Ventures

In this episode of Ventures, my guest Jairus Morris (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jairus-morris-41a85355/) and I discuss his entrepreneurial journey starting and growing SUPLMNT (https://suplmnt.com/, ← if you are looking for a beautifully designed water bottle, check these out). We discuss his background, early validation experiments, team recruitment strategy, fundraising tactics, vision for his company, and advice for fellow entrepreneurs.Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-69 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.1:27 - Jairus intro, background, motivation for starting SUPLMNT6:53 - Showing the basic bottle (check it out on video)8:24 - How did Jairus initially start the journey into his product/growth strategy.10:08 - How many different types of bottles are available to buy? 11:52 - What is the broader vision of the SUPLMNT brand?13:49 - What is Jairus’ personal strategy for staying healthy? 14:58 - Custom SUPLMNT bottles for Warby Parker17:22 - Given the vision (wellness), where is SUPLMNT heading? What can Jairus tell us about the next things on the horizon for the business.18:37 - What has the process been like for Jairus to navigate the "impossible job" of an early stage entrepreneur, juggling all the balls / wearing all the hats?22:32 - D2C Brands like SUPLMNT are a marketing game...what is SUPLMNT's marketing strategy?26:40 - How has Jairus experienced bias in his entrepreneurial journey?29:58 - What's Jairus’ advice for the VC/Angel community to be more empathetic to under-represented people groups?32:10 - Not all VCs have gone through the entrepreneurial journey. 33:01 - What are the next steps - in Jairus’ opinion - for scaling SUPLMNT?35:00 - Final words to the founders/investors listening in. (Keep going!)36:01 - Where can people follow Jairus/SUPLMNT online? https://www.instagram.com/suplmnt // https://www.linkedin.com/in/jairus-morris-41a85355/ // https://www.instagram.com/jairusmorris/ // https://suplmnt.com/  

In this episode of Ventures, my guest Ken Lundin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/kglundin/) and I discuss a wide variety of strategies and tactics for improving sales traction and business development processes in a growing startup. We talk about Ken's journey into sales, how founders should reach out to (and land) early customers, how tangible goods companies should think about retail sales strategies, and how to run experiments and make sales decisions with data.Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-68 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.1:29 - Tee-up for the episode and motivation to talk about sales growth2:00 - Ken general intro 3:01 - What got Ken into the world of sales? 4:50 - What is Ken's advice for the new entrepreneur (selling into enterprises) building a company from the ground up?8:23 - How, as a founder, do you figure out what your client's strategic priorities are in order to sell most effectively. Survey strategy and "I'm going to give you the results" as a way of learning about your industry.10:40 - If you are talking to the ideal customer profile (ICP) after a survey result conversation - then it becomes easy to give them the value proposition11:28 - What is the process of identifying ideal decision-makers?   12:55 - Effective sales decision makers write checks all year long - not just in Q3. 14:26 - Why is $20k the magic number that differentiates small/quick deals vs. larger deals? 16:46 - What are the most common mistakes founders make when they are building their sales game?19:00 - Helping early stage founders get traction to attract great talent. 19:45 - Driving sales through data20:01 - Assuming coachable founders, how do they scale after a bit of traction? (Test everything)22:04 - Consumer businesses / B2B sales principles 24:15 - D2C brands that need to sell into retailers (tips/recommendations)26:42 - Does Ken's group assist with sales or just help them set up the processes?28:05 - How has the pandemic changed the sales game? What have we collectively learned?32:56 - Sensitivity & empathy to what the world has gone through in the pandemic 33:50 - How does Ken advise founders who may be running toward burnout? 36:56 - What is Ken's ICP? When should a founder reach out to Ken?38:50 - Final thoughts. How Ken can help drive sales for your company / your portfolio companies. Massive respect for the entrepreneurs out there.40:39 - KenLendin.com // RevHeat.com // Ken on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/kglundin/)

In this episode of Ventures, I (https://www.linkedin.com/in/wclittle/) recorded a short monologue that describes why my partners and I at Prota Ventures are gathering a cohort of Web 3 product-managers-in-training to rapidly get up to speed on Web 3 patterns, tools, technologies, and networks. For more information and background listening/reading about the vision and mission of the training, visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/blockchains. To apply, please feel free to contact me directly at will@wclittle.com. Thanks!You can also visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-67 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.

In this episode of Ventures, I introduce a clip w/ Dave Feldman (https://twitter.com/daveketo/) from Episode 11 where we discuss lipoproteins, fasting, cholesterol, low-carb/high-fat diets, and exercise. With heart disease being the lead cause of death for humans globally, it’s important to understand the basic science behind various aspects of how the disease progresses. Plus, as entrepreneurs we talk a lot about “solving problems'', and it's hard to come up with a more pressing problem than this.Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-66 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.To view/listen to the full original podcast with Dave, visit: https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-11   

