27: How did Esteban Dalel raise $250k for Watermelon Tools before getting their first customer?

paris_vega: Welcome to the first customers podcast, Everybody today, we have Esteban de Lal, and he is the C, T. O and co founder of Water Melon tools, And they raised two hundred and fifty thousand before getting their first customer and now they've got over four thousand users. Esteban. welcome to the show. esteban_dalel: Thank you, thank you, Perry. It's great to be here. paris_vega: Good to have you here. Thank you for making time for us today. How did you get your very first? Let's start with Investors and then go into users and then customers. So how do you get your first investors? Because that's a type of customer. esteban_dalel: Yeah, okay, so let's buck up. paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: we were. I'll go back to the original story of why water melons called Water Melon. paris_vega: Let's esteban_dalel: We started paris_vega: go. esteban_dalel: during the pandemic were two extra verts developers working in the same company, and we were tired of not meeting new people like we wanted a beer, wanted to go out and party and we honestly decided to take over the companies slack and start creating channels to meet people like Song of the day. Let's watch serious and comment on it like book lub for serious. Um, we had buldible thing that when crazy, Uh, and after a few harcame to us until this like we love what you're doing. You've got to stop doing it. It's getting out of hand. We're going to do it from now on, paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: and we got together, had a couple of years and noticed that we could productise this. So that's when Water Mellen is born as a company group creator That helps companies connect for remote workers. We were a remote company and we started talking to people in Linkedin. They liked it, but as we were talking to a Char, they wanted to be in control of what was the themes. But if you're going to talk about the latest release, That's work stuff. you don't want to be in a group that talks more about work stuff. So it didn't work out, but we noticed that my, my describing herself And in Okay, you didn't want to be in a group that talked more about were afterward right, paris_vega: Right. esteban_dalel: So we noticed that that wasn't the route we wanted to take, but we found out we could work together, so we went to Miami hot week, which is a crypto hackerton. After talking to a lot of developer friends to figure out the problem that they had the biggest pain on And they all told us pretty much the same thing. Nobody documents code and we asked Do you document code? No, I don't. so nobody thought you would go. That was the answer and we started coding thing to automatically document code. We started applying to accelegrators in the hackton. It was a week long, so we were rushing, and by the end of the Hakathone, we had small little thing that were on his code to help developers Right documentation. Um, and an accelerator here in America, contacted us and said that we were in. gave us our first hundred thousand. just one promise. just on the power points and the people on the hakathandunloading our extension. paris_vega: That's really cool. esteban_dalel: Thank you. paris_vega: Um, And so you raised a little bit more? After that, how did you raise that additional? Those additional funds. esteban_dalel: Um, Okay, the first time that allowed us quit, and we on this full time we change the idea a little more because documentation wasn't the way. It was more about transmitting ideas from one ring to another. Telepathy is how we like to call it. Um, because nobody likes reading documentation either, so we had to think about something else. After demode. we raise a little money from like memory Investors, and we got popular in Japan like a week before M De day. We think it's because of the cute waterman with huge animas. We have a log. We think we like to think it's about that, but we actually can't reach Japanese, so we're not totally sure, so we raised like fifty from those angels on paris_vega: Paul is really really quick. So where were they able to download the Waterman tools to interact with? It? Was it esteban_dalel: In the paris_vega: on? esteban_dalel: in the paris_vega: Get esteban_dalel: Vis paris_vega: hub? esteban_dalel: code marketplace. paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: Think about it like going to paris_vega: Got esteban_dalel: get paris_vega: you esteban_dalel: help and clicking cloudreple. paris_vega: okay. esteban_dalel: You get at that. That's pretty much it, and paris_vega: Got you. esteban_dalel: insult on the on the side bar of the I V. the Integrated development environment. So paris_vega: Yeah, yeah, esteban_dalel: you're looking at code and there was water melon, Um. paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: And we start noticing that more people from America, we get popular and Twitter were popular and read it, and a lot of people are in America and were Serving that market because we're in Latin. We have the team same times we do speak English, but paris_vega: Hm, esteban_dalel: we have to be here in the States to be able to actually serve it. So we start looking at the options we applied to Why and get rejected. We applied to why. C with doing the context thing with a I, and they said like it's not going to work. Nobody's trained up good enough. A I. This paris_vega: Right, esteban_dalel: was way before chap, So paris_vega: right, esteban_dalel: Right now, of course we intergretatit, like paris_vega: Co esteban_dalel: in paris_vega: pilot, esteban_dalel: a week. Yeah, M. I got accepted into Taxursmiami, so we're now head quartered in Miami. They gave us a hundred k. paris_vega: Awesome, esteban_dalel: We're half way through the program right now and we're launching new stuff like every week it's been crazy. We're moving so fast. paris_vega: So give us a little insight into the like technical co founder lifestyle because you hear you know there's like stereotypes of how much effort it goes into. I mean, you see like young guy you, you've probably not got a whole life built out yet, so you've got a bunch of time to put into this. What's it like? Like what is? what's the demand on your time? Like how much? How much time do you work a day on this projec? esteban_dalel: Okay, so I have a hard time tracking it because sometimes I wake up like at six a M, and start coding, Then go walk my dog. Come back for breakfast and not do anything that day. So like one hour, and some days it's Sunday and I'm watching the clicks and I turn off the T V and sit down and code all the way till the sun comes up again, So paris_vega: Hm, esteban_dalel: I would say that Because of yeah, I'm young and I don't have a wife. I don't have a gerfrencurnly. The only thing that Takes out where my time is eating, going to Jim and my dog. So paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: pretty much any time I'm not doing that, I'm thinking about watermelon. H. You're supposed to not be your start up, but it's two persons start up, and paris_vega: Right. esteban_dalel: we're doing very good with two people, So whenever I'm not working, fifty percent of the company is doing nothing, so paris_vega: Right. esteban_dalel: it's heavy on my brain. paris_vega: Sure, so literally. Most of your time you're working on the project. esteban_dalel: Yeah, any time I'm awake the gem, like pulling weights. I'm thinking about. like the the product thing. I left a bug over there. I'm going to go fix these. Send this email all the time all the time. paris_vega: Okay, so the dream is, um, go from where you are now, And you said you have about four thousand users, but right now you don't have actual paying customers. You said, So talk a little bit about how you guys play on going from four thousand users to paid customers. esteban_dalel: Okay, I'm going to be blown here. Developers paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: are as holes, getting a developer to pray for anything is very hard like you know paris_vega: Sure, esteban_dalel: that in Netflaxes, they even pay for their spotify. You can buy books on the Netflas car. It's crazy like paris_vega: All esteban_dalel: we paris_vega: right. esteban_dalel: get the best breaks in the world, So getting a developer to pull out their own car and paid for anything is very hard. and developer tools always start by getting a critical mass to move With the tool to create a product that every developer would like to work with, and move up to the manager for them to buy it. So paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: that's a story of tile. That's a story of cloud flor. That's a story of Get lab. The big paris_vega: Interesting esteban_dalel: names have all gone that way and we have to paris_vega: Right. esteban_dalel: do it. That's the play book. paris_vega: Okay. So what do you think is critical mass for your tool? esteban_dalel: Honestly, paris_vega: How many users? esteban_dalel: We think that after ten thousand downloads we have grape on how to do this properly. We're getting more and more people to try our product and we're removing the pawl. We noticed that having on pale doesn't work, so we're going to it out for three differ product up to a point like you can only use it fifty times a month or some number. we haven't decided. But you get the whole experience right. you know, paris_vega: Okay? esteban_dalel: the whole, You're going to tell your manager like hey, I was doing it with this tool, but they need my credit card. Please paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: give me the credit card. That's how we paris_vega: right, esteban_dalel: go about it. paris_vega: so kind of like how chat? G, P. T. for example, a recent example of something that launched for free got a lot of people hooked on it because it was such a powerful tool for some people, and then eased into Hey, now there's a pro version for even more reliability or performance or whatever, upset to those pro level features and a lot of people like me. I was glad to swipe the A card because I was like Man, This is super useful for me, Um, for lots of different reasons, And so I easily swiped for twenty bucks or whatever the chat g, p t f is. And so I guess it's that same kind of thing like you want to become so ingrained into a developers process of doing their daily job, Um that it's of course type decision. they're like. Well, Yeah, I just have to esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: keep having this or have this next level feature that they're launching or whatever it is. esteban_dalel: Literally, we want to be able to win the scream test. You know that when you disconnect a service, and so when screams, paris_vega: Oh, esteban_dalel: you know paris_vega: yeah, esteban_dalel: it's required, so paris_vega: okay, esteban_dalel: we want to be that like when we pull paris_vega: okay, esteban_dalel: the plug. Are you going O jell, or are you going to be like? Oh, okay, we don't want that. they. Okay, we want like paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: you to be stock To go take a walk after. like how do we solve this? I need water mill. Water used to be like this. like whenever compiler to sound, My brain goes into panic. I know about to search and ungogle, But it's paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: so easy there, so easy. paris_vega: And so Co pilot, you're referring to the the A I like Coding assistant tool esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: that Hub has where it will help fill out as you code. It will predict what you're trying to code, and a lot of times it helps esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: fill in. esteban_dalel: it's very good. paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: they say. get help That like fifty percent of the code that has been uploaded in the last like years since Capelle was released has been written by Copilot. So half the code that has been sent out by developers is a mate. paris_vega: Wow, esteban_dalel: We've become like approvers of the A. I. more than anything, so I think paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: it's great. I think that's great because people that used to write. I don't know ten features a week. Count of write fifteen. paris_vega: Right, esteban_dalel: So it's not about lines of code like paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: everyone knows how to make a button. But that's not where the value is. What does the paris_vega: Right, esteban_dalel: button do? Where does it take me? Is hit faster for me to pay with these new buttons. That's paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: the kind of thing that the new features are going to. So we want Water mill to be that we have a lot of designed partners. I cannot give you names, but we got paris_vega: Yeah. esteban_dalel: a couple series a startups that are using our product inside them that we on't charge to, but they are like on a free plan. the whole team is useagainand. They paris_vega: Well, esteban_dalel: re loving it. paris_vega: so eventually are you going to do like? Hey, it's a price per set or something like that. esteban_dalel: We always say it's thirty dollars per person per month. If you pay by the year you pay less, but imagine this like you're saving your developers two meetings a week, and at the price point of developers time, that's paris_vega: Right esteban_dalel: a lot of money per person. paris_vega: For sure? Okay, so let's so now we've talked about kind of your initial story and the kind of overall goals of of where you're at users wives, Customers wise, let's go a little deeper into what it actually does. What your company does. What the tool you've built actually does. Because we're kind of talking around it now. And why would your tool water melon save a developer two meetings a week, esteban_dalel: Okay, the worst case in Aria is your remote distributed company and the people in your team are in Japan, in Portugal, San Francisco, and Brazil, Right like that's the worst case in Ari, everyone is everywhere. You're paris_vega: Right? esteban_dalel: so far away. One person has a question and it has to go like two. any four hours around the globe before everyone has had their safe, and if they have a follow question, you've lost half the week without work. That's the paris_vega: Right? esteban_dalel: absolute word Scenario. So paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: people are terrible at searching honestly and people are lazy like it could have been in your slack for days and you wouldn't have found it because you don't know exactly how to search for it. We do that digging for you in Gera and Slag were bringing in more services like every other week. paris_vega: And so if I'm a developer and I just glanced at your site and says it gives code context and you esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: can like high light, a block of code and basically somehow get insight into everything related to that piece of code. Can you maybe give a really specific example like I'm esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: a developer working on home page of a website working on a specific feature. esteban_dalel: Let's say, let's say you had a bag with the American Express cards. You're looking at the code that posits American Express, So paris_vega: All esteban_dalel: we're paris_vega: right, esteban_dalel: going to search everywhere. that says American Express cards. building. Um. It has like for digits. Anything that has four digits in text everywhere is sex right? Any request that has it? Any slackness? Is that has it, and we're going to surface it. Eventually paris_vega: M. esteban_dalel: you're going to be able to get into the conversation of why, Like we cannot handle American Express carts property. Someone has had this fight before and they can probably solve it. So it's like talking to the ghost of the person. Uh, paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: and bringing paris_vega: so esteban_dalel: in paris_vega: it's esteban_dalel: those paris_vega: like esteban_dalel: ideas. paris_vega: Okay, so it's almost like a universal search tool for any piece of code esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: in your project And esteban_dalel: yeah, paris_vega: I'll search across all of your apps that you use to communicate or deal with the code esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: and give you results esteban_dalel: precisely paris_vega: across everything that's connected. esteban_dalel: precisely. And you, paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: we're moving on to paris_vega: Okay esteban_dalel: like we started in your code, And now we're moving on like we are serving right now. Jes, like an, Get help. We want you to be able to search in Gera in Slack and get help across all the other services. So you're always paris_vega: Who? esteban_dalel: in a contextual context. paris_vega: So is that like Through a like a browser extension or something? how would you achieve that? esteban_dalel: We have as for every service and we've thought paris_vega: Okay? esteban_dalel: about like an extension. But it's a little far for paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: so We're think about like. where does the developer actually live? So we're like primarily using keyboard paris_vega: Hot esteban_dalel: Hot paris_vega: keys, esteban_dalel: keys. Yeah, paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: thank you, deeper hotkeys. We're moving. Like to make the services faster with a strong caching. It's very complicated. like Er, R are hard to serve. So if we can serve paris_vega: Right, esteban_dalel: the hardest developers, the most annoying ones, the rock starts. we can serve the other ninety nine percent right, and everyone's going to be benefited like people from marketing are going to be able to know it. What state is this piece of code that I requested And why did they remove it? Why did they change it? Why did the team talk about it That they didn't include us in? So it's gonna be context for everyone in the company. That's a dream paris_vega: Okay, Also providing more context. All right, And so that's why it saves like developer meetings. Because instead of having to talk to all these people, you can just search through all the conversations that have happened and all the activity that's happened, and probably answer a lot more questions and reduce the amount of meetings or slack messages you'd have to send. And so that means less interruptions of everybody's time. Everybody can stay in flow and keep being productive and not having to You know, Re align themselves and get back into what they were working on. Okay, esteban_dalel: You brought. You brought a thing that we love to say, Like our biggest competitor is the tap on the shoulder. That is when paris_vega: M. esteban_dalel: two people get together and can actually look at the same screen. Use the same keyboard. That's when you're like transmitting the best ideas. because you see their faces. You're moving your brain to the other person. So in a remote world that it's where everyone is going to. M. W Are going to be the tool that all companies used to communicate without interrupting others. paris_vega: Wow, water melon tools. Okay, And are you like ramping up for more fun raising, taking on more investors? Um, what's kind of your current goals? As far as esteban_dalel: Yes, paris_vega: that one esteban_dalel: Yes, paris_vega: thing? esteban_dalel: we dream with being what kind of story. A company that gets huge with very few people by hiring the correct ones. Only paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: we're going to raise big money very soon. I'm not available paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: to say paris_vega: that's fine. esteban_dalel: big money very soon. To get to that point, Trying to get customers right now, and designed partners, especially big companies that have pains that we can solve to create a product for for them, and then like pended for everybody. That's our target right now where we're moving fast faster. Actually, now that we have more money in the bank and not using it honestly, paris_vega: So you're just surviving going to the gym getting back to the code. esteban_dalel: That's that's the start of life like it paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: is started in a garage. I like having an office, but this is software like. I only need a keyboard, a good screen