#the fact they have ALL been released within 7 months of each other...like...woah we are thriving right now

[pokimoko]

I can't keep being fundamentally changed as a person by animated movies, it's just not sustainable.

[bukojuiice]

rose-colored boy

ೃ pairing: (eren jaeger x fem! reader)

ೃ  tags: college/modern au, fluff, humor, love at first sight cliché, mikasa is your cute little sister, armin, sasha, jean, and connie are your besties, and eren is a himbo who works hard and has terrible friends.

ೃ warnings: strong language and mild suggestive content

ೃ part 1/??? of my (eren x reader) college au!

ೃ word count: 3000 words

ೃ  my nav  →  my mha writing masterlist 

ೃ This is my very first snk x reader fic! so i hope you bear with some errors! qwq 

i’ve been following the anime ever since it was released in 2013, and this is the first time i’m  going to be writing for it.  this month’s manga chapter really took me out so why not channel my sadness thru writing an fluff! eren fic? 🤧 i hope you enjoy either way!

ೃ  please do reblog if you enjoyed!! (feel free to add tags too because i love reading them and my heart swells with happiness when people love my work!)

ೃ  in which (Y/N) (L/N), 20, still in school, and regretfully-unregretfully-her little girl scout sister's assistant, meets eren jaeger in an embarrassing too innocent door-to-door cookie sale whilst a humiliating party was going on.

cookies, suspicious maybe-maybe-not pot brownies, meddling little sisters and friends, “oh my god they were roommates” vine on replay 24/7, homework, tears, and fairy lights bring them together.

“I’m going to enter now.”

“Ahhh yes, please!”

“Shut up, please.” Eren muttered to himself as he tossed and turned around in his bed, but still couldn’t get to sleep. “When will they ever stop doing this?” Why did Eren’s next-door roommate and his girlfriend have to do this five times a day? They had a lot of stamina for 21-year-olds who didn’t have anything better to do.

Eren’s thoughts eventually brought him to his parents.

His parents- did they even exist?

For pretty much 14 years of Eren’s life, they had been out of town or out of the country. His older brother, Zeke, blonde, bespectacled, tall, and sometimes too far up his own ass older brother who Eren is able to confide in from time to time, recently got a girlfriend whom he’s hopelessly in love with (they’re even thinking about getting married which isn’t really a problem since the girl is genuinely nice to his older brother so Eren is good with her.), so… things in the family had been a bit rough and busy to say the least.

Communication with his parents wasn’t always the best.

Eren would study late at night back when he was seven, because no one bothered to help him with homework. Along with the fact that he wasn’t the brightest kid in class, and he knew that very well, but he had ambition and he was determined to make it big in the world. He focused more on sports, particularly Soccer in middle school and high school, and tried to balance that with his studies.  After being granted a Sports Scholarship from Shigashina University, Eren decided to rent and share a flat, living with his batchmates who he met at a mixer party (before Uni started as this whole meet and get to know each other kind of thing) and whom he was so quick to call his ‘friends’, just so that he could get out of the hellhole that was his own house.

But things turned out much worse than expected.

Eren thought that the ‘College Life’ was to focus more on pursuing your future career and make a name for yourself but… it was the other way around.

He thought that after Freshmen year, everyone would take things seriously. Sure, have some drinks, get wasted after finals, or have house parties from time to time. But he was unfortunately, dragged into the wrong crowd. After attending around 5 parties in the first few months of being generalized as one of the infamous and pompous freshman archetypes present in every university, he called it a year and spent the rest of his nights doing homework, projects, playing video games, staying at the school soccer field until 10PM while his roommates were probably smoking crack and not caring about the number of units they needed to take for each of their goddamn subjects.

 He was ~living the life~ and now that he regrets most of the decisions he made in freshman year, the only option that he has left was to wait until his third year and move to a different apartment.  

 Now, here he was, Sophomore year, nearing the end of the semester, and very much eager to get the hell out of here and also study for his upcoming finals on Constitutional Law II, as his professor, Mr. Erwin Smith, was going to throw hands if one of his students score below average on the exam.

 “EREN MICK JAEGER! BROOOO!” Eren winces when he hears the shrieky and annoying voice of his flatmate Thomas Wagner, calling out to him. “Wanna go and party with us?” Eren smiles halfheartedly, shaking his head, “Ah, no thanks. I have a game tomorrow and finals coming up on Thursday.” Thomas smirked and wrapped his arm around Eren, “Oh fuck that, live the college life ya spoon.”

