Mike Rome’s Post

Vickie Peng is a product mastermind like no other. 📸 SMB ads from $200M ➡️ $1BN+ @ Instagram 👗 Scaled Polyvore to $200M acquisition by Yahoo! 💰 Product Partner & Co-Creator of the Arc immersion program at Sequoia  My 5 key takeaways 👇 1. Biggest Lesson Scaling Instagram's SMB Ads to $1BN Always ask “What problem are we trying to solve?” We focused on acquisitions first, but retention was terrible. If we didn’t fix early we would’ve run out of advertisers. 2. How Pre-Product Market Fit Should Set Their North Star Metric Pick a number that represents customer happiness in your product. Buttons, dashboards, images… It should suggest that the user is finding value out of it. 3. Why The Best Product People Build Less Product You will always overestimate the amount you need to build to learn. The goal of building is to move an impact metric or learn something about it. Both of those things require way less building than people think. 4. The Delta4 Framework for Competing Against Incumbents  Every business service has a rating of 1-10. Compare your startup’s rating to an incumbent. You need to be at least 4 points higher to compete. 5. Biggest Product Hiring Mistake to Avoid  There are 3 layers to product: - Vision - Strategy - Execution Taking over vision & strategy too early can cause tensions. Lot of founders think they’re ready to give them up but they’re actually not. (links in comments) #founder #funding #business #investing #vc #venturecapital #entrepreneur #startup #seed #funding #product #sequoiacapital #productstrategy

Hitting the $1M ARR is HARD You may have thought: • It needs a huge team • Requires massive marketing expenses • Seems only achievable for VC-backed startups But it's actually rather simple: Lean and efficient teams can outperform Bootstrapped startups can also aim for $1M ARR Smart, organic marketing can bring surprising results Achieving $1M ARR isn't hard, but we've been conditioned to think it is. "𝘚𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴. 𝘏𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴. 𝘐𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘥𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘦 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘧𝘶𝘭." - Albert Schweitzer So, what’s your strategy to hit $1M ARR this year? PS. Repost ♻️ to help 1 founder / CEO.

We were delighted to have Martins Bratuskins, founder of Monetizr, as our guest speaker in the Smart Startup class at Riga Business School (via Zoom). Mārtiņš shared his inspiring journey from civil engineering to founding his successful mobile advertising platform. Mārtiņš discussed his background in civil engineering and how his interest in building and problem-solving led him to the startup world. Despite initial failures, his perseverance in hackathons and networking events fueled his entrepreneurial spirit. He remarked, "I knew I liked building stuff, but I wasn't sure if civil engineering was how I wanted to live my life. Startups allowed me to create and innovate in ways I hadn't imagined." He elaborated on the early days of Monetizr, including the struggles of starting a company in a foreign market and the significance of joining an accelerator program. "Our goal was to make gaming a viable media channel for big brands, just like TV or Facebook," he explained. "Monetizr aims to bridge the gap between consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands and gaming." Key Takeaways: • Mārtiņš emphasized the importance of focus, sharing that saying no to opportunities that don’t align with the core mission is crucial for a startup's success. "The biggest mistake we made was saying yes to too many things. Focus is about saying no to the distractions," he advised. • He highlighted that success requires relentless hard work, often involving long hours and a willingness to overcome numerous obstacles. "We often found ourselves working past midnight, drawing on whiteboards and making endless cups of coffee. Hard work is non-negotiable in the startup world." • Building and maintaining relationships is vital. Following up on advice and showing gratitude can turn mentors into angel investors and advisors. "Relationships are everything. It's about following up, showing how their advice helped, and building genuine connections." • Adapting and Learning: Mārtiņš shared that adapting based on customer feedback, rather than investor feedback, helps in staying true to the company’s vision and solving real problems. "Listening to customers over investors was a hard lesson we learned. It's the customers who use your product, after all." • In closing, Mārtiņš reflected on how Monetizr's journey, which began in Cincinnati, led to securing Procter & Gamble as a client. "It's funny how life works. We started in Cincinnati because it was the only place that accepted us, and now our biggest client, P&G, is based there. It's about making your own luck." We extend our heartfelt thanks to Mārtiņš for sharing his valuable insights and experience. As Mārtiņš puts it, "I think success in startups is about making the best out of what you have and being open to where the journey takes you." Special thanks to Dagnija Sedleniece for suggesting Mārtiņš as a speaker. #SmartStartups #RigaBusinessSchool #Monetizr #Entrepreneurship #StartupJourney #GuestSpeaker

