A Product Market Fit Show | Startup Podcast for Founders

They say the best founders can walk through walls. Well, nothing can stop Nabeil. For the first two years, Nabeil and his team worked out of his house. His entire house, except for his bedroom, was an office. He would nap while changes were loaded to production only to wake up 2 hours later to test again. He got in a car crash a week before launch and didn't even set aside time to deal with i...

Many founders start companies because they want to get rich. Honestly, that’s what I did. Unfortunately, only caring about making money often leads to bad startup ideas. Focus on value instead.  Another observation... seed stage VCs are called “investors”, just like hedgefund managers or stock pickers. It’s a poor choice of words. Finding seed VCs to back you is less about finding “investors” and...

To find product-market fit you need to deliver clear and exceptional customer value. The story of Applyboard shows you exactly what that looks like. Martin changed the lives of thousands of students who he helped study abroad. He impacted not just them but their entire families. In the meantime, he delivered 10x ROI to schools: for every $1,000 they paid Applyboard they made $10,000+ on tuition. ...

Two observations from the Loopio episode: 1. When you're working on your first startup, everything is hard. It's natural to think that the second time around will be much easier. It's not! 0 to 1 is always hard. 2. Most VCs will tell you that you need a really big addressable market. Yet many successful founders started off without worrying about market size at all. Early on, market...

Starting your second startup should be much easier, right? Well, yes and no.  Jafar was the founder and Chief Revenue Officer of Loopio, which went on to raise $200M+ and land thousands of customers.  He left to start Barley. This is the story of how he decided to leave, and what it was like to start over a second time. On the one hand, some things, like fundraising, are much easier. On the other...

Before the pandemic, there were 24 employees at Certn (Or Certonians, as they're called). After the pandemic, there were 500. That's 20x growth in just two years. That only happens for one reason...  insane product-market fit. This is the story of how Certn got there. Andrew (CEO) walks us through his five-step process to find product-market fit. He used that in the early days of Certn t...

Bootstrapping isn't sexy. At least not at first. As they say, it's not greed that runs the world but envy. And when your founder friend raises $10M, it's hard not to want it too.  But 10 years later, when you're running a $100M+ per year bootstrapped business, all of a sudden things aren't looking too bad. No runway to worry about. No pressure to sell. When you bootstrap a...

What's the most important asset of any startup? It's easy. The talent. The software you build is not defensible. It can be replicated. The team you build is what's special. And the culture you develop is what's unique. In this episode, Rob shares some incredible advice from his days at Uber and as the CEO of Float on how to build a high-performing team. He talks about hiring A+...

Wealthsimple is arguably the hottest private startup in Canada, with over 3M users and a valuation of over US$4B. In this episode, Mike (CEO) shares stories he’s never shared before. He goes deep into how he came up with the original idea, launched the product, and got early traction. From getting rejected by YC, to running around Toronto hosting Lunch & Learns, and calling every single one of...

When you launch a product and no one buys it, the decision is rather simple. You kill the product. At the very least, you make some serious changes to it.  What happens when you do real customer discovery, launch a product that solves a pain point, and get some traction, but can't really seem to take off? What happens when your product is generating revenue, but true product-market-fit still...

There's nothing quite like going from 0 to an 8-figure+ acquisition, especially on your first startup. And 100% bootstrapped! Aydin, the founder of Fluidware and now founder of Fellow, shares the story of his humble beginnings as a Jr Engineer, to launching a startup that would compete with SurveyMonkey and ultimately join their ranks.  Notably, Aydin never raised money at Fluidware. While it...

Customer discovery is easy, right? You just call up a dozen or so potential customers, ask them a bunch of questions, and you're done. It seems absurd but that's what a lot of founders do. No one becomes a founder because they like to research; they become founders because they like to build. But building too early often comes at the cost of building the wrong thing. Phil and his team at...

You've built a startup from nothing. You've set up a corporation, built a product, had customers, raised some funding, and maybe even had an exit. The entire time you're thinking to yourself, "Wow, next time it'll be so much easier!". That's what Mike thought. He built TopHat from nothing to 500 FTEs. In early 2020, he raised US$130M and exited the company. He ha...

Finding product market fit is rarely a straight line. Many founders zig and zag through different iterations of their product, different target markets and competitive positioning until they find true product market fit.  It was no different for Hongwei, the CEO and Founder of MappedIn. He went from building indoor maps for malls, to getting an investment on Dragon's Den, to finally building...

Every founder knows before you launch, you have to build an MVP. They also know that to build an MVP, you should do customer discovery. But few understand how to properly do customer discovery.  Before startup mode, there's research mode. And most founders don't do it right. Failure to do so is why most founders end up solving fake problems. If you want to avoid the fake problem trap, yo...

If you're selling to businesses, you already know... before you publicly launch your product, you'll have to go through a private beta.  But beta programs are not all made equal. Many founders go through the motion but get very little out of it. Others, like Jack (the founder/CEO of Clio, a $1.5B start-up) leverage it to get the right customers, helpful feedback, and a successful launch....

Raising money seems really easy when you're reading Techcrunch. Then you go out and try to do it and all of a sudden it seems impossible. Especially when you're new to the startup world and know no one. That's exactly what it was like when Aman, the founder/CEO of Procurify, raised his first round. He describes in vivid details how he flew to San Francisco, slept on the floor of a s...

Before startup mode, there’s research mode.  Many startup stories sound like happy accidents, where founders stumble upon an amazing idea more by chance than by strategy. The reality is the best founders have a deep understanding of the problem they’re solving. They are experts in their industries. They make sure not to invest time and resources into solving fake problems. And they achieve that th...

There are two types of startups: those that sell into existing markets and those that create new markets.  There are ups and downs to both. Selling into an existing market means you have a clear idea of customer needs and market size. It also means you have lots of competition. Creating a new market tends to cost a lot of money and the upside is uncertain. But you get to define the market and pote...

The standard advice is you need to first generate your own demand, and only then look for partnerships to accelerate your business. Another piece of standard advice is you should probably raise a small round  early on to hire key employees. The last piece of advice is that if you're a business founder, you probably should get a technical co-founder. Laura chose to do exactly the opposite. And...

You've launched a startup. Your excitement turns to anxiety as it becomes clear things aren't working out. Some customers are buying but not nearly enough. They like your product, but they don't love it. You realize you don't have product-market fit and are unlikely to get it. You'll need to change things up. You'll need to pivot. It's a painful process, but pivo...

You have a startup idea. You tell 10 friends and they tell you it's awesome.  What does that prove? Unfortunately, not much.  Validating your idea requires you to go outside your building and talk to real customers. Not only that, real validation means having customers pay for your product. But how do you do that without having to build something first? Find out from Eran, the CEO of Thriver...

Getting started with a consumer product is HARD.  Unlike selling to businesses, you can't just grind it out with cold calling. You'll need to figure out how to get noticed and drive traffic to your site.  And getting media attention is one of the best ways to do it. Andrew is the founder of Borrowell, a startup with millions of users. When he launched he was featured in dozens of publica...

You want to become an entrepreneur. But you're stuck at level 1. How do I come up with an idea? It's not easy. And there's no silver bullet. Matt, the founder of Assent. has built three successful startups: NoNotes, Assent Compliance, and Millions. In this episode, he shares the stories of how he came up with each one.  There's no playbook for how to come up with a billion-doll...

Building a product is the easy part. With the right resources, you can build just about anything. But once you've done that, how do you launch it? How do you get people to know your product even exists? And how do you do it on a tight budget? Jay, the founder of Bold Commerce, has launched dozens of succesful e-commerce products. In this episode, he shares the detailed story of how he launche...