Off to the Valley

Lloyed Lobo: Risk and luck are
two sides of the same coin.

A lot of people say he got lucky.

This girl got lucky.

Everyone gets lucky, man.

The reality is luck and risk
are two sides of the same coin.

The ones that get lucky are the
ones that never stop flipping.

They keep flipping risk.

And one day, the coin flips luck.

Prateek Panda: Hello everybody.

And welcome to Off To The valley, a
podcast that shares tales of audacious

individuals and entrepreneurs having
the courage to do something different.

Inspired by Silicon valley culture.

It really extends to a global
community of individuals who've dared

to step outside their comfort zones.

I'm your host, Prateek Panda, a
three time entrepreneur, diehard

marketing enthusiast, and a
forever seeker of knowledge.

Our superstar guest today is Lloyed Lobo.

This man, let me tell you,
has been through it all.

From experiencing the Gulf War as
a young refugee, to founding two

rockstar startups, Boast and Traction.

He's a champion of community-led-growth.

He's bootstrapped his startup
to $10 million in annual

recurring revenue and more.

And did I just mention that he launched a
killer book that hit the shelves recently?

The book is titled, From
Grassroots to Greatness.

It's a game changer on building
iconic brands and is already

being featured among the top new
releases and bestsellers on Amazon.

Lloyed, what a journey.

Lloyed Lobo: Thank you so much, Prateek.

That's a wonderful intro.

And I don't know, man, when
you're going through it, it

doesn't feel like a tough journey.

I think somebody else is always going
through something more difficult than

you are and you know nothing about it.

So be kind, count your blessings.

The glass is always half full.

And I always used to think this way.

But having a wonderful partner,
my wife, helped me realize this

after all the ups and downs that
the glass is always half full.

And so now, actually, I start my day every
day that I wake up, I think something

good that happened the previous day.

Thinking negative attracts the negative.

When you think positive,
you attract more positive.

There is something to be
said about manifestation.

Prateek Panda: Understanding and
knowing the fact that there is always

somebody going through something worse
makes us more human towards everybody.

Tell us a little bit about your backstory.

How did you get into entrepreneurship?

Lloyed Lobo: I'm an accidental
entrepreneur in many ways.

I was born in Kuwait.

My parents are from India.

They were poor.

My dad was a farmer.

My mom grew up in the slums of Mumbai.

At the time, if you're not
educated, you can't go to the West.

And if you want to make money in any
fashion, you had to go to the Middle East.

That was the only door that was open.

So they went to Kuwait.

And because they couldn't afford to
take us on vacation anywhere, my dad

would get free tickets back and forth
home once a year for the family.

So my summers as a child were
spent in the slums of Mumbai.

And I think, that's where I understood
the power of people and the camaraderie.

And what a small group of
people can achieve, no matter

how hard the obstacle is.

So as a kid, when we'd go back to
Kuwait, I'd hold my parents feet

and tell them, please don't take me.

I don't want to go back.

Fast forward a few years.

I got to experience probably one
of the biggest marvels I've seen in

my life is truly how a few people
when they're united by a great

purpose, they can move mountains.

The Gulf War hit Kuwait and
the security had lapsed.

There was a time where there
was no phone, no internet.

And when I went down the building that
day with my dad, everyone, instead

of belaboring on the problem, they
started thinking about solutions.

Hey, I'll guard the building
from this time to that time.

I'll organize food supply.

Somebody else is if you have displaced
family members, we'll organize shelter.

And every building
became the sub community.

And word of mouth spread from
building to building, communicated

with embassies, with governments, and
organized a massive evacuation movement.

And I learned a few things other than the
power of people and community that day.

One is Leadership in a way, right?

Great leaders cascade
purpose, not just goals.

I was this nine year old kid
and Rambo was huge back then.

And I threw on a red bandana and I was
running around acting like I am Rambo and

I'm rescuing Kuwait from the Gulf War.

No adult made me feel like I was
a little insignificant bother.

They let me do what I did like
help in very little way and a quote

comes to mind or a story comes
to mind from President Kennedy.

I think it's an urban legend, but
he was walking the halls of NASA.

At midnight and he sees his
janitor sweeping the room

and he asked the janitor.

What are you doing here at this hour?

And the janitor says sir, i'm
putting a man on the moon.

That's what great purpose does That's
what great leaders do they cascade

that purpose where the lowest common
denominator Feels like they're the driver.

And that's what I felt
that purpose in my core.

Now, fast forward a few more years.

My family immigrated to Canada.

I didn't finish high school, man.

I ditched all my high school exams.

I didn't graduate with
a high school diploma.

I think I was always craving this
risk uncertainty, always on the edge.

And most kids, if you think about it, if
you don't have a high school diploma, you

don't have your high school transcripts,
you didn't finish high school, they

won't apply to university, right?

I applied to every single
university out there in Canada.

I'm like, what do I have to lose?

Because I knew that if my parents find
out I failed, or like I didn't finish

my high school diploma, and they paid
so much fees, they would lose it.

So I said, Okay, I'm gonna play the game.

I'm gonna apply to every
university applied with the

previous year's transcripts.

Now, luck would have it that one
university, reached out and said, hey,

can you fill out these entrance exams?

Do these entrance exams, Math and English.

So I aced the Math and English exam and
they asked me, where are your transcripts?

And I said, I made up a story and I
said, there's political unrest in Kuwait.

And so they're not here yet.

And and this was years after the
Gulf war, there was no political

unrest, but there were talks of it.

So I concocted the story and they're
like, listen, start the semester.

And if we don't get your
transcripts within the month,

you're going to have to unenroll.

Luck would have it that
they never followed up.

And I graduated with
an engineering degree.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing.

Lloyed Lobo: And a key lesson here
as I go through my story, I want

some lesson or the other for people
to take away from it is risk and

luck are two sides of the same coin.

A lot of people say he got lucky.

This girl got lucky.

Everyone gets lucky, man.

The reality is luck and risk
are two sides of the same coin.

The ones that get lucky are the
ones that never stop flipping.

They keep flipping risk.

And one day, the coin flips luck, right?

And so that is, I think, an
important thing to keep in mind.

The other thing as an entrepreneur,
unless you're doing something

illegal, never ask for permission.

Beg for forgiveness.

That's the rule I learned here and so
powered by these learnings, a lot of

what we become is nurture, not nature.

We have this habit or tendency of
saying that this kid is talented or

look at how talented this person is.

Talent is not what defines you.

