The AFT podcast: At the Forefront of Transactions | Previously known as Fundraising Radio.

The AFT podcast: At the Forefront of Transactions | Previously known as Fundraising Radio.

The AFT podcast (At the Forefront of Transactions) - previously known as Fundraising Radio, is a continuation of our efforts to bring in-depth knowledge of the payments space. Do you know how credit cards work? How banks communicate transactions between each other? How the tap to pay works? How funds get disbursed by government agencies? You'll learn about topics in the payment space that you didn't even know existed. If you are in the fintech/payments space or just a curious mind - hop on!

Episodes

April 18, 2025 59 mins

Spencer Hurst, Founder of MercuryVote in this episode explains how stock voting rights operate, how they can be bought and sold (rented) and how the funds flow when a stock or a share of a mutual fund is purchased.

Brace yourselves for a deep dive into the confusing space of STONKS.

Spencer's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/spencerhhurst/

MercuryVote website: https://www.mercuryvote.com/

AFT's website: https://www.aft.fin...

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Wesley Walton - CEO of Glendale Area Schools Credit Union [GASCU] in this episode takes a deep dive into the structure and operations of credit unions.

GASCU's website: https://gascu.org/

Our substack: https://aftfinance.substack.com/

Our website: https://www.aft.finance/

How do credit unions make decisions, what are the key differences between commercial banks and credit unions, who should consider joining a CU and much more.

Key n...

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Marshall Greenwald, the Founder of Ionia in this episode digs deep into the souls (backend) of card processing.

Marshall's LinkedIn for those who don't know how to use hyperlinks: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marshall-greenwald-9480351/

Ionia's website: https://www.ioniapay.com/

AFT's Substack: https://aftfinance.substack.com/

AFT's website: https://www.aft.finance/


Here are the questions we've covered during...

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Terry Husayn (Talha), VP of Technical engagement and a member of the founding team at Orum. In this part Terry spoke about the process of building an early stage sales team - from the ground up. Specifically we focused on hiring, training and creating compensation plans for BDRs and SDRs.

Some mentions from the episode:

  • Winning an SDR interview, Terry's blog
  • Betts recruiting - recruiting
  • AlwaysHired - SDR school
  • Shi...
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Terry Husayn (Talha), VP of Technical engagement and a member of the founding team at Orum in this episode talks about the following:

- intro to cold-calling, who needs to do it and why

- testing of the outreach strategy

- specifics of outreach


Databases of emails/phone numbers:

Zoominfo

Apollo

LeadIQ

Lusha

Intent based signals tracking can be done here: Sixth Sense

Tool to capture your website visitors: Warmly


Terry'...

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Amjed Aboukhadijeh - head of sales at Socket. In this part he takes a deeper dive into the specific strategies included in the territory planning, more specifically - creating drip campaigns and running a POC (Proof Of Concept) that has a much greater success rate.

Here is the link to a spreadsheet template that you can use to run your Proof Of Concept: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16RFCe-VnSILzZerdbdPsajKSsfNQHzbKxcVIG48...

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Amjed Aboukhadijeh - head of sales at Socket, talks about the importance of territory planning in the sales process. He explains what steps does territory planning consist of and how you should work on each step.

This is the first episode of two that we'll have with Amjed - part 2 will be focused on very specific strategies that were mentioned in Pt 1 (this episode) so stay tuned!

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Lucas Price, Founder and CEO at Yardstick in this episode talks about asking the right questions, using structured interviews and scorecards to identify sales talent.


Who by Geoff Smart and Randy Street https://a.co/d/fBJf66l

A VP of Sales Hiring Scorecard For Startups…Get it Right the First Time https://avenuetalentpartners.com/2021/06/27/vp-sales-hiring-scorecard-startups/

What to Know Before You Interview Your Next Sales Ca...

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For our long-standing followers asking if we haven't released any new episodes in the past 8 months because we died - no we haven't, still kicking it! This new season of Fundraising Radio will be still catered to our old listeners but this time the focus will be on sales for early stage startups that have nothing to their name. Why? Because with the ongoing recession and great fears for the future of the US economy, more an...

