Who's ready to rock today Fire Nation? JLD here and welcome to entrepreneurs on fire brought to you by the HubSpot podcast network with great shows like I digress Today we'll be breaking down how to fuse experiences and storytelling to drive business growth to drop these I about Arjan Butnagar into eo fire studios Arjan is a CEO and founder of cloaked a consumer first privacy startup dedicated to bringing humanity back to the internet And today fire nation will talk about the art of storytelling why storytelling is so important for entrepreneurs We'll talk about the decision on what products you choose to create is one of the biggest decisions you will make We'll talk about building the right team and so much more and a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Arjan and our sponsors Shaqing that's the sound of another sale on Shopify the platform trusted by millions of entrepreneurs to create their online store and so much more sign up for a free trial today at Shopify dot com slash on fire all over case That's Shopify dot com slash on fire to start selling online today Success story hosted by Scott de clary is brought to you by the HubSpot podcast network the audio destination for business professionals Success story features Q&A keynote presentations and convos on sales marketing and more a recent episode on how to protect your business in times Of crisis is a must listen listen to success story wherever you get your podcasts Arjan say what's up to fire nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with Hey, I think I think one thing I believe that most of us agree with that makes someone successful is the idea of not Nestle even though it's really contrary to anything about business is not necessarily about money or the profit by the way Creation and it comes in the perspective of when you're either starting your business or you investing in yourself It's about trying to grow yourself the value you're able to create your skills and development not usually finding short chains or shortcuts in terms of Money the more you invest in yourself the more investment your business the higher likelihood of success that can happen in Firetation right now you're investing in yourself. You're investing your time into listening to this content Which we're talking about how to fuse experiences and storytelling to drive business growth So I want to start Arjan with the arts of storytelling. Why is storytelling so important for entrepreneurs?
It's where you ask that's when storytelling I think it's the biggest skill as an entrepreneur I'm a CEO of startup But a lot of people's not for journey you find sometimes the biggest skill you can create or hone and sharpen It's because when you do that you're not only finding a way for yourself to be motivated excited getting the whole world Because I know what you're seeing in the world and actually all comes back to this point where I think about I mentioned It's quite a bit of number of times but Atkins law of spacecraft design I don't know if people have heard of it, but it's a really interesting point that I kind of learned from one of my team members Whereas like well, what's so what's going on terms of what you're doing for business? Well, I can see the law of spacecraft design He kind of talks about for building spacecraft supplies to everything and set a bad concept with a good presentation is doing eventually But a good concept for the bad presentation is doomed immediately and it comes back to the story trying to tell if you're not excited About what you're doing if you're not able to have someone else see why you're looking to make a dent in the world change The change in the world then there's no way you're gonna make it make it make it anywhere And I think it comes with having the right story that you're willing to put out there the story that you're believing in everybody around you It's believing that Fire Nation I love how that makes it so clear about the importance of storytelling I mean if you don't have a good story no matter how great your product is if it's fantastic or it's horrible It's dead on impact, but if you have a fantastic product and a fantastic story That's the road to success. You have a fantastic story and a crappy product People might still figure it out But they'll figure it out down the road because they're gonna fall in love with your story So of course you never want to have a crappy product But it's at least gonna have you get past the start line when you have a great story and hopefully always be improving and making Whatever it is that you're creating that product that service better and better and better and better and speaking of stories Arjan Let's see how you the master storyteller tells your story Yeah, I always find that quicker long we're safe But my name is Arjan. I've been entrepreneur for 16 years the joke is that I've actually been since I was 10 years old I got my first job and I started my first business when I was 11 But I've been from an engineer to senior engineer CTO all to the entire technical chain at big enterprise companies fortune 500 It's two startups throughout my whole life and so I've always been passionate technology But also got the startups I sold my first startup back in 2016 right when I was in college I started my second one which grew decently well, but I'll really failed I took a break and said you know I want to learn about VC a became a VC helped start a VC fun and missing in pre-c startups Then I got the big aha moment for my third startup quote, which I'm super excited about and I've been off the races since then Yeah, but someone's always been just technology and also nonprofit a little bit along the way I also turn around nonprofit where I build schools and buildings Well one thing that I've realized in the over 3700 episodes of entrepreneurs on fire is that we love stories In fact if you look at history, which is actually my major in college history his story her story I love bringing in that her story part of it too because I don't want it just to be his but that's what the word history came from stories His story her story the stories were passed down over generations around fireplaces like we are always drawn in to once upon a time We lean in because we know a story is coming.
