When Trevor and Ben launched Ethos Network they were in uncharted territory—they were moving out of SaaS, which they knew deeply, into Web3, which they knew less about. And they’d be scoring people’s reputations on the blockchain, which was sure to be controversial. It required Trevor and Ben’s full focus.
They asked, how do we just automate our back office? “There is no value to us learning accounting,” laughs Trevor. “You have to hone in on what you’re good at.” With Pilot, Trevor has total confidence that their financial books are accurate and investor-ready with just 15 minutes per month. “We know we can count on Pilot to scale with us.”
As a small startup, the last thing you want to think about is bookkeeping. With Pilot, I don’t have to.
Web3 is not like SaaS. At his last company, Atlassian, Trevor struggled to get customers on the phone. Now, he’s in sudden and direct contact with all of them. “The exciting thing about Web3 is how close you can get and that feedback loop,” says Trevor. “We’re building credibility scores. Last week we reduced some people’s scores and they were tweeting viciously, ‘How could you do that?’”
This isn’t Trevor’s first company but it is a new space for him. Through his marketplace for collector cards and his hedge fund, he’d learned about pass-through entities and filing taxes. But it also left him feeling like it wasn’t his core competence. “I’ve tried to use QuickBooks and I have no idea what I’m doing. It was a waste of time,” he laughs. “Which is why with Ethos we were asking, who’s going to support us?”
Those all are things I don’t want to spend time on. I know we’re going to scale at some point and need the back-office finance part to scale with us.
They looked for a way to fully outsource their back office. “As a small startup, the last thing you want to think about is bookkeeping. I want to think about this as little as possible so we can build,” he says. “And I’m not just concerned with accounting, right? I’m also thinking about HR, payroll, all that. Those all are things I don’t want to spend time on. I know we’re going to scale at some point and need the back-office finance part to scale with us. So what should we do?”
All Trevor knew was that he wouldn’t use Bench.
Trevor used Bench for another of his businesses and was surprised when they shut down in December after only completing his books through April. “I didn’t love the service quality or experience but in the end, it always kinda worked so I stayed a customer,” says Trevor. “Then I get this email on December 28 saying, ‘Hey, we’re shutting down.’ I thought, this is the worst possible time to send this.’ I felt totally wronged by them.”
Though Bench was acquired and resumed service, Trevor was committed to finding a more reliable service. Plus, this time, their accounting would be more complex. “We’re in Web3 now and we’re going to have income from many places, plus normal accounting,” says Trevor. And they weren’t going to do it themselves. “That made us a little nervous.”
Trevor heard about Pilot as a referral in a Discord founders group and from the first call, he was impressed by the level of engagement and questioning. “Nothing has ever met up to the service quality I was looking for before Pilot,” he says. “I love that I can converse with our bookkeeper and ask questions, like hey do we need an account for this?”
Nothing has ever met up to the service quality I was looking for before Pilot.
Pilot hit the right notes—time-saving AI to auto-categorize transactions, but with a person to talk to. A well-designed portal with all their financials, but also practical advice and proactive alerts about compliance deadlines. “Do we need to file to pay a franchise tax in Delaware? I have no idea,” says Trevor. “I would never have known that. With Pilot, I never have to think about it. I know that it’s handled.”
Trevor has become convinced that the human element in accounting is essential. Every month he just gets an email from his same dedicated bookkeeper telling him his books are ready and asking a few questions which he can reply to within the platform. “It’s a great piece of software,” says Trevor. “I can say, ‘I noticed we didn’t track this or that.’ That connection with our bookkeeper and the ability to get an answer whenever I have a question is what gives me confidence.”
That connection with our bookkeeper and the ability to get an answer whenever I have a question is what gives me confidence.
“In SaaS, we expect software to be the main thing you’re buying—oh, just connect all these apps together—and that’s not true in accounting,” says Trevor. “Really. It’s difficult to do flawlessly. You need someone who is keeping your books, looking over transactions and thinking oh, this goes there and that’s not right. That human element will always have to be present, in my opinion. I think it’s easy to miss how important people are when you’re evaluating accounting services. Look for that human element.”
I think it’s easy to miss how important people are when you’re evaluating accounting services. Look for that human element.
Trevor says it isn’t exactly possible to quantify the time savings because “I wouldn’t have figured it out,” he says, laughing. “I’d have done it wrong. I’d have to hire someone to come back and say, ‘You have to redo everything 100 percent.’”
“I just can’t stress enough how nice it is that I just don’t have to think about it,” he says, “and just have confidence.”
Trevor and Ben can give their full focus to launching features for their already sizable daily active user base of 2,000, and preparing to raise future rounds. They know at some point, they may need to hire someone to manage finance, but with Pilot handling bookkeeping, accounting, and tax preparation, they still haven’t needed to.
“When I think about the next phase of the business, I know we can continue to depend on working with Pilot,” says Trevor. “They’re scaling with us, which I feel very confident about, and I think that’s super cool. It’s very aligned. It’s just another thing I don’t have to worry about as we go raise money.”
Ethos is a credibility platform that’s bringing trust back to Web3. People can sponsor or flag others to identify actors and assign credibility scores so you know who’s trustworthy.
