Traction

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Brian Rothenberg, Partner at defy.vc. Finding exponential growth is the holy grail of every startup, but many fail in pursuit of it. Brian’s career has spanned every stage of startup growth, from scrappy zero to triumphant IPO. He founded SkillSlate which was acquired by TaskRabbit (acq. Ikea), then went on to scale Eventbrite’s $5B+ growth engine as VP of Growth and helped them to IPO.   Today, Brian is investing in and advising early-stage startups. In this session, Lloyed and Brian discuss:   5:25 - How to determine early stage market fit 9:59 - What to focus on after the initial value and hook 15:00 - Keys to successfully defining and utilizing growth loops 21:57 - Pitfalls for companies that haven't been able to leverage growth loops 31:29 - Defining Eventbrite's growth model 43:41 - How growth teams are changing today Learn more at https://tractionconf.io This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca  Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Martin Basiri, co-founder and CEO at ApplyBoard. ApplyBoard is the world’s largest online platform for international student recruitment, with over 750 employees in 20 countries. It has recently closed its latest round of financing and the company is now valued at $1.4 billion. In this session, Martin shares the secrets and lessons learned from their exponential growth journey. Specifically, they discuss:   7:23 - What early customer development looked like 11:09 - Coming up with the idea and getting to product-market fit 16:56 - Tactics for driving customer acquisition and growth 17:48 - Strategies for finding the key early team members 30:43 - Fundraising during a global pandemic and becoming a unicorn 46:36- CEO goals for a company with 750 people Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Connect with Martin Basiri: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martinbasiri/?originalSubdomain=ca Learn more about ApplyBoard at https://www.applyboard.com/ This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca  Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com  

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Startup Helper, Elad Gil. The Information recently had a cover article with the headline, “The Rise of Elad Gil, Silicon Valley’s Biggest Solo Venture Capitalist.” Investing in one or two unicorns is already magic, but Elad has invested in over 40, including helping companies like Airbnb, Gitlab, Gusto, Instacart, Notion, Stripe, Square, Google, and Twitter navigate the hyper-growth phase by sharing his playbook. Specifically, we discuss:   6:51 - Coming up with the idea and getting to product-market fit 11:21 - Recommended key metrics for founders 20:35 - How to identify and optimize for every single unfair advantage 27:48 - How startups should think about growth 32:13 - Scaling from zero to thousands of employees without breaking the culture 39:37 - Signals to watch for that things are about to break 42:49 - The job of a CEO 51:14 - What dictates valuation? 58:02 - Keeping the team aligned on goals and strategy Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Connect with Elad Gil:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/eladgil/   This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com  

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Shiven Ramji, chief product officer at Auth0. Building a developer product is probably one of the hardest things for startups to build, because you're selling to people who don't really hold the budget. What are the fundamentals (or secrets) to building successful developer products and companies? Shiven has built two successful products and brands at Auth0 and DigitalOcean. Both companies recently had exits of $5B+ but have had different growth motions—product-led and sales-led. Shiven shares his learnings and how you can use them to scale your next product or company:   5:52 - Defining "product-led" 15:52 - Comparing product-led strategies and sales-led growth strategies 20:05 - The challenges selling to developers 23:40 - How to build a hyper-growth product 38:19 - The right window between free and timed trials 44:07 - The role of community in developer products 46:19 - How to build and scale ecosystems to grow your platform   Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Connect with Shiven Ramji: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shivenramji/   Learn more about Auth0 at https://auth0.com/   This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com  

