Entrepreneurs are ALWAYS builders.

All that changes is what they are building.

Stage 1: building a product

Stage 2: building a team

Stage 3: building a culture

Stage 4: building a strategy

Stage 5: building an organization

Audience Building 101

Every company in the world is an audience company.

Whether it's a Media, VC, or DTC business, if you're not building audience Day 1, you're not prioritizing the right things.

Here's my framework for thinking about & building a killer audience 👇

I call it the Audience Funnel.

The concept is simple, but it allows you to...

1) Think strategically about building your own audience

2) Analyze the relative strength of other companies' audiences

3) Understand the similarities & differences of different audience channels

The Audience Funnel is divided into three tiers, which include:

1) Rented Audience

2) Owned Audience

3) Monetized Audience

Tier 1: Rented Audience

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁: This is your top of funnel. It allows you to build mass awareness & is key for developing a relationship with your audience.

𝗣𝗿𝗼𝘀: High shareability, high discoverability

𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘀: You don't own your audience

Examples of Rented Audiences

- Social networks (IG, FB, Twitter, TikTok)
- Video platforms (Twitch, YouTube)
- Search engines (Web content)

Examples of Businesses with Big Rented Audiences

- @BuzzFeed (Instagram)
- @GoPro (YouTube)
- @charlidamelio (TikTok)

The Olympic Games are controversial.

They're amazing for unity & entertainment.

But they're a horrible business.

THREAD: A story of billions in costs, misaligned incentives & crippling debt. 🧵

172%.

Any guesses what that represents?

That number is % over budget.

Since 1960, the Olympics have run over-budget by 172%.

And no Olympics have ever run under-budget.

The Olympics have the highest cost overrun of any mega project in the world.

Olympics: 172%
Mega dams: 90%
Trains: 45%
Bridge & tunnels: 34%
Roads: 20%

The 2021 Tokyo Games is no exception.

2013: bid projected $7.4 billion of costs

2019: official budget of $14.6 billion

2020: budget revised to $15.4 billion

2021: government auditors project total spending will be $28 billion.

Tokyo is the 2nd most expensive Olympics ever.

At $28 billion, it's more than the GDP of:

- Uganda
- El Salvador
- Iceland
- Jamaica
- Madagascar
- Fiji

Total case study in expectation-setting by @JeffBezos.

If you want to understand how to communicate directly & candidly with employees, customers, partners, just read this...

1997 shareholder letter for those wondering

Who you surround yourself with is who you become.

9 steps for optimizing your circle 🧵

Step 1: grab 2 sheets of paper and a pen/pencil/sharpie

Step 2: on first sheet, make a list of your 10-20 closest personal connections

For me, this includes:

- Mom
- Girlfriend
- @austin_rief (co-founder)
- @SahilBloom (friend)

I get to 17 connections on my list.

Introducing The 50.

Where I share the story and lessons of a top 50 largest company in the world.

Time for #1.

This company went from 0 to $200bn in 5.5 years...

Let's dive in👇

Pinduoduo is the 50th largest company in the world.

If Costco & Disneyland had a baby, you'd get Pinduoduo.

A discount online shopping experience littered with contests & coupons.

490 million MAUs.
$8.5 billion in 2020 revenue.
14% of China's e-commerce market.

What's most fascinating isn't its size. It's its speed.

Pinduoduo was founded in 2015!

It IPOd in 2018.

The company 119x'ed its revenue in just 6 years.

This is where my fascination lies.

And to understand Pinduoduo, we must understand its fascinating founder.

Meet Colin Huang.

Probably haven't heard of him, but absolutely worth knowing.

The 41-year-old internet entrepreneur is the Founder & CEO of Pinduoduo.

He's #28 on the world's richest list ($50bn).

The Hangzhou native loved math & science early, earning him a spot at a top foreign language school & an internship at Microsoft.

He attended Wisconsin for college and joined a small tech co after graduation called...Google.

Top 10 Entrepreneurship HACKS for the 21st century

From TRS Podcast: @BeerBicepsGuy & Billionaire @hcmariwala

Life of a Billionaire, Business tips, Hiring Advice, New business opportunities & much more

Life Advice to Change your Mindset🧠

//THREAD//

1/ Advice to the Youth of 2020s

Identify God-given gifts & leverage them

Focus 75% of the time on your strengths, double down on them
Focus 25% of the time on your weaknesses

Speak to Mentors, Friends & Family to ID them

Passion is Overrated, Grit is Necessary

2/ Role of a Successful Entrepreneur

Your job within the organization changes drastically over time

At the Start: You have to do Everything (Ranveer Relates)
As you Grow: Delegate everything to the Right Talent (Think Elon Musk)

How to Hire & Maintain Right Talent? 👇

3/ Wisdom on Work Culture

Tip to keep Right talent is Great Work Culture

Monetary benefits may attract, work culture sustains great talent!

