Startup Stories - Mixergy

By Andrew WarnerSociety & Culture Business Education

Startup Stories - Mixergy episodes

April 11, 2018 #1583 How VinSolutions was built and sold to Autotrader for $150,000,000
Matt Watson is the founder of Stackify which helps developers improve their applications.
The company he started before that was called VinSolutions. They offered a collection of software for auto resellers.
He sold it to Autotrader and there were a bunch of different rumors about what the price of the sale was. Biz Journal said he sold that company for nearly $135 million. It ended up being $150 million.
I want to find out how he did it.
Matt Watson is the founder of Stackify which helps developers improve their applications.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
59 min
April 09, 2018 #1582 David took over PaleoHacks
He’s not the founder. He’s not super-comfortable being the front guy.
So how did David Sinick take over PaleoHacks?
(And why was he so anxious about this interview?)
David Sinick runs PaleoHacks, a place that allows you to connect with others who are on the journey to learn how to live, eat, and move better.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
1 hr 11 min
April 06, 2018 #1581 How to bootstrap a company while fully employed
I’m excited to have today’s guest because he’s the kind of person who’s been on all those forums that I’ve been on forever, building his company quietly and making it into something really big. He did it without ever having that big TechCrunch moment where they say, “Look at me, I raised so much money.”
In fact, for a long time, I’m going to say that TechCrunch would not want to cover you because if you did say, “Look at me,” it would be, “Look at me. I’m working at a company while building my company on the side and look at me, I continue to work for five years at my full-time job.”
No one gets excited about that. That’s not a sexy story, but it’s definitely a Mixergy story.
Aytekin Tank is the founder of JotForm which enables you to create online forms easily. It’s super simple and very functional. We’ll talk about that in the interview.
Aytekin Tank is the founder of JotForm which enables you to create online forms easily.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
54 min
April 04, 2018 #1580 Mark Cummins couldn’t get a job at Google…so he built a search engine so good that they acquired it
Today we’ve got an entrepreneur who created a search engine and sold it to Google about 18 months later. He took some time off and in his off time he invested in some companies, learned the other side of the entrepreneurial journey, and now he is back with a brand new business.
The previous company he created was called Plink. Imagine being able to take a picture of something with your phone and then finding out more about it. That’s the technology that Google acquired and merged it with the rest of their business.
His current company is called Pointy. What they do is they plug into a company’s barcode scanner, and as a result they know what’s in the store, what’s being sold, and they allow people who are interested in buying things locally to see available around them locally.
The founder who started about those companies is Mark Cummins. I’m happy to have him here to talk about how he did it and what he learned from building it.
Mark Cummins is the founder of Pointy which? lets ?local? ?retailers put their stock online so that they can be discovered via search engines.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
1 hr 8 min
April 02, 2018 #1579 How stress affects a founder’s performance
Today’s guest hit on an interesting issue. You’ve probably felt it but most of us don’t know what to do about it.
Stress.
Jane Smorodnikova is the founder of Welltory, an app that lets you measure your stress and be more aware of what’s going on in your body so you can understand what your body is ready for each day to feel better tomorrow.
I had no idea how well the app was doing. I invited her here to find out how she got so many users and how she got them to pay so much.
Jane Smorodnikova is the founder of Welltory, an app that lets you measure your stress and be more aware of what’s going on in your body so you can understand what your body is ready for each day to feel better tomorrow.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
57 min
March 30, 2018 #1578 How to spinoff a technology from an agency (successfully)
Wait until you hear the story my guest today has to tell. I can’t believe that I didn’t know about this.
Brandon Evans is a guy who started a company and sold it. Frankly, that alone would make for an interesting interview.
But then started another company and was fired from it. That too could make its own interview. Now he’s running something else where he’s taking entrepreneurs on Ayahuasca journeys.
Brandon Evans is the founder of CrowdTap, influencer marketing that actually works and iheart, a conscious business collective.
Brandon Evans is the founder of CrowdTap, influencer marketing that actually works. He’s currently the founder of 1heart, the first startup studio focused exclusively on building conscious businesses and backing heart-centered leaders positively impacting the world.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
