Rocketship.fm - Business Explored

Ever wonder how Silicon Valley became the venture capital and technology capital of the world? In this episode we'll take you back to the 1950s and share the story that kicked it all off.

In part one of our series on funding, we explore the various ways in which startups raise, sources of financing, and the terminology you need to know when it comes to raising a round.

Andy White discusses the state of venture capital and how it's changing inside and outside of Silicon Valley and what he has brewing in San Diego currently.

Jay Chernikoff, founder of co-working space(s), DeskHub, talks with us about building entrepreneurial communities and changing the way even established, large organizations work. **If there's a DeskHub location in your city, mention this episode of the Rocketship Podcast for $100 off your first month.

After two years and 200 episodes, we take a step back and reflect on some of our favorite lessons learned, surprising conversations, and what we're working on next. Enjoy!

Jason Fried, founder of Basecamp, talks with us about what it takes for a company to stay around for the long run. From the importance of early habits to the most impactful ways to iterate, he shares some incredible insights in this episode.

Steli Efti, founder of Close.io and co-host of The Startup Chat podcast, talks with us about the emotional side of entrepreneurship and sales, and how he overcomes failures, rejections, and slumps. He talks a lot about the difference between dedication and attachment.

Jon Nastor, host of Hack the Entrepreneur and author of How to Stop Procrastinating, Build a Business, and Do Work That Matters, talks with us about the experience of interviewing over 170 entrepreneurs and writing a book to share the most impactful lessons he's learned throughout those conversations.

Jeff Epstein, founder of Ambassador, talks with us about three distinct umbrellas of affiliate marketing, and how each can help boost your business. He shares some insights into their sales processes and culture, as well as how they use their own product.

Will Hench, founder of ThreadLab, talks with us about their unique approach to ecommerce selling, designed to reduce the buyer's cognitive load by making choices for them, and using data to guide these choices.

Gregg Parise, CEO of Events.com, talks with us about how they’ve prioritized culture above all else, and how impactful that has been on their ability to grow and win in the marketplace.

Craig Wortmann, founder of Sales Engine and Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago, talks with us about the difference between professional selling and entrepreneurial selling. He breaks down the key differences between high performing and low performing sales people by walking us through a real-world example.

Rob Walling, founder of Drip, talks with us about his recent focus on customer success. He believes there is a middle-ground between 100% self-serve, and high-touch onboarding, and he's hired help to find it. Rob shares his learnings from focusing on customer success, the impact on his sales process, and the metrics he uses to track it all.

Michael Jamin, long-time Hollywood screenwriter for shows such as Beavis and Butthead, King of the Hill, and most currently, Maron, talks with us about what a story really is. He walks us through key structural elements that you can use to help tell your company or brand story to better engage with your customers.

David Hauser, Founder of Grasshopper, talks with us about his angel investing philosophy. They don’t invest in companies without at least $500k-$1 million annual revenue and no intention of raising another round. In short, he wants to help fuel growth and culture, not swing for the fences on a low-percentage home run. Also, there are some great lessons in here on how they scaled Grasshopper through paid channels to a fantastic exit for all involved.

Paul Bradley, founder of Eventric, shares his story of bootstrapping for 10 years before raising money and shifting their business model. He talks about how changes in the industry has completely changed the way their business and offerings create value in the market.

Nick Disabato, founder of Draft and author of Cadence & Slang, talks with us about the intricacies of A/B testing that he uses with his clients. Everything from the most impactful changes you can make to a page to how to determine the proper sample size and run-time of your test. This was an incredibly informative episode.

Alex Berman, Chief Marketing Sumo at InspireBeats, talks with us about how they’ve built their business by sending over a million targeted, personalized cold emails. He shares some great tips for improving your emailing efforts and closing more deals.

Adam Saint, co-founder and VP of Design at Bench, talks with us about what design really means to him. It’s far beyond how something looks, and much more about the function of a system, and how that system works best for the intentions of the user. Fascinating discussion around JTBD, experience, and implementation.

