The Startup Operator

Mr. Snehil Khanor is a serial tech entrepreneur who has founded startups from early in his career and is currently the Co-Founder & CEO of TrulyMadly. He believes in creating sustainable business practices or as he likes to call it ‘Frugile Methodology’ (Frugal+Agile) for startups. In this episode he spoke about his process of going from Idea to Product to Company and his furgile Methodology, how online dating has changed and more in his interview with Roshan Cariappa.

Key Highlights:

(00:00) Introduction

(01:03) Going from Idea to Product to Company

(02:56) Building a profitable and sustainable startup

(06:16) Snehil's Frugile Methodology for Growth

(08:26) Growth v/s Profitability

(12:48) Doing the 0-1 journey

(14:43) Evolution of Online Dating

(20:26) Challenges and Opportunities of building in a competitive space

(22:39) Validating and building for scale

(26:53) Decoding the match making model

(31:52) User Acquisition

(33:33) User retention and monetization

(35:08) Changes in user behaviour post covid

(37:55) High level challenges Snehil is solving now

(39:31) Advantages of being an investor and a founder

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Connect with Snehil:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/snehilkhanor/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/snehilkhanor

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

​Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperatorStartup​​

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If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Welcome to another episode of The Startup Operator Roundup, where Roshan Cariappa and Gunjan Saha discuss - 

Sanket is the CEO of InVideo, an online content creation tool. Sanket shah is also a serial entrepreneur and has co-founded other startups like MassBlurb and Visify Books. In this episode he spoke about going from Idea to product to company, building creator tools and the nuances of building an online creator tool and more!

Key Highlights: 

(00:00) Introduction

(01:08) Lessons from starting multiple companies

(02:21) Mistakes in hiring

(04:44) Hiring people outside your domain

(06:21) What skills don't necessarily translate to success 

(10:49) Going from Idea to product to company 

(15:18) What changes with Experience

(18:31) Getting to PMF and scaling further

(20:33) Thoughts about the Creator economy

(22:56) Nuances of Building an online creator tool

(26:00) InVideo's Primary Use Cases

(27:17) Building and engaging a community

(28:57) Building creator tools

(31:47) Challenges with video editing online

(33:08) Learnings about Monetization 

(35:25) High Level Challenges as a founder

(41:08) InVideo's future plans

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Connect with Sanket:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sanketsh/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/sanket_invideo

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

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If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Adith is the founding partner at Gemba Capital and has made seed investments in several startups. In this episode Adith and Roshan talk about

the Dos and Don'ts of startup Investing, Evolution of founders in India and more. 

Key Highlights:

00:00 Introduction

01:33 Decoding the current fundraising frenzy

03:29 Evolution of startup investing and the Impact of the Pandemic

05:19 Dos and Don'ts of startup Investing

08:46 Building dealflow

13:26 Options for passive investors

14:33 Principles for Investing 

17:52 Easing regulations to encourage startup investments 

22:44 Adith's Investment thesis

29:03 Evolution of founders in India

34:26 Trends in D2C space

40:05 Fintech and Insurtech

46:30 Dos and Don'ts of picking a partner/fund

50:54 Optimism for the future 

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Connect with Aniket:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aniket-deb-a2859946/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/aniketdeb

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

​Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperatorStartup​​

-------------------------------------

If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Welcome to another episode of The Startup Operator Roundup, where Roshan Cariappa and Gunjan Saha discuss - 

Aniket is the Co-Founder and CEO of Bizongo, a company dealing with the Packaging industry. Prior to founding Bizongo, he was business intelligence manager at housing.com. In this episode Aniket spoke about his journey of founding Bizongo, finding product market fit and more in his interview with Roshan Cariappa.

Key Highlights:

00:00 Introduction

01:07 Founding Journey of Bizongo

03:54 Principles to Zero in on 1 Problem to Solve

05:28 Finding Product Market Fit

07:12 Deciding to Pivot 

08:50 A Peek into the Backend Process of Packaging

11:16 Managing Supply Chains

12:20 Nuances of building a connected platform

14:17 What is Bizongo?

