EP 534: 29yo Radius CEO Raises $100M, Helping Expand B2B Sales Pipelines with Darian Shirazi

Darian Shirazi. He's the CEO and co-founder of Radius. He was an early employee at Facebook and worked on the" Sell Your Item" Team at eBay. He's founded, invested, and advised many successful technology companies. Prior to starting Radius, Darian studied Computer Science and Philosophy at UC Berkeley. He's also a prominent keen speaker at Top of Technology Innovation.

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? – The Essays of Warren Buffet
• What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff
• Favorite online tool? — Yesware
• Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – "How much harder building the business is than you originally thought and how once you get to scale how amazing it feels."

Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 01:42 – Nathan introduces Darian to the show
• 02:15 – Darian shares about his time with Facebook
• • 02:30 – Darian's favorite project on Facebook was Facelift
• 02:45 – Darian shares what he thinks of Mark Zuckerberg
• 03:30 – Darian can't think of a time when Mark was at odds with another team member
• 03:58 – Radius is about growing pipelines for B2B marketers
• • 04:08 – The customers are typically enterprise and mid-market businesses
  • 04:15 – Radius fixes data
  • 04:30 – Radius' services
• 04:48 – The whole foundation of the product starts with the Radius business graph
• 05:17 – Darian shares how they help the client
• 05:40 – Darian shares how Radius is different with CB Insights
• • 05:50 – Radius' data is powered by their customers which allows them to access their CRMs
  • 06:20 – The activity data allows Radius to improve their data
  • 06:50 – Radius doesn't rely on publicly available data
• 07:30 – Radius was founded in 2011 and launched in 2013
• 08:00 – Average number of customers
• • 08:30 – It is not really a seat model
  • 09:10 – Radius has a used cased expansion
• 09:41 – Team size is currently 150 people
• 10:00 – Radius has currently raised $100M
• • 10:25 – Radius still has a lot of net capital left
  • 10:42 – Radius' retention for enterprise customers is around 93%
• 10:50 – Gross monthly customer churn
• 11:24 – Darian shares what drives their revenue
• • 11:48 – Radius's implementation day is only 18 days so customers see the value quickly
• 12:11 – Radius' pricing
• 12:23 – ACV
• 13:00 – First year revenue
• 13:25 – Darian has 2 co-founders
• 14:07 – Radius requires a team
• • 14:28 – Darian hired people from enterprise companies
• 15:00 – Darian shares Radius's CAC to LTV ratio
• • 15:36 – Radius's sales cycle
  • 15:52 – "Customer trust is our number one value"
  • 16:50 – It is difficult to measure CAC to LTV when enterprise companies rely on big events for marketing

• 17:53 – Radius's growth rate
• 19:14 – Radius' marketing budget
• 19:29 – The amount Radius spends on Dreamforce
• • 20:27 – Dreamforce is an incredible way to grow a pipe

• 20:40 – Is Radius going to be the next Benioff's acquisition?
• 21:48 – Darian shares how Microsoft has been an incredible partner for Radius
• 22:36 – The last funding
• 23:05 – Darian discusses Radius' future
• 23:40 – Follow Darian at Twitter and email him
• 25:35 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

• It takes a great team to create a great product.
• Take what you've learned from your last employer, be grateful for it, and leave graciously.
• Acquisition requires planning, an exchange of ideas, and thorough researching.

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
• Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11" secure even when he left it in the airplane's back seat pocket
• Ceo@Radius.com – Darian's email address
• @Darian314 – Darian's Twitter handle
• Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives