Aubrey Rhodes: Mastering Monetization | Subscription Heroes #9

In this episode, join host Jay Nathan (COO of Churnkey), with Aubrey Rhodes, an experienced SaaS engineering leader specializing in monetization and product-led growth. They explore his career journey from MailChimp, Stitch Fix, and Calendly to founding TopView Labs, a consulting firm for SaaS monetization.

About Aubrey Rhodes:

Aubrey Rhodes is an experienced SaaS engineering leader with a track record of driving growth at companies like Blue Bottle Coffee, Intuit Mailchimp, Brightwell, Stitch Fix, Calendly, and Workful. While at Calendly, he spearheaded a major billing system transformation, creating essential infrastructure such as entitlements, a unified product catalog, and metering to enable both product-led and sales-driven growth. Now, as the founder of TopView Labs, he helps SaaS businesses build scalable monetization solutions and optimize their payment platforms.

Here is what we cover:

Career Highlights:
• Aubrey's growth from developer to engineering leader.
• Experience in scaling SaaS companies with a focus on monetization.
• Founding TopView Labs for consulting on SaaS best practices.

Monetization Engineering:
• Managing billing, subscriptions, and integrations.
• Addressing challenges like compliance, refunds, and tax calculations.
• Building scalable, flexible billing systems.

Cross-Functional Collaboration:
• Example: Calendly's migration from Stripe to ChargeBee.
• Collaboration between product, engineering, finance, and support teams.
• Using third-party tools to streamline processes.

Data Management & SaaS Growth:
• Evolving data management practices from early ETL processes to cloud services.
• Building API and monetization teams for scalability.
• Leveraging data-driven experimentation for product growth.

Buy vs. Build Decisions:
• Using third-party tools for monetization.
• Balancing technical debt, compliance, and operational efficiency.

The conversation highlights the critical role of monetization engineering, data management, and team collaboration in driving SaaS success.