I Spent 24hrs with the Most Driven Tech Founder I've Met

Would you lock yourself in your office and refuse to leave until your company hit 1,000 new customers? How many nights you think you'd last? >> There we go. That looks nice. >> And if every night was worth $40,000 in revenue, when would you finally go home? That's exactly what Arjun Maha did. He's the CEO of Doula, a company that helps anyone start an LLC and handle all the other messy stuff that comes with running a business. how many days will it take to form 1,000 LLC's? >> And for 23 days straight, he worked, ate, and slept inside his New York City office. While his mission was simple, form 10,000 LLC's before he could go home, the results were staggering. >> 64. We're cooking >> $1 million in revenue in just 3 weeks. So, this doesn't look very long, but I guess it is. Yeah. And in this video, we're breaking down exactly how he pulled it off. From the founder mindset that keeps him motivated to the business model that turns Doula's website traffic into real paying customers. Now, originally, I was supposed to join him, move into his office for 24 hours, and see if I could survive this challenge, but then I got this message. So, for Arjun, that means he finally gets to go home tonight. And for me, I guess I won't be needing this. But I made the best of it anyway. I sat down with Arjun for a full day to learn what makes Doula successful and yes, grill him on how many times he fell off the futon. >> Twice in 23 days. >> Wow. All right. Now that you have all that information, let's dive into it. >> There's some restriction against actually living in the office. >> Really? >> There might be. Turns out it's a bit of a gray area. >> So, tell us what Doula is. >> We're a business in a box for LLC's, LLC, bookkeeping, taxes, e-commerce analytics, all in one place. The idea for Doula came from a failure. Arjun's first startup died under the weight of administrative work and he ended up losing $30,000 in legal and accounting fees. That's when he realized the killer wasn't his idea or his effort. It was wasting time on all the extra steps. >> But the thing that ate me the most was what if I didn't waste time on all that other stuff? Maybe the company could have worked. And then what I wanted was, you know, the Staples easy button. >> That was easy. >> Like that was easy. I wanted that for a company. Start it. your bank accounts connected, your payments, your bookkeeping, your taxes, all in one place. >> So, how many companies have you helped form LLC's for today? >> We've done over 10,000 from over 175 countries. >> Okay, so Duel launched in 2020, which means if we do the math, we can average that to about 2,000 LLC's a year. So, getting 1,000 new customers in just 23 days meant Arjun pulled off about 6 months worth of growth in just over 3 weeks, unlocking a whole new level of momentum for his business. That line I say every single week is talent is everywhere but opportunity isn't. >> So from a failed startup to helping over 10,000 entrepreneurs launch their companies, Arjun's goal is to one day reach a billion founders. >> Do you have an LLC? >> No. >> Not yet. >> Not yet. Maybe after today. >> Do you have an >> If you were to start a business, what's like that crazy idea you've never told anyone and now you can say it? >> My god. Um I don't even know. I'll think about it. >> Okay. Um, can we get a tour? >> Yes. The typical actual day is I'll come in. I have a work phone and I have a personal phone. I keep them over here. Even just having my phones here versus over on my desk. I don't touch them during the day cuz it's just enough friction. I took everyone's phones at 10:30. We put them in a bag. No phones during lunch, too. I taught everyone about attention residue, which is if you look at your phone or look at something else, it lingers in your mind. So, we went no phones. But, uh, that's like the first hack is I'll literally just leave my phones in here so that I don't touch them during the day. This is the futon bed which is now assembled. >> And after 3 weeks, he got his futon making skills down to a science. >> Time to make bed. Ready, set, go. 26 seconds. 12 seconds. 23 seconds. 21 seconds. This is the orange room, we call it, cuz of orange chairs. We will use this for team lunches and if there's meetings, too. >> Oh, and if at any point during the video you're wondering, "Hey, Payton, why are there no other employees at the office? Where is everybody? It's a holiday today. We are hybrid. So folks in New York come in Tuesdays and Wednesdays. >> And how many people work out of this office? >> In this office, there are usually on a given week 5 to seven people. There are over 70 total. Then this room where we >> This is where the YouTube magic happens, >> right? This is where we can record educational content, which goes on the Doula channel. And then um there's this coffee machine, then the espresso machine here. And then in the morning, what I'll do is I'll literally just make that shake there. I just keep a stack of paper here. LinkedIn, you can see people's birthdays. We actually do this. We'll wish people happy birthday, but then I'll actually ask people like, "Hey, like I'll I want to send you something." And not everyone responds, but I'll just write like a little handwritten note and we'll send it to them. And um I'll give them an LLC for their birthday. >> Who is this going to? Employees or just like anybody? >> Could be anyone. Anyone. It's