It’s easy to critique startups and companies as an armchair marketer. “This copy needs to change.” “That color looks off.” However, the real marketing work starts with getting your product in front of customers. A great product and messaging are moot if no one sees them. That’s why distribution channels are so important. This enables the 2 biggest marketing levers: Finding product-market fit and go to market. I’ve seen this firsthand as a founding PMM at 4 startups (20, 50, 100, 200 person companies). Even then, I’m not as early in the marketing process as the founders who literally started from ZERO. That’s why I was excited to chat with CEO and founder Rakesh Goyal to learn more about how he found product-market fit and is going to market with Velt (YC W22). We chatted about: 🚀 Journey from Google to YC 🔍 Finding product-market fit 💰 Getting the first paying customers 🎯 Go-to-market strategy 💡 Founder advice Check out the full interview here: https://lnkd.in/g9eHhnrA #startup #marketing #yc #gtm #pmf

9 Lessons I learnt while making $5000 from LaunchPedia 🥳 → It's not wrong to pivot. It's better than giving up. → Build multiple small bets, until you know what works. → Plan monetization whenever you're building a new product → Build products that make money, especially when your savings are on line → Don't overlook email marketing. Collect email addresses, build funnels and setup email sequences from day 1 → Don’t delay your launch. Ship fast, validate the idea, get feedback, and iterate. → Leverage side project marketing. Build free tools and directory sites to increase your distribution and upsell your paid products. → Validate the idea using short term distribution strategies. Ex: Product Hunt launch, listing on directories, & Ads. → You don't need to build fancy products, you can also build info products as long as it is helping people. #marketing #startup #startups #producthunt

For startups struggling to capture the attention of potential customers, connect with them and build credibility in today's fast-paced business world, Disney's marketing can teach you a few valuable lessons. Ready to join this rollercoaster ride? https://bit.ly/42TYZOE

I have been on an entrepreneurial journey for the past few months, developing innovative solutions for a market I know well in advertising with tvbeat, and for a new industry I'm exploring with TruckPay, a fleet and scale management platform. While creating new solutions comes with its challenges, I've been inspired by several industry friends and colleagues who have ventured into entirely different fields. These individuals have undoubtedly applied their advertising industry knowledge but have also taken significant personal and professional risks. I'd like to highlight a few who have particularly motivated me: Amy Raymond Cohn: Amy and I worked together at The Walt Disney Company.  With her company Joydays, Amy has shown incredible passion and purpose in her new venture. Laurel Orley: Laurel, whom I knew from her time at Mindshare, has built an impressive brand as the founder of Daily Crunch and has become a great mentor for others, sharing her insights generously. Brian Lee: Brian and I worked together at AOL.  His company Scratch Food Group is off to a great start.  His vision and early progress in his new venture are truly inspiring. Eric Rogers: Eric, also an AOL colleague, has successfully launched LEVIA and Second Act Cannabis businesses. It's remarkable to see him first develop a product and then transform his expertise into a consultancy to help others do the same. Jake Lewis: Jake and I worked together at The Walt Disney Company.   With his Baltimore North food truck, Jake has brought creativity and success to his new culinary endeavor. Each of them has relied on a strong support network to navigate the inevitable challenges and help them persevere to find success. In these times of industry changes, job eliminations, and technological advancements creating uncertainty, I encourage you to look around at your network of friends and colleagues for inspiration and motivation. While there are many more examples, these five individuals have significantly inspired and motivated me.