We want to hear that story So tell us the story of your current startup cloaked Yeah, so cloaked in the consumer privacy company putting you in control of your data and the story starts off because back in 2020 I was really curious about my own information. How could help my life? How could I be better? Between my finances my personal life.
I just knew there was a better way of doing things So I was like oh, let me think of understanding what I look like digitally So I bought a Mac committee and put it in my apartment and I sent it my integrations to everything about me from the basic stuff like Facebook Google Calendar and more complicated stuff. I hacked my message I got all my health kit data my eating data my workout data my movement data my social media posts everything about me I'm streaming this box and I'm a background machine learning start some basic ML. They start telling me hey You missed this meeting yesterday. You missed this workout yesterday.
Why don't you do 50 push between these two meetings based on my spending habits? They say hey, let's come back on the alcohol this week But it really hit me in the face one day when I was actually at lunch and something I put my phone down at the end of lunch I picked up my phone and realized my really crude AI had actually had a full conversation with my then girlfriend It actually said I love you center memes and it went back and forth and when I picked up my phone I was over and I remember just standing there looking at it I was like wait what just happened and I was like wow this is pretty cool But two big important things it mean that moment one I realized that I don't own any of my own data and two I don't trust Facebook Amazon Google and these companies and make something like this So we've hit a real blockage innovation and how to help ourselves as humans and people because even this big lack of trust in technology There's a big invasion of privacy. So I said I want to solve the privacy problem altogether and Here we are with clocked and I'm really excited about where we're at today You could really just drill down into the number one solution that you provide to people that have a real problem in your niche What is that? Yeah, so I've realized really digging deep into the whole industry has a backwards about what is security and privacy mean to Every day are you focusing on everyday people not just people who are super obsessed with private security Jowing down into it I realized that what we all care about is this idea I call comfort we mix the word security and privacy all over the place and I think of the idea that security is this Encryption fraud fingerprinting what my vector attack privacy?
Where's my data live? What's accident? What's it look like and this is later the third one talks about that? I really focus on this comfort and it's a cognitive point in which we all understand the problem So we're doing it quote is an every single situation when you're browsing online when you're doing apartment hunting when you're buying something When you're meeting a cute guy at the bar setting up for rewards We put a unique identity on the fly and it's a real working phone number email address password and soon credit card That's tied to actual information so you can use iMessage you can use your email client You can use your actual credit card, but no one has access to you or your direct extra your personal information And these aren't throw away or burner their permanent working identity is paired to a website paired to a person and you can turn them off snooze Then control them personalize them how you see fit But it makes it so that your information is a bonk anybody else but you and in today's age Fire Nation is only gonna get more and more scary As we go forward with everything that's going on in cyber attack scams all these different things I mean you need to take control of what you need to take control of and you know for you only you know that fire nation But believe me it's time to take inventory and say what do I need to protect We're talking about a lot of great things and more when we get back from thinking our sponsors ready to ditch your subpar podcast listening app And download an app that has every feature you want in need with more great features being added all the time The app is put up below and you can download it for free and start listening right now at put up low calm Put up low gives you access to every podcast after fingertips with easy discoverability audio and video podcasts and every genre and language And instant recommendations so the perfect podcast and live streams find you without you having to lift a finger plus Proplo is interactive so you can create and share short snippets and discuss episode with friends and your favorite hosts My favorite feature but upload to create your own personalized up next queue so you can set it and forget it Join me on prop below where you can interact with me connect with others ask questions and share your thoughts on your favorite Podcasts visit put up low calm download the app for free from either app store mentioned JLD or EO fire when you sign up for an account and start listening now That's P O D O P O L O Dot com.
