinyseed.com  Sponsorship inquiries: sponsors@tinyseed.com   TinySeed SaaS Institute Shreyas Doshi Product Sense Course  Shreyas Doshi on YouTube  Ep 15 - Strategy Session | The Offsite Podcast  The Panel Podcast  SignWell Bidsketch  Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you'd like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We'd love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

How do you step back from daily decisions without losing control of your SaaS? In this episode, Rob Walling answers listener questions about when to delegate key founder skills, whether great founders can succeed with any idea, and the limits of no-code or “vibe-coded” apps.  To help answer one question, he calls up Ruben Gamez to get his insights on what “good” freemium retention really looks like and why the shape of your retention curve matters more than the number itself. Want to get your question answered? Drop it here. Episode Sponsor: Struggling to make Google Ads work for your SaaS? You’re faced with an impossible choice: spend thousands on an agency or waste months learning from outdated YouTube videos. That’s why Max Sinclair, a five-year MicroConf attendee, built SaaS Ads Studio  a software platform that combines AI with proven ad agency expertise to help SaaS founders launch, write, and optimize Google Ads campaigns. Think of it as an agency team in a box that gets you to a profitable Google Ads engine in about six months. Start for free at saasadsstudio.com and be one of the first 50 listeners to use code ROBWALLING for 50% off your first year.  Topics we cover:  (2:51) – What’s a “good” freemium retention rate? (4:59) – How freemium retention differs for mobile vs. SaaS apps (9:51) – When to start delegating the Core Four SaaS skills (12:53) – How to hand off sales, marketing, product, and dev the right way (23:28) – Can great founders succeed with any product idea? (29:34) – Should founders avoid building on no-code or third-party platforms? Links from the Show:  MicroConf Connect  TinySeed SaaS Institute The SaaS Playbook SaaS Launchpad SignWell Ruben Gamez | LinkedIn If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

