In this episode, of How I'm Building This, Prateek interviews Alex Sambvani from Slang who shares his entrepreneurial journey, discussing his early influences, pivotal moments that led him to start his company, and the challenges of navigating the funding landscape. He emphasizes the importance of hiring the right people, the strategies for customer acquisition, and the lessons learned in SEO and marketing. Alex also reflects on the scrappy beginnings of Slang and outlines the future plans for the company as it continues to grow in the voice AI space for restaurants.
Takeaways:
- Alex grew up around entrepreneurship, influenced by his father's small business.
- A pivotal moment for Alex was winning a Hack Week competition at Spotify.
- Raising funds in a tough market requires understanding investor fit.
- Venture-backed founders must grow at a rapid pace to meet expectations.
- Hiring in startups requires looking beyond resumes to find cultural fit.
- Slang's voice AI solution addresses communication gaps in restaurants.
- Customer acquisition started with network connections and cold outreach.
- Inbound marketing strategies include SEO and paid advertising.
- Quality content is more effective than quantity in SEO efforts.
- Signing a customer before building a product validated their market fit.
Sound Bites:
- "I always loved tackling challenges."
- "We built a voice AI prototype."
- "We raised our series A in a tough market."
In this episode, we cover:
00:00 Introduction to Alex and His Journey
03:00 Pivotal Moments in Entrepreneurship
06:05 Navigating the Funding Landscape
08:49 The Challenges of Venture Funding
11:53 Hiring in Startups: What to Look For
15:03 Building Slang: The Voice AI Solution
21:09 Customer Acquisition and Market Focus
26:58 Inbound vs Outbound Marketing Strategies
29:51 Lessons Learned in SEO and Content Strategy
33:08 Scrappy Beginnings and Customer Validation
34:51 Future Plans for Slang
Where to find Alex:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexsambvani/
Slang: https://www.slang.ai
Where to find Prateek:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/prateekmathur
Activated Scale: https://www.activatedscale.com
For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email prateek@activatedscale.com
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