“No, really I have to study.”

Thomas frowned and groaned, “Oh god, you’re such a killjoy. Fine, if that’s what you want. Don’t blame us if we tell you to buy some beer down the block.”

Eren cracked an obviously fake laugh and pushed Thomas away from him, “You’re an ass. That only happened once and that was when we first met. Don’t you even dare try to ask me to buy you shit again.”

“Woah. Woah. Woaaaaaah. That was a joke Eren. Loosen up will you?” Thomas raises an eyebrow, clearly taken aback by the brunette’s sudden aggressiveness. He hums Moves like Jaeger by Maroon 5 as a way to spite Eren whilst passing by him down the staircase.

The brunette shook his head, tying his hair into a bun carelessly and sprinting into his room without uttering another word.

Eren just wanted to study. He really did.

Instead, his roommates, all of them, mind you, were all partying in the lounge and the music was too loud and Eren was too annoyed.

They did manage to bring him out and make him stay in the kitchen where he mindlessly glared at anyone who came in. He sighed and tapped his pen restlessly amongst the insane amount of books on the table.

There was a knock.

His roommate, Floch, came in the kitchen with his girlfriend who Eren couldn’t even name with all the women he has brought into the apartment. She was hanging onto his arm and giggling. Floch’s eyes were red and his speech very slow and lazy. "Eren!" he said with a sly grin.

Eren raised an eyebrow, shooting him an irritated look. "What now Floch? Are you here to tell me to take a shot again?" The ginger-haired’s girlfriend giggled once again and kissed Floch’s cheek. Floch laughed and swatted her away, though he missed by a long shot. "Someone's at the door," a thumb pointing to the den. "wouldchumind ge'in it?" another giggle. The girl nodded sloshily. "Yesss! Erenieee get 'em door, please. Be a dearrrrr."

Eren frowned and stared at them menacingly, earning no reaction from the two as they were mad drunk. "You were just in the den," Floch’s eyes widened. "My lovey wovey-we was in the den?" His girlfriend’s mouth went into an O. "Di'nt notice tha'!"

Eren sighed and stood up. He miraculously got through the throng of bodies and to the front door. "Yes?" he called out exasperated, not knowing who was outside.

"Do you want cookies?"

Eren turned and looked to see a little raven-haired girl, a girl scout no less, a blonde-haired boy pulling on a trolley who looked significantly shorter than him, wearing rimmed glasses, and an overall appearance whom his “friends” would immediately label as a nerd they had to be a few feet away from if they saw him and lastly, a girl who looked very tired and very done with life.

Beautiful (h/c)-colored hair, her eyes looked like the starry night sky, twinkling as he catches her gaze and a smile that looked forced, but warm all the same.  

A girl who was just absolutely fucking gorgeous.

Eren was captivated. His heart was beating like crazy and he could feel his ears turn red. He would make a fool of himself if he looked red as a tomato right now.

"Um," The girl peeked inside and grimaced, squeezing the hand that was her little sister's shoulder and catching Eren’s gaze. "Mikasa, I don't think these kinds of guys would want cookies."

“Unless they're pot cookies,” Eren almost said. Mikasa pouted and widened her eyes at Eren.

The older girl crouched down and frantically covered her little sister’s eyes. "Nopenopenope, Mi, don't pull that on him."

"But (Y/N)!"

(Y/N).

Her name was (Y/N).

Eren smiled sincerely (for the first time today) and leaned back inside to the drawer by the door to grab the extra cash he and his roommates put there for emergency pizza and stuff. "You know what? You're absolutely brilliant at selling cookies. I'll take one."

Mikasa smiled back at him cheekily and tugged her older sister’s hand. "See, (Y/N)?! He wants some! Go get 'em!”

The raven-haired girl then turned to the blonde teen, practically jumping up and down. “Armin look! We sold another one!"

“We did!” The boy who was apparently named Armin, clapped his hands together, then gave the little girl a high five. “You’re a natural at this Mikasa!”

(Y/N) looked at Eren, then Mikasa, and sighed. She grabbed a bag from the trolley Armin was dragging around and pulled out a box of cookies. Eren grabbed them slowly from her, their hands almost touching as he gave (Y/N) a small smile. The (h/c) girl blushed lightly, though not visible enough for the brunette to notice.

"Hope to see you again!" Eren called out when the siblings said their thank you's and bid farewell.

And, this time, even for the slightest moment, Eren’s serotonin levels were going straight through the roof. His heart was still beating loudly, almost in sync with the trash music his roommates were blaring on the speakers. and for a moment, even just for a moment. 

He felt genuine happiness that he hasn’t felt in a very long time.

 The three of you continue to walk animatedly, now that the coast was clear and the guy from earlier wasn’t within earshot, your blonde friend just had to break the silence.

 Armin smiles, pushing his glasses up to the crook of his nose. “(Y/N), you did see how he looked at you right?” The blonde chuckles softly, catching his best friend off guard.

 You blinked. “Him?” You try to stop yourself from smiling, blushing profusely. “Geez Armin, I don’t even know his name yet.”

 “I’ll bet you 100 bucks that he goes to our Uni.”

 “Even if he does, it’s not like we’ll talk to him or anything. Judging from the place he lives in and the people he was hanging out with, we’re in two completely different worlds.” You shook your head in denial, holding Mikasa’s hand, your interlocked arms swinging playfully. Armin gives you a knowing look in response.

 Mikasa continued to wave back at the boy whom they had just sold cookies too. (Y/N) looked over her shoulder and smiled. “Wasn’t he nice (Y/N)?” Mikasa asks her older sister. (Y/N) returned her sister a small smile, “He was.”

 "I hope we see him again!"

"I'm sure we will."

 The day of Eren’s dreaded finals finally arrive.

He has prepared tirelessly for this. Hours upon hours of hard work. But, before he finally gets his well-deserved sleep, he has a few more hours to cram and absorb more knowledge for his exams.

So, what better way to do so than head straight to the library as soon as it opens at 6 AM?

This time, no one was going to bother him. No annoying roommates and no distractions.

Eren heads over to a table near the coffee and snack machines. He puts down his bag on a seat next to him, and begins to study once again. Looking through the course materials and the lessons that he still didn’t quite understand. Eren was so absorbed with studying and relying on his gut feeling that no other student in this university would think of going to the library at 6 AM on the day of finals… then he’s wrong. Very wrong. 

 “Sasha, should you even be eating mashed potato this early in the morning?” Armin asks the brunette worriedly, a huge tone of concern in his voice.

“Armin! Don’t chu worry! I ate heavy breakfast! Bacon, Eggs, and Toast! Did you not see me in the kitchen!?” She reassures her blonde friend, continuing to scoop up the mashed potato on a reusable cup.

“Liar.” Connie hissed, narrowing his eyes. “I was awake since 4 AM. Not once did I see you sneak into the kitchen until (Y/N) woke you up.”

“Atatata. Can we… stop with the negative vibes for a second?” Jean tries to become the mediator by holding his hands up against his two friends who were about to start an argument. “It’s finals week. We have to keep a clear mind, body and soul-“

“Jean, you know that’s BS.” You yawn widely, still practically half-asleep.

“Oh, come on! Can’t you just let me be positive just this once!? If we fail this exam I’m going to blame you!“

The five of you continue to talk mindlessly on the way to the library. Connie pushes the glass door open, very much excited to have this huge library all to yourselves.

Until…

There was someone already there.

Your eyes immediately come into contact with Eren’s. His radiant jade eyes staring into yours, mouth practically agape, his hands holding on to wooden chopsticks as the hot air of instant ramen breezes through his face.

“Oh?” Connie blinks. “Guess we aren’t the first ones here then.” He whistles.

“(Y/N)!” Armin nudges you in the arm in an attempt to tease you. “Guess your wish came true huh? We did see him again! By himself too!”

“W-what am I supposed to do exactly?” You turn to Armin, speaking in a hushed whisper.  

“Say thank you to him! Offer him to go on a boba date or something!”

“You got the Sasha seal of approval (Y/N)! He’s hot!” Sasha motions you a thumbs up and you can’t help but feel yourself already wanting to die of embarrassment.

The four of them slightly push you towards his table. With your friends cornering you like this, there was no way of escaping this.

All you had to do was talk to him and properly thank him for buying cookies from your little sister.

That was it.

No need for any extra ad-libs or poor and bad attempts of flirtation.

