Chris Erler bootstrapped ComX from €10,000 and unemployment benefits to €20 million in revenue in four years, becoming a first mover in B2B digital sales in Europe. He sold to private equity at multiples he never imagined. Then the company went through insolvency, and he walked away with nothing the second time around.

In this episode, Chris and I get into what it feels like when your first company works on the first try, and what that kind of velocity does to you as a person. We talk about how his ego shifted as the money came in, what it was like to go from founder to employee inside a PE structure, and how his body literally broke down from stress he didn't even register. His spine was deteriorating for a year and he was answering Slack messages in a hospital at 11pm before he even acknowledged something was wrong.

We also talk about what the insolvency felt like, how failure carries a completely different stigma in Europe than it does in the US, and why he's now building Erler Ventures to help founders scale without burning out along the way.

This is a conversation about the full ride: the highs, the exit, the unraveling, and what success actually means after you've been through all of it. If you've ever built something that started taking more from you than it gave, this one is for you.

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(01:05) What "doing things differently" meant growing up in Austria
(02:30) What drove him to start his first company
(05:00) The goal was financial freedom, not a big idea
(07:30) It worked on the first try: €20M in four years
(10:15) What that velocity felt like emotionally
(12:15) "I tried to spend money. I didn't like it."
(14:15) The dopamine kick and the ego trap
(15:45) The body breaks: hospital at 11pm, answering Slack
(18:15) The PE deal changed everything
(19:30) "My why was not there, and that crushed me"
(22:30) What the exit money actually felt like
(24:30) The shift from founder to employee
(25:45) Watching ComX go from acquisition to insolvency
(28:30) Why failure carries shame in Europe but not the US
(32:00) Building Erler Ventures: helping founders not burn out
(35:00) "If your body doesn't work, nothing is fun"

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

Simon Swords bootstrapped Fundipedia for nearly 20 years before selling to FE fundinfo in May 2025. He started in a garden shed with an Ethernet cable and a VoIP phone, ran three businesses at once for years, and eventually landed clients like HSBC, Barclays, and Legal & General. He negotiated the entire life-changing exit himself with his chairman and a ChatGPT subscription, without a corporate broker.

In this episode, Simon and I go deep on what it actually costs to play the long game. We talk about the childhood that wired him to push through anything, why he says he would rather have died than given up, and why he cried the day the deal closed.

We also get into why he sought therapy after the business was successful, not during the struggle. And why he thinks once you have the money, you're no longer allowed to be sad.

This is a conversation about whether the exit actually sets you free, or whether the real work starts after. If you're playing the long game, this one's for you.

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(02:00) Why bootstrapping for 20 years was the making of him
(07:31) Cumulative childhood trauma and growing up in Dagenham
(11:30) Anxiety as a superpower in business
(12:59) "I would have rather died than given up"
(15:38) Thinking he was having a heart attack on an onboarding call
(18:30) His chairman buying him out for a million pounds
(20:12) Waking up with the money and the anxiety still there
(21:52) The dragon he was chasing for 30 years
(23:30) Why most of his therapy came after success, not during
(28:30) Running the exit himself with ChatGPT
(32:31) What the cry on closing day was really about
(34:56) Why once you have money, you're not allowed to be sad
(38:30) The friends who anchor him to reality
(42:23) The panic attack that made him stop
(45:30) His 2026 plan to fill the space the business used to occupy
(48:05) What he's most proud of

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

Chris Walker bootstrapped Refine Labs from $3,000 to over $20 million in revenue in three years, becoming one of the most influential voices in B2B marketing. He had the audience, the recognition, and the revenue. Then he walked away from all of it.

In this episode, Chris and I go deep on what happens when you do everything you're supposed to do and it still doesn't feel the way you thought it would. We talk about how he rated himself a 2 out of 10 on mental and time freedom while his business was thriving, the self-doubt he carried for 33 years behind a confident public persona, how his sense of identity and purpose shifted as he came into financial success, and why he sold two companies for a fraction of what they were worth to buy back his freedom.

We also get into his 10 Dimensions of Freedom framework and how he uses it to make decisions that protect all ten, and what he's building now with ENCODED.ai.

This is a conversation about the gap between achievement and fulfillment, and what Chris did to close it. If freedom is a priority for you, this one's for you.

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(01:08) What success looked like in Chris's corporate years
(04:32) Starting Refine Labs with $3,000 and $62K in student debt
(06:30) The freest he ever felt
(07:42) When passion turned into proving he was smarter than everyone
(09:32) The Success Game: the six-step hamster wheel
(14:00) Why believing success requires suffering creates it
(17:14) A 2 out of 10 on mental and time freedom
(18:35) Realizing $100M in B2B marketing was purposeless
(20:42) "This is just who I am"
(22:11) The biggest breakthrough of his life
(27:30) How self-doubt and public confidence coexist
(28:30) Frequency: identity, beliefs, and intentions
(31:55) Money as the goal vs. the byproduct
(34:30) Why $100 million would never be enough
(39:00) Selling Refine Labs equity at 20% of its worth
(40:38) Selling his Passetto shares for $18
(43:12) The mission behind ENCODED
(45:30) Frequency training as a daily practice
(47:50) The 10 Dimensions of Freedom
(49:42) Isn't life about trade-offs?

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

Hey, it's me again, Melissa, back for Season Three. I'm the cofounder and CEO of eWebinar, and your host here at ProfitLed. This episode is the backstory behind this season's theme: Passion, Profit, and Purpose, and how those three things shift as founders come into financial success.