What if your biggest growth blocker isn’t the market, but the story you’re telling yourself? In this episode, Rob Walling welcomes back fan favorite Ruben Gamez, founder of SignWell, to debunk common bootstrapper myths. They discuss misconceptions like never needing to sell your company or market your product, and emphasize the realities of growth plateaus, business valuation, and exit strategies. Topics we cover:  (4:50) – I’ll never sell my company (11:40) – I can just coast on profit forever (21:48) – I’m built differently, so I don’t need to market (31:54) – Building many tiny projects is a strategy (34:46) – It’s all about luck Links from the Show:  Invest in TinySeed Fund 3 Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X SignWell Ruben Gamez | LinkedIn MicroConf YouTube Channel If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 725, join Rob Walling and Ruben Gamez as they answer several more advanced listener questions. They discuss the challenges of pursuing freemium as a bootstrapper and make a suggestion that might surprise you. Rob and Ruben also talk about why building your business as a SaaS founder is usually the best way to build your brand indirectly. Episode Sponsor: Hiring senior developers can really move the needle in your business, but if you bring on the wrong person, you can quickly burn through your runway. If you need help finding a vetted, senior, results-oriented developer, you should reach out to today’s sponsor, Lemon.io.  For years, they’ve been helping our audience find high quality, global talent at competitive rates, and they can help you too. Longtime listener Chaz Yoon, hired a senior developer from Lemon.io and said his hire ”definitely knew his stuff, provided appropriate feedback and pushback, and had great communication, including very fluent English. He really exceeded my expectations.”  Chaz said he’d definitely use Lemon.io again when he’s looking for a senior level engineer.  To learn more and get a 15% discount on your first four weeks of working with a developer at lemon.io/startups.  Topics we cover:  2:31 – Considering a freemium plan as a bootstrapper 9:52 – Freemium, but without the intent to convert free users 12:24 – Raising prices as an alternative to starting a freemium plan 18:32 – When to start caring about your “brand” 25:10 – Investing directly in branding 31:00 – Revisiting your marketing funnels 34:08 – AI’s impact on SEO 38:20 – Google’s search results are already changing Links from the Show:  Get notified about The SaaS LaunchPad Ask a Question on SFTROU Email a Question on SFTROU MicroConf TinySeed The SaaS Playbook Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X SignWell Episode 724 | Managing Managers, Breaking Through Plateaus, Thoughts on EOS, and More Later-Stage Listener Questions Episode 717 | Bootstrapping to $1.3M ARR and 300,000 Free Users Val Sopi (@valsopi) | X BlogMaker State of Independent SaaS 2024 Report Josh Ho (@jlogic) | X Lane || Boot.dev (@wagslane) | X If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 711, join Rob Walling and Ruben Gamez as they answer listener questions. They chat about finding early customers without an audience, how to approach horizontal vs. vertical product spinoffs, and some considerations for No Code development. They also discuss the challenges of serving prosumer SaaS, the importance of understanding customer segments for pricing strategies, and the dual funnel approach for catering to different customer tiers. Episode Sponsor: We have been partnering with Lemon.io for several years, and they’ve proven to be a great choice when it comes to hiring for a highly skilled developer to work on your project. Here are five reasons why you should consider working with Lemon.io. The time from your request to getting a candidate is just 48 hours. Developers have previously worked with tech giants such as Apple, Google, Netflix, Airbnb, Intel, and LEGO.  They only provide senior devs, with an average of 7 years' experience. Their talent pool covers more than 300 dev languages & frameworks. Your hire comes with a zero-risk, replacement guarantee. Customers of Lemon.io typically stick around for at least a year, proving they know how to gain your trust by delivering consistent results. Quit wasting time searching for a solid developer at a great price. Get in touch with Lemon.io. As a bonus for our podcast listeners, you’ll get a 15% discount on your first four weeks of working with a developer at lemon.io/startups. That’s lemon.io/startups Topics we cover:  2:00 – Strategies for finding your first users when you don’t have an audience 10:42 – Positioning yourself to compete well against others 12:25 – Jumping into SEO before having a product 18:42 – Exporting No Code projects 24:15 – Choosing between a vertical or horizontal product spinoff 33:55 – Building a B2P, “business to prosumer” product 42:53 – How to make lower pricing tiers work outside of B2B Links from the Show:  MicroConf Connect Ruben Gamez (@@earthlingworks) | X SignWell TinySeed Bubble MicroConf YouTube channel State of Independent SaaS Episode 216 | How a Single Founder Launched a 7-Figure SaaS App (with Nate Grahek) Sticky  Castos Episode 480 | Stairstepping Your Way to SaaS with Christopher Gimmer If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 696, Rob Walling and Ruben Gamez cover a variety of topics. They discuss how product market fit is achieved across customer segments and use cases, not simply broadly. Ruben shares how he approaches effective decision making and sales as an introvert. They wrap up by sharing how they evaluate candidates when hiring to build their teams. Topics we cover:  4:47 – Product market fit, increasing average revenue per customer 7:58 – When did you know you had product market fit? 11:03 – Product market fit is a continuum, and use case specific 14:27 – Making hard decisions around product market fit 19:01 – Getting better at prioritizing and making hard decisions 27:38 – Doing sales as an introvert 33:09 – Building a functional team that gets stuff done 40:10 – Evaluating potential hires Links from the Show:  MicroConf Sponsorships Microconf Connect Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X SignWell Episode 695 | Ideal Customers, Moving from B2C to B2B, and More Listener Questions (with Asia Orangio) The SaaS Playbook Dynamite Jobs Who: The A Method for Hiring by Geoff Smart, Randy Street Crucial Conversations by Joseph Grenny, Kerry Patterson, et al.  If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 681, Rob Walling and Ruben Gamez go deep on the drawbacks of launching a second product. They both generally advise against doing so, as it can distract from the existing product. However they do share some successful attempts, strategic insights, how to approach feedback on second ideas, and the benefits for founders that beat the odds. Topics we cover:  1:31 – When you should launch a second product 5:32 – Ruben’s experience growing Bidsketch and SignWell 9:45 – Responding to market pull, avoid the sunk cost fallacy 12:26 – Dividing attention between multiple products 16:40 – Choosing when to split focus 21:13 – Why a second product worked for Ruben and others 28:54 – Gauging your product intuition and getting outside feedback 32:50 – Avoiding bias when receiving feedback on your ideas 38:21 – Strategies and goals for adding a second product 42:50 – Cross selling multiple products Links from the Show:  MicroConf US Tickets are on sale Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | X Episode 499 | The (First) Six Stages of SaaS Growth – Part 1 Intelligent Editing SignWell (@SignWellApp) | X Bidsketch SignWell Stratosphere finchat.io David Cancel (@dcancel) | X The SaaS Playbook If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 673, Rob Walling chats with Ruben Gamez, the founder of SignWell, as they answer listener questions. They cover topics related to pricing models for SaaS products, marketing strategies for new products, the concept of copycat apps, and the challenges of balancing customer requests with product development. Additionally, they address a question about choosing between working at a startup or a big tech company. Episode Sponsor: Find your perfect developer or a team at Lemon.io/startups The competition for incredible engineers and developers has never been more fierce. Lemon.io helps you cut through the noise and find great talent through its network of engineers in Europe and Latin America. They take care of the vetting, interviewing, and testing of candidates to make sure that you are working with someone who can hit the ground running. When it comes to hiring, the time it takes to write your job description, list the position, review resumes, schedule interviews, and make an offer can take weeks, if not months. With Lemon.io, you can cut down on a lot of that time by tapping into their wide network of developers who can get started in as early as a week. And for subscribers of Startups For the Rest of Us, you can get 15% off your first 4 week contract with a developer by visiting lemon.io/startups Topics we cover:  2:06 – Lifetime value pricing vs. monthly recurring revenue 11:33 – Pay-as-you-go as an alternative to lifetime or SaaS pricing 14:30 – Testing the market with a landing page 22:16 – Getting feedback from landing page signups 25:11 – Marketing strategies for SaaS 32:53 – Building copycat apps 38:51 – Startup roles vs. roles in a big tech company as a software engineer 43:33 – Balancing customer needs with our strategic roadmap Links from the Show:  MicroConf Sponsorships The SaaS Playbook Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | Twitter SignWell (@SignWellApp) |Twitter SignWell Hackers Incorporated, E4 | Lifetime pricing is underrated AppSumo Tailwind UI Loadster How to Grow Your Self Funded Business Faster – Hiten Shah – MicroConf 2014 If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Google

