Archives For Customer Development

What I learned from Corey Layton (Content and Marketing Director at Whooshkaa) and Serpil Senelmis (Director at Written & Recorded)

Camille Monce —  October 12, 2020 — Leave a comment

“People decide if they’re going to stick with the podcast in the first minute or two; they will decide if they’re going to stay on or not.” – Corey Layton

“Word-of-mouth is the most dominant way that people get recommendations from podcasts; it’s all about your friends’ recommendations.” – Corey Layton

“Analytics are essential. One of the realms you can get some stats is via Apple analytics which will tell you about the time people spend listening to your podcast. Now if you make an hour and 20-minute podcast and your time spent listening is 20 minutes in, you’ve got a problem. Equally if people are skipping over certain segments that you think is really funny every week, you can see that skip and then you like, “Maybe I’m not so funny.” Via Spotify you can get an understanding of your demographics based on gender and age. It helps you understand where your stories are resonating most, and the sort of demographic that you need to continue to pitch at or grow. Analytics are key.” – Corey Layton

“Before you start your podcast you need to ask yourself, “What’s in it for my listeners, and what’s the problem that I’m trying to solve for them?” You need to really know your audience. Who are you talking to, and what do you want them to get out of it? You need to be passionate about the subject matter that you’re talking about, or at least have done research on the subject so you are engaged in the actual topic that you’re talking about. And you need to bring in great storytelling elements. So knowing your audience will help you shape your whole podcast that will dictate what themes you choose what topics you choose.” – Serpil Senelmis

“It sounds like it’s technically easy but there are a lot of considerations in making a podcast that’s of high quality. The thing that I can say that is the same or similar is other markets such as advertising or search engine optimization or website design. You can basically have a crack at all of these things. And in fact, we probably all have had a crack at all of these things. But once you call in the experts, you’re going to get better results. Because you are competing with radio stations, you are competing with newspapers, and you are competing with commercial brands that are pumping out podcasts. So to be able to play in their league, you need to think like they do.” – Serpil Senelmis

“The most important thing are the answers to the following questions: (1) who is your audience; and (2) why are you making this podcast? If you don’t have a purpose, what’s the point of it? You really need to know what is your purpose and who you are going to service with your podcast. If you can’t answer those two questions, go write a short story or do something else.” – Serpil Senelmis

“Who else is doing the same, and how can you do it differently? Given with how many podcasts exist, there’s so many people on their own tangents. If you’re just mimicking someone–which most often is, “I’m in X industry, I’m going to talk to ex-experts from this industry about their experience”–chances are that it’s already covered. Find your shtick.” – Corey Layton

“Peoples’ attention spans, particularly on social, are not there. The work we did with Facebook was about taking broader content, which are 60-minute discussions, and cutting them down to 20-minute podcast episodes, which were then accompanied by 60 to 90-second videos. Each content piece did different jobs. The video is there to give you an essence and to hook you in. The podcast is to sit alongside it. And if you wanted to dive deeper, it was there was an option. The differing mediums are complementary because they have different roles.” – Corey Layton

With thanks to

Serpil Senelmis is the co-director of content creation agency Written & Recorded. As a journalist for hire with decades of experience in radio, television, newspapers, and marketing, Serpil helps organisations to tell their story. She steps through the podcast creation process from concept to publication.

Corey Layton is the Content & Marketing Director with podcast hosting platform Whooshkaa, where he has led the production of successful podcasts from Mercedes Benz, Facebook and the City of Sydney. Corey warns of the pitfalls in podcasting and names the secret ingredient in reaching your audience.

About Masters Series by WeTeachMe

Masters Series is a show about inspiring entrepreneurs, creative thinkers, and visionary dreamers, and the stories behind how they built their companies.

Subscribe to show

Show brought to you by

Masters Series is presented by WeTeachMe.

Our strategic alliance partners: MYOB, SitePoint, and Entrepreneur’s Organization.

Our media partners: Startup Victoria and Digital Marketers Australia.

Our content partners: Written & Recorded.

The views expressed by the contributors on this show are linked websites that are not necessarily endorsed by the publisher.

Question of the day

What was your favourite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

In Analytics, Competition, Content, Customer Development, Data, Podcasting, Purpose, Strategy, What I Learned From..
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What I learned from Ben Sze (Founder at Edrolo) and David Fastuca (Founder at Ambisie)

Camille Monce —  October 5, 2020 — Leave a comment

“Start tracking your time and see where you are spending your time. You don’t need to do it in a complex way. Just start by bucketing it. Email, admin, bookkeeping, just bucket it and see where time is going. Do it for 1-2 weeks and don’t give up; even if it’s difficult.” – Ben Sze

“Taking the leap into my own business was very daunting because I didn’t want to give up the paycheck or a potential career in finance that I enjoyed. I recommend you keep a full-time job if you can, and moonlight on your startup so you can get it started. Doing this also has the benefit of not stressing your cash flow situation. We had a period where we were not paying ourselves and it was very tough.” – Ben Sze

“Are we going to give this another crack or are we going go get full-time jobs, work half as much, and most likely earn more? What is the worst-case scenario in anything that we do; what is the worst that can happen? We are very fortunate here in this beautiful country in that we can easily take a chance. And if all fails you can go back and get a job. So the take a chance to go and pursue a passion and to pursue a dream. It’s a privilege that we all have. If you’ve got a dream or you’ve got a burning desire, take that chance because the worst-case scenario ain’t that bad.” – David Fastuca

“Surround yourself with people that had been there and done that, and can help guide the way. You will still make a hundred mistakes; we made plenty. I remember in a year, we almost shut shop over 5 times. Then there were moments where is was Sunday, and payroll was Tuesday. Business causes a lot of stress. One of our proudest things throughout the whole Locomote journey was that we were able to fund the company, pay everyone, and never miss a payment even when things were dark. For us, Locomote was our opportunity, we didn’t know if we are going to get this opportunity again, we were not going to let it go.” – David Fastuca

“Think of all these lateral sort of ways on how you can get financing. For example you don’t need $5M from day dot; you can start small to begin with until you get to that. Try and think laterally. If you have a gun to your head and couldn’t spend that sort of money, how would you do it? This is important because there will be times when you don’t have that money and you need to think like that.” – Dave Fastuca

“Having mentors is important. We have mentors now, and had coffee with one of ours the other day. In that coffee we said, “We want to be cash flow positive in X amount of time,” to which he replied, “Be patient. If you can hold out in the long run and be patient, you can build something a lot bigger and better. It is good you have your goals and want to hit those milestones–we all want that hockey stick curve on that growth graph–but just make sure you have patience because then you can really build something great as well.” – Dave Fastuca

“Go out and talk to your potential customers and pretend that you are going to sell them something. Get confidence that way. There’s no harm in speaking to potential customers. Maybe, don’t go speak to your premium, gold clients; go speak to your middle tier clients, and cut your teeth on figuring out how to pitch your business, and figure out if people will actually pay for the product or service you offer.” – Ben Sze

With thanks to

Ben Sze is a Co-Founder of Edrolo, an educational tech company that is creating better outcomes for students. Ben points out several key things that fresh founders should keep an eye on – not least of which is time. There’s a time management practice here that you’ll find invaluable.

David Fastuca is a Co-Founder of Ambisie, a business putting entrepreneurs in front of school students to broaden their horizons. David founded his first business at the age of 14 and it has had many different incarnations since then. He says we live in a lucky country where if all else fails, we can just go get a job – so have a crack at founding your own business.

About Masters Series by WeTeachMe

Masters Series is a show about inspiring entrepreneurs, creative thinkers, and visionary dreamers, and the stories behind how they built their companies.

Subscribe to show

Show brought to you by

Masters Series is presented by WeTeachMe.

Our strategic alliance partners: MYOB, SitePoint, and Entrepreneur’s Organization.

Our media partners: Startup Victoria and Digital Marketers Australia.

Our content partners: Written & Recorded.

The views expressed by the contributors on this show are linked websites that are not necessarily endorsed by the publisher.

Question of the day

What was your favourite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

In Acquisition, Active Listening, Coaches, Courage, Customer Development, Mentors, Self-Awareness, Self-Belief, What I Learned From..
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What I learned from Kristen Holden (Startup Manager at MYOB)

Camille Monce —  September 8, 2020 — Leave a comment

“People need to stop overthinking. People come to me and have this big 12-month project that they have been working on and I think, “Why not try the market with a scrappy version, or why not build a basic website so you can test the idea?” People just get caught up in this bullshit idea that it’s got to be perfect before the world sees it.” – Kristen Holden

“Just get out there and do something! Don’t think about it too much. Build small versions you can and test out, start a Meetup group, get 20 people to give you feedback. Just test something and learn something.” – Kristen Holden

“The most important lessons I’ve learned come from things I’ve screwed up.” – Kristen Holden

“Own up to your mistakes. Admit that you screwed up. Put your hand up and say, “That was me.” Don’t be depressed or down about it; people screw up; it happens. No matter how big the failure is, it doesn’t matter. Just tell someone and have someone to talk to about it like a mentor, your partner, or your parents to talk it through. You’re not alone.” – Kristen Holden

With thanks to

Kristen Holden is the Startup Manager at MYOB where he helps founders to skill-up before they scale-up. He cut his teeth in digital marketing in the late 1990s before spamming was frowned upon and the holder of the most domain names controlled web traffic. Kristen explains the mistakes he made in his early career and describes his hopes for a new wave of startups.