About a year and a half ago, after 14 years as a 3x bootstrapped founder, I hit a wall. I lost my inspiration, my motivation, and somewhere along the way, myself. From the outside, everything looked great. Profitable company, loving partner, life on my own terms. But inside, I was unraveling.

What I went through forced me to look at a part of the founder journey we almost never talk about. We spend so much time on growth strategies, marketing hacks, and the numbers, and almost no time on the person running the company. But the most important variable in any startup's success is you. And what you want, what drives you, and what success even means to you doesn't stay fixed. It shifts as you evolve. Your business stays constant and demanding, but you don't.

That's what Season Three is about. The conversations we don't have enough of. The ones about what happens after you've built the thing, found some financial security, and look up and ask, now what?

If this resonates, and you're curious how other founders have navigated this human journey, this season is for you.

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

It took eWebinar 16 months to go from idea to product launch, then another 36 months to hit $1M ARR; this is the core theme of this season. That's a total of 52 months from incorporation date.

You might have read about companies that get to $1M in a year, much less now with AI startups and the world riding that wave. Those are outliers and not the norm. 36 months to $1M is actually the median, even for funded companies.

“Normal” is not newsworthy and doesn’t get the media spotlight it deserves so you might feel like you’re moving too slow even when you’re in the right place.

On this season finale episode, Melissa and Todd dive into the 12 most shocking surprises on their way to $1M ARR after everything they tried, learned, and failed, which formed the foundation by which they continued to iterate on the business and product.

Thank you for tuning into Season 2 of ProfitLed!! Your support is deeply appreciated.

If you enjoy this podcast, please consider leaving us a review as that will help us continue to make episodes for you.

Takeaways:
• Things they thought would have a huge impact, but didn’t
• Assumptions that made them think they’d get to $1M faster
• Things that took a lot more effort and time than anticipated
• Why you don’t need fancy metrics to prioritize roadmap
• Why $1M is not the magic number even though it seems like it is

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

When Melissa cofounded eWebinar, she had no idea it was going to be “product-led”. Before becoming an entrepreneur, she had always been in B2B sales and biz dev roles. She was always a sales-led founder as both her previous startups were enterprise SaaS. The word “product-led growth” didn’t even exist in her vocabulary!

When she ran out of leads to sell to in her network 9 months after launching eWebinar, she asked other founders for help. You can imagine her surprise when she learned that low cost, self-serve SaaS products were sold in a completely different way. Turns out, people don’t pick up the phone for $99/month products; they prefer to do their own research and sign up at their own pace.

On this episode, Melissa and Todd dive into the 9 most important PLG (product-led growth) lessons learned as they powered through and figured things out by trying everything under the sun from playbooks, experts, and friends.

Takeaways:
• Marketing strategies that worked, and ones that didn’t
• Why you should invest in high quality, engaging content
• Why customers aren’t always your greatest source of info
• Hardships and beauty of making a self-serve SaaS startup work

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

“This is fine as a lifestyle business.” Says every VC with a slight look of disdain after you pitch them your brilliant idea they don’t want to invest in.

The industry has given “lifestyle business” such a bad reputation by commonly using it to describe non-venture scalable businesses with less ambitious founders. Only 1% of startups are venture funded, which means the other 99% are bootstrapped and by industry standard, lifestyle businesses. If anything between zero and unicorn is “lifestyle”, I’d happily take it.

eWebinar was founded intentionally as a lifestyle business, and that means choosing happiness over revenue for all decisions as it relates to the wellbeing of every team member, product, pricing, customer support, operations…

On this episode, Melissa and Todd discuss what a “lifestyle business” is for them, and the things they do to achieve the dream company that gives everyone involved (not just the founders) a great lifestyle.

Takeaways:
• How the industry and VCs (negatively) perceive lifestyle businesses
• Melissa’s 10 non-negotiables to happiness that led her to found eWebinar
• Intentional decisions we make to achieve our dream lifestyle business
• How choosing happiness over revenue impact product, operations and team
• The culture we try to create at eWebinar and what it’s like to work here

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.

Should you “do right by your customers” at the expense of the company, your team, and your own wellbeing?

Your answer might be “yes”, until you realize a small change that customers would barely feel could mean instant profitability for your bootstrapped startup.

Having said that, hindsight is always 20/20. There are some mistakes that you just have to make yourself, no matter how many warnings you get.

On this episode, Melissa and Todd share the five pricing mistakes they made, why they were so costly (including one that would’ve given them $30k/month overnight), and what they could have done differently.

Takeaways:
• The pros and cons of not offering annual plans
• Why you need to put usage limits on your trial period
• Why “being fair” has little to no impact for your customers
• Why you shouldn’t grandfather and increase pricing across the board
• The importance of understanding every cost that drives your platform

Show notes:

• Find show notes of each episode on ProfitLed.fm.

Connect with our host:

• Follow Melissa on LinkedIn where she shares stories & lessons from her founder journey weekly.
• Connect with Melissa at melissakwan.com and subscribe to 'your founder next door', Melissa's weekly newsletter on what it's like to build a company without an abundance of resources and friends in high places.
• Follow @themelissakwan on Instagram and YouTube where she shares short videos of business advice and other truth-bomb sound bites.

This podcast was brought to you by eWebinar:

Find out how you can turn pre-recorded videos into interactive experiences with chat so you can run your demos, onboarding calls, and training sessions on autopilot, 24/7, without being there. Hop into a demo at eWebinar.com, no salesperson required.