How you nurture that talent is what
actually turns you into success because

you could, you can't rest on the
laurels of your talent and compete.

You need to keep practicing and honing
and be consistent with that talent, right?

And I think truly if you surround yourself
with the right people, let's say you

want to be an entrepreneur someday, a
successful tech startup or a movie star,

whatever it is, whatever you're passionate
about or what you dream of becoming.

Step number one is surround
yourself by successful people, try

to get in those circles, right?

I never knew when I got into university
that I would be an entrepreneur someday.

But my nurture in my childhood enabled
me and exposed me to learn a few things

that were key to entrepreneurship.

One was the power of people,
companionship, surrounding

yourself by good, positive people.

And when I went in the business
world, I find out that this quote.

Your network is your net worth, right?

A lot of what we are is our network.

And I changed the quote.

I think for my book, I didn't, I don't
think I put this in the book, but the way

I like to say it is your community is your
currency, not your network is your net

worth, but it's the same thing, right?

So who you know matters and how do you
engineer luck in many ways is by building

a network and building relationships.

More and more successful people
that I talked to have been building

a network and they are what they
are because of that network.

I was chatting with having dinner
with a good friend yesterday.

Who in weeks raised a
$15 million first fund.

And I'm like, how did you do it?

Like you have Mark
Andreessen in your fund.

And he's this took 10
years of network building.

Like I started building relationships with
people and giving back and connecting with

them, like going back 10 years, just not
just asking people for things blindly,

but giving back and helping and supporting
them and building true connections

and bonds and bringing them together.

And then one day I decided to raise a
fund and I reached out to these people.

And of course, like lots of
people write checks, right?

And one connection led to the other and
it led to Mark Andreessen investing.

Or the same thing with the book, the, with
the, my book from grassroots to greatness

is a bestseller on Amazon this week.

I didn't just wake up one day
and decide to launch the book.

It's years of connections I've built
that are giving the love and support.

Your network matters significantly.

Your community is your currency.

I think that pushed me over
the edge into entrepreneurship.

Prateek Panda: Yeah, I think the key
learning there like you said, is this the

network also takes time to build, right?

And I think a lot of times people
don't have enough patience because you

don't see some immediate gratification.

As humans, we are wired to look
for immediate gratifications.

So do you have any tips or advice
for people who are moving to new

countries or, starting to move their
startups and how can they go about

building this network in a new place
where, you know, absolutely nobody.

Lloyed Lobo: I think, the
one thing is very underrated.

It's just reach out, follow
somebody and reach out.

Figure out your ideal customer
profile, your ideal audience profile.

And then just reach out to people.

So I'll give you a very easy
framework because this is, it

sounds easy, but it's a lot of work.

See, everything great is on the other
side of risk and pain and hard work.

Nothing worth doing is easy, but
what happens is as you do difficult

things, You become stronger, you
become more resilient and you learn

more and the process gets easier and
you get into a flow state, right?

So I'll give you an example.

So when I finished engineering,
I started figuring out like,

hey, what do I want to do next?

And I genuinely imagine a guy who
didn't finish high school and then

somehow finagle into engineering, right?

I'm obviously like on the
other side of risk there.

I didn't want to do a
typical nine to five job.

So I started asking people, hey,
what's the best job I could get if I

want to be a business person someday?

That was always my, my, my thing.

I wanted to go into business.

And they said, man, your
communication kind of sucks.

So you should learn to communicate
and improve your communication skill

because everything you do from convincing
your spouse that you want to do a

company and you won't bring money to
convincing early customers to convincing

the media investors, even convincing
employees, not only early employees.

To work for low pay but later on
as the company grows you need to

evangelize your employees to buy into
the vision it's all communication.

Now, I knew one thing, and this
is another key lesson here, is

self motivation is hard, man.

Self motivation is hard for
95 percent of the people.

I would say 99 percent of the people.

What is self motivation?

Let's break that down because a
lot of us write this term like

a buzzword in job requirements.

We're looking for a self
motivated individual.

I guarantee you the person
writing that job description

is also not self motivated.

Self motivated is not showing up to
work and showing up for something

when the conditions are perfect.

Self motivation is showing up when
things are imperfect, when the weather

is crappy, and you don't feel like
waking up because you slept two hours,

and you're punched in the face and
hit in the gut over and over again.

And how do you get up and show up?

That is self motivation.

Now, what I was worried about is
Man, I was an awkward communicator.

If I went on stage and went to like
speech classes and if people laughed

at me or somebody made fun of me,
I'd get demotivated and my self

motivation would die right there.

So I'm like, how do I
combat the self motivation?

And I realized that the best
way to learn something is not

to look for self motivation.

But to create a system, really put
yourself in an environment that forces

you to do that something over and over
again if you suck at that something.

So I started applying to sales jobs
because what better job than sales?

What other job forces you to communicate
over and over again other than sales?

Now again, luck would have it, I
applied to all kinds of sales jobs.

Xerox, small tech companies, big
companies, nobody would give me a job.

I ended up getting a job.

At a startup making cold calls,
telecom startup, really small.

And I got to one work alongside
closely with the founder and

the early founding team there.

They wouldn't obviously give me a sales
job because, I'd never done sales before.

But cold calling taught me a few things.

One is like to keep waking
up or keep getting up despite

being punched down repeatedly.

Failure, dealing with failure,
dealing with rejection.

Dealing with embarrassment.

Polishing your messaging on the fly.

Pivoting your tone.

Negotiating.

All of that you learn when you cold call.

And I kid you not man, the first cold
call I made, I practiced for 4 hours

and when the decision maker on the
other side came on and yelled, HELLO!

I freaked out and I hung up right away.

Everyone started laughing.

So imagine now I did this in an
audience where I went and spoke

publicly and they started laughing.

I'd probably never go on stage.

But here I signed up to get paid.

My parents are not rich.

I need to make money.

And with great pomp, I told them that,
no, I'm going to be in business and

the best skill I can learn is selling.

And my parents, Indian immigrants,
they're like, your friend's kid, our

friend's kids are at Microsoft and
everything and you've done engineering

to make this little money, minimum
wage, pretty much doing cold calls.

So I needed to uphold that I, the
decision I made is the right one.

And I kept going and going and, fast
forward today, everything I learned

stems from that one skill, right?

Communication is huge.

And so incidentally, my
girlfriend, then now wife, got

into medical school in New Jersey.

And so I started applying
for jobs in New Jersey.

If you work for a startup as your first
job, chances are no big company is going

to hire you in your second job back then.

