33: Mitch Stein (Pond)
Revenue: Real Startup Stories
English - May 26, 2021 12:00 - 1 hour - 77.1 MB - ★★★★★ - 12 ratingsEntrepreneurship Business Technology revenue technology ecommerce dtc saas startups founders Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Mitch Stein is Co-Founder & CEO of Pond, a software platform that brings together nonprofit organizations and technology providers. Their approach is unique, allowing nonprofit executives to be paid for taking meetings with vendors. The end goal is to help all 1.5 million nonprofits in the country get access to better software and tools.
In this episode, we discuss Mitch's background, his work at Goldman Sachs, perfectionism, what inspired him to be a founder, the mistakes he made building Pond (including the false starts along the way), and his advice to founders. We talk about the importance of talking to customers and focusing on the right solution, instead of trying to build a complex product from the beginning. This advice alone will save you months of time and tens of thousands of dollars.
GUEST
Mitch Stein LinkedIn
Pond Website
PODCAST
Safa Mahzari
Patreon
Alluxo Website
TERMS
VC = venture capital
ARR = annual recurring revenue
PMF = product market fit
SaaS = software as a service
CRM = customer relationship management
B2B = business to business
DTC = direct to consumer
H2H = human to human
TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - Episode intro
1:06 - Culture and work styles
5:21 - Mitch's background
24:11 - Advice based on your startup stage
38:10 - Founding story of Pond
53:18 - The problem with hero worship
1:07:18 - Aligning around a mission
1:15:43 - Advice to founders
1:23:09 - Wrap up and final thoughts