With Bench, you get a professional bookkeeping team to do your books for you and our simple, elegant software to review your finances. It’s everything you need to forget about your bookkeeping, without actually forgetting about your bookkeeping.
Sign up at Bench and get 20% off for your first 6 months.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
1 hr 1 min
March 28, 2018 #1577 AppDynamics from idea to a $3.7 billion company
It all started with a realization. Two, actually. Jyoti Bansal noticed that more of the software that controls our lives will be in the cloud, and that it would all eventually break.
So he decided to create a company to help the people who make software understand what was going wrong so they could fix it.
This is the story of how he turned this vision into AppDynamics and why he sold the company to Cisco.
Jyoti Bansal is the founder of AppDynamics which gives users real-time insight from your apps using Application Performance Monitoring & Management—how they’re being used, how they’re performing, where they need help.
Sponsored by
needls – needls is the easiest and most effective way to advertise on Social Media. The needls ad platform allows businesses to automatically create, target and optimize digital ads across Facebook and Instagram, and in turn, determines the perfect target audience for these ads by monitoring social media conversations in real time. Using its proprietary intent engine and AI, needls identifies buying signals within posts, tweets and status updates, then delivers ads directly to these individuals.
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
53 min
March 26, 2018 #1576 How does a proven founder find a second business?
Today’s guest noticed a problem. If you’re a web designer or app creator, you can’t see the look on users faces when they’re using your product. You can’t see if they encountered a button they don’t understand, for example.
He thought companies should be able to create a great product without having to code analytics to find out how people are using it. So he built a company to solve that problem. I want to find out how he did it in today’s interview.
Todd Olson is the founder of Pendo.io which helps product teams understand and guide users to create product experiences that customers love.
Todd Olson is the founder of Pendo.io which helps product teams understand and guide users to create product experiences that customers love.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
With Bench, you get a professional bookkeeping team to do your books for you and our simple, elegant software to review your finances. It’s everything you need to forget about your bookkeeping, without actually forgetting about your bookkeeping.
Sign up at Bench and get 20% off for your first 6 months.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
55 min
March 23, 2018 #1575 How Bubble founders are making coding obsolete
Today’s guest says that his company is going to make coding obsolete. If anything, they’re going to probably be building or teaching people how to build using his creation.
Emmanuel Straschnov is the cofounder of Bubble, a visual programming language for web and mobile applications.
We’re going to find out how he did it. Frankly, this isn’t just a vision for the future. It’s a real sustainable business today. It’s bootstrapped. It’s doing well. I invited him to talk about how well and how he got here.
Emmanuel Straschnov is the cofounder of Bubble, a visual programming language for web and mobile applications.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
59 min
March 21, 2018 #1574 Building a digital marketing agency from nothing
Today’s guest is an entrepreneur I have known for 8 years.
His name is Ross Hudgens and he’s the founder of Siege Media, a content marketing agency with a focus on SEO.
Here’s the thing that blew my mind about his story: I thought agencies could only grow so big and Siege Media has grown way beyond what I thought was possible.
We’ll find out how big in this interview.
Ross Hudgens is the founder of Siege Media, a digital marketing agency with a focus on SEO.
Sponsored by
Toptal – If you’re having trouble finding developers, Toptal is a network of elite pre-vetted software developers. You tell Toptal what you’re looking for, they search their network for the best people, they test the candidates, and then they present you with only the candidates who meet your individual needs. Once you pick someone you can start work with them the next day. They offer a no-risk trial period. Go to Toptal.com. Get the best of the best right now.
HostGator – Ready to take your website to the next level? Whether you’re a first-time blogger or an experienced web pro, HostGator has all the tools you need to create a great-looking website or online store. A wide range of options includes cloud-based web hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Founded in 2002, HostGator is the perfect web partner for business owners and individuals seeking hands-on support. Visit www.hostgator.com/mixergy to see what HostGator can do for your website.
More interviews -> https://mixergy.com/moreint
Rate this interview -> https://mixergy.com/rateint
1 hr 6 min