Rand Fishkin talks with Jason Barnard about the Lost and Founder.
Lost and Founder! Rand Fishkin, cofounder and CEO of SparkToro and Snackbar Studio, and author of "Lost and Founder," shares raw insights on the brutal realities of startup life that nobody talks about. Drawing from his 17-year journey building Moz and the painful lessons learned along the way, Rand reveals why 95% of venture-backed startups fail and how the "move fast and break things" mentality destroys more companies than it creates. Learn why being patient with your business growth isn't weakness—it's wisdom. Discover practical strategies for building sustainable companies without sacrificing your sanity or values. This episode shows entrepreneurs how to resist investor pressure, make decisions that align with your vision, and why sometimes leaving money on the table is the smartest move you'll ever make.
#Entrepreneurship #Startup #VentureCapital #SparkToro #Moz #Founder #Business #SEO #Marketing #Tech #SiliconValley #Investor #Funding #BusinessStrategy #EntrepreneurLife #StartupLife #Podcast #FastlaneFounders #RandFishkin #LostAndFounder
What you’ll learn from Rand Fishkin
This episode was recorded live on video June 17th 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl1F0DOa8WI
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Transcript from Rand Fishkin with Jason Barnard on Fastlane Founders And Legacy. Lost and Founder
[00:00:00] Rand Fishkin: The venture capital environment creates a path that is successful for extraordinarily small numbers of people and far fewer than most tech entrepreneurs and people who join tech startups and are recruited and work in that field understand and believe. And the complexities of that environment, the competing demands and the incentive structure is much more complicated than what's traditionally been presented to entrepreneurs and founders. And I am trying to open that Pandora's box and take out all the ugly secrets and show the whole ecosystem for what it is, which is not all terrible and bad. There are good parts of it, and I think some parts are worth keeping.
[00:00:56] Rand Fishkin: Which is why I'm still an entrepreneur and a founder and someone who raises money. Not from venture capitalists anymore, I still believe in parts of that world and I still love parts of that job but I think we can optimize away from the parts that are terrible and ugly and have poor incentives.
[00:01:15] Narrator: Fastlane Founders and Legacy with Jason Barnard. Each week, Jason sits down with successful entrepreneurs, CEOs and executives, and gets them to share how they mastered the delicate balance between rapid growth and enduring success in the business world. How can we quickly build a profitable business that stands the test of time and becomes our legacy?
[00:01:38] Narrator: A legacy we're proud of. Fastlane Founders and Legacy with Jason Barnard.
[00:01:44] Jason Barnard: Hi everybody and welcome to another Fastlane Founders and Legacy. I'm here with a quick hello and we're good to go. Welcome to the show, Rand Fishkin.
[00:01:56] Rand Fishkin: Howdy, Jason. Good to be here again.
[00:01:58] Jason Barnard: It's lovely to have you back. So this is going to be a shorter episode than usual. We're going to be talking about startups and being the boss of a startup and investors and moving fast and breaking things and how difficult it is and is it more difficult today than it was before? All of that in a moment.
[00:02:13] Jason Barnard: But before that, my thing is Brand SERP and I always have to show people's Knowledge Panels. Yours what's absolutely delightful. Got all the facts straight, pretty much. It's unfortunately focusing more on Moz than it does on SparkToro, but I don't think that's a huge problem for you.
[00:02:30] Jason Barnard: But then I also looked at Google Learn About, which I really like because it's an educational kind of platform where you ask a ...