So I got a job doing sales
at a startup, small company.

The word startup wasn't used as much
as a small new company, 10-15 people in

the enterprise supply chain software.

And I got a free trade visa because I was
Canadian, got a TN visa, went to the US.

And I landed there and I realized it's
not a repeatable, scalable product, right?

Like you got to talk to customers to
figure out what their requirements are,

then translate those requirements into
dev requirements through wireframes.

And then.

Oh, also build a marketing website
and build the marketing materials.

I'm like, what is this?

But now the thing is again,
system, not self motivation.

I couldn't quit.

I'm on a visa.

If I want to be with
this girl, I can't quit.

And I made a huge pomp and said,
I'm going to move to the US

and I'm going to, turn into an
entrepreneur and all of this stuff.

So I couldn't quit that job because
one, I couldn't get, how do I find

another job to give me the visa?

So I had to stick with it.

And so as a function of sticking with
it, I got to work closely with the

founder and the leadership team got to
talk to now from cold calling to meeting

customers in person, large customers,
Tiffany, Armani, Simon, and Schuster.

So I polished the messaging, talked to
big enterprise customers, was able to

close large enterprise deals or be a part
of that, then wireframe, talk to the dev

team, learned everything about marketing
and sales and collateral and all of

this stuff, started hosting events and
then my next job from there transitioned

into running sales for another startup.

And then when I'd hit a ceiling and
my best friend from college called me

saying, I want to do a startup together.

I jumped at the opportunity because I'm
like, rather than getting low pay and

betting on some venture backed startup.

That isn't doing well, we may
as well go on our own journey.

But if you look at the theme there, right?

It is four things.

If you boil down my journey,
it's four things that are crucial

elements to anyone's success.

I kid you not.

Number one is your
companions matter the most.

You are the average of the five
people you surround yourself with.

And if you want to supercharge that,
your community matters the most.

Number two.

Communication is everything.

If you want to be a successful
entrepreneur or any successful person,

you need to learn to communicate
because the job of a leader is to build,

inspire and motivate a team to deliver.

Deliver is the output and so clearly
articulating your vision to excite

and inspire people and energize them.

It's something you need
to do day in, day out.

It's not a one and done activity.

And people who are excited and inspired
and energized can move mountains.

So communication is a huge part of that.

The next thing is creation, learning to
create, whether it's content or products.

It's huge, right?

And as a function of these jobs, working
on startups, I was learning to create.

And the last one, man, without this
fourth element, you will be nothing.

This is the key is consistency.

It is consistency.

Look at Gary Vaynerchuk to Mr.

Beast to Warren Buffett to Jason Lemkin.

One thing is common consistency on small
actions leads to big outcomes over time.

Compound interest on consistency
is what we call overnight success.

And so you can be the best
communicator and have the best

community and be the best creator.

But if you're not
consistent, you lose it all.

And I want to translate this.

I, when I went to do Boast, which
was my Co-founder came up with the

idea of automating R&D funding for
businesses who are building new

products or improving existing products.

I had already been so prepared with
four things, my DNA of community,

ability to communicate ability to
create and be consistent, meaning

never stop, keep being relentless.

So what happened was now.

In the back of your head,
what do you call it?

Like a computer, right?

You don't know, but you subconsciously,
your subconscious brain, then when

faced with risk or uncertainty or
challenge, you pull little skills that

you have that have become muscle memory.

And I think over my life, those
things became muscle memory.

So anyway, the first one was cold
calling, obviously, and communication.

So when we started both, we started
calling manufacturing companies

and oil and gas and construction
companies to buy our stuff.

Communication, pick up
the phone cold call.

That was the first job I did.

Nobody would talk to us man.

Imagine how scammy it sounds right?

Two guys they've never heard of saying
give me your R&D and innovation data and

I'll get you money from the government.

No equity, no interest.

What are they gonna say?

Either it's a scam or I'm already doing
it with some big renowned accounting

firm and so dejected we said, Okay, let's
start going to these people's events.

Okay, we started going to these
people's events And construction, oil

and gas manufacturing, we look like
two young guys who threw on a suit

jacket on top of a hoodie and they
seem like the cigars club, right?

We couldn't relate.

So now dejected, super dejected.

We start hitting up the startup events.

We started looking at what
other events are there.

And when we went to the startup
events, man, it felt like our tribe.

Instant connection.

We're doing this call, right?

We, the second podcast we're doing
together, having this great camaraderie.

They became our friends, they were
living breathing their companies, we

were living breathing this startup life.

We started eating together, partying
together, hanging out together, we even

participated in hackathons together.

So that became our tribe.

Now there's some key lessons here because
we started this question with, if you

have no network, where do you start?

So this is where we were, we had
no network, where do we start?

Number one, you got to figure out
what your aspiration is and what

do you want to get to, right?

What is your goal?

And, route to getting to your goal, who
is the ideal customer profile or ideal

community profile or ideal audience
profile that will help you get there?

Who are you going to create or build a
network of that will help you get there.

You want to get in movies, you ought to
be surround yourself with movie stars.

You want to be a startup rockstar.

You got to surround yourself by startups.

That's the kind of thing, right?

And so let's say you don't know at all.

So where do you start?

Let's say you have an idea for a product.

You don't even know who to sell.

You don't even know who to create for.

These four steps will help you
decide how do you even come

up with your target market.

Number one, do I have a
passion for this audience?

Oil and gas manufacturing, I don't
think we could create for them, man.

It just didn't resonate, right?

But the startup community, not only
we now built three startups for

them, two failed, but it failed
with, we did two AI companies, they

failed with thousands of users.

Just, we couldn't get the tech working.

This was an AI product in 2013
and 15, way ahead of its times.

One was a chatbot and one
was an AI sales assistant.

Nonetheless, then, Boast, also
selling to the same market.

Traction, the community we
built to 120,000 subscribers,

also to the same market.

And this book, From Grassroots to
Greatness, which is a bestseller

now, also for the same market.

The point I'm trying to make is if you
don't love your audience, And have a

passion to help them to create for them.

How you will you build something
sustainable,.Building a company and even

harder building a community led company
is a labor of the heart and mind, right?

It's hard, right?

It's a marathon.

It's not a sprint.

And.

It's a long freaking slog.

If you hate your customers and
your audience, you'll never

be able to sustainably create.

The next thing is start with a
small niche that you see growing.

When we started both in 2012,
startup market was really small.

Everyone would laugh at us
saying, man, these guys are

never going to pay you on time.