Dave Munson, founder of Saddleback Leather, talked with us about the importance of having a purpose behind whatever it is that you do. Finding a way to leverage your business into a means to achieve something more meaningful and impactful is something we should all pause to consider, especially around Thanksgiving and the upcoming holidays.

David Cancel, founder of Driftt, shares the fears and excitement of starting his 5th startup, and lessons he's carried with him from one to the next. He also talks with us about the value of marketing to current customers and keeping them engaged and motivated to send referrals.

Matt Schlict, founder of ZapChain, talks with us about building a new kind of social network of communities, where bitcoin is exchanged, or 'tipped out' as a way of acknowledging great content and commentary. He also talks about their next big move of selling digital content on ZapChain for bitcoin, with their first major label artist, Talib Kweli.

Tim Fargo, founder of Tweet Jukebox, talks with us about starting over in the SaaS space after a $20 million dollar exit in the service space. He's figuring it out as he goes, and jumping right in the deep end. He's build a large tribe of free users and is flipping the switch on paid plans. Lots of great lessons in this one!

Jonathan Eppers, CEO of RadPad, talks with us about the unique tactics they’ve used to approach growing a marketplace, where it can be difficult to bring both sides to the table. He also shares his experience setting up the proper relationships with your advisors and investors, and how they’re different.

Thomas Knoll, serial entrepreneur and personal advisor, talks with us about his new venture, Knoll Consulting. He teamed up with his wife, a licensed psychotherapist to create a 6-week course designed to help entrepreneurs and their partners find a variety of new ways of communicating more effectively with one another (including things like practicing fights before they happen)! There's a special discount for Rocketship listeners - use code: ROCKETSHIP at checkout and get $100 off the course price.

Brett Hagler, Co-Founder and CEO of New Story, and his team have built a unique donation model, with 100% of donated funds being put to work building homes in Haiti, and with operational costs being funded by their investors.

Michael Amburgey, Founder and CEO of hiVolume Media Co. and KaraoQ, talks with us about rolling out their karaoke app and replacing old, tedious processes with new technology. He talks about the value props not only to the venues, but to the KJs and patrons as well, and how they are changing the way people interact with karaoke.

Ian Crosby, co-founder and CEO of Bench, talks with us about their journey from a totally manual process to something vastly more efficient and scalable. He also talks about how to think differently about the problems you’re solving and creating something people really want.

Chris McMurtry, founder of Dart Music, talks with us about the problems they’re tackling in the metadata and distribution of classical music, and how the genre is growing. He shares their experience going through Nashville’s music accelerator, Project Music.

Chris Lucas, VP of Marketing at Formstack, talks with us about how they experiment with, measure, and optimize various marketing channels. He also talks about how the’ve built out their marketing team with specialists in various areas (SEO, PR, PPC) and use analytics to measure what’s really working, and why.

Jason Amunwa, Director of Product for Filament, talks with us about their process for iterating their way to product market fit. He talks a lot about things they’ve learned from beta users, and how they’re working toward making new users as successful as possible.

Ken Davenport, CEO of Mission Edge, talks with us about how they’re helping non-profits run the business side of their organizations. He talks about how millennials enjoy giving back in a much more hands on way, and how organizations can give back to the community in various ways, like skilled corporate volunteer programs. He also covers the new concept of impact investing and other ways to give back and still receive returns.

Andrei Soroker, CEO of Sameroom, talks with us about the early days of their chat app and what it was like competing with Slack and other early players in the space. He shared how they found a big opportunity and pivoted to a new approach, and shares the SEO efforts that have been killing it for them recently. He also talks about hiring abroad and some of the challenges of trying to help bring employees overseas to come work in the U.S.

Gabriel Weinberg, Co-Author of Traction, shares what's changed since the first release of his book. He covers the Bullseye Framework and how it's changed over time. And he also shares what it's been like using a publisher for the second edition.

