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It's H2 2021! πŸŽ‰ Share how we can help you grow your startup, and who knows? Someone might just be able to help.

Happy H2 2021! πŸŽ‰ I've been thinking about this for a while now and what better way to kickstart an awesome and exciting H2 with putting up some ✨ for all the Founders here. I'm here to invite you to share your pain points, struggles and advice you may need at this stage in your business. I hope this thread will be a productive coming-together where we can all learn from each other and perhaps implement them at our own businesses. I'll go first - I'm a Go-to-Market Strategist, Marketer and Strategic Partnerships Dealmaker with prior experience working at high-growth tech companies like Uber, Razer, Breather, and others. AMA about early stage startups, launch and partnerships, and I'll do my best to help where I can via this thread (so others can learn too 😊)
Hi! My vision is to make the path to entrepreneurship easier and more understandable for everyone who wants to start a business. My mission is to accomplish this by coaching and content. What I need help with is feedback on what would be helpful for founders. I currently do one-on-one coaching and have a group program on how to hire the right people, fire the wrong ones (including co-founders) and manage your team to get what you want from your business.I've built several companies and have had a few exits (I built a $50 million business and sold it to a public company) but this is my first online business. I'd love any suggestions from Elpha! Thanks for the thread @valerielowym!
You are absolutely killing it, Diane! Great job!
Amazing initiative! Is it only for founders or other people allowed to participate?
Everyone's welcomed! I've had many founders, managers asking tons of questions on the side, and I felt that it's a wasted opportunity when all of us can learn together. :)
Thank you for this initiative! πŸ™Question about partnerships: We are going to work with international students in the US. Who do you think is it better to approach in American universities for discussion? Who is easier to contact from the staff? Or should we rather contact student unions?
Hey Alina,Thanks for the question. I would need more context as to who you’re trying to partner with and what are you trying to get them to do. My suggestion would depend on understanding more about your business and how you want universities to help. Val
Sure. I'm building a platform for improving speaking skills in a foreign language for international students, and want to onboard students from the university - all at once. So I assumed I could actually contact the international students' office or go to the students' unions, though I don't know which dept would be easier to connect with because I've never worked with them before.
What I would do is reach out to student councils and unions first, and work with them to go to international students' offices. Universities are incentivized to support student initiatives and it always helps when you have existing student bodies supporting you. These student unions will also be your internal ambassadors recommending it to their friends. As a rule of thumb, it's always best to target groups of people that is the easiest to get an in with, and could also be your ambassadors referring you to their peers (your target market). I would recommend you to look at building a "Student Ambassador" or some form of "College Champion" program where you are incentivizing the students to be leaders and recommend their peers to join the platform. Whether your rewards are in the form of points/anything valuable to them, you can decide what is best. Also, this helps with building a community within these universities itself to push your local marketing initiatives when it arises.
Wow, this is wonderful, thank you a lot! <3
You’re welcome! Glad it could be of help. :) Good luck and let us know how it goes!