The Best Episode of Season 1 - How Ada Pivoted to a $1B+ Valuation w/ Mike Murchison (Founder & CEO)

Re-releasing the best episode of Season 1.Mike spent two years building a social search engine. It didn't work. So he and his co-founder took frontline customer service jobs at seven different companies at the same time, and did that for the better part of a year without writing a single line of code. He printed out a speech to read to his lead investor over lunch, telling him they had failed and offering the money back. That research became Ada: 350 people, over $200M raised, and a $1B+ valuation.In this episode, Mike breaks down why doing the job manually beat shipping an MVP, how being committed but not attached is what makes a pivot possible, and how they proved the software worked by quietly replacing themselves with it.Why You Should ListenWhy they refused to write a line of code for almost a year.How working as agents at seven companies showed them what to build.Why telling your lead investor you failed is easier than you think.How to stay committed to the problem without getting attached to your solution.Keywords startup podcast, startup podcast for founders, product market fit, finding pmf, Ada, Mike Murchison, pivoting a startup, customer experience automation, AI chatbots, customer support software, lean startup, customer discovery, B2C to B2B pivot, enterprise SaaSChapters00:00:00 Intro00:01:28 Volley, The Startup Before Ada00:05:42 Why Companies Talk to Customers Less00:08:58 Becoming Agents at Seven Companies00:13:22 Reading a Speech to Their Lead Investor00:18:12 Committed But Not Attached00:22:05 Refusing to Write a Line of Code00:28:24 Research Mode Comes First00:33:06 Replacing Themselves With SoftwareSend me a message to let me know what you think!