In this episode of Ventures, I sit down with Yannick Folla (https://twitter.com/y_folla) to discuss an introduction to Web 3 for product managers looking to get quickly up to speed to add value to the Web 3 ecosystem. We discuss practical aspects of how to build with DeFi, NFTs, DAOs, decentralized patterns, specific networks, layer 1 vs. layer 2 technologies, and more. We also take specific product development examples within Figment.io’s business and use those as teaching opportunities for a broad audience. Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-65 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.2:20 - Yannick’s background and story into the Web 3 world, joining Figment, and building products.11:08 - Starting with Figment’s staking service, with the products of the staking dashboard and Hubble (https://hubble.figment.io/ ), how did Yannick and team approach building the products for the audiences they serve?13:24 - Product evolution/iteration nuances of Hubble14:40 - DataHub (https://figment.io/datahub/) - similar to Heroku for Web 3 - how to educate a Web 3 PM in the context of how Yannick and team have built DataHub18:39 - User experience needs/opportunities that drove the development of DataHub20:22 - Figment Learn (https://learn.figment.io/) - how is this available to help train Web 3 PMs and the developers that would be on teams to build dApps?22:50 - What are folks going to first learn when going through Figment Learn (APIs, Balances, querying, creating a wallet, and posting a transaction) 25:04 - Running through an example of doing a decentralized version of Twitter, how would a Web 3 PM need to restructure their thinking to build such an application? 28:30 - Homework for primitives for Web 3. DeFi, NFTs, DAOs, https://a16z.com/2018/02/10/crypto-readings-resources/ // https://www.matthewball.vc/the-metaverse-primer // Web 3 is coming up to it’s “iPhone moment” and Yannick believes it’s going to be intricately related to the metaverse31:03 - Aspects/definitions of Web 3 (metaverse, semantic web, blockchains/decentralization). Might be a 4th, a new generation of Internet where the value creators are the owners and capture the value. 32:09 - For a history lesson, why did the original wave of people attempting to decentralize existing Web 2 platforms fail? 34:03 - Decentralized governance - What do Web 3 PM need to know about decentralization/DAOs from a philosophical and practical approach? Multiple different types of DAOs and use cases. Thinking of subreddits as DAOs. 36:34 - What are the DAOs built on? How can someone start a DAO?37:59 - is this the same Aragon from 3-4 years ago?40:28 - Let’s talk about DeFi and NFTs. What are the best tools? Where can people learn more? Look at Uniswap (https://uniswap.org/), Aave (https://aave.com/), and YFI 44:17 - How hard is it to spin up an NFT club?46:00 - NFT types (ERC 721 & 1151) 46:39 - Anything else for Yannick to add to the conversation? Keep learning. Be active on Twitter (big source of knowledge). 47:43 - Where can people find Yannick online to continue the conversation? https://twitter.com/y_folla 

In this episode of Ventures, we pull a clip from Episode 18 with Spencer Graham (https://twitter.com/spengrah) and Tony Little (https://twitter.com/DrTonyLittle) where we talk about Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), and “scaling trust” in the Web 3.0 era. What is urgently needed in the Web 3 community is product managers; i.e. people who can understand how to build great experiences using the applicable Web 3 tools/capabilities/paradigms. These product managers can then build companies of their own, join new companies as co-founders, or consult for existing companies to help usher in a compelling decentralized future for us all.Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-64 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.To view/listen to the full original podcast with Spencer and Tony, visit: https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-18    

In this episode of The Ventures Podcast, Josh Haas (co-CEO and founder of Bubble.io -- https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshhaas/) discuss the implications of no-code/low-code in general - and Bubble.io in particular - for founders building new web apps this decade and beyond. After raising a recent $100m round, Josh and the Bubble team have a vision to replace traditional custom web development with their no-code/low-code solution, essentially as a new “language” that promises (and has proven) to save orders of magnitude of time and money for founders building web apps.This is obviously a big and bold vision, so we spend a fair amount of time in this episode diving into the details. Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-63 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.For more information on Bubble, check out https://bubble.io. To dive right into learning materials and get started, check out https://bubble.io/academy To check out the learn-to-code series that Will mentioned at the end of this episode, visit: https://satchel.works/@wclittle/learn-to-code-as-an-entrepreneur  

In this episode of Ventures, I took the liberty to record a short monologue that outlines how I (https://www.linkedin.com/in/wclittle/) and my partners at Prota Ventures (https://www.protaventures.com) evaluate early stage venture deals and teach new investors how to conduct basic diligence. I briefly discuss what aspects of your founder team, product experience, market dynamics, traction nuances, and believability of your financial model commonly stand out to investors - for better or worse - when making allocation decisions. Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-62 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.If you haven’t yet built a financial model for your business, check out this article series - https://www.startuprocket.com/articles/startup-financial-modeling-part-1-what-is-a-financial-model  - written by me ( Troy Henikoff (https://www.linkedin.com/in/troyhenikoff/) and I wrote. You can also listen to podcasts that Troy and I have done here → https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-14 and here → https://satchel.works/@ProtaVentures/the-prota-podcast-ep7 

In this episode of Ventures, we pull a clip from Episode 37 with Kelly Jo Horton (https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyjohorton/) and Sol Cates (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sol-cates-649736/) to discuss marketing operations in a growing startup. Early founder teams often leave the design, implementation, and maintenance of marketing stacks as an afterthought, which ends up costing the new company a massive amount of time and money. In this episode, Kelly Jo and Sol help us understand why bringing in an expert - or at least someone dedicated to learning from experts and driving the integrated flow of marketing data - is essential to any B2C or B2B company’s growth.  Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-61 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.To view/listen to the full original podcast with Kelly Jo and Sol, visit: https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-37  

In this episode of Ventures, we pull a clip from Episode 33 with Bill Murphy (https://www.linkedin.com/in/williamwmurphy/) and Sol Cates (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sol-cates-649736/) to discuss how entrepreneurs should be aware of their rose-colored glasses when approaching a market. It’s not easy to face the brutal facts about what customers need and will pay money for, but the process of asking the right questions and making decisions with an appropriate amount of data is critical. Visit https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-60 for detailed notes and links to resources (videos, articles, etc…) mentioned. You can watch this episode via video here.To view/listen to the full original podcast with Bill and Sol, visit: https://satchel.works/@wclittle/ventures-episode-33