and my head phones to get into the flow and build a world class product. It takes a lot of time, a lot of effort, a lot of zoom coals with customers. but I mean, I don't consider myself the smartest person in the room. Like it. A lot of great. paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: It takes a while to learn how to code. but you can now coded. Now we chose to do something that we enjoy As founder. we have found er market fit. We, we're developers and we like solving developer problems, just like we were extra verts solving extravert problems and we're not getting tired of this. That's why we want to have money in the bank to be able to do this like for years and years and years. paris_vega: That's cool. so you're dedicated to the craft of building software and being a programmer esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: If you esteban_dalel: the paris_vega: ever esteban_dalel: heart paris_vega: read the esteban_dalel: art is selling like you know, Developers paris_vega: Yeah. esteban_dalel: always like to build solutions and then they have to go out and sell it and panic, But luckily paris_vega: Exactly. esteban_dalel: I'm an extra Bert, and well, I feel no shame in telling you like Hey, I sell it right now. We're charging, but it's going to cost you thirty bugs starting. I don't know, Jude, and people are going to be like Sure. I just meant the guy just unload and it's going now bow into eventually, Them trying it out, having a high moment And actually knowing like hate these worries. I don't what it is because I like the guy, but the thing works and that's our goal right now. paris_vega: That's exactly why I started this podcast is because I've come from a design and development background back in the day and been a part of a lot of small projects, or trying to start my own project. And then you build something, or you work on something, or you help launch something. You quoting what, launch it. Where it exists somewhere on the Internet. But nobody cares. You know like nobody knows exists. Nobody knows what you've been doing in the dark, You know, heads down just making stuff. And so there's that moment where I've realized on past projects I was like. Oh, well, just because this exists doesn't mean customers. automatically. you're going to flock to you. You esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: have to do something between finishing your product or the first version. You know that, M v p, or whatever it is that just works or solves a problem. And there's something that has to happen between that and convincing that first person to give you money. And that's what this whole show is about. Is the something in between? They're what are people doing to build that connection between? Hey, we got a product of service and now we've convinced the humans who actually give us money for it. esteban_dalel: Yeah, they say build it and there will come. That's paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: both. That's vot like you can have a terrible product. But when in distribution like I don't know, Cretlist or Wikipedia, which are horrible products. Like Wait, they renewed Wikipedia. but that was like a year ago, like very recent, but they were horrible products that just worked and people loved them because they worked and they want in distribution. Wikipediis. The first result pretty much any time you search and go, But correct list was simply like the college student thing, And when they graduated college they kept on using it. Um, paris_vega: Hm. esteban_dalel: face book, Beat my space, because they were like exclusive at the beginning, So Yes, distribution beats product Anywhere. If you have a decent product, you can win on a decent paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: product with great distribution, but you cannot win on a mediocre distribution with a great product. paris_vega: All right, so maybe talk a little bit about how you're planning to make that transition because you're at that point you've got users. Which type of customer for sure? Um, but like you're saying, you're just trying to hit critical mass to where it makes sense to start charging people or risk charging people, Because I know you might be concerned about losing users or whatever, but talk about maybe some strategy or tactics you guys have talked about about how to make that That cross over. esteban_dalel: Sure, free products are a very complicated thing. Like you got to know when the free part is too good and people are like paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: abusing it where to turn it premium. So I love the ample of the spotifie because you're like they give you three songs and they only let this keep, and every three song songs they give you, and with the spotifiepremium you can bloblallala. You're like buying coding how Or like in the game And then you get the damn it. I'm going to pay for It was by being so good, because if you had four songs, you could get through the whole shower without, and a right like that's where the cut up happens. So you gotta be measuring all the time. You got to understand your users psyche their brain When