Kieran is probably a serial entrepreneur – he founded his first business aged 15, (sold age 19 for $1.25m), his second and third were also acquired. He’s co-founder/CEO of his fourth startup, Thread. In this interactive discussion, Kieran shares some of his experiences and learnings having founded and grown four tech businesses before the age of 30. Kieran’s focus at Thread is to drive the growth of the business and keep developing – not maintaining – the company culture.
Prior to Thread, Kieran founded one of the first video sharing websites aged 15 and sold it for $1.25M aged 19. He was then CEO and co-founder of Playfire, the largest social network for gamers, which he grew to 1.5 million customers before being acquired in 2012. He’s a member of the Forbes, Drapers and Financial Times 30 Under 30 lists.
Born in Peru, and raised as a math and science nerd in New Jersey with a passion for movies and storytelling, Cesar worked in advertising before leaving it all behind to pursue his own personal creative endeavours; among them a personal project – 1SecondEveryday.
It took time and a co-founder, Schoneck Shoaf, to turn it into a business, but now the App has been downloaded over 2 million times.
In this talk from BoS USA 2019, Cesar will share the story of how he accidentally turned his idea for a tool that would encourage him to be more adventurous into 1SecondEveryday. This became a thriving, bootstrapped, remote only, business that became the number one paid app in Apple’s App Store in 2018. Cesar shares the decision-making process that ultimately led to a change in business model, a rewrite of the platform and to taking outside capital.
Find out how 1Second Everyday:
make remote working work
changed the business model as it grew up
discovered the ever-growing number of alternative sources of funding available to software entrepreneurs.
Regular BoS Newsletter readers will be familiar with our “Curated Content” section. Every week we collate the most interesting stories from the SaaS world and send them to out in our Newsletter.
We know our community of SaaS founders are busy – they don’t have time to scour the internet for niche software news and articles all the time. That’s why we do it for them. If you want to join this community of very clever people you can sign up here.
Growth, Funding, Pivotal Moments and the Evolution of Adzerk to Kevel
BoS regulars will know James Avery, founder of Adzerk, recently renamed to be known forevermore as Kevel. We caught up with him following the announcement of an $11 million funding round for the 13 year old SaaS business which he describes as, ‘Seedstrapped’. We talk growth, funding, pivotal moments and the evolution of Adzerk to Kevel
We cover:
The origin and growth of Adzerk
His attitude and approach to taking outside funding and finding the right money at the right stage for him
Some of the BoS talks that had an impact on his company, including changing its name to Kevel
Why he doesn’t worry too much about what might happen in the future
Food for thought for anyone on the Long, Slow SaaS Ramp of Death…
Video, transcript and links to talks James has found particularly impactful as he built Kevel below…
Eric (the money guy) & Brian (the product guy) Dosal share their experience of starting, scaling and ultimately selling BrightGauge, their self-funded, 35 employee SaaS business back in 2019. They share an honest and open account of why they decided to sell while it was still very profitable and experiencing rapid (50% year-on-year) growth.
They share the lessons learned in starting a company in San Francisco and then moving it back to their hometown, Miami, FL and the reasons why they took the decision to sell the company. They were not VC funded and had no pressure to sell. Even with a great culture, great team, great everything, it still could be a great idea to sell. AFTER selling, there are still things to do but it’s OK to take a break and/or start a new project.
Hear their takeaways from the experience, and learn how and why to finish big and leave on top.
Regular BoS Newsletter readers will be familiar with our “Curated Content” section. Every week we collate the most interesting stories from the SaaS world and send them to out in our Newsletter.
We know our community of SaaS founders are busy – they don’t have time to scour the internet for niche software news and articles all the time. That’s why we do it for them. If you want to join this community of very clever people you can sign up here.
Nandini has been immersed in the world of brand safety & digital advertising since 2016, when she began running Sleeping Giants, the social media campaign that alerted advertisers that their ads were funding hate speech on Breitbart News. Her efforts led to her being recognized by Business Insider as one of the industry leaders “fixing” digital advertising. DigiDay named her a DigiDay Changemaker. In 2019, Sleeping Giants won a Gold Cannes Lion Award for Best Social Media Campaign and a People’s Voice for Public Service and Activism Webby Award.
In August 2020, HotJar publically dropped the Trump campaign and the GOP account (before it was cool to do so). It was not only an unprecedented move for a tech company, it’s an incredible case study in how to manage a social media crisis in this age of extremes. In this talk from BoS USA Online 2020, Nandini discusses the background to the story and the actions the company’s leadership took to address a challenge that most software company CEOs have never seriously considered: booting users who violate their Acceptable Use Policies. Nandini explores the role of Acceptable Use Policies & ToS as a tool for choosing your course of action.
John Snyder started Grapeshot in a small office overlooking King’s Parade, right at the heart of the Cambridge tech cluster. While Cambridge is well known for the quality of its technology, many companies have struggled to turn their technology advantage into global commercial success. John was determined to do both in the global adtech market, not one that is traditionally associated with deep Cambridge tech.
In this talk from BoS Europe 2019, John talks about how he set about educating himself by learning from others and why he decided that his business had to have a global vision from the outset. He describes entering new markets with a relatively limited supply of capital which meant every new move could have been very costly. Ultimately, much of the success of the business was down to maintaining a clear company culture whilst operating across several continents and territories amidst different social cultures.
The company was acquired by Oracle Corporation in May 2018.
Luckily, there are an almost limitless number of tools that offer a solution that will help you reclaim control of your life. Unluckily, people often become less productive as they adopt new apps and tools that don’t fit with their individual work styles, work flows and habits.