Oh now that's a sound I like to hear what is it you ask that's another sale on Shopify the all-in-one commerce platform to start Run and grow your business Shopify makes it simple to sell to anyone from anywhere and I speak from personal experience We've used Shopify to sell physical products as 2015 whether you're selling dog treats or decanters start selling with Shopify and join the platform Simplify commerce for millions of businesses worldwide we Shopify you'll customize your online store to your brand discover new customers and build a relationship That will keep them coming back Shopify covers all the sales channels to successfully grow your business from in person to an all-in-one E-commerce platform and even across social media platforms and thanks to 24 seven support Shopify is here to help you succeed every step of the way It's how every minute new sellers around the world make their first sale with Shopify and you can too Center for a free trial at Shopify dot com slash on fire all lowercase go to Shopify dot com slash on fire to start selling online today Shopify dot com slash on fire Feeling connected to your team is a must but with employees and contractors all over the globe feeling that connection can be tough Not to mention the software you use can sometimes make you feel out of sync like you and the rest of your team aren't on the same page And when a team is disconnected your customers pay the price if the software You're currently using issuing out of date data on your business or your customers that equals trouble or maybe you feel like your software Is making impossible to see the full picture if that's the case then listen up Customers end up bearing the brunt of this disconnection meaning a great customer experience is lost sometimes forever ready to get your team on the same page HubSpot transforms everyday conversations strategic decision-making sessions and everything in between into moments customers feel good about with a Lovingly crafted suite of tools you can seamlessly connect your team So everyone has access to the same data and you're able to focus on what really matters your customers learn How HubSpot can help your business grow better at HubSpot dot com our gen we're back and deciding which products to create is often the biggest Decision that entrepreneurs will make talk about how storytelling and how storytelling can shape how we build out our products Yes, so quote actually started the way we're starting for their RV one came from stories telling myself I thought about privacy and security how many approaches face and I was like well What if we could change businesses and change the way they have been for structure? But I realized that's a really hard story to tell because you've convinced businesses where they're not necessarily aligned to change the way they Operate they're focused on profits and data exploitation. That's how they work and even the ones I do that convinced It's a slow burn one after another and I remember going on for a run and I was like well Why why can't I do this? Why can't I what's the part I should be building and as I'm vibrating hit me?
I'm like why what if I could just work with consumers because they're the ones who feel the pain they've empathize they connect and then I all start coming together around all of them what if we could start really simple because everybody makes a Security really difficult VPNs encryption changing apps make all your friends go to a different app altogether I think let's make it really simple that people can grasp their head around and I think for me it all comes back to I knew That's the story I wanted to tell one that was simple people could easily grasp they have that idea that this connection them This early they feel that problem. They're energized by the solution and I when I was energized by that story myself I think well This is the path I want to go down and it comes back to what I even thought at the beginning was I Could easily pivot our business and become a B2B business and help protect people's databases and make them more secure and make Pretty good killing and go hundred a million to dollars But I knew my goal is I want to change how the world works That's the way I view what I do day to day everything should make an impact So I knew that this was actually a path to making impact if we aligned the people themselves So I think for entrepreneurs when they're thinking about building their product and storytelling is that it comes back to how do people resonate with what you're trying to do? And you want to set the appropriate goal my goal is to change the world change how you interface the technology and the face of the internet How we attract each other technically digitally to make innovation much smarter the future putting control of our data in our privacy Giving us a sense of control and I knew that's my goal Is the goal is that I want to make a side business or gonna do dropshipping and these things well Set that goal properly and then find a story you want to tell even at that moment you want to your thing that you're selling to be something People love or excited they want to spend money on buying and the way you put your marketing your landing pages all convey that story So I think you have to figure out what people what you resonate with and then channel that out Otherwise, there's no other way you can tell story that attracts a product or it convinces you about a part you want to build Are you on a path to create impact fire nation? I love that phrase.
I just love that methodology Look at the mirror after so that question by the way Not everybody wants to change the world and how we interface with the world like our agenda's fire nation That's fine That is totally fine But are you want to path to create impact because if you're gonna create impact fire nation if your story shows how you're going to create that impact You're on your way now building the right team is so important Arjan, but it's so tough. How did storytelling help you attract the right team? I think storytelling was the only or the biggest skill I had I think from storytelling this really key elements between So you join your team. They're betting on a lot of things when it's jumping on your ship One night I talked to my team all the time that I think we're all in one boat together And we all have our own role me leading the charge is just a role on the ship It's not that I it's all we're all doing what I say We all the role to play and I think I fall more into leadership side and the way I operate But it's we all are doing some part of this when I talk to somebody of candidate person interested in I make sure that they know that I'm someone They can trust professionally.