Just thank him (Y/N).

You can do this.

You breathe a hefty sigh then approach his table with confidence. The brunette continues to look up at you whilst turning the page of his reviewer that he wasn’t even looking at.

“Hi again! I just wanted to thank you properly for helping my sister and I, out the other day. Mikasa really appreciated the gesture you did for her, and she couldn’t stop talking about you to our parents since we saw you. You see, none of the other girl scouts want to be paired up with my sister because they think she’s an emotionless and monotonous freak. They’re really mean to her but she really wants to continue being a girl scout so my friend and I accompany her whenever she has to sell cookies!”

“It’s N-no problem!” Eren quickly replies, running a hand through his hair. “Why would they say such horrible things to your sister like that? Judging from the way she acted in front of me, she was quite the opposite. In a positive way of course! Those kids are just assholes who are intimidated because another girl their age is seemingly better than them.”

You giggle in response. “Thank you. I’ll tell Mikasa that you said that!” 

There was short silence for a few seconds until you realized that you forgot to say something. 

“Ah! I’m (Y/N) (L/N) by the way!”

“Eren.” He smiles, reaching his hand out to you for you to shake. You grip his strong and calloused hand firmly, and Eren could feel his ears turning red again while you were about to blush as red as a tomato.

You hear your friends snickering in the background and you took this as a sign to go back to your table. “I guess, I’ll see you around campus?” You ask, tilting your head. For, you actually really wanted to see him again after this.

“Yea! I’ll be seeing you!” He grins widely, watching you leave where he was seated. His smile then envelops into a frown as soon as you went away then he goes back to studying.

“(Y/N)! (Y/N)!” Connie whispers loudly, calling you over by waving his hand. Why was this dunce being so painfully obvious? “Ask him if he’s looking for an apartment or if he wants to live with us!”

“Already!?” You ask in disbelief, a bit shocked by what Connie had just said. He scoots to the left, as you take a seat between him and Sasha. “Guys, you’ve known him for like… 3 minutes. Only Armin and I actually interacted with him before this.”

“He has to pass the vibe check first.” Jean shrugs, sipping on an iced expresso. “But, yeah, he does seem alright from a few feet away.”

“Come on (Y/N)! Ask him!” Sasha nods approvingly. “It’s weird that he’s studying alone like this while we’re in another table trying to remain unaware that he looks lonely as hell.”

“UMmMM… maybe he wants to study alone because that’s the only way he can focus? That’s a thing that normal people do, Sasha.” You remark sarcastically, trying to think up of more reasons to not approach him again.

Armin clears his throat, “Look, (Y/N), it won’t hurt to try right? Besides, don’t you feel a tiny bit sorry for him? He does seem lonely and you do have a crush on him so… more ways to interact with him right?”

Your shoulders slump and you breathe a defeated sigh. “Okay okay fine.” You make your way to Eren’s table again but before you do, you turn to your friends. “By the way, I don’t really have a crush on him just yet. I just find him cute okay?”

“Yeah yeah.” They say in unison as you continue to walk back to the brunette’s table.

“Hi again Eren!” You wave and try your best not to fumble or look painfully obvious that you were infatuated by him. He looks up and you try your best not to smile like a weirdo.

“Hm?” He hums.

“Would you like to come over to our table and study with us?”

To be continued.

[the-doll-house-xo]

Yay for this new blog! Wishing y'all the best! ahh 😍 Can I pls request Jackson Wang jealous smut? Thank you lovelies xx

Jacksonsnoona435- Did you see Jackson and ___ together? They were so cute ^^Got7ornever- Woah can they go out already? I bet Jaebum is mad Jackson got to ___ First kekeCookielover804- I hope ___ realizes how lucky she is. Our Jackson is such a sweetheart

“Wow I can’t believe they actually think we’re a couple” You chuckled as your body laid across the living room couch in got7’s new dorm. Scrolling through the comments underneath the new picture Jackson had posted of the two of you wearing matching black hoodies and army pants while sharing a large banana spilt dessert, you were surprised how many fans thought you and the idol were dating.

“I told you to change before we went out. But ‘no, this outfit made my butt look good Jackson’ so now look where that got us.” Jackson’s voice came from below as he sat crossed legged on the floor as his back rested against the leg of the sofa. Looking up at you with his adorable smile, he wasted no time in taking the phone away from your hands and looked at the comments. “Jackson oppa is so cool…No wonder ___ is in love with him’. Well I can’t argue with that I am pretty awesome.” His once cheeky grin turned cocky as he winked up at you only to earn a pillow thrown in his face.

