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How +3 failures led to a $150k/month SaaS, with Bernard Huang of Clearscope

The Failory Podcast

How +3 failures led to a $150k/month SaaS, with Bernard Huang of Clearscope

Bernard Huang (@bernardjhuang) is the Co-founder at Clearscope, a profitable SaaS product used by companies to get written content performance. He is a driven entrepreneur who has used his creative capabilities to launch many startups, including Mushi Labs, Mosec, and Food By People. On this episode of the Failory Podcast, find out how this once online…

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Notes

  1. Who Is Bernard Huang, Cofounder of Clearscope? at 2:48

    Bernard Huang is the cofounder of Clearscope. On The Failory Podcast he introduces himself through the failures, not the product. Full answer

  2. How Did Bernard Huang Make $120,000 Playing Online Poker? at 4:05

    Bernard Huang started playing in college, in the years after Chris Moneymaker won the 2004 World Series of Poker from a small PokerStars satellite. Full answer

  3. How Did Bernard Huang Buy a Foreclosed Dickey's Barbecue Pit? at 4:47

    Friends asked Bernard Huang, then at the University of Texas in Austin, to take over a foreclosed Dickey's Barbecue Pit. Full answer

  4. Why Did Bernard Huang's Dickey's Franchise Fail? at 13:02

    Bernard Huang says poker had warped his picture of money. He thought buying a franchise was like financing a McDonald's and that the cash would start arriving. Full answer

  5. Why Did You Stop Playing Poker at 22:03

    When and why did you decide to stop playing it? Weren't you making great amounts of money? Full answer

  6. What Were the Beginnings of Mosec at 23:47

    Mosec was a phone-based CRM focused on call tracking and notifications. Bernard co-founded it in 2011. Full answer

  7. What Made You Become a Founder at 26:09

    Were there any clicks that made you realize you wanted to run a business on your own? Full answer

  8. How Many Times Did Bernard Huang's Mosec Change Its Product? at 27:22

    Bernard Huang says Mosec changed its idea about every other week. The team came into Betaspring with an education startup. Full answer

  9. Why Did Bernard Huang Shut Mosec Down If Customers Liked It? at 32:59

    Bernard Huang says Mosec was not killed by angry customers. People told the team they loved the product. Full answer

  10. What Led Bernard to Become Founder at Food by People at 38:32

    Bernard shares about the beginnings of Food By People, a marketplace for home-baked goods that leveraged the Cottage Food laws passed by the US government. Full answer

  11. Why Could Food by People Not Make Money on a Cookie Order? at 45:28

    Bernard Huang says the unit economics at Food by People, his marketplace for home-baked goods, never worked. Full answer

  12. How Did Food by People End Up Raising Only $87? at 46:03

    Food by People raised $87, and Bernard Huang is clear that it was not millions. Maciej Ceglowski, founder of Pinboard, was satirizing venture capital. Full answer

  13. Getting Hired by a Y-Combinator Startup at 49:25

    After his startup, Food by People, was closed, Bernard moved to San Francisco and he joined 42 Floors, a Y-Combinator backed startup, as a growth hacker. Full answer

  14. Why Bernard Leave 42floors at 54:16

    42Floors was acquired by Knotel in July 2018. He left the startup in Feb 2015 to co-found Mushi along to his Food by People co-founder. Full answer

  15. What Was Game Runners and Why It Failed at 56:18

    Game Runners was a League of Legends coaching service helping players learn the best new strategies fastest. Full answer

  16. How Did Bernard Huang's Mushi Labs Get Its First SEO Clients? at 59:38

    Mushi Labs began when Game Runners, Bernard Huang's previous project, was running out of cash and a company emailed asking for search help. Full answer

  17. What Is Clearscope at 1:03:52

    When running Mushi Labs, Bernard and his co-founder began working on a SEO & content tool called Clearscope. Here he shares what is it about. Full answer

  18. Why Does Bernard Huang Say the SEO Industry Is Full of Misinformation? at 1:16:48

    Bernard Huang, cofounder of Clearscope, says SEO collects bad information because Google has never plainly explained how ranking works. Full answer

  19. What Would Bernard Huang Tell Himself After Mosec and Food by People? at 1:27:09

    Bernard Huang would tell his 2013 self, the one just past Mosec and Food by People, to take better care of himself. Full answer

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