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Laurie Schultz who was most recently CEO at Galvanize which was acquired for $1 billion..   Early-stage startups often act like pirates, fighting to scale in pursuit of treasure while being rough around the edges and breaking things along the way.   But eventually, it comes time to evolve into something more like the navy—still heroic, but disciplined and polished in its approach, with a long-term view.   Laurie Schultz recently sold Galvanize for $1 billion. In this episode, she discusses 10 fundamentals every founder or leader can use to evolve from pirate to navy admiral for high scale.   Specifically, she discusses:   11:13 - What it takes for a founder to transition to scale 14:54 - Identifying and finding the right key early team members at different points along the way 20:01 - Transformation from services to software 29:42 - One-page strategic plan 44:11 - Leveraging partnerships and new markets to achieve rapid revenue growth 55:45 - Does profitable growth matter after a certain point?   Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Connect with Laurie Schultz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurie-schultz-2675081/   This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, I welcome Andy Johns, venture partner at Unusual Ventures.   Some of the fastest-growing products have artfully constructed a series of content flywheels, resulting in nearly unstoppable organic growth for years or decades. To put the power of a content flywheel in perspective, Reddit recently claimed 430M monthly active users—it’s 15 years old and still spreading its wings.   But how do you create such a platform? In this episode, Andy describes what the ingredients are, how they work, and what you can do about them in pursuit of building your own startup fueled by a flywheel. Specifically, Andy covers:   12:22 - How do you define growth? 22:25 - What is a flywheel? 26:20 - The different types of flywheels and the key ingredients to make them successful 35:35 - How to keep users engaged and constantly coming back 41:39 - How to make your users are a source of repeatable organic growth 46:40 - Successful flywheels in B2B and B2C companies and what you can learn from them 53:05 - Bringing new people into your network 1:03:11 - What to look for in early-stage startups before investing   Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Tune in by clicking the link below and don't forget to subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Sridhar Vembu, founder and CEO of Zoho Corporation (moderated by Frederic Lardinois at TechCrunch).   Sridhar built Zoho, a software product firm valued at over a billion dollars, without a rupee of external funding—almost completely bootstrapped. Months before the pandemic, he moved from Silicon Valley to a village in Tamil Nadu, where he is now based. Years before Atmanirbhar Bharat became a slogan, Sridhar championed the cause of self-reliance and the creation of local employment.   We hear about inequality, college debt, and a lot of other issues. Sridhar believes that the private sector has to solve these problems.    "We are entrepreneurs and capitalists, and all of us have a responsibility."   This is Sridhar's passion now.   With exceptional clarity, superlative focus, and a philosophical "zen" like approach to both life in general and building software, Sridhar is the original “Sage of Software 2.0.”   Podcast highlights: 1:43 - What Zoho used to be vs what it is now 6:20 - Doing things right against competitors 9:48 - Starting out without any venture capital 14:51 - The temptation to IPO 18:31 - How to market 44 products 19:52 - Additional potential Zoho products 22:55 - How to stay focused 24:07 - Zoho University Learn more at https://tractionconf.io   Connect with Sridhar Vembu: https://twitter.com/svembu   Learn more about Zoho at https://www.zoho.com/   This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Ali Tamaseb, partner at Data Collective Venture Capital (DCVC).   What are the key traits of billion dollar startups?   Ali embarked on a journey to answer that question with real data.   In the process, he has collected the largest data set on startups (30,000+ data points) to analyze every piece of them and understand what makes super founders and unicorns.    What makes this even more incredible is the fact that he did this manually over the span of four years.    This labor of love was done with the intent of figuring out what really separated unicorn companies from the rest. Was it luck? Was it a specific skillet? A specific journey?   Ali joined us to share his learnings and discuss how you can use them to scale to unicorn status.   Podcast Highlights: 10:24 - The key traits of a Super Founder 21:37 - Eight ingredients of a unicorn 27:30 - The deliberate ideation process behind successful startups 40:37 - Venture capital vs. bootstrapping 41:43 - How to be opportunistic to win big 44: 59 - How to choose between different ideas in different industries 50:33 - Founder stories and failures you can learn from   Learn more at https://tractionconf.io Connect with Ali Tamaseb: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alitamaseb/?trk=storyline-update_share-update_actor-image   Learn more about DCVC at https://www.dcvc.com/   This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Farhan Thawar, VP of engineering at Shopify, a global commerce company that provides tools to start, grow, market, and manage retail businesses of all sizes.   Farhan studied computer science despite his parents’ disapproval, which was because at the time there were computers but no computer industry to speak of and very few job opportunities. He ended up with a job at the food giant Kraft.    It turns out his choice to work with computers was the right one, and he has started and worked at quite a few companies leading up to his current role at the Shopify rocket ship. He is looking to bring in more than 1,000 developers to Shopify. Since Covid, the company has gone permanently remote, so they are looking for top talent, regardless of location.   Lloyed and Farhan discuss a variety of topics including diversity and culture and the way Farhan embraces diversity throughout the organization. They talk about the challenges of building efficient teams and ways to increase productivity and team building. It’s a dynamic and fascinating conversation. Learn more at https://tractionconf.io This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com

On this episode of the Traction podcast, host Lloyed Lobo of Boast.AI welcomes Jyoti Bansal, CEO and co-founder of Harness. There’s a .00006% chance of becoming a billion-dollar company. Now imagine building two in your lifetime. Is it luck, or is there strategy involved? Jyoti is an engineer turned serial entrepreneur with 2x unicorns. Harness recently attained unicorn status with a $1.7B valuation alongside his previous unicorn AppDynamics, which he sold to Cisco in 2017 for $3.7 billion. With a belief that software has the ability to change the world, Jyoti builds products that not only work, but reach multi-billion dollar exits. How? Because he understands that yesterday's "wow" feature becomes today's performance feature.   Podcast highlights:   7:47 - How to street fight your way to $1 billion in ARR 9:57 - What he would (and wouldn’t) do again when building a unicorn 16:13 - How AppDynamics evolved over time 20:33 - How to build a product roadmap that sells 28:41 - How many channels should you use for marketing? Learn more at https://tractionconf.io This episode is brought to you by: Each year the U.S. and Canadian governments provide more than $20 billion in R&D tax credits and innovation incentives to fund businesses, but the application process is cumbersome, prone to costly audits, and receiving the money can take as long as 16 months. Boast automates this process enabling companies to get more money faster without the paperwork and audit risk. We don’t get paid until you do! Find out if you qualify today at https://Boast.AI. Launch Academy is one of the top global tech hubs for international entrepreneurs and a designated organization for Canada's Startup Visa. Since 2012, Launch has worked with more than 6000 entrepreneurs from over 100 countries, of which 300 have grown their startups to Seed and Series A stage and raised over $2 Billion in funding. To learn more about Launch's programs or the Canadian Startup Visa visit https://LaunchAcademy.ca Content Allies helps B2B companies build revenue-generating podcasts. We recommend them to any B2B company that is looking to launch or streamline their podcast production. Learn more at ContentAllies.com