“Oh please, clearly you’re the one in love with me. I mean…look at these abs” You playfully lifted up your shirt to reveal no abs what so ever, just a soft stomach which was slightly fuller due to the meal you two had not too long ago.

“Oh yes…very sexy indeed.” The brunette rolled his eyes before the sudden vibration of your phone in his hands made him turn his attention to it.

{New Message: Alex]: I can’t wait to see you tonight ;-)

[New Message: Alex]: You looked so pretty yesterday in class. Ah I couldn’t concentrate

“So you’re going out with Alex again huh? What is this? The fifth date?” Jackson questioned while getting up from the floor. Handing out the phone to you, you couldn’t contain the blush rising to your cheeks as you typed out a quick reply to Alex.

“Yeah, I think he might ask to finally be my boyfriend. I’m really nervous for tonight. I hope everything goes well.” You called out from the couch as you could hear the idol moving around the kitchen most likely getting something to drink. Once you saw him walk back into the room with two bottles of water, you took one from his hand with a thankful smile and sat up straight.

“Are you sure you even like the guy? I mean it’s only the fifth date anything can happen. Plus I heard he’s a huge flirt around campus.” Jackson spoke out as he made himself comfortable on the couch beside you. Making you move on the cushions so he could rest his head in your lap, you were quick to push him away to hear a small groan leave his mouth. “Oh come on, I’m only telling you the truth!”

“Whatever Jackson. I’m not going to sit here and listen to you talk crap about a guy, who I happen to like very much by the way, and you hardly even know. So you know what. I’ll just leave early and get ready for my date. I’ll see you later.” You replied while getting up from the couch to grab your things.

You could hear the brunette calling out your name from behind but his words prior had turned your mood. Closing the door harder than expected, the idol was now left by himself.

[Later that night]

[New Message to: Jackson

[Text]: He already had a girlfriend. She showed up at the restaurant!

[Text]: I’m so embarrassed right now…I’m coming over. I just need someone to talk to.

-

“The little piece of shi-“

“Jackson, please. I just want to forget the whole thing happened. He wasn’t worth it anyways.” You mumbled as your stared down at your bare feet tapping against the rug in Jackson’s room. The moment you walked into the restaurant and saw Alex with his girlfriend should have been your signal to leave. But you were too foolish and walked up to the two. Alex knew he was caught red handed but his girlfriend was oblivious to the fact of you and him have been seeing each other for a few weeks.

Not one to cause drama in a public setting, you sat down with the two for a few minutes, using the excuse of dropping off notes to the boy so he wouldn’t have to explain to his girlfriend why he was meeting up with another girl at such a late hour. The act you put on was so good, his girl even gave you her phone number. Now, Shannon, has a permanent place in your contact list.

“I can’t believe you actually stayed that long. I swear, Y/N, you’re too nice sometimes.” Jackson caught off your train of thoughts as he wrapped an arm around you. Pulling you into his warm chest as he made you two lay down on his bed. The simple act alone wasn’t anything sexual. You and Jackson had been known to be two people who loved physical contact. Even with your friends from middle school, they gave you the nickname Koala because you always gave the best hugs.

Wrapping your arms around him, your head buried into the crook of his neck as you allowed two small tears to spill down your face. “I just feel so stupid. Why do I always end up with these types of guys. There must be something wrong with me.”

“No. Don’t say that. You’re perfect just the way you are. Sure, the guys you date are shitty. But that doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. It’s them that has the issue.” Jackson’s breath danced against your shoulder as you felt his fingers tenderly running through your curled hair.

“You’re only saying that because you’re my best friend.” Your voice came out a soft whisper as you focused on the other’s gentle touches. Hearing something that sounded like an annoyed grunt coming from Jackson, you pulled back a little to look up and see his eyebrows pulled together as he seemed to be staring down at you in deep thought. “Jackson?”

“Do you think I only say these things because you’re my best friend? Really ____. Do you honestly think that’s the only reason?” He questioned as the hand stroking the ends of your hair traveled higher to the back of your neck as his index finger brushed against your skin.

“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about.” You lied. You both knew it was a lie by the way your voice cracked the moment you felt his palm press down lightly as he gripped your neck to make you stare into his eyes.

“You know…” Jackson’s voice turned low and husky as his eyes stayed yours as he pulled you closer to his body. Using his free hand to hold onto your waist, a small smile was given as he watched your leg move to lay against his side. “I always get so jealous when I see you going out with these guys. How lucky they are to be in your presence and they don’t even know it.” He confessed as both of you began to breath harder and nothing but a simple change it position had happened.

“So… you’re jealous?” You bit down on your lower lip to conceal your grin. Everyone knew you had a crush on Jackson the moment you met him three years ago. Working for your father’s gym and training young adults over the summer. You would have never suspected Jackson Wang who was a rookie idol at the time to walk into the gym. One thing lead to another and the two of you ended up meeting once a month for workouts. Those workouts soon turned into hang outs with turned into you constantly staying at Got7’s dorm whenever the group wasn’t promoting. The two of you created a bond that was stronger than any friendship you’ve ever had.

A low chuckle left the young man’s lips as his tongue slipped out to tease you. “Me? Jealous?!…Of course, I was jealous. It should have been me taking you out of dates and treat you like the queen you are.  But with work, I knew it wasn’t right for me to confess and have you waiting here all the time while I’m overseas. I just couldn’t picture us being in a relationship where I’m never home to see you. You don’t deserve that. You should be with someone who has the time to spoil you and be there 24/7.” Jackson finally let the secret he’s been holding in for nearly two years spill as his grip around your waist tightened as though he was scared you were going to leave him. “I just want to see you happy. Even if that means it’s not with me.”

Watching as the brunette closed his eyes; waiting to hear your rejection. He inhaled deeply and let out a shaky breath as he felt you small hand cup his cheek.

“Jackson…Look at me.” You said his name softly and smiled when you saw his brown orbs again. Allowing your thumb to stroke over the rough stubble against his cheek. You loved seeing his bare face when he went without shaving for a few days. He may call them flaws but to you, it made him even more handsome. “Do you really think I wouldn’t be happy with you? I don’t care you have to travel all the time. Your job is very important and you’re doing what you love. As long as you’re happy that’s all I care about. So if that means I’ll only be seeing you a couple times a month once you guys start promoting again, I’m completely fine with that. I’ve liked you since they first day we meant, stupid.” You playfully flicked the idol’s forehead only to have him grab your wrist and flip the two of you over as he laid on top of you.

“So you like me too huh?” The confident smirk he had earlier that day made its appearance once again as you could feel Jackson’s heart beating. Wasting no time to claim your lips for a heated kiss. The desperation the two of you felt for those two and a half years had finally been released.

The night everything happened so fast. Clothes were thrown places neither of you cared about as your soft whimpers and his deep grunts filled the room. Exchanging meaningful ‘I love yous’ and ‘Let’s just stay like this a little longer.’ You were surprised none of the guys had walked in to see what was happening between the two of you.

“I love you so much,” Jackson whispered against your lips as his hips worked to hit deep within your walls. Making your legs wrap tightly around his waist, the sweat began to roll down the side of his face as he felt his release building up. Rough kisses were given to your mouth down to your collar bones as the brunette made sure to leave his mark in several places along your chest. You were his now and the scratch lines you left on his back proved he was yours.

“Come for me baby. I want you to come first.” He grunted as his pace quickened. Leaning back to reach his hand down to play with your clit. The teasing of his thumb brushing against the sensitive bud made your toes curl in ecstasy.

“Jackson…Please.”

“You’re almost there….Come for me”

“Fuck!” You hissed as your essence dripped down your thighs. Weak arms moving to wrap around the other’s shoulders. You held on tightly to him as your sensitive walls squeezed around his dick. Encouraging him to finish as well.

Hearing your love give his last grunt as you felt him suddenly pull out to coat your thighs with his own release. Both of you then collapsed on the bed and stared up at the ceiling.  Everything had changed now. Now longer were you two best friends. Instead, you were lovers. Or were you that already? The question was one both of you knew the moment Jackson turned on the bed too wipe away the sweat on your cheek and smiled

“So I guess this means we’re together now?”

“I guess so.”

“See, and you said my fans were crazy.” The brunette chuckled and held you close to his chest, only to receive a soft slap on the arm.