I've had the experience and background and technology and products and leadership and say okay This person has some thinking or how can it share that this is something that they feel confident in taking on they end their experience ties What they're trying to do I tell you about my experience from the job, etc Then I jump right to close our different to this case for close But for a business it's that we think about not only competition and why we're doing it better It's because you have a unique perspective in the world because when somebody's joining your company even if it's in a perspective They want to they want to see the world from your lens They want to feel excited by that and I think that's where I think about from bringing a track and right team I saw people who really saw that the world can change and they feel that they have the skills to join me on the journey And they're sighted by me. I think the biggest thing is they're trying to come on the team Half of it is absolutely the business your market opportunity the other half It's really important that they want to bet on you as myself and my co-founder that people are team is really attracted to and excited to join us And I think we were we also treat people very respectfully And I think that's a big dimension that we're very spectral to people we're talking to the way we operate And it's a thing that this is a guy I'd like to hang out with and and work with and that's why I think despite me not asking I get messages from my team members that for in the morning to all the way at ten at night where they're they're themselves excited about Cloping our business because they want to push that forward I think me having the right story the way I talk about myself the business the market and where we see the world changing I think really helped me attract a really strong teammate team members across the board Fire Nation I really hope you're understanding the value the power of stories in comes to attracting the right people and our gen I mean I'm convinced I think Fire Nation is convinced they want to tell the right story, but here's the question What's the next step? Well, I think there's key elements to taking the next step if you want it if one you're convinced that having a story is important I think there's a few it's only a few points You have to really iron out the first thing I talk about is that it starts with you who are you what what's what's your background? I always have a short version of my talk myself a long version You want to kind of talk about the key points about what you're excited by what's your background things like that And then the next part about that story that you want to do is like think about how you get it personal because Every every person who's listening to you wants to take a chance to take a bet on you and what you're doing So you want to think back is like well your customers your team They're all aligned to what you believe in to tie back to you and what you think about in the world what you want to change I always think about from that perspective you're telling the story well from voice transition from you You want to think about how do you make it powerful and stand out what you're doing for your business should be something that's It's excitement energy money could be profits It doesn't have to change the world You could be making money and making a really good approach you buying real estate property or you could be getting into kind of make a Start-up I think both those aspects is a powerful statement you can bring out to the world people connect you and then I always kind of end with Thinking of well, you always give it a hero right the biggest thing that the next step is like well What is the hero on my journey and it's not actually you it's you and the company and approach your thinking and making sure that people can highlight that You are actually going out and taking market share from other people you have to stand out You want to be telling a story worth telling and so if you're gonna take a market share from other people you want to make sure that you have a Much stronger approach.
I think these kind of miss the approach of starting with you keeping a personal making powerful having to stand out and giving it a Hero aren't the key elements I think of a story that when you really sharpen you could tell it a minute you can tell it in 10 minutes You can tell 30 minutes and people can you can really expand and practice that and I think that is the next step is I ironing out what those points mean to you have a story worth telling Fire Nation That's a great place to start in our gen if Fire Nation wants to connect with you your company Tell us how we can do that give us any call to action you have for our listeners Fire Nation and then we'll say goodbye Yeah, absolutely one we love to check out cloaked we are in public beta kind of consumers come in every day trying out cloaked And it's fully in action So you can join us a cloak a cloak to app slash eos it'll skip the waitlist you can also reach out to myself directly I can give you a unique cloak on the fly Arjun at cloak cloak ID that's a unique cloak It's audience that you can reach out to me, but yeah, always excited to hear from entrepreneurs people excited about your business And I always have to pay forward so I can help anyway We'll be happy to fire nation You're the average of the five people you spend the most time with you but hang out with AB and Shayeld today So keep up that heat head over to eo fire calm type Arjun ARJ UN in the search bar his shows page will pop right up and who doesn't like skipping wait list Fire Nation waitlist are for people that aren't in Fire Nation, so Arjun where does Fire Nation go to skip the cloaked waitlist? Yeah, if you just bought a clog.app slash eo f it'll help you skip the waitlist when you hit join early access Arjun, thank you for sharing your truth your knowledge your value with Fire Nation today for that We salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side Sounds good. Thanks so much having me. Hey Fire Nation a huge.
Thank you to Arjun for dropping value bombs and sponsoring today's episode Fire Nation are you ready to rock your very own podcast check out our free podcasting course where I will teach you how to create and launch your podcast for free Free podcast course calm. I'll catch you there or on the flip side Shotching that's the sound of another sale on Shopify the platform trusted by millions of entrepreneurs to create their online store and so much more Center for a free trial today at Shopify dot com slash on fire all or case That's Shopify dot com slash on fire to start selling online today Success story hosted by Scott declaring is brought to you by the HubSpot podcast network the audio destination for business professionals Success story features Q&A keynote presentations and convos on sales marketing and more a recent episode on how to protect your business in Times of crisis is a must listen listen to success story wherever you get your podcasts