Why you should reach out to strangers you admire online - Rodney Gainous Jr.

Rodney Gainous is the founder and CEO of Safe, a company dedicated to providing more easy-to-use privacy tools for individuals and businesses. In this episode, we discuss the changes Corona has wrought, the importance of sending cold emails, the importance of location for networking, and much more. Enjoy!

You can reach Rodney on Twitter at Rg2official.

(7:59) Do you need to move to the Bay area, or tech hubs in general, to be able to fully chase your dreams of working in tech? What are the merits of doing so? Can you run a tech startup from any location?

(11:09) Even if you choose to run your tech startup from outside a tech hub, is an experience of the tech hub necessary or helpful to have?

(15:01) The difference between knowing a lot about a place and actually living in a place.

(16:56) How to build a network in today’s Post-Covid world, despite all the restrictions posed by lockdowns.

(19:58) Why you should learn to reach out to strangers, founders and people you admire, online more often. (Hint: a lot of them are more open than you think)

(20:41) What is the value of being open in the business world, especially as a founder?

(25:15) Is it good to be upfront about what you want when interacting with a stranger you want something from or are you better off building a relationship first? Where is the line? What is the right way to go about it?

(29:43) A tip to help increase the open rates for your cold emails.  

(37:02) As a tech founder, how should you treat hype? Both hype of your company and external tech-related hype that generates FOMO?

(47:51) Why is Miami receiving so much hype? Apart from it potentially being the new base for Silicon Valley.