Foundr Magazine Podcast | Learn From Successful Founders & Proven Entrepreneurs, The Ultimate Startup Podcast For Business

In 2012 James Beshara and his co-founder officially launched Tilt, a platform that aimed to make crowdfunding not only more personal but to make the process as easy as possible. But if you ask the Y-Combinator alum himself, he'll say that Tilt was created years before it even launched. Originally starting off as an offshoot of an earlier startup that he was working on, he soon found himself working on Tilt more and more. It was then he realised he was onto something. "For every young entrepreneur out there, starting, or building, or founding something. It always sounds like it just starts one day in February or starts one afternoon when you get hit with inspiration. When in truth I think it is the amalgamation of just always starting things, doing things, trying out ideas and one of them just starts to get pulled from you, and you start to spend more time on it." Ever since it's inception Tilt has been on a tear. In just four short years Tilt is now valued at $500 million and has crowdfunded some of the world

Something that most entrepreneurs struggle with the most is coming up with an idea for a startup. They'll study business forecasts and look at unique trends trying to find the next big thing. What most entrepreneurs forget though is that the most disruptive startups in the world were created to solve a single problem. Which is what exactly Polina Raygorodskaya was looking to do when she founded Wanderu, a platform that allows you to find, compare and book bus and train tickets anywhere within the United States. In just 4 years Wanderu have grown their database to over 5 million users. It turns out there were other people that were facing the same problem as Polina. A long time entrepreneur Polina came across the idea for WanderU while constantly commuting back and forth in New York. Often having to travel by bus or train she quickly found out, to her surprise, that there was no single database to allow commuters to easily find and book bus and train tickets. Sensing a startup opportunity she closed down her P

There are no shortcuts when it comes to good online marketing, something that Dave Hobson knows all too well. As the resident expert on all things marketing at Foundr we give you a very special episode today about Dave from how he came to be at Foundr to his thoughts on successful online marketing. Funnily enough, it is entirely possible that Foundr would not be around if Dave had not cold-called Nathan nearly four years ago. At the time Nathan had only just started Foundr and Dave was at a job where he had to cold-call people and try to make a sale over the phone. Instead of making the sale the founder of Foundr and Dave got to chatting and they eventually became friends. In order to understand why Foundr may have never existed without Dave Hobson you first must understand his role at Foundr. Essentially he's Nathan right-hand man, the go-to guy whenever a discussion needs to be had about marketing, strategy or the future of Foundr. Even before he started officially working at Foundr, Dave has always been in

The term "unicorn company" describes a startup valued at over $1 billion that managed to get there in a relatively short period of time. Usually when we talk about unicorn companies, we're dealing with Silicon Valley and the cutting edge of the tech scene. Companies that are disruptive in the sense that they've created something totally new. Rarely, however, do we find a unicorn company that started out in an overcrowded and declining market. Yet somehow, despite the odds, Tom Bilyeu, co-founder of Quest Nutrition, turned a fledgling startup into a powerhouse in just six years. When Quest Nutrition first hit the scene with their protein bars, they were told by almost every expert in the space that it was insane and that it was guaranteed to fail. Yet Bilyeu and his co-founders persevered and tackled the problem in a way that no one else had thought of before. First they focused on their customers, to empower them and actually help them make healthy and positive changes in their lives. In short, they treated t

When Hal Elrod was 19 he was involved in a car accident with a drunk driver that left him with brain damage, 11 broken bones, and doctors telling him that he'd never walk again. While many people would understandably give into grief or anger or any other whirlwind of emotions that come after such a traumatic event, Elrod instead made the conscious choice to be at peace with himself. He knew there was nothing he could control about his situation, but he could control how the situation affected him. While he accepted the fact that he might never be able to use his legs again and was at peace with it, he was also determined to find a way to walk again. “I’m going accept the worst-case scenario, while I focus on the best case scenario.” Three weeks later, defying all odds and expectations, he began to walk again. Since then, he's called upon his life story and lessons he's learned along the way to become a highly sought-after motivational speaker and bestselling author of the book The Miracle Morning. Through his

