Over the past few months, we’ve been hard at work, developing integrations and forging partnerships within the agency world. Today, we’re thrilled to introduce you to EngineBI, a cutting-edge SaaS platform designed to empower agency leaders like you to master the art of decision making.
As we journeyed through this period of growth and innovation, we gathered invaluable insights and experiences that have sculpted EngineBI into a whip smart tool designed to take your organizations financials to the next level.
Today, we invite you to delve deeper into the heart of EngineBI as we present exclusive interviews with two integral members of our team: our visionary CEO and our Head of Product. These conversations offer a rare opportunity to gain firsthand insights into the minds that conceptualized, built, and continue to nurture this remarkable software and growing community of agency leaders. Join us as we uncover the stories, visions, and passion that drive EngineBI forward.
We’re so excited to introduce you to these incredible individuals, who are steering the EngineBI ship towards a future bright with possibilities.
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Up first, meet our CEO- Jon Morris.
- Q:How many years have you been working on this product? We have been working on this product for over 2 years and it took 1.5 years before launching it in alpha.
- What was the turning point that led to you starting this organization? I had a business coach at Rise Interactive for several years that I would meet on a quarterly basis. Every time I met with him he would say that the insights we have are far superior to the other agencies and professional service companies he worked with. He kept on saying it is a business within itself. After I left Rise I did not know what to do and that message resonated with me. I felt that I could really help professional service companies grow faster by giving them the information and tools to make better decisions.
- What does success look like to you? Helping thousands of professional service company owners achieving their financial dreams
- What are the 3 main things you love the most about EngineBI? I love the impact we are having on companies that do the work. I love that the product is getting better every day and that the impact will be greater every quarter for our clients
I LOVE the team at EngineBI….I believe in a performance-based culture and there is no doubt that this is a world class team. - How EngineBI has helped you in your leadership role? I am new to running a SaaS company and it requires me to learn and run the company differently than a professional service company. I have loved learning along the way and becoming a better CEO in this category.
- What is your vision for EngineBI? My ultimate vision for EngineBI is based on a few things:
1. The first is that I want to create an algorithm that gives every professional service company a score based on how they are doing as it relates to year over year revenue growth, profit margin and cash relative to monthly overhead.
2. That we constantly analyze the decisions that are necessary to help professional service companies improve their score.
3. That the outcomes for the score and improved decision making helps thousands if not tens of thousands of companies change their financial trajectory for the better. This will help create wealth for the owners and ideally hundreds of thousands of jobs across the world.
- What is the most valuable advice you can give to an agency leader whose business is underperforming and doesn’t know where to start? The starting point is to understand how you are doing from revenue growth, profit as a percent of revenue and cash relative to monthly overhead. It is very hard to fix a problem without knowing what problems you are trying to solve.
- If you were leading an agency again, what would be the first 5 things you’d put in place at the beginning to start off strong?
1. I would focus on building the right leadership team (ops/finance, sales & marketing, Client Service and research & development)
2. Clearly define our target audience and how we plan on reaching that audience
3. Answer the two question test which would help us understand our differentiator
4. Build a robust strategic planning and budgeting process to ensure that the resources were aligned properly
5. Talk to every customer and develop a detailed action plan to ensure that we retained any existing revenue - What advice would you give to yourself 10 years ago? I tended to focus on the 5% wrong versus the 95% right. This created a lot of stress within Rise that I do not think was completely necessary.
I focused for many years mainly on revenue with a lot less thought to profit and cash. I would have made sure I was focused on all three.
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Now, meet the brain behind coding and building the software: Felipe Mejía
- How many years of experience do you have in building tech products like Engine? Around 18 years.
- What are the 3 main things a developer needs to keep in mind when building a product like EngineBI?
1. Clear use cases.
2. Translate requirements into a Data model.
3. Strong skills designing complex problems. - What is your favorite part of the job? I like all what I do but specially working together with the team and coding.
- What is your least favorite part of the job? When the working day is finished.
- What is the feature that you like the most about EngineBI, and why? I like a lot Quickbooks integration because it is very challenging and have to use all my skills to design and code a solution.
- What is the feature that has taken you the longest to build? So far I think Shared Expenses module due to the complexity and changes in requirements.
- What is the most powerful feature EngineBI has and why? I think the possibility to have a very detail overview of the current financial situation of a company from different angles.