“Yeah, whatever…just don’t get cocky.”

“Um…it’s a little too late for that don’t you think, baby~”  

[topicprinter]

TL;DR -- In prep for my first visit to SaaStr Annual, I binge-listened to all 95 podcasts and wrote down the highlights. In the original blog post we built a simple search app of the data set I created along with images of all the SaaS resources mentioned on the show. The rest of the text is below. Hope some might find it useful....Who needs a #drinkwithharry?Over the past few weeks, I tasked myself with listening to all ~32 hours of the SaaStr podcast, in preparation for the SaaStr Annual conference. Each show is an incredibly dense, 20-minute nugget on the business of SaaS. IMHO, it is totally and completely worthwhile to meander through twice-weekly.However. Powering through them all in one go was the equivalent of a Brain Blaster—more like binge-watching Planet Earth than Portlandia. Do as I say, kids, not as I do.So, what did I learn? Well, a ton. Let’s try to unpack the highlights with the Data, the Recommended Resources, the Words of Wisdom and, finally, the Personal Lessons.To the Data!As part of this journey, I put together a file that combines data from the RSS feed along with my own note-taking on each episode (typos and dirty data notwithstanding).[Note: Due to reddit formatting, here are the details of the data set]:The CSV file is available on GitHub.The Search App is inside the original post.The how-to on getting dynamic data into a static set using our cloud data pipes is in a secondary post.Fun facts:54% of episodes featured a CEO and/or Founder21% of episodes featured a VC or other InvestorThe remaining episodes (with a few exceptions) were with VP of sales, marketing or customer successOf the non-VC interviewees, there was a diversity of SaaS products on display. HR and Marketing companies were most prominent (~30%), but others ranged from security-guards-on-demand to shipping APIs to a Slack bot. It’s a big world out there.There were only two repeat guests (Jason Lemkin and John Barrows)The “60-second SaaStr” was nicknamed “the Churn” for a few early episodes. The “Good, that’s perfect, I think we’re warmed up” audio snippet appeared 43 episodes in. Were these the experiments and casualties of lean podcast methodology? We’ll never know.Recommended SaaS ResourcesThis is probably a good time to note that Harry Stebbings, the wunderkind interviewer, is a natural. In addition to tight, relevant questions, the brilliance of the show really comes down to the editing. 20 minutes is a perfect length and a huge differentiator compared to other tech and startup podcasts.One question Harry often asks (~55% of all interviews) is simply: “What are your favorite SaaS resources?” Interviewees answer with various blogs, books, podcasts, among others. I compiled each resource and grouped them by number of mentions. To make things a little easier to read, I also highlighted the books in blue:[NOTE: All the SaaS resources mentioned I grouped and, due to lazyness, just took a screenshot. Top four were SaaStr, Tomasz Tunguz blog, David Skok blog, & Mark Suster blog, but a long-tail of other interesting reads; for the full list, see the original postThere is a clearly a preference for SaaStr on these Saastr podcasts (weird!), but you clearly don’t want to miss out on Tomasz Tunguz or David Skok either. When you go to google "How to Castrate a Bull" make sure you add "business book" to your search criteria.Words of WisdomAs for actual content, where to begin? It’s an embarrassment of riches. So as not to write a novel, let me give you a taste by simply quoting from a handful of interviews (with gentle editing for clarity):Nick Mehta, Gainsight, Episode #24 on What Companies are Getting Wrong with Customer Success“#1 they think it is just about churn reduction… just the beginning of the story… it’s about upsell, expansion and most importantly about advocacy and getting your customers to be your best sales people…#2 they hire the wrong leader… maybe passionate about the customer and product, but not operationally focused…#3 they put it under another exec… part time responsibility of marketing or sales… #4 they make it all about people and heroics v. process… #5 they think about it as just the CSM team’s responsibility, when in reality that customer success team is the quarterback… but you need the whole company to rally around it.”Aaron Ross, Author, Episode 46 on the Most Common Reason Companies Struggle to Grow“Because they haven’t nailed a niche… you can have a big vision, but it means being very focused—baby steps—around the type of customer segments… who today you can find, talk to and who need you enough to buy from you… so you can double-down and grow fast.An old story, company has a product, anyone in the world can use it and get value from it, but no one is buying it. Where are you a need to have vs. where you are a nice to have? It’s hard to have the internal discipline in the early days to say these customers can all use us, but they don’t need it so much that they’re going to