Kim Gamez’s Post

One of the most difficult tasks I have ever gotten to do as an adult is to start a startup. Ignore what you watch on TV or movies, starting and growing a business is a lot! It really is, especially when you are a solo founder. But some things I've learned since I started building Blurpe are: 1. Focus on making money. That's the most important thing. 2. Hire the right people and be kind to them. 3. Ask for help when you need to. 4. If you can't afford it, there's no shame in saying you can't. 5. Cut your cost and use free tools as much as you can. 6. Pivot as much as you can until you find product-market fit. This last lesson was shared with me by one of our investors in our pre-seed round. He said, "Identity your 2 most important metrics and grow them by 20% month-on-month" The journey is still far. Let's see what this can become with 10 years of consistency. Play the long term game 🚀 PS: If you’re looking to hire a marketing talent, head on to Blurpe.co and book a meeting with us. We have over 5,000 vetted marketing talents and we would love to match you with one.

In my experience there is one thing that makes a great founder... Being good at more than 'one thing'. Don't believe the clickbait. As a founder you are going to have to get down and dirty with sales, operations, product, cold emailing, fundraising, hiring, legal issues, engineering, finance, marketing and much more. Some to greater and lesser extents, but you can't build a business without knowing what it takes to <actually> build a business. Anyone who tells you differently simply has never done it themselves. Have I? Yes. Have I built a unicorn? No. But I've worked with founders for ten years who are or have been on that track and believe me when I tell you each approached it differently and with a different superpower. Normalise understanding that building is hard. And building a vc backed behemoth is harder.

Following last week’s recommendations for books, here are 5 must-watch films to inspire your entrepreneurial spirit this summer: "Steve Jobs" - Get an in-depth look at the life and vision of Apple's co-founder, Steve Jobs. "Joy" - Follow the inspiring true story of Joy Mangano and her journey to inventing and building a business empire. "The Founder" - Explore the journey of Ray Kroc and the rise of McDonald's into a global fast-food empire. "The Social Network" - Dive into the dramatic story of Facebook's creation and its impact on the tech world. "Moneyball" - Learn how data and innovation transformed baseball, with lessons applicable to business and startups. Grab some popcorn and get ready to be inspired! 🍿🎬

Saying no is hard. Saying no to 💰💰💰💰 is even harder. Our business is built on the back of our own product, but for a while was supported by marketing partnerships. Big finance brands love collaborating with Financielle. As a small team with a relentless focus on growing our own product for our users, it can be hard saying no to revenue. But, ultimately, any slight distraction could take us off course.. Sure, with more resource and the right partnerships, there will be amazing global synergy. Right now though, we have amazing momentum with our own product and pace is extremely important in start-up land. It's hard to say no, even harder when it is turning down money, but the bigger goal is important. Q to founders - are you focussing on the thing that takes you closer to your North Star? Or being distracted by shiny things 👀

My secret to running an 8 figure business ( It’s not discipline ) Then? I call it HAVING FUN . I genuinely believe this….. The ones who have fun, win. And I have been having fun for the last 10 years. For those who don’t know, I worked for 2 years at Google. It was everything you can get in a job. - Great pay  - Good food  - Challenging work  - Knowledgeable colleagues  - Inspiring mentor and manager  - Stable and non toxic work environment. Most importantly, it was fun.  All of this also brought me closer to the next chapter of my life. It started with meeting Rajneil R Kamath at Google.  During our chats, we realised how much we loved Google.  And also realised how much we wanted more. Just a bit more in life. Our chats led us to our first entrepreneurial venture. And that failed, sort of. I say sort of because, - We both learnt what not to do  - And we sold it for a decent amount of money - We had so much learning and fun at the same time - All the above led us to our next venture. Obviously! We started ArtE Mediatech with the money we made from the sale of the previous venture. The first 4 years were nothing short of a roller coaster ride. Exhilerating.  - Driving revenue - Learning how to sell  - Networking and meeting new people  - Building good professional and personal relationships And all this has brought me to the next chapter of my life. 📖 Writing a book (soon to be published)  🚧 Building my first SAAS product Am I having fun? Hell yeah! Every morning I wake up, I feel super charged. Ready to go! Because, ➡ No matter your net worth  ➡ No matter the money you make  ➡ No matter the make of the car you drive If you aren’t having fun, you are not successful.  If you aren’t having fun, you aren’t living. P.S - I’m all for making money. It buys comfort. It’s very important.  Imagine having fun while making it, how much more you would make!

Searching for a co-founder? It's not about ticking off boxes. It's about aligning passions. Imagine teaming with someone who is as obsessed about your startup as you are. Someone who doesn't just clock-in and clock-out but lives the journey. Consider Richard Branson finding Nik Powell for Virgin Records or how Larry Page teamed up with Sergey Brin to make Google the colossus it is today. Think about it. Take the leap. Find your partner-in-crime and set the world ablaze. Because great ideas need great co-founders.

5 mistakes founders make when searching for a co-founder: 1. Partnering based purely on friendship. 2. Not defining clear roles. 3. Ignoring potential value alignment issues. 4. Overlooking complementary skills. 5. Skipping a trial working period. Here’s how to improve: 1. Choose a partner based on compatibility and shared vision. 2. Clearly outline responsibilities from the onset. 3. Ensure both share the same core values and company vision. 4. Seek out a co-founder whose skills complement yours. 5. Consider a short-term project together before formalizing roles. Example: Larry Page and Sergey Brin, co-founders of Google, balanced their technical prowess and shared a unified vision which underpinned their mutual respect and successful partnership.

Everyone says starting a company is a rollercoaster. But no one talks about the specific stomach-drop moments. So unless you are blessed to have a support group of founder friends (YC is very helpful for this), it's hard to separate "normal" failure from true catastrophe. So it ends up feeling like you're getting stomped in the face by catastrophe eery day... List of things that have either happened to me or founders friends that are NOT fatal. → Losing your first big customer → Getting sued by some patent troll → Blindsided by some random regulation → Copycat clones your product, every pixel → Rejected by 100+ seed investors in a row → Critical product outage, customers yelling → Lose track of spending, go over your budget → Missing your growth KPIs for 2 quarters straight → Sending 100 v. personalized cold emails, 0 replies → Spend weeks polishing a launch, no users ever use → Realizing you waited way too long to make a key hire → Having a warm sales lead string you along for months → PR backlash and bad press from an avoidable mistake → Getting turned down by a candidate you REALLY wanted → Finding out a competitor just raised $50M more than you → Getting zero traction on a mktg campaign you poured $100K into → Spend months paying back tech debt instead of shipping new stuff If you ever are wondering whether some setback is fatal or something that tons of other founders run into, DM me :)