I’m the CEO of a $100 million business. But I’ve tried (and failed) to build 20+ startups before. Here are 10 pieces of brutally honest advice after two decades of entrepreneurship: 1/ Leverage your Zone of Influence Your Zone of Influence is the intersection between your existing knowledge, skills, and network. To find yours, ask yourself: • What do I get paid for in my day job? • Who do I have access to in my network? • What hobbies have people commented positively on? You likely have $100,000+ worth of knowledge, skills, and experience RIGHT NOW that others would pay for. 2/ Focus on ONE goal One of the biggest lessons I learned from working directly under Mark Zuckerberg was this: Pick ONE goal… then focus relentlessly on reaching it. Mark’s goal was 1 billion users on Facebook. Every idea we’d bring, he’d always ask, “Does this help user growth or not?” I remember pitching him about doing monetization. He grabbed a marker and wrote “GROWTH” on the whiteboard. You don’t grow fast by doing many things, but by doing ONE thing extremely well. 3/ The best marketing is a great product When I was Director of Marketing at Mint, we grew from 0 to 1 million users in 6 months. We tested many marketing strategies - PR, blogs, influencer marketing, affiliate programs, etc. But ultimately, the best marketing is a great product. Marketing was easy because we had a product that customers LOVED, not liked. First-time entrepreneurs focus on customer acquisition. Second-time entrepreneurs focus on customer retention. 4/ Buyers buy again When I ran my conference business (CommunityNext), I didn't know how to find sponsors. So I looked at who was sponsoring OTHER conferences and reached out to them. Instead of trying to find NEW customers - find the ones who are already spending money. 5/ The industry you pick matters When we started AppSumo, there were ~10 SaaS tools. Now, there are 10,000+. I’ve watched super hard-working people spend years working on ideas in shrinking markets with little to show for it. WHAT you work on matters more than HOW hard you work. A growing market makes business easy. A shrinking market makes business hard. 6/ Work backward from your lifestyle In my 20s, I was obsessed with getting rich and proving Facebook wrong for firing me. But when I became a millionaire... I still found myself chasing money for the sake of money. Sometimes I still do. Far too often, I see entrepreneurs start a business for freedom but get sucked into their business and end up working MORE than if they just stuck with their day job. Don’t trade your 9-5 for a 5-9. 7/ Practice Leadership The advice I’d give my younger self is to practice leadership. For example, start by hiring a cleaner. You learn how to agree on the money, make sure they’re responsible, and check in on them regularly. Follow Noah Kagan for more content like this! Continued in the comments... 👇👇

I met someone who had raised tons of capital, but one issue wrecked their startup. They haven’t been able to recover yet! They had all that they needed to run their startup -Millions of dollars of funds -A brilliant team -Scalable tech Everything was in place. But they couldn't manage their cost of acquisition! They relied entirely on Google and FB ads for their leads. If you rely solely on paid ads, you're asking for trouble Because very soon, Google and FB will eat your lunch Costs will go up, and reach will go down Instead, -Invest in your organic online presence -Build multiple channels for lead-gen -Talk about what you do -Build your brand Don't let Google and Facebook kill your startup! What other minute things affect businesses massively, in your opinion?

New year, new goal = share my journey as a founder more authentically online. If you know me well, you know I love a challenge. Like most of us, I don't post much because a) I find it slightly terrifying and b) it's not a muscle that I exercise often. Something I've learned from the best founders - they are never afraid to invest in hiring experts to keep them ACCOUNTABLE to their process + goals. Personally, I've hired an exec coach, a therapist, even a triathlon coach. I could never have completed my first Ironman in 2022 without my coach Ryan Dreyer guiding me through the unknowns + the random fear, uncertainty, and doubt along the way. What I took away from that was that when I'm afraid: a) it's normal and b) I need a "coach" to guide me to my destination. So - I hired a writing coach last week to get my thoughts (learnings, ideas, stories, etc.) down on paper. I'll be sharing more on the following 3 topics: 1) DTC / Marketplaces: What I've learned scaling and selling StackCommerce from $0-100m profitably over the course of a decade. There's still a lot that I haven't shared about what I've learned & experienced during that time - especially around mindset, bootstrapping, and partnership-led growth. 2) Early-stage Venture: Over the past 15 months, my fund (OpenSky Ventures) has invested in 15 companies in commerce. Prior to that, I angel invested in 30+ companies and will share what worked and what didn't. I'll talk about is what we look for in companies and what the current market is like for brands + SaaS co's looking to raise now. 3) B2B SaaS in Commerce. We launched Onward publicly only a few months back and are already well into 7-figures ARR completely bootstrapped. I'll share more on why Onward and how I'm doing it differently this time around. For now, I'll just state - it's completely different and I couldn't be more thrilled about it. If those topics sound interesting to you, follow me here. I'll be posting ~4-5x per week. PS: What topics would you want to see me cover? Let me know in the comments and I'll see what I can draft a post about.