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Jonny Price, VP of Fundraising at Community Round Fundraising (WeFunder) in this episode talks about equity crowdfunding, process that founders need to undergo to have a successful crowd-funded round and more. We've also talked about the major pitfalls in said process and how to prepare for those.

Jonny's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonnyprice/

Community Round Fundraising's site: https://wefunder.com/

SPVs (Special Purpos...

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Hall Martin, Founder and CEO at TEN Capital Network that raised over $900 million for its clients, in this episode talks about hiring fundraising advisors who can connect you to the right capital. We spoke about different regulations around fundraising and of course, about hiring experts for your fundraising round and whether it's worth it or not. 

Hall's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/halltmartin/

TEN Capital Network -...

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Alyona Mysko, CEO & Founder at Fuelfinance in this episode talks about the story of her company and the effects that the war has on it and its future plans. Hint: no giving up in sight and Fuelfinance is preparing to raise soon while expanding!

Fuelfinance website - https://fuelfinance.me

Support Ukrainian Busines - here

Here - how to open in Delaware a company, but it is in Ukrainian. If you want to read another way of op...

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Sharmin Ali, Founder and CEO of Instoried tells her story of helping others write good stories. In this episode we go in-depth into the reasons why Instoried build all their tech in-house from scratch and how they use it as their competitive advantage to secure funding for the expansion.

Sharmin's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharmin-ali-5b6b4237/

Instoried website: https://www.linkedin.com/company/instoried/

I forgot what...

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Russ Wilcox, Partner at PillarVC talks about his experience running startups himself. Throughout his career he raised 10 times and 3 times these were down-rounds. In this episode Russ explains what down-rounds are bad, how they happened to him and how he managed to survive and thrive!

Russ' LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/russ-wilcox-2005/

Pillar VC's website: https://www.pillar.vc/

For people who want to understand how to ge...

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Tae Hea Nahm, Managing Director and Co-Founder at Storm Ventures in this episode talks about his experience working as an attorney and helping startup founders raise money for their companies, and eventually starting a VC fund of his own. We also spoke about his book "Survival To Thrival", why he wrote it and what was the affect on his fund.

Tae's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tnahm/

Storm ventures: https://www.stormventure...

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Koby Conrad, Head of Growth at Rupa Health and Founder of Channels of Growth talks about his experience building a company and pivoting 3 times. He also explains what growth management looks like and who should be dealing with that field.

Koby's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kobyconrad/

Subscribe to Channels of Growth here: https://channelsofgrowth.substack.com/

Course on fundraising by Fundraisin...

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Jeremy Neilson, CEO and Co-Founder of Assure in this episode explains how SPVs work and what they are, how founders can use them to make their rounds easier and what are the expected costs of creating an SPV and syndicating your own round. 

Assure's site: https://hubs.li/Q015d7j-0 

Jeremy's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremyneilson/

Assure's bootcamp: https://boomstartup.com/

Assure's Youtube: https://www.youtub...

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Nick Desai - Founder and CEO at HeyRenee in this episode talks about how he started 5 companies and how many of them actually made it. He also explains why he chose to raise money from VCs for all his companies and how that decision affected the business.

HeyRenee site: https://www.heyrenee.co/

Nick's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nickdesaiheal/

Can your investors fire me? Here is an episode of Fundraising Radio explaining ...

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Dylan Kendall - candidate for Los Angeles City Council District in 2022 and a Founder of a for-profit and non-profit in this episode shares her experience of being a founder in Los Angeles. She explains how did it happen that fundraising for a non-profit turned out to be easier than for a for-profit company and how she got into politics.

Learn more about Dylan as a candidate here: https://dylankendall2022.com/

Relevan episode where...

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Jeb Banner, CEO and Co-Founder of Boardable explains how the governing boards really work and how founders can make sure that they don't get fired from the companies that they have started. He also spoke about the first steps that early stage founders should take to establish the board and explained the legal requirements around the board management.

Jeb's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jebbanner/

Boardable: https://boardabl...

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