Brian Scudamore of O2E brands knew all along that he wanted to be an entrepreneur. Relying on that sense of determination, he's built up a sprawling multimillion-dollar business empire, with franchises all over the world. But it all began with junk. To be specific, it all started in a McDonalds drive-thru, with Scudamore sitting in his car trying to figure out how he would pay for college. What he saw was an old pick-up truck filled to the brim with junk, and he immediately knew that this would be his ticket to chase his entrepreneurial dream. "A week later, I had a business hauling away junk, and that was the way into my job and a career path that's now been 27 years of pure entrepreneurial passion," he says. The first business he founded was 1-800-Got-Junk, which has since turned into multiple franchises all around the world and spun off into three more business in the home services niche. Altogether they generate a revenue of $250 million per year! But it hasn't been smooth sailing over the past 27 years,

On November 9, 2013, I released the first episode of the Foundr Podcast. It was with Fabio Rosati, then-CEO of Elance. To be completely honest, I wasn't quite sure what I was trying to achieve by releasing a podcast. At the time, it was just another way for us to give to our community, by releasing the audio of our interviews for free. Fast-forward to today and I can't believe we're at our 100th episode! It's flown by and so much has changed since. But the entire time I've kept in mind this piece of advice from my friend Daniel DiPiazza: "Keep producing content on a consistent basis every single week, keep getting next-level epic interviews, and people will come.” He was totally right. In the years since that first episode, we've managed to become one of the top 10 podcasts for business, we have over 70,000 downloads a month, and it's done wonders for our business. So to mark this occasion, we decided to do something a little different in this episode. Instead of me asking all the questions, I'll be the one g

As much as entrepreneurs can go on extolling the virtues of a great marketing strategy or knowing your target customer, at the end of the day, it's all about having something worth selling. No matter how great your advertising campaign may be, if you don't have something that people want to buy then you simply don't have a business. And yet, entrepreneurs all too often tend to gloss over this fact. They'll focus on everything else, but somehow forget to question whether or not their product is a winner, or even if it's a good idea in the first place. This is where Janna Bastow of ProdPad steps in, because she, more than anyone else in the world, knows exactly why effective product management is so instrumental to your startup's success. For Bastow, effective product management is when you're able to find that delicate balance between what's technically feasible, valuable for the customer, and profitable for the business, and define a roadmap on that basis. Ever since launching ProdPad in 2012, a tool that let

Today you might recognize Robert Herjavec as "the nice shark" on ABC's Shark Tank. With a pleasant smile and a reassuring tone of voice, he may seem like an odd fit in the highly competitive world of business and investing. But don't let that fool you, because behind those kind eyes lies a strength of character and iron will that every great entrepreneur needs to achieve success. When Herjavec was a young man, he actually wanted to be a filmmaker. In fact, he was a producer for the Winter Olympics in Canada in 1984 while only 22 years old. It was a promising start to his dream of moving to Hollywood and becoming a big-time director. The trouble was, no one was hiring. With a degree in English literature, a passion for filmmaking, and zero experience or knowledge in computer science, it might seem odd that he would eventually go on to found the Herjavec Group in 2003, one of the top cybersecurity firms in the world. The company grew from $400K to a whopping $140 million in sales annually in just over 12 years.

When you think of the word "entrepreneur," the image you're likely to conjure up in your head is one of a fast-talking, brash millennial with personality and ego to spare. That's exactly the kind of entrepreneur Nathan Latka is. At only 26 years old, Latka has managed to do more in five years as an entrepreneur than most people double his age! While there may be entrepreneurs out there who wring their hands and refuse to make a move until everything is perfect, Latka instead drives forward like a runaway train and grabs each and every opportunity that comes his way. This attitude is perfectly showcased when, as a college student, Latka began his first multimillion-dollar business in his dorm room ... while in his underwear. Despite knowing nothing about coding, he began cold-calling and began pre-selling Facebook fan pages at $7,000 a pop. When it came time to deliver the goods he took to YouTube, taught himself everything he needed to know, and started making money. Before you knew it he had a multimillion-d