These guys are going to go bankrupt.

You guys are not going to build a
successful business selling to startups.

Fast forward today.

That market has exploded, right?

It's the fastest growing segment.

You got to follow your gut and
your instinct because there's great

success in picking a contrarian view.

And actually being right.

You just got to follow where
the innovation is happening.

And as a function of me living in
Silicon Valley, I could see a lot of

innovation and funding going in startups.

Now the industry, this whole
R&D funding market at the time,

wasn't so prevalent for startups.

And we just use that
product to sell to startups.

And nobody saw that there was a future
there, but we knew that all the innovation

dollars are being spent by startups, as a
function of overall company spend startup

spend the most on R&D and innovation.

So keep that in mind.

Also going after a small but growing
niche sometimes will help you identify

white spaces more than a saturated market.

If you're in a saturated market,
then you got to find, you got to

basically offer a 10 X solution.

It might be hard to find a white space.

The third thing is there
a propensity to pay?

Will they pay you?

That's everything someday.

And the last one is.

Is there ease of access?

So passion for the market,
small but growing niche, ease

of access, propensity to pay.

Start there.

Number two is understand
your audience really well.

And we chanced into this, right?

By luck.

But we went there and we got
to eat, breathe, drink, sleep

with them, hang out with them.

We understood not only their problems
and goals, we understood their

aspirations at what stands in the way.

So problems and goals are short lived.

Aspirations are longterm.

And as you build a community led company
or any company, if you look at, see every

company, that's a hundred million in ARR,
they have more than one product, right?

If you just focus on the customer
problem at hand or the goal at hand,

you'll just build that one narrow
product and keep adding features.

The way to build multiple products.

We talk about second act in SaaS.

The way to make your second act
bigger than the first act is to

actually follow the aspiration.

What is the customer's
eventual aspiration?

So you can build multiple
products for that aspiration.

So if you look at both, we
started with automating R&D

funding from the government.

These were government programs
that were manual and cumbersome,

and we would collect their data.

And automate that process.

Then we added lending because the
government would take a long time to pay.

You got to accumulate a year's
worth of R&D work and expenses,

then file it with the government,
then the government pays you.

So that whole process is 14 months.

So we raised a hundred million dollar fund
to say, Hey, why wait for every month you

spend in R&D plug your tech and financials
to boast and we'll give you the money now.

And then we'll deal with
the government a year later.

And then now we've got this interesting
data set of R&D data and financial data

and banking data, which nobody has.

And so our next set of products are
around R&D analytics, like helping you

innovate faster, who you should hire,
what projects you should invest in.

Again, all towards the
customer's aspiration, right?

Why do they want money to innovate faster?

Why do they want to innovate faster to
create impact, to accelerate innovation?

And so it was all along that line.

So understanding the customer's
aspiration is important in addition

to their problems and goals, then you
understand their circle of influence.

Who do they follow?

Meaning, who are the
influencers in the space?

This gives you a list of people.

Say, if you host events, you
can invite them as speakers.

If you host podcasts, you
can invite them as guests.

Who do they frequent?

Meaning, what platforms
are they prevalent on?

Are they on LinkedIn?

Are they on WhatsApp?

Wherever they are, so you
can distribute content there.

What blogs, magazines they read?

I'll do a TechCrunch.

So if you see now at our events,
every year we have Frederic from

TechCrunch come every single year.

I don't moderate any of the sessions.

I don't need to.

I let Frederic moderate
three or four sessions.

I let John from Forbes moderate
three or four sessions.

Because those are people that our audience
follows and reads their content, right?

And so when Frederic from TechCrunch
is interviewing like Jyoti Bansal of

AppDirect, it's oh wow, this is like a,
this is like reading a TechCrunch article.

Like they vibe with it, right?

And then the last one
is , what do they pay for?

What do they fund?

What other tools or services they pay for?

This gives you a list of
sponsors or even partners.

Now, once you have this understanding
of your customers, and their circle of

influence, which is very key because
you have the customer in the center,

you have the circle of influence,
then you leverage the circle of

influence to create content for them.

And so now everywhere they
look, they surround themselves

with you, they see you, right?

And you can repurpose one form
of content multiple times.

But when you start there, start
one, start really small, right?

Say, if you're doing a podcast, you
want to build a network, great way,

pick a small niche that nobody's
talking about, or it's a white space.

And build a list of people, scrape
their email addresses, you can

use hunter.io or you can now use
apollo.io, and you can find people's

email addresses and it is emailing.

Prateek, you won't believe man, almost 95
percent of the people who've come to our

traction events, our podcasts, and this is
Atlassian's president, to Zoho's CEO, to

Twilio's CEO, to Jason Fried of Basecamp,
to Jason Lemkin, I have cold emailed.

I do this over and over again.

The compound interest on
cold emailing people to build

relationships over 10 years is a
massive network of 120, 000 people.

Jason Lemkin wrote the
foreward on my book.

You know how I met Jason Lemkin?

I was hosting an event.

I cold emailed him and cold emailed
him to come and moderate a session.

I was a big fan.

Okay.

Then what I did was I cold emailed
a whole bunch of other unicorn CEOs.

And I know Jason liked
interviewing founders.

I convinced Ryan Smith of Qualtrics which
had a big exit at the time, I think in

2015 to come speak and I pitched him on
the idea that Jason Lemkin will interview

him and he was like, yes, I want Jason
Lemkin to interview and he's if you

can get Jason Lemkin to interview me,
I'm in and I told Jason Lemkin, then

I followed up was, Hey, uh, my first
interview, first email to Jason Lemkin

was something like, Hey, I'd love to
invite you to come to speak at the event.

He didn't respond.

Next one was, Hey, Jason, all these
other people are interested in speaking.

Would you be interested?

The next one was, Hey, Ryan
Smith asked if you would be open

to moderating and he said yes.

So it took three or four tries.

Now what happened after that was he was
so impressed when he came to that event

because he saw Rippling's founder there.

This is at the time when
he was doing Zenefits.

He saw Eventbrite's CEO.

You name it, like that Chief
Growth Officer at LinkedIn.

He's like, how did you get all
these people to come to your event?

And I said, I cold emailed them all.

And everyone in the speaker room was
saying, Lloyed just cold emailed us.

Till today, even at the last traction
conference last year, everyone, when

they came to the speaker dinner,
they're like, how do you know Lloyed?

They're like, he cold emailed us.

Even I got on your
podcast from cold email.