About Masters Series by WeTeachMe

Masters Series is a show about inspiring entrepreneurs, creative thinkers, and visionary dreamers, and the stories behind how they built their companies.

Subscribe to show

Show brought to you by

Masters Series is presented by WeTeachMe.

Our strategic alliance partners: MYOB, SitePoint, and Entrepreneur’s Organization.

Our media partners: Startup Victoria and Digital Marketers Australia.

Our content partners: Written & Recorded.

The views expressed by the contributors on this show are linked websites that are not necessarily endorsed by the publisher.

Question of the day

What was your favourite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

In Advice, Customer Development, Failure, Fear, Perspective, Reality, What I Learned From..
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What I learned from Ben Cohn (Co-Founder at TAXIBOX) and Ben Stickland (Founder at Alliance Software)

Camille Monce —  August 8, 2020 — Leave a comment

“Nothing in my last 7 years has been one major step. Everything has been tiny, tiny steps.” – Ben Cohn

“Starting a business with the view as to who will buy that business, or what industry is going to buy that business, is a really important point. This shapes the way you will to develop the business so that it eventually has a buyer.” – Ben Cohn

“The first-year and a half or two years were quite easy for me because I knew I only had to work really hard, and that it was just dependant on myself and my business partner. As the business grew, we got staff, we operated in 3 cities, and now we’ve got 49 full-time team members. People have things going on all the time in their lives, and you cannot carry all of that load. The interpersonal stuff that happens when dealing with people and work dynamics, I find it challenging.” – Ben Cohn

“As time goes on, the odds and the stakes are much, much higher. To be frank, I don’t find that it gets easier with time.” – Ben Cohn

“I’ve seen clients come in with a great idea and I desperately try to convince them to go and try to talk to their market. And they come back and say that they have talked to their market. And what they actually did was go to five people, who already like them, and said, “I’ve got a great idea. It’s going to be awesome. Do you like it?” and those people didn’t want to hurt their feelings and so the feedback they got was just rubbish. What the problem interview does is that it forces you to not show anything. It forces you to literally go to a group of people and just classify and prioritise the problem and just get a real sense of what is causing pain. If there is not pain in the market, it’s really hard to sell to.” – Ben Stickland

“Go and talk to people. Don’t just say, “I’ve got a great idea, I know my market, and I’m going to be determined.” That little phrase is highly correlated to losing lots of money. (Just on my experience and my observation.) Get out of the building. Talk to five customers with problem-solution interviews and in most cases, it will change your idea.” – Ben Stickland

“Really trust your gut instinct. We all have a very strong feeling in our gut as to who we really are and what we want to do in life. We get clouded by the expectation of what we should and shouldn’t do. Being in touch with your gut feeling as to what your calling is, and what you need to do, is a very powerful thing; it’s a very hard thing to do because there is so much noise around us.” – Ben Cohn

“I hire on culture; I do not hire on skill. In our business, we feel we can train anyone up. I hire for culture, and skill is secondary. There has to be an interpersonal connection.” – Ben Cohn

“The highest rate of success in tech startups is two people, not one, not three; and it’s people who have known each other for a lot of years, not people who have just met. Because when you know someone for years, you actually go into it knowing their faults and you don’t have unresolved expectations of them.” – Ben Stickland

With thanks to

Ben Cohn in a Co-Founder of TAXIBOX, the mobile self-storage solution that brings yellow cubes of joy to your front door. Ben did a lot of on-the-ground research to jumpstart his business. He explains his approach to making sure TAXIBOX customers always have a remarkable experience.

Ben Stickland is the Founder of Alliance Software and has spent a lot of time and money in the startup space. Ben says the first three years of business are like walking up a see-saw, then things start to level out and become a bit easier. He says he loves running experiments to see what’s going to work in his business.

About Masters Series by WeTeachMe

Masters Series is a show about inspiring entrepreneurs, creative thinkers, and visionary dreamers, and the stories behind how they built their companies.

Subscribe to show

Show brought to you by

Masters Series is presented by WeTeachMe.

Our strategic alliance partners: MYOB, SitePoint, and Entrepreneur’s Organization.

Our media partners: Startup Victoria and Digital Marketers Australia.

Our content partners: Written & Recorded.

The views expressed by the contributors on this show are linked websites that are not necessarily endorsed by the publisher.

Question of the day

What was your favourite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

In Business Partners, Culture, Customer Development, Exit Strategy, Failure, HR, Intuition, People, Resilience, Strategy, What I Learned From.., Work Ethic
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