Hi everyone, I'm @tomek, co-founder and CEO of Satsback.com - a Lightning-native cashback rewards platform and browser extension that helps users save in bitcoin when spending fiat online.
We're a small team of passionate Bitcoiners based in Europe who wanted an easy way to stack sats, so we built it and made it our mission to empower others with savings in sound money.
We've connected over 15,000 online stores already, and while most of them target the biggest European markets, many can be shopped by users globally. We're privacy focussed and proudly anti-KYC.
Fun fact: We recently enabled automatic payouts to Lightning address so you could set your Stacker News Lightning address in your Satsback.com account to have your earned sats sent directly to your Stacker News account.
Let's go.
Hey Tom!
I'd like to offer satsback on my website. Can you help with that?
Love to meet you during Bitcoin Amsterdam.
Definitely! its a bit of a manual process for now but would love to set this up. Will be in Amsterdam later this week so talk more about it there? I'll be in a Satsback.com tshirt :)
Great, thanks! Looking forward to seeing you in a few days.
Hi Tom! Love what you guys are doing in Europe.
Are you also coming to Turkey soon? Can't wait to earn sats here.
Thanks! We're actively working on connecting a bunch of stored in Turkey.
We shoud have some news on that front soon™️
You could help us by letting us know what are the most popular onces in Turkey that you would like to see connect. Thanks in advance.
Wow, great to hear! Will join your Telegram group and drop some of the stores I'd love to see there.
Hi Tom! What's your favourite pizza?!
Pepperoni
Nice! We are all Satoshi... but we don't all like pizza Hawai.
what are the most popular stores your customers are using to stack sats?
Those would be the ones with most transactions.
Hey Tom, your servivce sounds great, amazing that you have so many online shops that I frequent.
Have you thought about doing a bit of localization for the Spanish? Latinos love cashback and if this can be a way to help a bit of adoption and save money, I think people would try it. Almost everyone is aware of bitcoin and slowly more and more people through LN-enabled wallets.
If you'd like a bit of insight on Latam, let me know. I'm a developer and founder at a US (non-bitcoin) startup, doing a few Bitcoin projects here and there.
Now for the question:
Do banks or financial entities ever come to and knock your door saying "hey yo you paying people in assets, we want some regulation"? If so what's the best answer to that? Find a capable lawyer or surf around the wave? Have been thinking about making a non-KYC btc to fiat exchange registered in Latin America so that we don't get hit with BS KYC regulation, but a bit paranoid of regulations, etc.
Thanks!
Hey! Thanks a lot!
We have thought about adding multiple language versions of our platform and Spanish would be a great candidate for the first non-english version but we'd like to make sure we have more to offer for the non-Spain, Spanish-speaking markets. Very cool, would love to stay in touch. Could you DM me on twitter? @tomchck
Re; your question, it really depends on the jurisdiction you are in and best to get a legal opinion from lawyers that specialise in these things. For us we were able to avoid KYC rules since we are not really an exchange and we don't accept fiat from our users. We just pay out relatively small amounts of sats and there is virtually no risk of money laundering using our platform.
Errata:
Localization for the Spanish-speaking market
Hi Tom,
are u guys planning a mobile app?
Thanks!
Hey! The mobile version of our web app should work well. But we will be launching a mobile app eventually, yes.
Hi Tom,
Are you trying to orangepill some of the stores? Any big names?
Is there a plan for orangepilling them in the future?
Cheers
Great question. We haven't been doing too much of this so far as most of our users are happy spending their fiat and saving in sats. However we will doing some orangepilling as part of a new product we are working on.
Looking forward reading about it.
Thanks for bringing an awesome product to the plebs and for doing this AMA, we need more projects like this!
Hey Tom, what separates Satsback.com from other sats back such as Fold or the BTC co?
Thanks sir.
We've been focussing on the European markets that have been largely underserved by other bitcoin rewards companies. We're also Lightning-native and super excited by the Lightning network, so trying out things made possible by it such as; no minimum amounts before withdrawing, auto payouts to LN address.
I believe we also have the largest amount of online stores connected compared to similar companies.
We're working on other exciting things that will set us apart further. Stay tuned...
Rad answer. Thanks. Not EU based myself but yeah they've been underserved.
Good luck . 👍
I am approaching the world of Bitcoin out of CEX for the first time and find it really complex and cumbersome compared to other crypto environments (for example Ethereum, Algorand) where you have few wallets and a clear and simple layered logic (Eth --> Polygon). How do you see the adoption of the world of Bitcoin moving from technical nerd guys to the masses?
Please don't do shitcoining. It's a sin!
It is Bitcoin only, not all that crapto shit.
Hey, I haven't used any crypto products for a while now so hard for me to comment how Bitcoin / LN wallets compare but I think we have made a ton of progress with UX til now so it will just get better with time. I remember using PCs and the internet in the 90s and it was horrible to use and look where we are now. These things just takes time and we just need to keep pushing.
Why ur service not working in middle east?
It is, if you go to https://satsback.com/stores-list you should see some stores/services no matter what country are in just not as many as in select European markets. We're an early stage company and do plan on focussing on more regions in the future. We understand that there is a massive interest in Bitcoin in the Middle East.
Hello. Do you plan to expand to South America or do you know of similar projects here? thx
Unfortunately I don't know of other bitcoin rewards companies in South America. Some of the stores we have connected should work from these countries but these are global platforms like Booking.com, Aliexpress. We would love to connect more local stores since we know how much people need Bitcoin in these markets. We try to do more of this in 2023.
Thank you, I hope you continue to grow and see you soon
Hey Tom! Any plans for mobile satsback reward options in the future?
Hey! You mean sats back rewards for buying mobile phones or mobile services?
Hi Tom, is it possible to use satsback in African countries?
Hey! Yes, you can go to https://satsback.com/stores-list and select your country to check what is available. However, it will be mostly global stores / services as we haven't focussed much on connecting many stores specific to the African region. Would love to do that, just need to take this a region at a time.
That's great. Small steps gets you far in the long-run. Keep up the great job!
What's the most surprising thing you've learned building satsback?
Wow, good one. It must be that bitcoiners will go out of their way to help you if they see that you're also fighting the good fight, helping others understand Bitcoin and the importance of sound money. Coming from an ordinary career in the telco industry, I'm still surprised by how responsive, helpful, and generous with their time other bitcoiners are. Love you all 🧡
🎉⚡❤️🔥
Nice site! I have just opened an account. Although I live outside Europe, I do buy some stuff and services from merchants you are showing there.
How did you come up with this idea? it is brilliant!
I remember the rebate cashbacks at Staples and Sears when I lived in the US. Maybe brands can use this for rebates.
Thanks
Thanks! We keep trying to add more stores from other regions so do check back in. I think eventually all brands will need to offer bitcoin rewards to stay relevant :)
Will definitely try it out.
🧡
Hi there,
please explain better how is possible this anti-KYC
BTW, I've tried to register, but following the link in confirmation mail, my browser told me that the connection is unsure.
I would therefore like to understand the situation better.
What's the Satsback team composition at the moment?
Hey got many places in Australia
стоит изучить этот метод. удачного дня бро
What advantages does Bitcoin give satsback over fiat reward platforms?
Other than valuing bitcoin, do satsback's customers differ from typical rewards shoppers?