Brian Trauschold, Co-Founder of Ambition, talks with us about their entire approach to sales. He covers the importance of identifying the right person at the right company to talk to, and shares various techniques for cold reachouts and followups.

Florian Dorfbauer, Co-Founder and CEO of Usersnap, shares their internal process around using growth experiments to methodically scale their customer base. From the effects on revenue to the positive changes in their company culture, Florian covers the entire process and how you can replicate it with your team.

Jason Zook, creator of Buymyfuture.com, talks with us about lessons he’s learned over the past decade of entrepreneurship. His perspectives and goals have changed a lot during that time, and have affected the way he runs and operates his business.

Ben Uretsky, CEO of Digital Ocean, talks with us about maintaining a strong and positive culture through explosive growth (they went from 40 employees to over 120 in less than a year). He shares things that have helped everybody stay in alignment on larger company goals and vision.

Greg Beaufait of Dundee Venture Capital talks with us about the trend of seed rounds becoming more like traditional A rounds in size and early company valuations. This has a whole new impact for the companies raising money in this new landscape and talks through some specific examples of how companies have handled the challenges in different ways.

Nathan Chan, creator of FoundrMag, talks with us about how they’ve grown their Instagram following to over 300,000 followers, and how the channel is drastically more engaging (and profitable) than any other social outlet.

Allie O’Connell, Director of Marketing for Bellhops, talks with us about how they’ve 5x-ed their revenue since last year, with a focus on PR, TV, Print, and word-of-mouth. She's found significant success through traditional channels and shares some replicable techniques.

Jane Portman, creator of UI Breakfast and author of The UI Audit, talked with us about common mistakes founders make when they approach design and feature integration with their app. She knows most early-stage and bootstrapped companies can’t afford a dedicated UI designer up front, so she teaches some basic principles for making sure you keep things simple and effective for your core users.

Michael Conley, VP of Digital at The Cleveland Cavaliers, talked with us about the kinds of digital campaigns they're running to create an ultra personal experience for fans both inside and outside of the stadium, including ways to keep them engaged in the off-season. The kinds of things they're doing (and the scale at which they're executing them) are truly amazing - this is a great listen.

Cynthia Jamin, Founder of TwirlyGirl, talked with us about the very personal reasons for starting the business. She shares how she’s remained true to her purpose at every step along the way, even when it went against the grain of what everyone else said was “right”. She proves time and time again that staying authentic to your vision and your brand will never steer you wrong.

Ai Ching Goh, Co-Founder of Piktochart, talks with us about what it’s been like starting the company in Southeast Asia. From the support of the government to finding talent, there are a ton of opportunities to take advantage of. She also shares some insights on trends she’s seen with infographics and how people are trying to visualize data for all kinds of purposes.

Aman Mann, Co-Founder/CEO of Procurify, shares stories from their early days and the relentless hustle that got them off the ground. From finding product-market fit to letting momentum and perception drive sales, this interview is fantastic for anyone struggling to achieve rapid growth.

JD Graffam, Founder of Simple Focus, an agency which also acquires SaaS products like Ballpark and Pulse App, talked with us about his product acquisition process. From financing, to improving product, to managing risk, JD gives you everything you need to replicate his strategy.

Mitch Wainer, co-founder and CMO of DigitalOcean, talks with us about how they’ve grown to over 150 people and the one of the top hosting providers, second only to AWS, in just a few short years. He shares how they’ve heavily leveraged content to fuel their growth and support existing customers.

Marti Wolf, the Chief Culture Officer at Mailchimp, talks with us about how they’ve maintained their culture of fun and weirdness as they’ve grown to over 400 people. She shares how everything is values-oriented and geared toward making sure everyone feels empowered to tinker, explore, grow, and have fun.

Jeremy Reeves, direct response copywriter, talks with us about how to methodically put together a sales funnel that provides real value to your potential customers. He starts by delivering value (usually in the form of content), before even trying to make a sale. From there, he continues to build the relationship so when the time to buy does come, it's a very easy sell.