All the talks from previous Business of Software Conferences from one place. Great SaaS & Software Talks.

If you want to watch previous BoS Talks, you can access all of the publicly available ones from here, listed by year. The more recent talks will link to the video of the talk, a transcript, the speakers slides, any follow up online AMAs and attendee notes. Great talks on building SaaS and software businesses.

Enjoy!

Patrick Campbell, CEO, ProfitWell

Patrick considers why SaaS companies obsessed by User Acquisition and User Acquisition Cost are focusing on the wrong metrics, missing the far more important growth drivers for a SaaS business: monetization and retention.

A data rich talk that shows the importance of developing your product in collaboration with your current users to understand the needs of the people that are paying for your product. While user acquisition is important, a 1% improvement in customer monetization or user retention will have 3-4x impact on bottom line over user acquisition.

Slides, Video & Transcript below

Now here is a reading list. We asked this year’s Business of Software Conference USA speakers…

Please don’t think about it too hard, just reply with the first one that comes to mind:

• What book has had the biggest influence on your business life?

As you know, they are a smart bunch of folks so we thought it would be interesting to hear what things they have read that have had the most influence on their career and thinking. They are well read, many have written books of their own and we wanted some new things to read on the plane out to Boston. (We can’t wait).

Want to know what some of the smartest people in town think are the most influential business books they have read, wait no more!

What can SaaS CEOs who have led businesses for over a Decade Teach You?

Mimecast Founder & CEO Peter Bauer has been named one of the top ten most influential figures in the world of cybersecurity and has run Mimecast for over 14 years. Peter spoke at Business of Software Conference USA in 2012, soon after he moved to the US to build Mimecast’s presence there.

His talk title was, ‘Founding Principles vs Scaling Principles‘ and it’s well worth another watch.

Jason Fried, CEO, Basecamp

Since Basecamp was founded in 1999, it has pioneered a different way of doing things, a different way of working, a different approach to doing business. Started with four people, today Basecamp has about 50 employees across 32 different cities across the world. Everyone at Basecamp is free to live and work wherever they want.

This talk is about dog-fooding. Getting an opportunity to see how a company like Basecamp is run, using Basecamp, (other project management tools are available as Jason freely said), was a great opportunity for attendees to see inside the workings of a company that chooses to do things differently. It is a fascinating insight into the inner workings of a company recognized by Forbes this year as one of America’s 25 best small companies – Small Giants, companies that value greatness over growth.

Laura Roeder, CEO, MeetEdgar

Almost everyone running a consulting, training or agency business, however successful, will admit at some point that they wish they could run a product business. Why don’t they?

Turns out it is quite hard – many of the skills required are complementary but stopping taking on paid clients to allow a team to build a product with no immediate prospect of return requires a brave and bold move. Laura decided to make the move a couple of years ago, while pregnant. Organically funded, the new business reached $100k MRR within a year and continues to grow – at $200k+ MRR when this talk was given. She shares some of her experiences changing her business and some of the things that have propelled the growth of SaaS business, MeetEdgar.

Slides, Video & Transcript below

Rather than tell you how great our talks are, and how many cool people you’ll share space with (as all conferences do, let’s be honest), we’d rather let our attendees speak for us.

“Do yourself a favour, get to the next BoS if you want to learn how to run your business better.” Steve McLeod, Barbary Software

“If anyone is in the tech space or is the CEO of a fast growing tech business or software firm, it’s the right place for them.” Eloise Bloniarz, Future Workshops

One of the things which makes us different from other events is the type of people you’ll meet at BoS.

We are for people who are building long-term sustainable businesses; people who aren’t about short-term hacks and flipping, but who are looking to grow something durable.

57% of BoS USA attendees are C Level, VPs or Founders.

The rest are Product Managers/Leads, Software Engineers, Developers and Marketers who want to know more about how their bits fit into the rest of a successful business. (Fun fact: the Marketers are most likely to have either “Overlord” or “Shepherd” in their job title.)

Great to see Mikey Trafton is coming to Business of Software Conference this year.

One of the things we love about BoS is that speakers come back to be in the audience.

Just registered for @bosconference. Can’t wait to hang with @peldi, @asmartbear, @MarkLittlewood and my other BOS peeps.

— Michael Trafton (@mikeytrafton) July 25, 2017

As Mikey says, this will be his fourth time, he spoke twice before. Once about his framework for building a world class culture in business – a lesson he learned the hard way. The following year, he talked about hiring a great team. both talks were funny, thoughtful and packed with practical advice.

Welcome back to BoS USA Mikey. Check out the talks below.

There’s a new coffee machine in town. It’s a bit intimidating.

One of the great things about working at Redgate is the coffee. The company is spread out over three floors and they have one single place on the ground floor where everyone has to go for their daily fix of caffeine, (or a bewildering array of juices, teas, herbal teas, breakfast cereals etc). It’s good for meeting other people in other teams.

But coffee is a big thing here. Last week the coffee machines were replaced. The new machines are scary…

Business of Software Conference – Code of Conduct

Always worth reminding people that this is important for us all. We expect everyone who attends our events in any capacity to treat other human beings well whoever they may be.

All attendees, speakers, sponsors and volunteers at our conference are required to agree with the following code of conduct. Organizers will enforce this code throughout the event. We expect co-operation from all participants to help ensure a safe environment for everybody.

The Quick Version