EP 508: Siftery $4M Raised, 25,000 Users to Help You Find Software Tools with CMO Gerry Golyer

Gerry Colyer, head of growth at Siftery. He was previously the VP of growth at HealthSherpa and co-founder of two startups. He's a graduate of Yale and Stanford. The CEO of Siftery was convinced there was a better way for companies to discover, select, and make better use of their software and so began their journey into filling this particular need in the market.

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? – Hooked
• What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk

• Favorite online tool? — Buffer
• Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Not quite
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Gerry wish he had studied more in Computer Science

Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 01:32 – Nathan introduces Gerry to the show
• 02:11 – Gerry's 500 company is Central Mayoreo
• 02:57 – Siftery helps users discover and choose the right software to reach their needs
• 03:20 – Siftery is currently tracking 10,000 software programs
• 03:30 – Siftery gets data from their recommendation engines
• 03:57 – Siftery has a small team in SF
• 04:11 – Siftery has 30 team members in Bangalore and Kiev
• 05:24 – How Siftery collects data
• • 05:59 – There's a combination of data scraping from the web and getting recommendations from actual software users
• 06:48 – Siftery is trying to create tools for software buyers
• 08:10 – Siftery has no pricing model yet and currently free
• 09:13 – Monthly headcount expenses
• 10:00 – Advantages of having a development team in Bangalore
• • 10:12 – Cost of living is Bangalore lower than in SF
• 11:00 – What number are you focused on every day?
• • 11:11 – Data points being contributed in the community
  • 11:31 – Number of vendors engaged in the platform
• 12:00 – Launched earlier in 2016
• 12:30 – Siftery is more powerful than Techcrunch
• 13:00 – How are you able to get updates so quickly?
• • 13:05 – We get feedback from software reviews, friends in the 500, and other software owners
• 13:43 – 25 data contributors
• 14:00 – Utility metric
• 15:15 – Siftery's target area
• 15:50 – Connect with Gerry through email, Twitter and Siftery
• 18:05 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

• Meet people and build connections or, better yet, build companies.
• There are opportunities in the B2B space—find the gap and fill it.
• Having a team in another country can help startups build their business at a lower cost but still maintain the quality of work.

Resources Mentioned:

• Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
• Drip – Nathan uses Drip's email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel
• Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn't have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal
• Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible.
• Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books.
• The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens and follow-up with email sequences
• Gerry@Siftery.com – Gerry's email address
• @Ggiaco – Gerry's Twitter handle
• Siftery.com – Gerry's company website
• Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives