SAAS Operators Podcast E11: Referral Strategies from a DMT Shaman
In this episode of the SAAS Operators Podcast, we talk about product launches, market expansion and building a system for reliable growth. Zach shares what he learnt from Foreplay’s latest product launch for Lens, including lessons around pricing, bundling and execution. The boys explores the difference between adding new customers vs. deepening value for existing ones, and why stacking launches can backfire. They talk about the power of referrals, how to operationalize them, and the surprising story of a DMT shaman that inspired a one-referral-per-user strategy. The episode ends with a broader conversation about motivating adoption, integrating into workflows, and what it actually takes to compound growth in SAAS.
Showing Up for the Right Stuff
This weeks episode kicked off with a joke about cliché CEO dad energy. But it turned into something real. Jeremiah talked about setting a boundary, being there, fully, for the moments that matter. That theme carried through the whole conversation. Not just in parenting — but in how we build product, go to market, and serve customers.
Product Launches Don’t Build Businesses
If a single launch makes your business, you’re probably in trouble. Launch day is just the announcement, not the adoption. And stacking multiple big launches at once (new product, new site, new pricing) turns what should be a sprint into a marathon in the mud. Zach did that with Lens. Won’t do it again. Still, we pulled it off. Upgrades came fast. Plan expansions from 50% to 400%. But the real win? People actually love the product.
Building What Should Exist
And then we got into it — not just what to build, but how to think about growth after the build.
Zach shared his take on how he was never excited to build analytics. It’s not the “fun” category. But that’s exactly why it became exciting. Nobody in the space was doing it well. And if the incumbents aren’t executing, you get this rare opportunity to build something the way it should be built. That became the unlock. Not "analytics for analytics sake", but making it useful enough to solve churn, expand accounts, and finally get the price-conscious customers to spend more.
The Referral Engine No One Owns
Then we hit the idea that stuck: what if every customer referred just one new customer per year?
That’s it. That’s the whole game. You wouldn’t need a growth team. You’d double in size every year, compounding to something unrecognizable in five.
But it has to be someone’s job to make that happen. You can’t leave it to chance. You need to find the right moment, reduce the friction, and hit the emotional trigger that makes someone want to refer. Because even if your product is great, most people won’t stop what they’re doing to spread the word, not unless you make it dead simple and emotionally rewarding.
Zach told a story about a DMT shaman named Chad (yes, Chad), who only accepts new clients through one referral per person. No price, pay what you want. The scarcity made the referral matter. That same mechanic could work in SaaS. Give customers one golden referral a year — a serious offer with actual value. They’ll think hard about who to send it to. That intentionality can’t be faked.
If referrals matter, someone has to own it. That means one person whose only job is to identify the best moment to ask, reduce friction, and make the action easy. Maybe it’s at week six of onboarding. Maybe it’s after a major success milestone. If someone is tracking this, they’ll find the right moment and they’ll force the rest of the company to improve everything that blocks it.
Grow Through Value, Not Volume
If you've already got tens of thousands of customers, the opportunity might not be in adding more, but in getting more out of the ones you have. Not by squeezing them, but by solving more of their problems. Make the product so good they have to bring someone else.
That’s the game. Show up. Build the thing that should exist. Stack value for the people who already believe in you. And then build systems, not just hope, around helping them bring more people like them.