when it relaxes and just before that happens, you pull up right, you dangle the cook in front of them just Enough to paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: make them go for the credit card. So it's a very complicated balance between, Um, not pay walling, Because that's probably what happens with me or times anyone shares you. An article. You read the headline, you read the first paragraph and you have no idea what what it was about. You close it and the don't want to discuss it. So they're becoming this. Since this journalist thing that just gives create headlines without any kind. And paris_vega: Yeah. esteban_dalel: um, unlike you, do like you get through, Have the video and then they pull it out, so freezing products are very hard and you should start something that you don't have to balance this out. Like start telling from the beginning. paris_vega: So do you guys? have you considered like a enterprise approach Like B to be style, Because I know, like you're saying, Freemium, you know, is one of the hardest, like Direct consumer, And you mentioned that you know you're trying to maybe go after managers somehow, because it it does seem easier when you're going out b to B, because you don't have to have you know serving all these customers with some product that has to work for whatever, millions or hundreds of thousands of people. You can just Kind of cater those initial features to those fewer higher paying customers. esteban_dalel: Well, yeah, but going for the big players is a different beast. Um. paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: going for a big player, It requires like several people to approve the butt yet see people to be sold to M. You have to have like security things. They're not going to trust a company that was created a year ago by two random guys on the Internet. So yes, we've considered it, but we know that we're not ready for it. It's gonna this Or moral, and that's the thing inside. teams like paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: growth heals wounds. If you're fighting, you founder, go out and sell and make your company work. You're going to see fighting, or you're going to change the fight for something else. Right. You're gonna be discussing Analytic, and suddenly you're going to be discussing revenue, and you're goin to be talking about nice stuff in between the fights, and eventually it's gonna be about that, paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: so go for the right Level that you're able to tolerate Would be my recommendation. We decided that we don't go full corporate yet. We don't go for anyone over a hundred people. And we mean people, paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: which means teams of development of fifty or less. So we're serving these nice where we know we can handle their problems. They're starting to paying the paying the big corporate, Different pains and different ways of scratching their itches. So paris_vega: Yeah. esteban_dalel: not yet paris_vega: all right. So you're looking at the kind of mass approach going after lots of different users. Are there any other kind of tactics or? Oh, that's right. You mentioned that you can you go out and sell. You know if there's a frustration or something, you go out and sell and you've gotten four thousand users or more right now. What type of selling are you doing? Is it just Hey? it exists in the market place. Are you running any adds with some of that money? or you know what is the selling that you're doing esteban_dalel: Okay, going out, Go out and sell means a lot of things for a lot of different companies, paris_vega: Right? esteban_dalel: in our case, and wearing a pink sweater to anywhere Go, so people ask me, Hey, what the hell is Water Mill and I stand paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: up there and pitch them in thirty seconds in a restaurant in Bears. In developer events, Anywhere I can pitch, it's an opportunity for me to get a sell right, So I post a lot on Twitter and I like retited from the Water, my own account. I go out to link in and start hitting random people with the pitch. Um, I go out and have stickers and like knock on offices paris_vega: Really esteban_dalel: and give out stickers. It's crazy like if I don't feel like coating, I'm gonna still be selling because it helps me communicate my ideas better. You have to expose yourself to the nose to be able to see Into this. Yes, it's it's hard. I know, like being in front of people is hard. Singing in front of an audience is hard. But you got to do it. That's how you make a business. paris_vega: Interesting because normally you know, I don't think for myself. At least I don't think of a developer tool is something that gets sold manually, like you're saying, But it makes sense that you'll definitely get an edge and you'll get more customers if you do that, because I think maybe there's this stereotype of this kind of idea of how text start ups get started, launched and grow, and it's like some, A mixture of social media or getting hot or viral On some, you know, dead form or hack or news, or you know some something like that, Like where you