Prateek Panda: I was just going
to say that you cold emailed me.

And,

Lloyed Lobo: emailed you, and then
you invited me a second time around.

Prateek Panda: yeah.

And, we've had we spoke to two times and
we built an amazing rapport together.

And that's a perfect example of, how
you can continue to build your network.

Lloyed Lobo: Exactly exactly.

And that's what I'm saying, man.

Most people don't ask.

Why don't you just ask?

It is the easiest thing to do.

Now when you ask though, don't
ask like you're taking like,

Oh, I want to pick your brain.

No, have a very specific ask.

Thank them for something
that they've done.

Compliment them and try to give
them a little before you ask, right?

Like I was giving Jason Lemkin
now the opportunity to interview

this founder who had just exited.

And who eventually the following year
went on to come and speak at SaaStr.

And so Jason got to build
a relationship with them.

I gave him something unique.

So try to give somebody something unique.

I have this rule in networking.

When you meet somebody, try to walk away
with something you can connect them with.

Whether it's a plumber or a restaurant.

or a lawyer or a banker or whatever
it is, walk away with something.

And then you know what?

Make that connection instantly, give
them, you do that two or three times.

What you develop is the
feeling of reciprocity.

Now they have to give you, I'll give
you, I'll give you another example.

Great friend of mine, Leah Tharin,
she has this podcast Productea.

And she asked me to make a couple of
intros for her and I got really busy

with the book, but nonetheless, I
reached out and then I didn't follow up.

But then she went and made like four
or five intros for me to podcasters.

And those folks responded
very immediately.

And they got me on their podcast.

That ate me alive so much that
this Sunday I had a window.

I reached out to six people.

Like I reached out to
Jason Fried of Basecamp.

I reached out to Des Traynor

I reached out to Farhan, the VP of Eng
at Shopify and all these unicorn execs.

And I'm like, will you
do this for Leah's show?

And then I had an automatic follow up.

And four out of those five
people agreed to be on it.

Because there's this
feeling of reciprocity, man.

Because it was eating me alive that,
without me asking her, she made three

or four intros, and she asked me for
two intros, and I couldn't come through.

So I think, try to give.

Because when you give and give, and
you don't have to give in a big way,

but you can research somebody and
figure out what they're looking for

and try to make that connection.

A lot of emails I get, man, Prateek,
is about, what can you do for me?

Can I get on a one on one call with you?

I read your book, or I read your
post, can you spend some time with me?

I'm like, bro, I've got
120,000 subscribers.

How can I spend time with
so many people, right?

Message me a thoughtful question,
and I'll try to answer it async.

Don't try to get on the phone with me.

Make my life easy by
asking me very specific.

I want to pick your brain.

No, do something for somebody.

And the best way to do that is by
starting to build a community, because

everyone wants to share their message.

And you telling them that I'll
interview on a podcast, one, through

that podcast, you can ask them the
questions that are burning you.

So it's like free advisory.

Two, you'll tell them
that I'll amplify this.

Now, don't just say I'm
going to amplify it.

Go on and do it.

Just throwing a podcast is not enough.

Now, post that podcast everywhere
and reach out to people manually.

Again, cold email people
to say, I did this podcast.

Here's the summary.

Give it a listen.

Drive traffic to it, right?

And so when you start doing that for
your audience, you start to build

a network and compound interest
on doing that for years is huge.

I'll give you an example.

When we started hitting these startup
events and spending time with them,

we found two white spaces in 2012 when
all the startup events happening at the

time were high level CEO platitudes.

Some CEO from some multi billion
dollar company or multi hundred

million dollar company coming and
sharing an inspirational talk.

It's not tactical, right?

If I'm a founder who's at zero
or one trying to get to one or

five, I don't need inspiration.

I already quit my job
to start this company.

I need tactics.

Nobody was talking tactics.

And the number two thing was
the local media where we started

the company in Calgary, Canada.

They weren't covering startups.

So what did we do?

I reached out to the local
newspaper, which is Post Media.

It was the largest newspaper
in the country at the time.

And I said, will you cover startups?

I'm happy to write for free.

And they said, ah, it's not a priority.

So what I did was I didn't stop there.

I had cold email the editor.

He said no I reached out to another
friend who knew Rob Lewis who he used

to write tech vibes at the time and i'm
like, hey, can I guest post for you?

You're not covering Calgary stories.

I'll cover some Calgary stories.

Now.

Here's the thing.

Here's another lesson I was a
founder with no I was a new founder.

My only prior experience was
doing sales and marketing at

startups not being a founder.

So I couldn't talk about my founder
journey So if you can't lead people

because you have a higher authority on
a topic than them, then what do you do?

You curate, right?

You can curate, you can invite people who
are the higher authority and interview

them and curate their knowledge.

So you either lead or you curate.

And if you can't lead or
curate, then you can report on

current trends, news, whatever.

And so I covered a few founders in
the local startup scene and I sent

it to TechVibes, they posted it.

I shared it with those founders because
they hadn't been covered before.

They shared the hell out of it.

At the time, LinkedIn wasn't huge for
distribution, content distribution.

Most of the content was on
blogs like Neil Patel and Jason

Fried and Lemkin and whatnot.

And Insta, TikTok for business
wasn't, TikTok wasn't there.

Insta wasn't a thing for
business really, right?

Or it wasn't a thing at all.

And they started retweeting
the hell out of it.

Then I use that article and I
followed up with the editor.

I'm like, Hey, editor of post
media, here's an article I

wrote on a regional blog.

Look at how many shares
and retweets it had.

It has, this is an audience
that is relevant to you.

It's a young audience that is
turning away from traditional

newspapers and tuning into blogs.

I can bring that audience back to you.

He responded saying, you're right.

I'm impressed.

I'll give you a blog post.

Now again, don't ask for permission.

Beg for forgiveness.

Now I had no startup experience
and I couldn't talk about like

SEO and doing startups like a
Neil Patel or a Jason Fried.

So I said, what do I call this blog?

It was one blog post.

I kid you not man, I called
it Startup of the Week.

I wasn't sure he was gonna give
me additional blog posts or not.

It was one blog post.

And I covered a founder that
had just raised $3 million.

And he was having a hard time, I
think, even getting on Tech Crunch.

Now on the local newspaper, Post
Media Calgary Herald, Startup of

the Week is this company, Ethore.

And he shares the hell out of it.

It goes even more like
viral than the previous one.

