I’m excited to have another one of our portfolio company founders on this episode of Panic. Oana is the founder and CEO of Sequel.io, which allows organizations of all sizes to host live events and webinars right on their own website. It’s a no-code solution that lets marketers turn live video into leads by embedding events on their own websites. Coming from a marketing background at HP, Oana launched Sequel.io shortly before the pandemic to solve her own marketing pain points. And she’s building quite a juggernaut in the live-video space. 

Part of the fun in being a seed investor is using many of the products in the portfolio early. We’ve used Sequel.io’s solutions at our first post-pandemic Palooza in 2022, and again at Palooza in 2023. As many long-term subscribers know, I’m also using the platform from our portfolio company beehiiv for my daily blog posts. You might say I’m ‘eating our own cooking’ – it’s all part of investing for profit and joy. You’ll learn a lot from this episode. Enjoy! 

Guest - Oana Manolache, Founder and CEO at Sequel.io 

howardlindzon.com, sequel.io 

Twitter: @howardlindzon, @Omanolache, @sequel_io, @PanicwFriends, @knutjensen 

linkedin.com/in/oana-m-manolache/

#fintech #invest #investment #venturecapital #stockmarket #finance 

Show Notes: 

Introduction (00:32)

Welcome Oana (08:44)

Origin of Sequel (09:24)

Importance of staying on platform (12:06)

Building through the pandemic (13:57)

Putting yourself in the customer's shoes (17:58)

Perfect size company for Sequel (19:35)

Game Changer series (20:56)

Building AI with the customer in mind (22:55)

Building a culture with a remote sales team (24:31)

Dealing with large competitors (26:19)

Challenges to remote work (28:09)

The Bay Area and startup scene worldwide (29:58)

Balancing digital and physical (32:37)

Working with Social Leverage (33:26)

Leading with Content (35:01)

Wrapping up (36:27)

Closing thoughts (36:58)