In the late 1960s, when Kenneth "Hap" Klopp traded in his corporate aspirations for the life of an entrepreneur, the support network for such endeavors was not nearly what it is today. But Klopp knew he had what it took to run a successful company, and he was right. After taking over from co-founders Douglas and Susie Tompkins in 1968, Klopp spent the following 20 years as CEO using pre-Internet disruption and brand-building wizardry to turn The North Face into a global outdoor gear brand. Under his leadership, the company played a role in the growth of the outdoor recreation industry itself, and his journey as an entrepreneur is full of timeless wisdom that only comes from decades in the trenches. Klopp got his start when he took over the family business, following the death of his father, while finishing his undergraduate degree at Stanford. He then went on to complete his MBA while orchestrating the sale of the company. After graduation, he went out to interview for positions, only to find that no one was

Dubbed "the world's most powerful startup incubator" by Fast Company, Y Combinator (YC) has been plucking startups from garages, dorm rooms, coffee shops, and assorted founder hangouts for over a decade. With a combined valuation of more than $65 billion among its alumni, a list that reads like a who’s who of startup fame—think AirBNB, Reddit, Dropbox, Instacart, Scribd, Weebly—YC has become a Silicon Valley institution. It is described as an elite founders boot camp, a place where ideas are incubated, annihilated, refined, and polished for a period of three months, ready to be served up to a bevy of hungry investors. As co-founder of this entrepreneurial playground, Jessica Livingston has seen it all: the tears, the tantrums, and the triumphs, while getting a bird’s eye view of some of the startup world’s biggest success stories. In this interview you will learn: How to close the gap between a failed startup and a wildly successful one What Y Combinator is looking for when they take on new startups The ex

All entrepreneurs and startups are underdogs in one way or another. After all, in order to be an entrepreneur you're already going against the grain, and in order to be successful you must be willing to challenge the status quo no matter how large or small. But it's not everyday you find someone who manages to completely disrupt a billion-dollar industry with nothing more than a blog, some hustle, and a keen sense for marketing. In this modern day tale of David and Goliath, we speak with Alborz Fallah, who armed only with a blog managed to take on the centuries-old automotive industry and come out on top. Today his blog brings in millions of dollars in advertising revenue and challenges some of the biggest media companies in the world. But it didn't happen overnight. It took some grit and a great understanding of marketing and branding to get to where he is today. Something that he readily shares with us in today's interview. In this week's episode you will learn: Tips on finding the right audience and niche

To be a great entrepreneur, you need to have a great vision. Case in point: Back in the 80s, we were just entering the internet age. At the time, it didn't really exist beyond a few government think tanks and laboratories, and we were only just beginning to understand what was possible. It was during that time that massive companies like IBM, Sears, Microsoft and Citigroup began investing millions of dollars into figuring out this internet business. Despite all of the competition, in 1985, Steve Case and the team behind a fledgling startup named AOL rolled up their sleeves and helped shaped the internet into what we know it as today. "When we started AOL in the United States, only 3% of people were online and those 3% were online only one hour a week. So it really was early days in terms of, it was still a niche hobbyist kind of market. I believed that someday it'd be a mass market, someday it'd be a mainstream market, someday it'd change how people got information, communicate, bought products and so forth."

One of the greatest misconceptions you'll encounter in the startup world is the one about age. You'll hear would-be entrepreneurs constantly telling themselves that they're too young, or that they're too old, or that they're just waiting for that right moment to finally become an entrepreneur. That's ridiculous. There is no perfect moment waiting around the corner for you, because the perfect moment only comes to those who actually go out there and create it. Ben Chaib, founder of Sell and Succeed, is the perfect example of that. After working in the corporate world for 25 years, he decided that enough was enough. He had the skills and ability to generate millions in revenue, but he wasn't getting the return that we wanted. So he set out and created his own business, and today he's consulting hundreds of other aspiring entrepreneurs on how to market for success. "We are great at doing things for others, but we are not great at doing it for ourselves. But we deserve it more than others," he says. While relativ