like, there's just these few paths, so that's really cool to hear you using every old school tactic you can think of, to just literally go to person to person sales to say hey, go download down, load or ap or tool and try it out. Is that kind of how the pitch goes Or how do you do it esteban_dalel: Yeah, I mean there, the channels or fedora. Everyone wants to be paris_vega: Right? esteban_dalel: in the top of hacker news. Everyone wants to go and read it and become popular. Everyone paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: wants to be a product on number one, paris_vega: Sure, esteban_dalel: So it's you're competing for attention that people don't have any more. So either you're Tiktok Super Star and create the best beams for Twitter, or you do it the hard way. And well, we haven't gotten lucky with being popular and ready. The Japanese read it, but not the American one. So paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: um, you gotta do the foot work whatever it is like. If you're very good at doing at on Facebook, you go on ahead. Yue. Gotta figure out you're going to test it out because people are not gonna know about this random lead like there's millions of companies out there. You're not you've never heard of and distribution wins, Distribution always wins. You got to be the best at putting your company in people's eyes, so that's why you see like Bill Boards of the Night logo, Just with the night Legal. paris_vega: Yeah. esteban_dalel: Always been thinking about our shoes always. So that's where what you want to do? paris_vega: Okay. So you're trying to make the little animate watermelon everywhere esteban_dalel: Uh, paris_vega: everywhere you can get it esteban_dalel: yeah, yeah, yeah, paris_vega: Okay. So you did say that some of the types of sales and marketing you're doing, you're posting everywhere you can on social media, sounds like, and just kind of a shot gun approach of just trying everything just to see what gets traction so that you can see what works And I think that's cool how you're using your own kind of personal rhythms. Like coding. Most of the day, You need to break perfect time to go get some human action and take advantage of that to do a little sales. So do you go to Like? Do you intentionally say I'm going to go to so many like developer events or conferences or like Net working things. esteban_dalel: Yes, yes, I go to the most again. Luckily, I'm told, and seeing a tall guy with a pink sweater like open up conversation super ly. Uh, paris_vega: You can get esteban_dalel: so paris_vega: a tattoo on your forehead of a water melon. esteban_dalel: I thought about painting my head like red and green water Man Read That Would, That would start conversation a lot. paris_vega: Yeah, for sure. esteban_dalel: Um, but yes, I mean, Start up is a merican. If you're lucky, it's gonna be come a sprint, and you're gonna be super Are in the first five months, but in most cases either you go down or you become popular. If the fifth year right so you got to hold on to that. You cannot destroy yourself. in the process. The hustled culture has told us that you need to get to first hundred lovers in your first month. Holy ship. Now actually sleep, People are gonna be there next month paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: To a Yes, paris_vega: right, esteban_dalel: It's important. but if you destroy yourself, there's no more company as a founder, so paris_vega: Exactly esteban_dalel: you've got to be careful about the balance. I do recommend excertising and taking some on every day and talking to customers. You want customers money. It's great raising money, but that's just like for flaunting it best, the best companies are the ones that are Self sustainable and you make pay roll every month. Raising money puts a lot of stress in your life that will help you destroy yourself. paris_vega: For sure. Yeah, hustle culture can definitely. It can kill you for sure. Depending on how you interpret it and your own personal ambition, you can definitely drive yourself to an early grave. Um, so that's good that you're focusing on exercise and a little bit of balance. So all right, You got this tool out there? Anybody can download it I guess from your website. esteban_dalel: Yeah, From the website and on the Vscode market place, we're gonna be soon in the market place Gransnack, To look for the happy water melon with the huge ice. paris_vega: All right and do you, yourself and your co founder? Are you the only ones that handle like marketing related task, like posting on social media? Are you kind of like building in public? Kind of like Peter Levels? If you're familiar esteban_dalel: Yeah, yeah, levels is a great example of a person that has created things by himself. paris_vega: Right, esteban_dalel: Crazy guy. I love the guy. We have free lancers helping us goes right to be able to post all the time. We, of course, look at it and edit it to make it sound like us. Because the blank canvas is very hard, but yes, it's paris_vega: Sure, esteban_dalel: us handling everything moving fast, thinking a lot, trying out new things fighting amongst ourselves without telling