15:22 Organization Structure at Bizongo

16:58 Learning from working with SMBs

18:05 Focussing on Profitability 

19:36 High level challenges at Bizongo

20:42 Changes and Challenges at scale

21:48 Bizongo's future plans

23:25 Learnings from operating through covid

25:03 Closing Remarks

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Connect with Aniket:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aniket-deb-a2859946/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/aniketdeb

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

​Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperatorStartup​​

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If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Tamanna and Tarun are both Serial entrepreneurs coming from a background in Finance. They first co-founded Baby Destination, a community of 1.3Mn mothers whoa advice and support each other and on everything about babies. They later co-founded Convosight, the world's first community marketing and management platform!. In this episode they spoke about how to build and grow communities, certain dos and don'ts and more in their conversation with Roshan Cariappa. 

Key Highlights:

00:00 Introduction

01:15 Tamanna & Tarun's Journies so far

03:42 Learnings from a versatile career

08:35 Building and growing a community : 101

17:05 Seeding conversations to evangelise a community

22:20 Dos and Don'ts with early adopters of the Community

26:28 Drafting Guildines for a community

29:00 Platform specific nuances to build a community

32:51 Building a community indepent of platforms

37:49 Dos and Don'ts to Monetize Communities

43:23 Going from Idea to Product to Company for Convosight

49:10 Finding Product Market Fit

55:01 Setting up Customer Acquisition 

01:01:02 Evolution of Tech Stack for Creator Economy 

01:08:14 Closing Remarks

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Connect with Tamanna: 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/DhamijaTamanna

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tamannadhamija/

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Connect with Tarun: 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/tdhamija

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarun-dhamija-cfa-b86a912D

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

​Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperatorStartup​​

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If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Welcome to another episode of The Startup Operator Roundup, where Roshan Cariappa and Gunjan Saha discuss - 

Abhishek and Saurabh are the co-founders of Plum, an insurtech startup aiming to transform the healthcare experience. Prior to founding Plum, Abhishek held the position of CPO at Hypertrack and Saurabh was the product head at Freshworks. In this episode, they spoke about getting into insurance as product guys, designing use journeys and more in their interview with Roshan Cariappa.

Key Highlights

00:00 Introduction

01:26 Getting started in Insurance 

08:12 Identifying solvable problems

14:20 Designing user journeys

17:54 Designing for new users

22:11 Aligning stakeholders priorities

25:41 Partnerships in the ecosystem

28:56 Plum's Ideal Customer

31:14 Ongoing disruption in Insurance 2

33:28 Tailwinds in National Health Stack

39:04 Nuances of building in the Insurance space 3

43:04 High Level Challenges at Plum

45:53 Plum's Future plan

47:35 Closing Remarks

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Connect with Abhishek:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhishek24/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/thesanerguy

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Connect with Saurabh:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saurabhplum/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/tanish2k

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

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If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!

Ajey is a serial entrepreneur who has co-founded several startups over the course of his 25 year career and is currently an operating partner at Sequoia. In this episode he spoke about his journey so far, balancing speed versus quality and more in his interview with Roshan Cariappa and Augustus D'Souza. 

Key highlights:

00:00 Introduction

02:07 Ajey's Journey So far

07:13 High level challenges

16:45 Principles for build v/s buy

23:24 How does visibility factor into the Build v/s Buy decision

26:47 Balancing quality and speed

31:09 Refactoring and technical debt 

35:07 Microservices vs Monoliths

40:39 Advice on hiring CTOs

43:43 Downsides of Job Hopping

46:18 Prioritising and building hiring skillset

51:22 Key skills to transition to an Engineering Leader

53:42 What makes a great engineer?

57:00 Closing Remarks

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Connect with Ajey:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajeygore/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/AjeyGore

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Connect with Us: 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupoperator

​Twitter: https://twitter.com/OperatorStartup​​

-------------------------------------

If you liked this episode, let us know by hitting the like button and share with your friends and family. Please also remember to subscribe to our channel and switch on the notifications to never miss an episode!