Switching to-do list applications? Can’t make your mind up on a note-taker? Or just can’t quite stick with just one resource. This talk helps to break down a simple process on how to filter down your options and stick with the resource you choose for years to come. Save yourself time, effort and even money with these helpful approaches to matching software to your needs and goals.
Startups often struggle to communicate the value of their products, particularly in sales meetings. From pitches that drown customers in a word-soup of features, to high-concept vision pitches that leave customers confused and sceptical – many companies struggle to connect authentically with customers in a way that generates deals. You need the Point of View pitch.
In this talk, April is going to teach you the difference between selling and helping customers buy. She will show you the different types of pitches to use and the pros & cons of each, and why Point of View pitches work so well.
When you sign up for our excellent newsletter, you don’t just get access to first sight of new talks, invitations to exclusive hangouts with speakers and smart people and all the community goodness, we ask you if there is something we can help you with to help you navigate the over 300 talks from BoS Conference collected over 15 years from some of the smartest people in the industry. We try to find some particularly relevant content to help you think about your challenge.
This is a reply I got recently from a new subscriber:
> So hit reply and let me know the problem you’re trying to solve, and I’ll be in touch with some top advice from some of the software world’s brightest minds.
> Don’t believe me? Put me to the test…
I’ll take you on on that one:
On the topic of the Management of Innovation: Whose role is it in modern businesses, is it concentrated on a particular function or distributed amongst people? Any best practice? Insights?
What do you have in stock? Any interesting speakers in that sphere?
If you’ve ever worked with someone you didn’t trust, you will know why trust is important in the workplace.
Teams that don’t trust each other don’t work well together. Morale, productivity, staff turnover and outputs suffer. Much of the talk around ‘trust’ in business is woolly, misunderstood and lacks clear and actionable frameworks for you to make things better. Drawing on personal experience and a lot of study, Gareth will help you to appreciate how trust issues may be limiting your company’s growth and the role you might be playing in destroying trust.
In this talk delivered at both BoS Conferences in 2019, Gareth shares some concrete and clear steps you can take to build a culture of trust with your peers, your investors, your team and your company.
Paul Kenny has been a regular attendee at Business of Software Conference since it started in 2007 and has spoken several times before, and for good reason. Over the last 25 years, he has helped to develop salespeople and sales managers working in media, technology and the professional services sectors.
In this talk from BoS Europe 2019, Paul will help you understand and conquer the challenges of scaling sales teams rapidly with a focus on the challenge of getting new hires up and running quickly and effectively. He’ll share some of the important lessons he’s learned as he has helped software companies to recruit, develop and manage their sales teams.
Radhika Dutt is an entrepreneur and product leader who has participated in four acquisitions as a result of the products she built and advises organisations from high-tech startups to government agencies on building radical products (ones that create a fundamental change instead of optimising the status quo). She co-founded Radical Product Thinking as a movement of leaders creating vision-driven change. Radhika graduated from MIT with an SB and M.Eng in Electrical Engineering, and speaks nine languages while learning her tenth.
In this talk from BoS USA Online, Radhika talks about where iteration goes wrong, why Lean and Agile fall short, and how to diagnose the most common product diseases and overcome them. There are some great discussion points and tools covered int his talk that you can use in your team too.
Should you rethink your sales process from the buyer’s perspective?*
For most of us, sales means reciting features, benefits, pressuring customers into purchasing. Selling feels icky. It’s not our fault – that’s how most selling is done. There’s a better way. Bob Moesta has taken Jobs-to-be-Done theory and flipped it to apply it to sales.
Before giving this talk Bob asked, “Why are there no sales professors?”. There are lots of practices but really no underlying theory. We need to learn how to think like a salesperson.
In this talk, delivered at the end of BoS USA Online, Bob talks about how to help people to buy, without selling. He takes us through the six steps of a customers journey from ‘first thought’ to ‘on-going use and building habits’. Knowing this journey can help you to position your product differently and help your customers buy.
TOP TIP: Recreate the Business Of Software Conference Travel Experience.
We can’t wait to see you on Monday for the first BoS Conference USA Online. We know that some people miss the thrill of business travel but the good news is that you can recreate that part of the experience – at home!
Here’s how…
And talking of taking part at home, the best news of all is that everyone who is taking part this year, won’t have to travel at all. Don’t miss the talks and the talk.
Don’t worry about missing your flight, worry about missing your chance to spend some quality time with some awesome people.
We’re delighted to welcome April Dunford, Jason Fried, Bob Moesta, Alex Osterwalder, Rich Mironov, and Tendayi Viki back to the BoS stage – albeit an online one this year.
BoS Speakers are chosen because we believe what they have to share will help software entrepreneurs make a real difference in their businesses. There’s still time to bag a ticket to BoS Conference USA Online, 21-23 September – and with no hotel or flights to book, it’s easier than ever.
As we look forward to their talks this year, we’re taking a look back at some of their previous talks. Read on below to find great talks about:
How to position your product to make it obviously awesome
The brightest software entrepreneurs from across the world will be meeting online to meet with their peers, discuss the big issues around running a software business, and participate in interactive sessions led by experts including April Dunford, Bob Moesta, Alex Osterwalder, and many more.
Every year at Business of Software Conference, the generosity of our supporters allows us to offer full conference tickets to deserving entrepreneurs and leaders who otherwise wouldn’t be able to attend the event.
This year is no different – a huge thanks to our supporters:
In a recent conversation with Bob Moesta as we discussed his session and talk at this year’s BoS Conference USA online, 21-23 September, we talked about how we have adapted to work in a virtual format, he asked,
“What would happen if we didn’t do BoS Conference?”
A great question. One we have considered. Like Bob, we reached the same conclusion…
Not doing BoS Conference is not an option.
Here’s why, with some insights into Bob’s thinking about the challenges, opportunities and the purpose of an event like ours.
