From $0 to $150,000,000: 21 Lessons learned Along The Way - Fall Semester 2017 - Opening Keynote Presentation - Weber State University Nye Lecture Series
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Watch/listen to the LIVE presentation while you follow along with slides here: https://youtu.be/n9rinzTzVLc This is the story of the lessons that Zach Smith and Thomas Alvord learned, over the course of the last four (4) years building their company, Funded Today, and raising over $150,000,000 USD in revenue through rewards-based crowdfunding. This presentation was first given at Weber State University's John B. Goddard School of Business in September of 2017.
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From $0 to $150,000,000: 21 Lessons learned Along The Way - Fall Semester 2017 - Opening Keynote Presentation - Weber State University Nye Lecture Series
- 1. From $0 to $150,000,000: 21 Lessons Learned Along The Way Thursday, September 7th, 2017 Zach Smith, CEO and CoFounder, Funded Today
- 2. ENTREPRENEUR
- 3. An entrepreneur is an individual who, rather than working as an employee, runs a small business and assumes all the risks and rewards of a given business venture, idea, or good or service offered for sale. The entrepreneur is commonly seen as a business leader and innovator of new ideas and business processes.
- 4. The Story of Our Journey
- 9. 21 Lessons We Learned Along The Way
- 10. Lesson #1: Entrepreneurship is in the blood (it’s not for everyone, and that’s okay)
- 11. Lesson #2: Voracious Curiosity - Be a Dream Student
- 12. Lesson #3: Find a mentor and work for a good boss
- 13. Lesson #4: Connection is Everything
- 14. Lesson #5: Just go for it! Fail fast.
- 15. Lesson #6: One failure does not yourself a failure make
- 16. Lesson #7: Be committed to success, not your idea of success
- 17. Lesson #8: Success does not indicate future success; Failure does not indicate future failure. Baubax - $9,192,055 raised Wireless Charging Apparel - $67,310 raised CANCELED
- 18. Lesson #9: Pareto’s Principle of 80/20 Works
- 19. Lesson #10: Market Size Matters
- 20. Lesson #11: The Star Principle
- 21. Lesson #12: Margins Matter
- 22. Lesson #13: Your Greatest Competition Comes From Within
- 23. Lesson #14: The grass isn't greener on the other side
- 24. Lesson #15: Perspective is a Private Experience
- 25. Lesson #16: You Build Great Wealth by Owning Businesses
- 26. Lesson #17: Entrepreneurship is Largely Salesmanship and Negotiation
- 27. Lesson #18: Don’t launch charitable for-profit ventures
- 28. Lesson #19: Your role as an entrepreneur changes over time 1. Learn how to get revenue fast 2. Grow your revenue 3. Build a team and learn to “let go” 4. Design & improve processes 5. Build new ventures / Pivot / Invest unused capital
- 30. Lesson #21: Entrepreneurship has the greatest risk/return of anything you’ll undertake. EVER!
- 31. Bonus Lesson #1: Company Culture Matters and You Must Ultimately Find Your Higher Purpose
- 32. Bonus Lesson #2: Entrepreneurs Can Shape the World When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and you're life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money. That's a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you'll never be the same again.
- 33. QUESTIONS? And HOW TO GET IN TOUCH WITH US... ● Apply For Our Services: https://www.Funded.today/get-more-pledges/ ● Learn More about Crowdfunding: https://www.Funded.Today/blog/ ● Zach Smith - CEO and CoFounder: zach@funded.today Skype: startdoingbusiness
Notes de l'éditeur
- Entrepreneurship is messy. If you want a turn-key, here’s what to do, standardized, and formalized work setting, go work for a corporate company that has been around 50+ years This presentation is going to be messy and perhaps a bit jumpy and all over the place. And that’s on purpose, as it represents an entrepreneur’s journey. Everything you do in business is sales. How you present your menu. Your website. Closing Clients. How you upsell people. Handling unpaid invoices. So much of a company is sales. Sales books talk about motivation and They really don’t help you at all. Negotiation books are the real sales books.
- You have to work VERY hard. You have to be persistent. My business partner stayed up until midnight helping put together this presentation, and he had to wake up at 3am today.
- How many books have you ordered in the past month? Learning never stops. I'm still a voracious learner. Audiobooks, Podcasts, articles, books. Autobiographies -It is NOT a rush. No opportunity is ever too good to be true and if it is, it's probably a scam. Timing is not everything and usually, "success timelines and stories" are shortened for theatrical effect anyway! ;)
- -I was fortunate to have some very great mentors and bosses. My dad - Construction and roofing growing up, teachers at Weber State (Ryan Pace), Dr. Hoffman (marketing professor), Alex Lawrence (Business advice and leadership guidance, and networking), my cousin (Josh Nyland), James Edward
- Networking is so important Meeting up with Thomas IGG deal for newsletters with Anders Scott Adamson - 80/20 Influencer Marketing
- FreeWavz story Backer Network story - We just created it and we sold it even before we were done building it Take it to market. Stop being hesitant.
- You never what is going to work; no one has the magic eight ball; you cannot divine success. We believe in Product Validation and that’s why crowdfunding is so powerful and unique. SpineGym, BeachSheetz, even Funded Today!
- (Just because you have one successful venture doesn’t make you a baller.)