like anyone I'm connected with. So, >> and guess what? He means anyone. A few weeks after I visited, I actually got a LinkedIn DM and a birthday card from Arjun with a free LLC inside, which means I have no excuse to not start my own business. I guess I should whip up an LLC and see how Doula actually works. All right, so I'm about to log into doula.com to create my free LLC that Arjun gifted me. So I'm going to log in here and click create free account. Just start typing in my information. Which country do you reside in? United States. What kind of business are you building? What is your desired company name? I don't know. I didn't think this one through. Pack Productions. Which state do you want to form your business in? New Jersey. For today, I'm going to go with the starter plan because that's where I want to start and that's also what Arjun gifted me an LLC for. All right. Here, I'm going to add in my code. Usually, you would just go and pay and there you go. I have a free LLC. The only thing you would have to do is pay for the state that you reside in. And every state is a little bit different. But for the sake of this, I live in New Jersey. And now we just keep moving forward. All right, we're done. It was as simple as that. Thanks, Arjent. >> And then after that, the thing which I do at the pre the end of the previous day is I go through my task list and I already know what I want to work on. I usually do this is I'll go to sleep in my workout clothes. So like when I wake up, I just don't have to think about anything. Um, same way here for work. I know exactly what tasks, like at least the first couple of tasks I want to start working on and then I can hit the desk right away there. Or I've looked at my calendar the night before. So today I knew I had two interviews and can jump right into that. All right. Do you want to make a shake or we can use the Ninja Creamy for protein ice cream? >> Let's do a shake. >> Shake. Okay. >> Within the first 10 minutes of meeting Arjun, it was obvious that his discipline and routine aren't just personal quirks. They're part of what makes Doula successful. >> Press it once. and he shares that mindset with his team, shaping a culture that's built around focus and consistency. >> Does it actually taste good? What do you think? >> Yeah. No, I think it tastes good. I taste the peanut butter. I >> I think it's really good. Now, I I have an interview in 3 minutes. So, what I'll I'll do is when no one's in the office, sometimes I'll just do the interviews from here. I'll probably just do that here. The way we run the interview process, it's actually fully based off of this is the best book on hiring I've read. We took the entire book. That's what we just based our entire hiring process off of. So, the interview I do is the fin it's a focus interview, but it's the final round sort of culture fit. My plan is to do a final round for every single person. >> I have a 5:30 a.m. interview tomorrow. Is there's a candidate in Europe who we're interviewing. So, I offered slots as early as I'd be up. So, 5:30 to 10:30 a.m. >> I did an interview on Tuesday. At the end, I asked, "Do you have any questions?" And the candidate said, "How's your futon?" So, they they've been they've been watching the challenge, too. >> That's when I started to realize this wasn't just a personal experiment. It was a tactical business strategy. By vlogging the challenge every day, Arjun was creating a story that no one else can replicate. And it was doing more than just bringing in customers. It was attracting investors and new hires who wanted to be a part of the company. >> They've just learned so much about your personality, what the company's doing. They see the challenge and they're like, "Wow, this seems like a cool place where I'd like to work." So, 50 on day one, 950 remaining, and then we'll we'll add the count here as we go. Hey, how's it going? Fantastic. Great to meet you. Very first question, you could work anywhere in the world. Uh, any type of company, tech, could be outside of tech. Why would you want to work at Doula versus anything you could be doing? >> I was taking notes on Arjun's interview process and there was one specific question that blew my mind. >> Let's say we do the debrief and we come back and we say, "Hey, Criselle, we thought there was a good fit, but not a great fit. Why do you think that might be the case?" >> Once the interview is over, I immediately needed to know why he asked that. The goal of that question is actually to one see if people can be critical about themselves because no one's a perfect fit. So it's actually a check on if someone's like there's nothing wrong like there's zero that's a bit of a red flag. >> Yeah. >> Um it also gives them a chance to directly address what might not be a good fit. >> Uh so we can address it up front. So >> yeah, that was a good question. >> Okay. What a morning we're cooking. One of my morning commentaries to myself was I think that just because it's a holiday doesn't mean you don't have to work or you can work. But then also the opposite goes just because it's a work day doesn't mean you can't rest and recover too. >> On the weekends I I like to do the same thing. >> It became clear to me that weekends and holidays don't change much for Arjun. While I'll use Saturday and Sundays to ride on my couch and binge Netflix, Arjun is still working. His mindset is simple. If you love the work you do, you don't need to live for Friday. And