20VC: Hubspot Co-Founder Dharmesh Shah on The 3 Risks All Startups Face, Angel Investing Rules; No Founder Meetings and No Due Diligence, SMB vs Enterprise; Lessons on Pricing, Distribution and Why You Should Resist Going Enterprise

20VC: Hubspot Co-Founder Dharmesh Shah on The 3 Risks All Startups Face, Angel Investing Rules; No Founder Meetings and No Due Diligence, SMB vs Enterprise; Lessons on Pricing, Distribution and Why You Should Resist Going Enterprise

Dharmesh Shah is the Founder and CTO @ Hubspot, a full CRM platform with marketing, sales, service, and CMS software. Dharmesh started Hubspot in 2006 and today it is a publicly-traded company (NYSE: HUBS) with over 3,500+ people and a market capitalization of $16.9 billion. Prior to founding HubSpot, Dharmesh founded Pyramid Digital Solutions, which he bootstrapped with less than $10,000 and after 11 years of CEOship, Dharmesh helped the company get acquired in 2005 by SunGard Business Systems. In addition to co-authoring "Inbound Marketing" Dharmesh founded and writes for OnStartups.com -- a top-ranking startup blog and community with more than 1,000,000 members. Finally, if all of this was not enough, he is an angel investor in over 90 startups, including Coinbase, AngelList, Gusto, Okta and many more. and a frequent speaker on startups, growth, and the business of technology.

In Today's Episode with Dharmesh Shah We Discuss:

1.) The Founding of Hubspot:

  • How did Dharmesh's wife help Dharmesh find his co-founder in Brian?
  • What about SMB did both Dharmesh and Brian find a shared passion for?
  • What is the single biggest mistake Dharmesh made in the early days of Hubspot?

2.) The Culture Code:

  • What is Dharmesh's single biggest advice to founders when it comes to culture?
  • What does Dharmesh mean when he says "you have to treat culture like a product"?
  • What does Dharmesh mean when he says he looks for a "low ego to accomplishment ratio"? How does he test for this when hiring new hires?
  • How do the best people approach both responsibility and accountability? How does this show in their work and behaviour?

3.) The 3 Kinds of Risk in Startups:

  • What does Dharmesh believe are the 3 core risks all startups face in the early days?
  • How does Dharmesh advise founders when it comes to "testing for a market"? What is the right way to do customer discovery? What are the biggest mistakes founders make in the discovery process?
  • How does Dharmesh advise founders on when to release their second product? What is the right framework for this decision? Where do so many founders make mistakes here?
  • How does Dharmesh approach market timing risk? What have been his biggest lessons here?

4.) SMB vs Enterprise:

  • Why does Dharmesh believe that SMB is the single best market for founders to choose?
  • What are the single biggest challenges with enterprise? How do the long sales cycles and contracts in enterprise hide both customer satisfaction and prevent product development?
  • What are some of Dharmesh's biggest lessons on pricing? Does Dharmesh agree you should always "raise your prices"?
  • How does Dharmesh advise founders on when is the right time to go into enterprise from SMB?
  • What are the single biggest changes founders need to know when making the move from SMB to enterprise?

5.) Angel Investing 101:

  • What are Dharmesh's rules when it comes to angel investing?
  • What have been some of Dharmesh's biggest lessons from analysing thousands of emails to founders pre-investing? What are the biggest signs in emails of future founder success?
  • Why does Dharmesh not have calls with founders before investing?
  • What are some of the biggest mistakes Dharmesh has made when angel investing?

Items Mentioned in Today's Episode with Dharmesh Shah:

The Hubspot Culture Code

Dharmesh's Favourite Book: Les Miserables

Episoder(1387)

20 VC 003: Bob Ghoorah on Startups, The Pitch and Uber

20 VC 003: Bob Ghoorah on Startups, The Pitch and Uber

On today's episode I am thrilled to welcome Bob Ghoorah, Managing Director at Columubus Nova Technology Partners. Bob has experienced both sides of the table having been an early employee at three technology companies in Silicon Valley; LoudCloud (Nasdaq: LDCL), Opsware (Nasdaq: OPSW) and Ning, a privately-held software platform (sold to Glam Media in 2011). In this episode we find out: The benefits of having a legal knowledge in the Startup community. What characteristics make the best entrepreneurs? Who does Bob think of, when the word 'success' is mentioned and why? Where Bob sees the future of Uber? What aspects of a Startup are essential in order to obtain VC funding? Is it important for Startups to be located in Silicon Valley? What books Bob woulg give to an aspring entrepreneur and startup founder? What advice Bob would give to anyone looking to get into the Venture Capital Industry? Finally, we head to the quick fire round. Here, we get Bob's immediate reactions to the latests tech topics including tech bubble, company valuations and the first trillion dollar company. For all the resources mentioned in todays show head over to The Twenty Minute VC.

13 Jan 201522min

20 VC 002: How to become a VC with Kris Jones

20 VC 002: How to become a VC with Kris Jones

In this session of The Twenty Minute VC, I'm so excited to have the opportunity to interview Kris Jones. Kris has enjoyed an amazing career in the technology industry, founding PepperJam, an internet marketing agency in 1999 and later selling it to Ebay in April of 2010. More recently, Kris has made his transition into the Venture Capital Industry through the founding of an early stage technology investment fund, KBJ Capital, which includes portfolio companies Highlighter.com, French Girls App, ReferLocal.com, LSEO.com and many more incredible companies. In this session you'll learn: Why Kris decided to make the transition from the Startup ecosystem to the world of Venture Capital. How did it feel for Kris, selling his company to Ebay? What was the most important lesson Kris learnt in the journey from having the idea for PepperJam to being acquired by Ebay? What is the key characteristic a Founder must have? What can an individual do to get employed in the Venture Capital industry. Kris is also a prolific writer here are some of his articles, you can check out! Forbes: 15 Steps to Set Your Company Up for a Successful M&A Mashable: 9 Ways Social Media Marketing Will Change in 2014 Citibank: How to Impress a Potential Investor

13 Jan 201522min

20 VC 001: Guy Kawasaki of Apple, Motorola and AllTop.com

20 VC 001: Guy Kawasaki of Apple, Motorola and AllTop.com

Welcome to the 1st episode of The Twenty Minute VC, on today's show we have Guy Kawasaki, Guy is the Founding Partner of Garage Technology Ventures, a seed & early stage venture capital fund investing in extraordinary entrepreneurs with unique technologies. Previously, he was Chief Evangelist of Apple Inc and an advisor to the Motorala Business Unit of Google. Guy is also the author of many best selling books including the recent best seller, The Art of Social Media: Power Tips for Power Users. In this episode we delve into: Why Guy made the transition into the VC industry? What is the most important aspect for a startup to have? What drives Guy insane about startup founders today? What books Guy gives to aspiring entrepreneurs? What software & apps Guy cannot live without? We then finish on a quick fire round where we discover Guy's thoughts on the future of Amazon, Tesla and whether we really are in the midst of a tech bubble. All of the products mentioned in todays show can be found at www.thetwentyminutevc.com If you love the show, please do leave a review on the iTunes store and don't forget to subscribe!

13 Jan 201519min

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