anybody. It's paris_vega: Uh, esteban_dalel: hard. paris_vega: uh, esteban_dalel: It's hard. having got co founder is very hard. It's worse than being married because there's a contract that will make you very poor if you break it. So You got to be careful about you. You pick to be your co founder, and you should honestly balance out your strength. You should have similar things, be able to sit next to each other for for a long time, but one person, and this is like sort of bookish. The hustler and the hacker have to get together. Some one has to be able to go out and sell, and the other one has to be able to sit down built. so It's better if both can do both. But you've got to be specializing. One thing. You kind of be thinking about two things at the same time. Selling is very very hard, very time consuming. building is very very hard, very time consuming. So paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: it's not better to be one of the or the other. paris_vega: So how is your specific co founder relationship? Are you the You're the C to? So I'm guessing that the other one is. Is it design focused or business, or what's their focus? esteban_dalel: He's a business guy. He actually paris_vega: Okay, esteban_dalel: actually went for computer science in college. He went for business in college. We met in Hakathon, We didn't like each other honestly, The first because we were both extraverts fighting for an attention. so we didn't like each other, but we kept bumping into each other, and after we graduated college, we were super best friends. We had to organize a lot of parties we had created, like a Roup of people that talked about start up during their free time for the whole college. So like a club and we actually went separate ways and then came back. I invested in his company. He was working with another friend. They went broke, and then I started working with the guy. we became roommates. After college, I rented out of place and he got A room for it, and that we played up again. He went to Bitnambut when we had already worked in by Mon for a few months, and we could actually test out what remote companies have to suffer the most. Literally. it was a twelve hour difference, so our product had to be that good for us to be able to work in that super difficult situation. paris_vega: Because you are rarely online, probably at the same time, esteban_dalel: Yeah, we we only talked about on now We're a week face to face yet. paris_vega: So you're using your own tool to help esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: overcome that. esteban_dalel: that's very important. dog footing. using your own product is very important. It's cool that you bill for someone else. But if you don't feel the pain, you're not going to know where to put the bandit right, You're paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: not going to find the bugs. You're not going to find the. Yeah, the pain is not going to be there. You're gonna be looking at it and be in pathetic, but it's not your pain. You can just walk out. paris_vega: Yeah, Okay, cool. and so does does he program at all, or is esteban_dalel: Yeah, paris_vega: it just esteban_dalel: yeah, he has. paris_vega: okay? So esteban_dalel: he paris_vega: you esteban_dalel: has paris_vega: both esteban_dalel: his milita paris_vega: okay? esteban_dalel: tasks. paris_vega: That's interesting. It's always interesting to hear the dynamics of co founders and how you know which how the task get broken up. esteban_dalel: That's the thing, like he. He talks more to the customers. I hunt for the very hard developers that I want a cater to. He goes with the bulk of people right, So we're putting together the idea, the hard developer and the average one, Because we got to serve a little for everybody, but we're focusing On several use cases. Um, and you got to talk to them all the time, so he will bring in a lot of ideas and I will filter them, and sometimes I will pop out a lot of problems and he will filter them. So I'm building and he's selling and we're going to. We've different forces on different sides that paris_vega: Yeah, esteban_dalel: hold each other accountable on properly prioritizing our time. Does he Think that we have the least stuff? paris_vega: Yeah, Well, Esteban appreciate your sharing your time with us or let you get back to coding here in a second, let's say pretend really quick that we got a room of another ten thousand of your target customers listening, and they're waiting on you to tell them why they should use your product esteban_dalel: You're going to be saving your developers headaches and race quitting every other day, So your developers are going to be in a better mood and are going build faster by using water melon. You're going to be having a better place to work. paris_vega: All right, and once again you can find water melon tools on Waterman Melon Tools Dot Com. And you mentioned Vs Cod market place, and then the other market place is coming soon. esteban_dalel: Yeah, precisely, paris_vega: Okay, al, right, Esteban, thanks for being with us today, man, I appreciate it. esteban_dalel: Thanks a lot, Paris for having me. It's been great.