buy… got to focus on these 1-2 very specific areas… maybe not sexy… but enough of a pain there that they’re going to need us and go through all the huge time and energy and effort—the more-than-you-expect-process—to evaluate us, buy us and deploy us.”Russell Glass, LinkedIn, Episode #14 on Marketing within the Customer Lifecycle“At each stage… [customers] have certain information needs… and if you can, as a marketer, help them with those information needs at the right part of the journey of that decision, that is when you are relevant… that is when you are able to transcend being marketing material and move into the information universe.”Seth Besmertnik, Conductor, Episode #79 on Weaponizing Marketing:“Your marketing can be a weapon and core competency and differentiator… [for a crowded market] what ends up discerning the difference is the marketing… are people finding you?… do they know you exist? There are a lot of great software companies that are dead on the side of the road because no one ever found their business, no one found their product and they weren’t good at sales and marketing. So having a great product is the start, but it’s not how you get across the finish line.”Mathilde Collin, Frontapp, Episode #10 on Content Marketing Strategy“We have a process, first try to release at least two posts per month… and then always try to write 1/3 on market we’re in… 1/3 on our journey… and 1/3 about specific use case for customers”Peter Reinhardt, Segment, Episode #80 on Turning Up Product Market Fit to Eleven“[Early on] we managed to convince ourselves that pretty meager levels of customer excitement meant product market fit, which I think is an easy thing to do… I think customers have more dynamic range in their response to a product than most people realize… “oh that seems helpful”… 7 or 8 out of 10… but when you really hit a pain point, the customer’s dynamic range goes up to 11… and their response is totally different… like holy shit, can I get access to it today? I need to call this other person on my team who has been talking about this forever, how ’bout I introduce you? and you’re like “woah, woah” it doesn’t even exist yet, slow down… I think the customer’s dynamic range is much broader than we realized and so we never actually hit that 11 and just convinced ourselves that 7 out of 10 was product-market fit.”Ryan Smith, Qualtrics, Episode #83 on Necessity of Managing Runway“Rome wasn’t built in a day… it’s going to take time, if you can keep your options from a funding or partner standpoint to actually give you a long enough runway, entrepreneurs will figure it out. The problem is when they put a stopwatch on their back… every bet that we’ve made has taken a little longer than we anticipated… you don’t want to limit yourself to one point in time… you gotta play the long game.”Leo Widrich, Buffer, Episode #89 on an Embarrassing MVP“The quote… that you should be embarrassed by your first version gets misinterpreted a lot… you shouldn’t be embarrassed because it completely breaks or is unusable… that’s the wrong type of embarrassment… the type that is good is the embarrassment of richness… like, kinda embarrassed because it’s only this one feature and you wish you had done three more… it is complete unto itself… not the base layer of the cake, but, instead, a cupcake.”Personal Lessons LearnedIf there is one thing I’ve personally learned throughout this process, it’s that the 2x speed on a podcast app is probably the greatest invention of all time.But, as far as SaaS goes, I think what you receive through drowning in all this content is a solid understanding of the conventional wisdom of running a SaaS business, from early days to scale. Things like:Hire athletes in the beginning, specialize later.Initial product market fit is when you have 10 unaffiliated paying customersSales and Customer Success need to be working in tandem, given the necessity of retention in SaaSDon’t spend money on sales until you have a repeatable processFocus early on a single personaGet people to pay you earlyMore mojitos, fasterAnother cool thing about this binge-mission, should one accept it, is that you’ll certainly find a few tidbits that speak directly to your situation. For instance, I almost fell out of my chair when Harry Glaser of Periscope Data (Episode #30) was asked about greenfield opportunities in SaaS and then went on to lay out the problem that our startup, Flex.io, is trying to tackle:“I think one thing we see that maybe other folks don’t see there’s a lot of back end data munging and processing and kinda unsexy data things going on that are really being done with a collection of hacky python scripts right now… copying data from place to place, transforming data, storing data, all that stuff is being done by people writing scripts on the side… so I think there is a big opportunity there…”Let’s hope so, Harry!…Well, I hope this proved to be a useful summary for you, dear reader. May your SaaS companies flourish and may your mojito glasses never be empty! Hope to see you at SaaStr Annual.edit: formatting