Podcast

In 2009 Natalie Nagele and her husband, Chris, launched Postmark to help businesses deliver emails to their customers quickly. 

A decade in, Nagele had grown the company to around 40 employees, which was when she began feeling burned out. The pull to explore new interests was the catalyst for accepting a life-changing acquisition offer from Active Campaign in 2022. In this episode, you’ll learn how to: 

• Develop passionate employees that care about your company.  
• Create raving fans that ref…

In 2012, Ryan Coon started Rentalutions, a platform to help landlords manage and communicate with their tenants more effectively. 

The business showed steady growth, but Coon wasn’t satisfied. 

Five years in, Coon rebranded the company to Avail and focused his marketing to target DIY landlords with under ten rental units to manage. The changes proved successful as Coon grew the business to around $7 million in revenue before selling to Realtor.com in 2020 for approximately five times revenue.

In 2015, Lorenzo de Plano co-founded Solace Technologies, one of the first vape manufacturers in the United States. The goal of the business was to create a discreet vape pen that customers could use as an alternative to smoking cigarettes.

The business boomed to revenue of more than one million dollars a month, but a looming threat had de Plano eyeing an exit.  So, when a $15 million offer came in, he bit. In this episode of the Built to Sell Podcast, you’ll learn how to:

• Bootstrap to a sev…

In 2009, Raman Sehgal started a small marketing company called Ramarketing. In 2015, frustrated with the company’s progress, Sehgal decided to analyze his business. 

That’s when he discovered something interesting. 

Ramarketing’s most valuable customers (low-maintenance, sticky, high gross margin, etc.) were in the pharmaceutical industry. Sehgal immediately pivoted the company to solely serve clients in the pharmaceutical supply chain. 

Focusing on big pharma worked. Ramarketing grew from $5…

In 2001, Haroon Mokhtarzada and his brothers started Webs.com, which allowed anyone to build a professional website. Eager to grow the company, they decided to raise money from a venture capital firm – a decision Mokhtarzada would later regret.

They ultimately grew Webs.com to over 50 million users and sold it in 2011 to Vistaprint for over 10x revenue, totaling $117.5 million.

Hungry to start another company and learn from their mistakes, Haroon and his brothers began Truebill in 2015. The…

This was a pretty interesting episode of John Warrillow's Built to Sell podcast.

Along with three friends, Sebastian Johnston co-founded TheAmazeApp in 2014. The idea was simple: Social media influencers could upload a picture of what they were wearing and tag the clothing on TheAmazeApp’s database of e-commerce retailers. Then, when one of their followers purchased the item, TheAmazeApp would receive a commission they shared with the influencer. 

The founding team raised $800,000 through…

Jim Estill is one of the most successful entrepreneurs you've probably never heard of. 

In 1975, Estill started EMJ Data, a technology distribution company, from the trunk of his car and grew it to $350 million in sales before taking it public. 

In 1997, Estill joined the board of Blackberry and stayed through the company's heyday that ushered in the era of the iPhone.

He then became a partner at CanRock Ventures, a venture capital firm.

In 2015, Estill bought Danby Appliances, the company…

Henry Hyder-Smith and Steve Denner started UK-based Adestra in 2004. Adestra is a digital marketing software that helps big companies handle email campaigns, among other things.

The company grew nicely. By 2016, it had around $9 million in revenue and a client list that featured some of the U.K.'s best companies. Hyder-Smith and Denner decided it was time to go beyond their borders and enter the U.S. and Asian markets. To fund the effort, they raised $7.2 million from the Business Growth Fund (…

These days, you're just as likely to watch a football game on a mobile phone as you are on an old-school TV. The technology that enables you to watch your favorite show on whatever device you have handy was made possible by Jason Flick. Flick co-founded a company called You.i TV with a vision to "own the glass." He struck deals to provide the user interface, which enabled content to be viewed across devices with the likes of the NFL, NBA, and just about anyone else who produces original conten…