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In episode 605, Rob Walling is joined by Ruben Gamez, and they dig into a handful of listener questions. Topics range from building a SaaS with little development experience and using no-code tools to build your MVP to stair-stepping bootstrapping a two-sided marketplace. Topics we cover:  [0:55] Selling to the enterprise  [4:31] What level of development expertise would you say the founders of a B2B SaaS should have in order to create a successful product?  [13:26] Should you launch a productized service to validate a SaaS idea before building it?   [20:47] Can you use the stairstep method to bootstrap a two-sided marketplace business?  [31:34] Is no-code something you see mainly for building an MVP,  or is it something that you could sustainably build an actual SaaS startup on without running into scaling issues? What are the downside risks to no-code tools other than platform risk? [37:08] Do you think no-code tools will ever get to the point where you can build a full SaaS business?  Links from the Show: Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) I Twitter SignWell RocketGems Castos  Bubble Airtable  Dynamite Jobs Clarity.fm MicroConf Masterminds  The SaaS Founder Guide to No-Code  If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you. Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Stitcher

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

In Episode 555, Rob Walling answers listener questions with Ruben Gamez. They discuss different models of bootstrapping success, hiring W2 versus hiring contractors, determining if a business is an ideal fit for bootstrapping and they revisit enterprise pricing. The topics we cover [01:24] Bootstrappers Rob & Ruben admire [12:25] Pros and cons to hiring contractors vs W2 employees [23:05] Determining if an idea is a good fit for bootstrapping [28:31] How to develop competitive pricing for large enterprise clients Links from the show Moraware CartHook Balsamiq Churn Buster SparkToro Bidsketch Episode 551 | Task-level vs. Project-level Thinkers, No Such Thing as an Autopilot Business, and More (A Rob Solo Adventure) Ruben Gamez (@earthlingworks) | Twitter If you have questions about starting or scaling a software business that you’d like for us to cover, please submit your question for an upcoming episode. We’d love to hear from you! Subscribe & Review: iTunes | Spotify | Stitcher

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell

Side project. Full-time job. Three fired developers. Ruben Gamez built Bidsketch while working as a web development manager, using SaaS SEO and SaaS content marketing to grow from zero to $7K MRR before quitting his day job. Blog posts, keyword-targeted content, and cold-emailing 30+ bloggers for reviews drove every early customer. Ruben reveals the exact content-led growth tactics that took Bidsketch to 1500 paying customers, why a free tool he spent six weeks building attracted zero visitors, and how integrations with complementary products converted better than any inbound marketing SaaS channel he tried. Bidsketch has helped its users earn over $261 million through proposals created on the platform, all built by a solo founder with three full-time employees and zero outside investment. 🔑 Key Lessons 🚀 Start SaaS SEO before writing code: Ruben launched a blog and landing page before building Bidsketch, using SEO-targeted posts and proposal templates to generate signups while still employed full-time. 📉 Free tools fail without ongoing promotion: Ruben spent six weeks building a free estimate calculator that attracted nearly zero visitors because he relied on a one-time launch instead of building steady organic traffic. 🔄 Each SaaS SEO channel eventually plateaus: Bidsketch outgrew blogger outreach, then shifted to organic search, then integrations, then cross-promotions. Each plateau was a signal to experiment with the next channel. 🤝 Integration partnerships convert better than blog traffic: Bidsketch's integrations drove less traffic but converted at higher rates and retained customers longer, making them more valuable per visitor. 🧠 Treat outsourcing failures as learning investments: Ruben fired three developers and scrapped months of code before finding a workable approach. He framed each failure as skill-building. 💰 Hit revenue milestones incrementally before quitting: Ruben grew from $1K to $2K to $5K to $7K MRR before leaving his full-time role, using each milestone as proof the next was reachable. Chapters About Ruben Gamez and Bidsketch Life before Bidsketch and the corporate grind Designing a business for freedom and flexibility Where the idea for Bidsketch came from First steps: landing page, blog, and SaaS SEO Outsourcing development while working full-time SaaS content marketing tactics: SEO, templates, and blogger outreach Failing to get traction and almost giving up The free tool that attracted zero visitors Growing past $1K MRR with new channels Bootstrapping vs seeking investors Current business: 1500 paying customers Lightning round Resources Full show notes: https://saasclub.io/7 Join 5,000+ SaaS founders: https://saasclub.io/email

Ruben Gamez

Founder

BidsketchSignWell