Everyone is sharing it in the local
community, friends, family, because

it creates this vibe that the local
newspaper is creating like a mini

award startup of the week, meaning
you're the most valuable, most

exciting startup of the week to watch.

I kid you not within a day or
two, I started getting like

missed calls from the editor.

I call him like, Oh man,
he's going to lose it.

Why did I call it startup of the week?

But he was happy.

When I talk to him, he's Lloyed,
if you commit to writing this every

week, I will give you a print column.

Prateek Panda: That's amazing.

Lloyed Lobo: So think about this.

If I hadn't reached out to him and hadn't
asked, this wouldn't have happened, right?

So now that blog turned into print
column, but it did four things.

Number one, we were a new company.

It would take years to get any SEO.

We got a backlink from the highest
domain authority website in the

whole country, the newspaper.

Every week.

So our SEO started, our domain
authority SEO started jumping

for an anchor texted keyword.

Get your R&D funding from
Boast backlink, right?

Number two, instant social proof.

Even in 2023, a print column has
more weight than anything else.

Prateek Panda: Definitely.

Lloyed Lobo: So these guys are good
guys endorsed by the newspaper.

Number three, it would create
this like weird dynamic where

every Monday at 7 or 8 a.

m.

or 6 a.

m.

Something the founder would go to the
newsstand and buy a bunch of physical

copies and share it with family and
they would take pictures and it would

get shared number four I put it I put
a link in there saying if you want

to be featured apply to this woofoo
form now that form started filling

gave me some of the early database.

Didn't stop there.

That was the online activity.

Now.

How do I turn that audience
that is building online?

into a community.

We started hosting meetups.

Remember I said all the events at the
time were organized by event organizers

and they're high level CEO platitudes.

So I started emailing these
people and saying, Hey Prateek.

I'm inviting Jason.

He's going to talk about his
journey, getting the first 100

customers and raising their
first half a million seed round.

They're going to dive steps A to Z, right?

That's tactics.

We only have 10 spots.

It's at our co working space and
there's going to be free pizza.

All ten, showed up.

Now, if I stopped at one startup
of the week and one pizza

night, it would be game over.

We never stopped.

I wrote, didn't get paid,
but for almost three years, I

wrote that startup of the week.

And the day I stopped writing
it, because I got busy with the

business, that column also stopped.

But nonetheless, for almost
three years, I wrote it.

And these events, we kept
doing it, and doing it.

And one day, 200 people showed up to
the co-working space, and the guys

at the co-working space are like,
you've hijacked all the aisles.

This is like not a conference here.

What are you doing?

You can't do this anymore.

That eventually became validation
for us to do an actual conference

and it turned into the TractionConf
and we've done it in SF.

We've done it in Vancouver many
years, in Calgary, or rather in Banff.

And it's now turned into a podcast
network, or rather a huge podcast

property, YouTube channel, and a
big email subscriber base, right?

Prateek Panda: That is so
amazing and so inspiring.

Lloyed Lobo: But what I'm telling
you is a very simple here, Prateek.

For anyone looking to build a network or a
community, rather, I say community because

network sounds sounds very transactional.

A community sounds very
personal, like this bonding.

It's a community.

As I was writing this book, I talked to
almost a thousand people or so, community

members, community leaders, entrepreneurs.

I looked at hundreds of companies,
started with nothing and became

long term enduring brands.

And I rewatched all our content
from our traction community.

And it's funny, our
community is called traction.

It's not called the boast community.

It's a community of practice.

It's not a community on our
product because we had no product.

We were forced to build this
community that eventually ended

up becoming our customers.

Because this community gave
us the social proof, right?

And that community is called
traction because it was tied to the

aspiration of what our ideal Customer
profile wants they want traction.

They want to create impact.

They want to build successful companies
But nonetheless, so it became a very

disarming thing when we started the
community Imagine we started a community

around a product and we have no product.

No customers people were like
This is a timeshare presentation.

This is not a community, right?

So as I was talking to these people,
I found something very interesting.

Every obscure idea that eventually
became a global, enduring

phenomena from Christianity to
CrossFit had four specific stages.

That's a bold statement here, right?

From Christ to CrossFit, every
obscure idea that became an

enduring, global phenomena went
through the exact same four stages.

People listen to you,
you have an audience.

How do you get people to listen to you?

Understand your ideal customer profile,
figure out their aspirations, their goals.

And then pick a channel and
start creating content for them.

How do you pick a channel?

You figure out where do
they hang out, right?

Where do they frequent?

So if LinkedIn is where your customers
hang out, start creating content there.

Now, when you bring that audience
together to interact with one

another, it becomes a community.

So if you look at it, at the time
LinkedIn for us was not huge, we

started creating content on the local
newspaper, startup of the week, right?

And then we started bringing these people
together to interact with one another,

and it started becoming a community.

Now, when your community comes together
to create impact towards a greater

purpose, far greater than your product
or profits, it becomes a movement.

And when your movement has undying
faith in its purpose through sustained

rituals over time, it becomes a cult or
a religion of boast is that community.

But in my book, I talk about several
companies that became movements and

became cult like brands, like your
Harley Davidson or your CrossFit.

But what I'm saying is if we kept,
if you keep going on this journey.

For the next 10, 15 more years, no
doubt it'll eventually get there.

But consistency is key.

Another example is Atlassian.

So last year, Atlassian's community
self organized 5,000 events.

Prateek Panda: Wow.

Lloyed Lobo: If Atlassian had
to organize 5,000 events, they

would have to have a massive team.

So this tells you that Atlassian
has 5,000 superfans who on

average engaged 100 people.

And Atlassian, without any involvement
of theirs, other than enabling and

showing love and giving some pizza
money to these people, were able to

engage half a million people last year.

That didn't take overnight.

It took Atlassian 20 years to get there.

But Atlassian is in the software
space, it's a cult like brand.

And so that's the important thing to
keep in mind is don't get dejected.

Even Mr.

Beast, if you look at his videos or Gary
Vaynerchuk's videos from 15 years ago, Mr.

Beast videos from seven, eight years ago.

They're all bad.

They're awful.

But you know what thing is common?

They never stopped.

The most successful people never stop.

If I stopped at like 10 percent events
and I got dejected or at the 5th startup

of the week saying, ah, this is too hard.

We wouldn't have gotten here, right?

And then when you create,
you just have to seed it.

Just cause you do an event.

What happens is we create, but we
fail to communicate that creation,

and we fail to do it with consistency.

So here's how it happens.

We're all creators, and
so we default to creating.