that shaped how he approached every single day of this challenge. >> I never want to. One of my life goals is I never want to live for the weekend. That sounds It sounds kind of miserable if I have to just wait till Saturday to enjoy. Like no, I'll do that on a Tuesday. So someone started on Fridays in our random channel. And it is cess 2 Brazilian slang. Sex t o for it's Friday. Let's go. Although again, every day of the week should be on Friday. They started posting on Friday and I was like that's awesome, but we shouldn't have to wait till Friday. So, I found the equivalent for Tuesday and then I started posting it on Tuesday. >> As I was coming back, I was thinking one thing. I know there's going to be questions of, "Oh, if you weren't filming this, would you actually on a Friday be sleeping?" You can ask my friends. The answer is most likely yes. >> Tell us a little bit about why you decided to do the 1,00 LLC challenge. >> I think one day I was just on the stairstepper in the morning and I tend to just get good ideas then because I guess I'm moving. The idea was what is something we could put out that's so unique to Doula no one else can do >> and now we'll finish off with the 5-year journal >> I thought could be content which has viral top ofunnel potential I thought it was something which I could do now like it'll just get harder to do this in the future like I don't know if I had a pet or kids like if you it's maybe not impossible to like very much harder to do that then showed some of the team some footage and they were like oh damn this is we can actually turn this into something >> was it harder or easier easier than you expected. >> It was easier than I expected. Most of my days before this were very similar. The only difference is at the end of the day, I would do the same, I don't know, brush my teeth, wash my face that I do at home, and go to sleep. And then when I wake up, I would do the same things I'm doing here, just at home in a smaller place. >> There's a very good chance, folks, given the rate that we've seen, we're going home in less than 4 weeks. I have tried to structure as much of my life around the the business working and like the business success, but the business to me is again the vehicle. It's a growth vehicle for us having an impact, but a growth vehicle for me too. Well, well, well. The count is 84. So, that takes us up to -17. It took 23 days to hit 1,000. The universe saw and said, "I'm going to help you out and help send you home." 1,000. Let's go. >> Okay. So, we did it. 1,000 new LLC's in just 23 days. Now, the question is, how does Doula even get customers, let alone 1,000 new ones in just over 3 weeks? Well, I had Arjun show me. For over an hour, we sat down as he drew out Doula's sales funnel and walked me through the journey of a customer. But this is a lot and pretty confusing, so I'll make it a lot more simple. At the bottom of the funnel, there are three plans. The starter plan at $297 a year, which covers just the LLC. Next, the mid-tier plan at $2,000 a year, which adds taxes, and the top plan at $3,000 a year, which also includes bookkeeping. About 80% of people start at the $297 plan. But as their businesses grow, they realize it's easier to let Doula handle taxes and bookkeeping, too. So, they upgrade their plan later on. Now, let's move up the funnel. At the very top, the TAM is huge. Anyone with an internet connection. That's 4 billion people. But in reality, only about 5 million people a year are actively starting or planning to start a business. And those people are entering the funnel in three ways. Searching online, stopping their scroll on content, and hearing about Doula from someone in their network. And Doula turns those moments into customers through three main channels. One, paid search on Google. If you type start an LLC, Doula is bidding for a top ad spot that leads to their site. Two, referrals and partnerships. For example, an Amazon FBA YouTuber might send their viewers directly to Doula. In exchange, partners earn 50% commission on any plan sold. All right, let's pause. Doula turned partnerships from a nice to have into a core growth driver for their business. If you want to learn how they built over 2,000 partnerships that generate six figures for top performers, we have a bonus video linked in the description where Arjun breaks down the entire funnel. He explains why it works, the commission structure, and the relationship strategies he uses every day. Grab it down below. Let's get back to the video. And finally, word of mouth. Duela's strongest channel. It costs nothing. Anyone can create a free account, get a referral link, and earn the same 50% commission. Once someone lands on doula.com, they can either create a free account instantly or book a demo with a team member. But only a small fraction converts. Roughly two out of every 100 visitors. That meant to reach 1,000 new LLC's in 23 days, Doula needed about 50 new daily signups, which requires about 2,500 people to have visited the site every single day during the challenge. According to Arjun, it was the most LLC's the company has ever averaged in a month. And when I asked why it happened, here's what he said. >> I'd like to think people see the challenge, they're like, "Oh, that's cool. I now want to go start my company with Doula." I think it's it's been too soon for that feedback loop to really kick in, but I think the universe saw we're doing the challenge and said, "Hey, let's