He believes in giving max freedom on the job rather than nurturing

You need to transition to being an influencer about your Brand

4/ Harsh Mariwala on Success

Don't let successes go to your head🧠
Be an eternal Student and Identify trends in the market

Identify product-market fit

Focus on all stakeholders, not just shareholders

Customer is King

How to Price Your Services in a Way You Don't Get Busto

// A THREAD //

Whether you're a full-time freelancer or you just want freelance on the side you have to know your price so you don't get busto.

We will discuss the three most common ways how to price your services:

- Hourly rate
- Project rate
- Service as a product

But basics first.

Don't think about the price as a one-night-stand.

Rather build a very close relationship with it.

It:

- helps you to increase/decrease demand
- gives hints about how good/bad your service is
- positions yourself on the market

Know how to use this tool.

Cheaper ≠ Better

Imagine someone selling you a car for $350.

What would you think about it?

Exactly.

Set the fair price, not the scam inducing one.

The cheap price will bring you a specific sort of people.
- to be polite.

So always compete with quality, not price.

1. Hourly rate

This is the most straightforward way how to set your price.

How to set it?

The basic equation may look like:
[Monthly target profit ($) + All costs ($)] / no. of billable hours in a month

PS. Even if you're starting out don't get much lower under this price.

Owning and operating a SMB is the best tax deal in America.

—

Whether you have a $10,000 side hustle or $10MM enterprise, earning business income opens up amazing opportunities for tax savings and wealth creation.

Let’s walk through how it works
(thread below ⬇️)

Expenses -

Business income opens up an opportunity that W-2 employees do not enjoy - bonafide business expenses.

Of course direct costs incurred are deductible, but many expenses exist in your life already. When you have business income you get to spend them before tax.

Most employees are running a no deductible office at home - now claim business phone bills, home office utilities, dues, travel, education and legal that you spend regardless.

The other deduction opportunity is business use of your personal assets including auto and home use.

Employment taxes -

Another great saving is employment taxes through and S-Corp and set salary.

Taxpayers are given the ability to bifurcate their employment from their ownership and pay a reasonable salary, often times saving thousands in employment taxes.

Benefits -

Also in a SMB the owner has ability to provide benefits including medical and retirement, particularly the business is a solo enterprise.

Medical reimbursement plans, SEPs, 401ks, DB Pensions offer potentially hundreds of thousands in tax savings & deferrals.

So you're a freelance marketer, designer, coach, growth hacker etc thinking about building your business in 2021. VC platform teams can be your ace in the hole.

We need you! We love you! We can be a great stream of biz ... IF you know how to pitch us.

Here's my advice:

PSA: if you don't know, VC platform teams are the (usually) non-investing professionals who support portfolio companies in functional areas.

@upfrontvc has a Head of Talent, a Head of Legal, and a Head of Marketing (me!) We're all former senior operators in startups.

As individuals we can't *do* the work for ~ 100 active companies, but we *can* reco resources to teams who may not have the experience, and definitely don't have time, to find them.

I look for fit in functional skills, category, pricing & chemistry. One size does not fit all.

So! Cold pitches work! But not like this: "I'm a freelance graphic designer, here's my book, please consider me, good day."

Problem is now I have to work to figure out if/where you would fit & I couldn't meet with everyone even if I wanted to.

A better 1st pitch:

1. Give me a functional/skills scope. Instead of "I'm a comms consultant" (generic) tell me "I'm a comms consultant who works with startups on messaging, media training and media relations."

Or: "I'm a growth consultant w/ a core focus on paid Facebook & Instagram campaigns."

Search-funders and SMB buyers with sales experience are starting on second base.

Thread on how sales abilities improve your success odds in acquisition entrepreneurship:

1. SMB Deal Sourcing ~ SALES PROSPECTING

In order to buy a SMB, you need to see hundreds of candidates. How do you do that?

Like in Sales, you have two main prospecting avenues:

1. Inbound - Advertise or network with SMB professionals in your target market, e.g. business brokers / SBA lenders / CPAs / lawyers.

2. Outbound - Find and contact owners of SMBs that fit your criteria to see if / when they want to sell.

Inbound is nice because the opportunities come to you. But they might be few and far between.

Outbound is grunt work, i.e. "Dialing for dollars." Because of this (not in spite of it), outbound has advantages:

- More opportunities.

Higher-volume deal flow → better odds of a successful acquisition. Remember, it only takes one.

- Less competition.

Educated people shy away from grunt work. Your willingness to sweat will be rewarded with buried treasure (off-market deals).