As the dominance of technology keeps on gaining steam, some non-techy, would-be entrepreneurs are made to feel discouraged. How can they compete with all the slick coders starting businesses in this virtual world? That didn’t stop non-coder Brian Moran from making serious money online, and ultimately making it big in the competitive niche of Software as a Service (SaaS). No programming geek, Moran was a marketing major, but primarily a baseball player, in college. He had hoped to continue his baseball career after graduating, but an injury forced him out of the ballpark and into the office. His office job was stable, well-paid, low-stress … and intolerable. “I was just bored out of my mind. I was getting paid well, great benefits, I had just gotten married,” says Moran. “But someone else was controlling every aspect of my life.” Six years and a newborn later, Moran is now the founder of the successful SamCart checkout service, which counts Foundr as one of its many customers. In the time between, Moran was co

The closest thing Ankur Nagpal has ever had to a job was a summer internship at Amazon when he was 18. Ever since then, he's been his own boss at companies that he's built. Outside of that brief fling as an employee, Nagpal has wholly dedicated his life to being a serial entrepreneur. In his early years as an entrepreneur, he entered the highly competitive startup scene in Silicon Valley as a very successful Facebook app developer. Only he didn't make individual apps. Instead what he was selling was the platform that everyone used to create their own apps. From there, he bowed out with a cool seven figures to his name when that company had run its course. Just as the real winners of the gold rush weren't those who found gold but the entrepreneurs who sold the tools, Nagpal has made a living as the one people turn to when they're looking for development tools. Fast-forward to today and he is now the founder and CEO of Teachable, a business that teaches and trains other entrepreneurs on how to create their own

Brene Brown was a meandering youth in her 20s, doing more traveling and bartending than she was building a business or focusing on school. As a result, she didn't graduate college until she was 30. Nonetheless, after finishing her bachelor’s in social work, she quickly gained her masters and PhD and started a career as an academic at the University of Houston. But something was rustling beneath the surface for Brown—being a quiet academic and publishing papers wasn’t enough for her. That something was entrepreneurship. Brene Brown started publishing books and doing talks and coaching for executives and successful entrepreneurs. But Brown is best known for her unique message, calling for entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs alike to open their hearts and minds to vulnerability. What many avoid and even look down upon, Brene Brown insists is a key to success, real intimacy, and happiness. Brown is a thought leader of our time. In an entrepreneurship community dominated by masculine values and "tough guy" attitud

As the son of hardworking immigrants, David Cancel saw his parents working seven days a week to support their family. As an adult, he realized that not all people worked the way his parents did, which sparked in him a desire to make a living without getting a “job.” Cancel always knew that he wanted to be an entrepreneur, even if he wasn’t quite sure what that meant. As a kid, he found that flipping through the pages of Inc. Magazine and other early entrepreneurial publications didn’t offer much insight. He saw ads for get-rich-quick schemes and stories of businessmen who had reached amazing heights. Although he wasn’t quite sure what it meant to be an entrepreneur, he knew he wanted in. The term “serial entrepreneur” gets thrown around a lot, but few have lived a life that defines it as well as David Cancel. Building and selling companies has become a way of life; his obsessions around ideas or problems quickly snowball into companies. He has started and exited five companies in the past 16 years and is curr

Justin Kan doesn’t come off as the type who lives for the spotlight. Which is funny, because at one point he live-streamed his life, 24/7 for the whole world to see, for months. That may seem like an unlikely path to a billion-dollar sale, but in fact, the early experiment in the world of live video got Kan and his partner Emmett Shear part of the way there. That unconventional level of dedication and curiosity is a testament to how these two have been willing to dive into the opportunities before them, leading them through a flurry of tech business successes. Kan’s CV speaks for itself: He co-founded hit companies Twitch, Justin.tv, Socialcam, Exec, and is now a partner at startup incubator Y Combinator, which invests millions annually into tech companies. A native of Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, Kan was not an obvious candidate for someone who would succeed in tech. He has a certain natural charisma, but studied physics and philosophy at Yale, neither of which is necessarily a match for a career in