We don't want to communicate what
we created, and we get dejected

because nobody consumes it because
we haven't communicated it.

And then we stop being consistent.

This is exactly what happens, right?

We'll do an event.

And we'll spend all this
production value on event.

Events are also products.

I view everything as a product.

Like you build a startup and you build
a software, you raise seed money,

and then you get no customers for it.

Start by researching the customer
and figure out what would be a

great experience for them, then
create the experience, right?

But you'll spend all this time with
logistics and food and everything and

then try to sell tickets and then, and
be worried that nobody will show up.

And then what do you
do for selling tickets?

You'll run ads or you'll
run massive email blasts.

No!

Identify who the audience is and
personally reach out to them.

Reach out to people.

Keep growing that audience
and keep following up.

Keep doing it over and over
and over again and keep doing

it and more people will come.

Man, I kid you not Prateek.

If I didn't have cold email, I
would be freaking broke today.

I wouldn't be sitting in Dubai.

And that's the reality of everything.

Prateek Panda: You know the success
behind Lloyed Lobo - cold emails.

Let's quickly switch gears.

I know you're we are running out of time.

Amid all of this, there is a
difficult phase also, right?

You.

You went through a health scare, you
ended up being severely depressed

as you were exiting your company.

A lot of people are hesitant to
talk about mental health and, I've

been starting to talk more publicly
about mental health as well.

When you were going through this.

How did you recognize the problem and what
did you do to, overcome this challenge?

You know the hard thing is all
our life, we chase success, looking

for happiness and success is
society's definition of success.

What is that money, fame, power?

It's all fleeting.

The only thing that remains is
your health, is your relationships.

It's your family.

And Prateek, what's really interesting
is we're proactive on everything except

our health and our relationships.

You know that?

You notice that?

And I was in that boat all my life.

I chased success looking for happiness.

Because, growing up as this rebellious
kid, everyone from my relatives

to my mother-in-law, she didn't
want me to get married to my wife.

My wife got into medical school in
second year of undergrad without MCATs.

Everyone said this guy
will amount to nothing.

And so you run on this chase, right?

And especially us coming from Indian
backgrounds, it's even more stronger

in like Asian families that, you gotta
be a doctor or an engineer, or you

need to do this definition of success.

And I chased and chased and chased, and I
didn't spend as much time with my family.

I got two kids now three, I
neglected the hell out of them.

As a luck during COVID, we hosted
a community event when there was

a window opening and the investors
who bought half the company and

liquidated us, we sold 52 percent of
the company to a growth equity fund.

And that's a conversation for a
whole nother day, probably on how to

optimize for the best founder outcome.

And I was excited, man.

I was ecstatic, but I got so busy in
the due diligence and all of this stuff.

And my wife would always say.

Stop to smell the roses.

And would say, listen, I'm really busy.

I don't have the time for this.

When the deal goes through,
we'll take everybody to Bora.

She's nobody cares about your Bora.

You think kids are going to remember Bora?

They care about spending
time with you, phones down.

The kids will remember the
time you didn't spend with them

versus the two week vacation.

Like I say, compound interest and
consistency leads to overnight success.

Compound interest of not spending
time with your kids or having the

phone always like this when you're
eating with them, leads to disengaged

kids or destroyed relationships.

Now, luckily, they were really young at
the time when I went through all of this.

My, my children are now, today,
they're nine, five, and two, but, at

that time when I was running, I was a
seven year old and a three year old.

And the due diligence process happened
and, for the longest time, I think

when I married my wife, I said to
her, I will retire at 40 as a joke.

And to me, retirement
doesn't mean do nothing.

It means freedom to do what
you want, when you want, where

you want, with whom you want.

And I kid you not, man, the
week of the 40th, my 40th

birthday, the wire hit my bank.

Everyone had goosebumps.

Manifestation.

But nonetheless, I
booked everyone to Bora.

This is what happened two
days before the Bora trip.

I get Omicron.

I had bilateral COVID pneumonia.

I'm hospitalized.

I'm on oxygen.

My wife being a doctor at
Stanford, where they admitted

me, wasn't allowed in the room.

I had people walking into
the room with spacesuits.

They set up a 24x7 Zoom.

And now all I'm hearing
on Zoom is people crying.

They're pumping all these
steroids in my body and I'm

feeling like lost and delirious.

And I'm thinking to
myself, what have I done?

It's not the money in my bank, it's the
people around my tombstone that'll matter.

It's not the destination or the journey,
it's the companions that matter the most.

You could be on a crappy journey on
the way to hell, but great companions

make it memorable, and you feel strong.

That's why they say misery loves company.

Going through that Gulf War,
it never felt like misery.

You had companions, you had that spirit
and I felt lost and then came back and

the company had gone from 35 people, we
were growing to over a hundred people.

We started to hire all
these big company execs.

I'm a pirate zero to one person.

I wasn't getting along with them.

Late summer, my daughter comes to me
and she says, dad, you've gotten worse.

You promised us from the hospital that
now you'd spend more time with us.

Your biggest regret if you die would be
you didn't spend enough time with us.

And I tell her, I'm really sorry.

Things have gotten really busy.

We have so many other people.

I'm trying to figure out
my own role in the company.

I've gone from being a founder to
now I don't know what I'm doing

here anymore with all these people.

And we got to make all these employees
that joined us whole, because they

put their faith in us and she tells
me, why don't you go and work for

a founder who thinks like that?

Someone who thinks like that.

So I can have my dad back.

You see what I promised coming out
of the hospital was I'll change.

Try to change for one or two months,
but old habits died really hard.

Then that happened two days.

I grieved about it.

Two weeks later, I ended up at a company
offsite with my Co-founder in Austin.

My phone is always down
in business meetings.

Mysteriously, it's not down in
family meetings at the time.

And I pick up the phone several hours
later, and there's 20 missed calls, okay?

My wife's best friend calls me,
and she's You asshole, you've

done this for the third time now.

I'm like, what happened?

Your wife is in freaking labor in
the hospital, delivering your third

kid, and there's no sign of you.

Like, where are you?

Now I have to take the next flight,
and it's not until next morning.

I make it back to San Francisco.

And literally within an hour and a
half or less than two hours, between

an hour or two hours, my son was born.

So it was a close call, right?

Now I go into a board
meeting, all stressed out.

Obviously, I'm not getting along
with the new execs because we hired

CTO, CMO, CFO from like multi-billion
dollar company kind of thing.

And I'm like, listen, you
got to fire these people.