help out here." >> Now, let's talk about money. Normally, when customers first sign up, about 80% choose the starter plan, and the other 20% pick a higher priced plan. If those numbers had held, Doula would have generated around $750,000 in revenue. But it just so happened this time more than 20% of customers went straight for the premium priced plans. And that pushed total revenue for the challenge to just over $1 million. >> Are you feeling sad that you have to leave? >> It's a little bittersweet. >> Yeah. Well, if you ever do do the challenge again, make sure to invite me back. >> Well, no. We'll manifest this. I think at some point we will have to do 10,000. >> It's time to go home. >> Journal here. Pillow and blanket stay in there. And I got all my supplements here. Have you ever used one of these masks before? >> Never. >> We got some good content doing the mask. Okay, that is everything. >> After 3 weeks of sleeping on a futon and eating protein shakes for breakfast and dinner, Arjun finally got to go home. >> We're packing up. So, I decided to tag along. >> Moment of truth. >> Let's see what's inside. Do I leave it a mess? Did I leave it >> 23 days later and you're home? >> And his apartment was nothing like I expected. It was small. Really small. >> This is way smaller than what I thought it was. I really don't spend much time here, so I didn't want to spend more than I really needed to for a bigger apartment. Could have spent a bit more and get meaningfully more space, but at the time I was just like, "This is fine. The location's really good." And because it is so small, like when I wake up here, I just don't really want to lie in bed >> cuz I I can look up and everything's just here. It's like, "No, I kind of want to get out." But then when I come home, it's nice cuz I'm just like, "Yeah, I'm tired. I'm going to sleep." It really is just a place to sleep and like wake up and then have the essentials. Standing there in his apartment, it clicked. Arjun is intentional with every decision he makes. I mean, from planning his mornings the night before to not touching his phone in the office to not overspending on an apartment he barely spends time in. I learned that success for Arjun isn't about having the fanciest things. It's about building systems that make progress inevitable. And this is just the beginning. I'm Arjun Mahadavan and this is my apartment. I have my bed. I have my kitchen. I have my bathroom right here. Beautiful little tiny thing. And I have my scale. There is a nice little balcony that I have. Small, but it's mighty. Well, that's all we got time for today. Thanks for watching this episode of Stories of Scale. I'm Payton, and I'll be back soon with more founders, more stories, and more chaos. All right, thanks for watching, and uh don't forget to hit that little button in the corner. You know what I'm talking about. See you.

Would You Lock Yourself In The Office? *Watch doola’s CEO break down the partnership strategy fueling their growth.* 🔗 https://clickhubspot.com/e4fcde Arjun Mahadevan, founder of doola, challenged himself to stay in his New York City office until he helped form 1,000 new LLCs. After spending 12 hours with him, I learned that Arjun’s the kind of founder who thrives on structure and momentum. Every decision he makes — from how he plans his mornings to how he leads his team — is built around one thing: progress. In this episode, Arjun breaks down the systems and habits that keep him focused, along with the sales funnel that turns doola’s website traffic into real paying customers. The 23-day challenge brought in $1 million in revenue and became the fastest stretch in doola’s history to reach 1,000 new customers. And if you stick around to the end, you’ll get an exclusive look inside Arjun’s NYC apartment (spoiler: it’s small…really small) and his reaction to finally being home after nearly a month in the office. - Payton 00:00 The 23-Day Challenge 2:00 The Origin Story: From Failure to doola 03:12 Office Tour 04:45 Giving Away Free LLCs (Literally) 05:18 Creating an LLC 06:30 Morning Routine & Founder Discipline 07:22 How doola Hires: The Culture Fit Test 09:34 The Work-Life Mindset That Drives Growth 10:50 The “Why” Behind the 1,000 LLC Challenge 12:08 Breaking Down doola’s $1M Sales Funnel 15:30 Going Home After 23 Days 16:05 Inside Arjun’s Apartment 16:50 Closing Thoughts Subscribe for more Science of Scaling: 🔗 https://clickhubspot.com/5fjr Join our Data-Driven Sales Newsletter That Helps You Hit Quota Faster: https://blog.hubspot.com/the-science-of-scaling-subscribe Cold Calling Essentials: 👉 https://clickhubspot.com/a42eed ICP Expansion Guide: 👉 https://clickhubspot.com/d43908 The 30-Minute Battlecard Builder: 👉 https://clickhubspot.com/732ef4 The Revenue Leader’s Guide to Scaling: 👉 https://clickhubspot.com/3b0361 About HubSpot: HubSpot is a customer platform that provides education, software, and support to help businesses grow better. The platform includes marketing, sales, service, commerce, operations, and website management products that start free and scale to meet our customers’ needs at any stage of growth. Today, thousands of customers around the world use HubSpot’s powerful and easy-to-use tools and apps to attract, engage, and delight customers. ⚠️ Disclaimer: The videos on our YouTube channel are for informational purposes only, and are not intended as an endorsement for any of the products or services that we feature. #ScienceOfScaling #HubSpot