- - Jordan/Curtis -Baubax Travel Jacket, Kuroi Hana, Cubiio -Even at Amazon, this is true with their AWS division
- The market size will dictate how much your company can ever possibly make. If you are getting into a $1 million industry, you aren’t ever going to make a lot of money. What if you start making your first few dollars and then you find out your market is too small? That’s a problem. Consider your macroeconomics before you even begin. Rewards-Based Crowdfunding is a $1 Billion per year marketplace and it’s not growing. That matters to us. If we keep the same market share, we’re not growing. Supragenix - Won’t ever grow past their current size unless they get into new markets. Liberty Action Center - Petition tools for non-profits is a $1 million industry OR smaller, but ELG and petition tools for the masses is hundred million dollar industry, etc.
- A star is being in an industry growing 10%+ per year and being the market leader. That’s where you want to be, that’s where you want to invest, that’s where you want to get a job if you are getting a job. Even if you’re not going to be an entrepreneur, work for a star company. More bonuses, stock options, etc.
- Every industry, and each company, has different margins. You need to know your margins, both in your particular product and business and your industry at large. Gross revenue can be deceptive. There are million dollar campaigns on Kickstarter that literally afterwards are looking to raise venture capital money to continue operating. Whereas a $30,000 campaign might have 50% margins and net $15,000 for a 30 day campaign. Your first rep, your first employee that you hire, is so likely to go and rip you off. Part of it is that they see the whole picture (Or at least what they believe is the whole picture). It might literally be the exception when they stay with you! Zuckerberg story… Don’t be the person who is going to work for a start-up and tries to rip it off. It’s straight up lousy and shady and you can have more integrity. When you’re starting your own company, get the right paperwork. I’m not saying worry about all of the formalities, but, for your first reps, your first employees, make sure your paperwork is super solid. Know that your non-compete in Utah can only be for one (1) year maximum (Legislature changed the law in 2016). Non-solication agreements are great too.
- Remarried and my new wife. So many things are so much better and some things are still the same. You don’t even know the things you should be grateful for. You don’t even know how or where the grass is greener right now, where you’re standing! Until you experience something else, you don’t even realize that was something that you should have been grateful or, or that was good. For SOME things the grass is greener. But it’s a two sided coin, a double edge sword. Any positive has accompanying negatives. You get to choose your hours, and your hours get to choose you 24/7. Money doesn’t change things Hard work, drive, and perseverance are required to continually stay on top
- Joke: The irony is that the way my business partner, Thomas Alvord and I see this one is even different! And, the same is true for everyone in my company. Assume The Positive You basically become a judge. If things grow, you become a judge. You make decisions that half the people hate, and half the people like, and sometimes NO ONE likes. There's two sides to every story. I've become more moderate. You can have a Presentation “P” that conveys your product is $X value. But you can CHANGE your presentation, and the PERCEPTION of your whole product will change. So, even though your PRODUCT might not change physically, when you PRESENT it differently, your PRODUCT “P” will change in the minds of your customers/backers. Onsen Towel - The product has SOME “intrinsic value perceived” you cannot get elsewhere. Go scramble that egg right now. “How lucky that guy is! Their margins might not be good. They had 10 people on their team and a net profit of $50K and net profit of $5K each after 8 months.”
- Lawyers & accountants make money by making partner / people leverage) Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos Half of all millionaires are self-employed or own a business. Around 80% of millionaires are college graduates.
- Everything you do in business is sales. How you present your menu. Your website. Closing Clients. How you upsell people. Handling unpaid invoices. Helping your team catch your vision. So much of a company is sales. Sales books talk about motivation and They really don’t help you at all. Negotiation books are the real sales books. Story of Curtis negotiating with us (Our reps are getting paid $10K/month or more)...”You guys taught me how to negotiate; how, don’t be frustrated when I use those skills and put them in action!” Funny joke: “Here’s another example of how perspective is a private experience!”
- Charity can’t be your crutch. It never works. Launch a venture that stands on its own, THEN bring a charitable element into it. People who launch a venture or product with the charity as the lead marketing angle likely will fail. Make the product stand on its own. Then, add that Humans are inherently selfish. Take care of their selfish interests first, by giving them a great product, and then make the buying decision even easier, by adding an element of charity. The people who do a ton for charity first made their money in for-profit ventures (Zuckerberg). Google. (Internet for third-world countries).
- Systems and Processes - The E-Myth From Day 1, we were literally making money. RooSport - Made Money FreeWavz - Made Money Got more Clients - Me and Thomas - joke about how Thomas was a lawyer and I was an accountant but we had reverse roles Zach got all of the money and Thomas paid all of the expenses (I was an accountant, after all). And, Thomas, being an attorney, probably knew he could sue me!
- (Completely poor to absolutely rich in just months) $5,000,000 at $60,000 median income means in ONE (1) year I will have NETTED more than I would have made in 83 years!
- The only way to avoid pissing people off is to do nothing important.” — Oliver Emberton Living the 9 Company Core Values we have at Funded Today. Culture matters if you want to build a company that is bigger than just yourself. I want every single person I interact with to want to attend my funeral because I want to give everybody I interact with 51% or more of the value of the relationship because the REAL Zach Smith knows exactly what to do with the other 49%.