None of them are going to work out.

And they're like whoa.

Calm down.

You've had a stressful year.

Why don't you take a paternity
leave and come back and, we'll

figure out the right place for you.

Now, I didn't take that in the right way.

I went home that day and I hugged my wife
and I literally cried for 10 minutes.

And I said, listen, I'm really sorry
for all the times you needed me.

And I put the company first.

Today, the company doesn't need me
and you're the only person here.

Now, this is what most
sane people would do.

Who are not entrepreneurs.

They had come into money that
they had never seen before.

I went from being like piss poor all
my life to being a multimillionaire.

They would go to Bali or go or somewhere
and just chill for a little bit.

But no, I became depressed because
I spent the last 10 years building

my identity around this company.

I had no other social, all my friends
were from the startup community, but

the community was my second family.

And in many ways, first family,
I knew nothing outside of that.

All my friends, my entire circle
was all community members.

And so my identity was this company.

And suddenly I felt it was taken away.

I faceplanted.

The money didn't matter, right?

I felt I lost my tribe.

And I started running and
running from place to place.

Anyone would call me, I'd just
go to their event like Paris

and Costa Rica and you name it.

I went all over the world, just going to
random places to meet with friends, right?

I'd fly some friends in because
I'd come into some money.

And things came to a head
when I was in Romania now,

speaking at a tech conference.

We're now at the speaker
retreat after the conference.

We're three and a half hours from
Bucharest in some wilderness at two in the

morning, everyone's sitting by the pool.

I'm frantically dialing for an
Uber and I'm asking the hotel

person, can you send a car?

They're like, no, not here.

You're not going to
get a car at this hour.

And they're all laughing at me.

You're not going to get a car.

So I leave the Uber searching on and
it's searching, 20 minutes go by.

And then suddenly the sound comes, ding.

And then the Uber is coming.

I'm waiting for it to approach.

It finally gets there.

And I tell the Uber, can
you wait a couple minutes?

I go, pack my bags.

I book a flight to Costa Rica.

And I'm like, let's go.

And I tell them, guys,
I'm leaving to Costa Rica.

I had a few friends call me
and they're in Costa Rica.

So I need to go.

I need to make that trip.

And we drive now three and a half
hours to make like the 7:30 or 8 a.

m.

flight.

That's how crazy I became.

And then when my wife saw me when
I came back and she's like, Lloyed,

you've gotten out of shape, overweight.

You're like miserable.

You're insufferable.

You're drinking.

What's wrong with you?

If something happens to you,
you will not get a third chance.

COVID survival was a second chance.

And what happens if
something happens to you?

Your kids will be left holding the bag.

And then I came to my senses
and I turned my life around.

Again, how?

I didn't do it solo.

I surrounded myself with
companions who were fit.

I, joined the Peloton community.

That community brought me to sanity.

And so as I was looking back, I
reflected, Prateek, that all my

life I had no money, but I was
happy because there was a community.

And the one time I came into
money, I felt I lost my tribe, my

community, and I got depressed.

And that's the reason why I decided
to write the book on community is

because honestly, loneliness is
the number one killer in America.

There is this concept of blue zones, which
are five places around the world where

people live to be a hundred functionally
is important because longevity

without functionality means nothing.

And they have nine traits, four
or five of them are to do with

communal activity, social activity.

And so Your companions matter the
most and one of the key things I

did was started surrounding myself
with positive people who are fit.

I started being thankful.

My wife's words, the glass is half full
is what I started the conversation with.

Thank something good that
happened the day before.

And then exercise first
thing in the morning.

Exercise releases endorphins in your
brains that calms the feeling of stress.

And I love doing it first thing in
the morning because there is a study

by Naperville High School where they
introduced a concept of zero hour PE.

Before you start a single class or read
a single book or opened a single piece

of paper, you would go and work out.

Lift weights, run, whatever it is.

Those kids turn out to be some of
the smartest kids in the world.

Some of the most athletic
kids in the world.

That's amazing.

There's no brain function
that exercise doesn't improve.

And so now, I don't start
my day without working out.

Wake up, bang out 50 pushups to eye
of the tiger, which is the first

song I listened to when I hopped
on the Peloton and be thankful for

something good that happened the day
before and now, hit the gym, right?

And it becomes a system.

And for me, working out
is also social activity.

There's so many people around.

I can't sit and work out alone at home.

I can't, for me it's a social
activity that brings me joy.

And I think that is.

Some of the things you can do to
improve your mental well-being is one,

have this glass is half full mindset.

Workout first thing in the morning.

Surround yourself with smart people.

See a therapist.

I think it's so underrated.

Nobody wants to talk to a
therapist, but you know what?

Do you want to keep telling publicly
that you're crushing it and be crushed

from inside and one day be gone?

What a disservice, right?

To a great life.

Clean your diet.

Clean your diet.

I kid you not, man.

There's this processed
Western diet is bad for you.

Eat protein rich whole foods.

Cut out nonsense dopamine
like infinite scrolling.

Anything that addicts
you, cut it out, right?

But I think start, make small steps.

The easiest small step
is wake up every day.

Think about a specific act that
brought you joy the day before.

Like literally, like tomorrow
when I wake up, I'm like, I had a

wonderful conversation with Prateek.

We talked about all these
things and we had a great time.

And then talk about something else
that I went through and then bang

out some pushups, hit the gym.

I think that should be the
cadence of what you do.

Drink a lot of water.

Surround yourself with
smart, positive people.

There's too much negative
energy out there, man.

I stopped watching the news even.

It's just all left wing, right
wing, wokeism, cancel culture.

This one, that one, the news happens.

The compound interest, I talked a
lot in the consistent theme here is

compound interest on consistency.

Compound interest on consistency
of exposing your brains to negative

news and negative energy over
time will make you depressed.

Yep.

I think that is spot on.

And on that note, I think Lloyed you've
shared tremendous amount of, knowledge

bits here, right from entrepreneurship to
startup to building network and community.

And how do you end of
the day be happy, right?

So thank you so much for
spending time with us.

And I think a lot of people are going
to find this episode very informative.

Very practical and helpful.

Thanks again for sharing your
story so candidly and so honestly,

and I really appreciate that.

Sounds good, Prateek.

Thank you so much.

And that wraps up today's episode.

Before we sign off, I would like
to thank you for your support

and thanks for tuning in.

If you loved today's episode.

Then don't forget to subscribe to this
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Be kind, be happy, challenge the norm.

I'll see you folks again for the next one.