The Slice'd Podcast: Recent Episodes
Startup Blogpost
The Slice'd Podcast takes a slice of founder stories from humble beginnings to billion-dollar exits. Join host, Michael Gallagher, every Monday to learn more about inspiring founders and actionable tips for your entrepreneurial journey.
You can build helpful tools as a form of marketing, here's how. Resources mentioned:
GuestPostTracker.com
Qualeroo
Bubble or Adalo
Check out this listicle with more low code or no code tools
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
ant the ultimate suite of tools to find and cold outreach any prospect? Check out these tools. Resources:
Hunter.io
Snov.io
FindThatLead
Get Prospect
Lemlist
GrowthHub
Never Split the Difference
Getting to Yes
Negotiation Genius
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ready to get creative with Google Ads? Listen for an overview of SEM and tips and tricks to add it as an effective acquisition channel for your business.
Resources Mentioned:
If you want a deeper dive, check out this course.
SpyFu
Google Ads Audience Targeting Resource
Carrie Rose
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
This episode is a don't miss rundown of how to play the SEO game by Google's rules to capture more traffic to your site. Resources:
Ranking factors: Check out this article from Backlinko on the top ranking factors for 2022
Site audits: Ubbersuggest, Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz
Finding keywords: Seedkeywords, Answerthepublic, Ahrefs, Explodingtopics, Reddit, and more to find potential content and see its competitiveness towards ranking
Link Building - RhinoRank, Terkle, NO-BS Marketplace to link build (DO NOT order links on Fiverr or spammy bad links), GuestPostTracker
Learning SEO: Backlinko, Niel Patel Watch him on YouTube or explore the blog, and Payton Clark Smith
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Part two on how to grow your newsletter subscriber base.
Resources mentioned in the episode:
Pulling emails/contacts in Google
1k Email Subscribers in 1 Week
Designrr
Spark Loop
Viral Loops
Lemlist
FindThatLead
QuuuPromote
Duuce
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Email allows you to own a direct relationship with your customer without relying on an unpredictable algorithm of a social platform. But how do you start—and grow—a newsletter? Here's how.
Resources mentioned:
Marketing Examined
Ghost
ConvertKit
Mailchimp
SendFox
Drip
https://duuce.com/newsletter-directory
Feedly
Morning Brew
The Rebooting
Trends
Contrarian Thinking
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
What's the fastest way to scale your business? Through a network of affiliate advertisers, as we explain in this episode. Tune in and discover this comprehensive list of affiliate sites to get your program off the ground:
Commission Junction
ShareASale
Impact
Partnerize
Partnerstack
PepperJam
Refersion
FlexOffers
Perform [cb]
TapFilliate
FirstPromoter
3West
Madrivo
Advertise Purple
Gen3 Marketing
AddShoppers
Global Wide Media
Diablo Media
MaxBounty
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Targeted blogs—often called sponsored articles—are an acquisition strategy you don't want to forget about. Here's the why and how they can quickly help you scale your business and online presence. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
How do you know what benefit will resonate with your customers? How do you effectively communicate that unique selling proposition in ads? Check out this week's episode for actionable tips on building better brand messaging and copy.
Resources mentioned in the episode:
Marketing Examples - Great website for studying copywriting tips.
Building A Story Brand - Make your customer the hero of the story. You are the guide.
75 Resources for Writing Incredible Copy that Converts - Neil Patel is great. Go through these resources and I guarantee you will write better copy.
Consider This - Great book on writing in general. Study it.
Headline Analyzer #1 - Throw your email subject lines, blogs, headlines and more into this tool to see the emotional marketing value it holds. Higher scores tend to mean better / more effective copywriting.
Headline Analyzer #2 - ^
Hemingway App - Helpful tool to make writing more concise and reader friendly.
Copy Hackers - Check out their worksheets
Wayback Machine - Analyze past versions of popular websites. These sites have big budgets. This means they have likely spent big bucks on A/B testing and finding the right copy formula. It's okay to imitate the techniques that work.
Clearscope - Gives you content grades, readability scores, and actionable suggestions as you write your content. Check it out, but more on this after we dive into SEO.
Feel like you need a whole course on this? Check this out.
Google rhyme dictionary...sometimes alliterations or rhymes work best for title offers, likely not ad copy though.
Not a designer but still looking to make your brand pop visually? Tune in for 7 tips on coming up with a visual identity efficiently. Links mentioned:
99.designs
Use Dribbble.com
Fiverr and Upwork
Canva
Coolers
BrandCrowd
Join us this week for tips on keeping your mental toughness throughout the difficult journey of being an entrepreneur. Although this topic is a bit more qualitative than quantitative, it is critical nonetheless. Plus, get 9+ resources that we find helpful in producing mental clarity.
Mentioned in Episode (in order of appearance) - Jordan Peterson's Self-Authoring Program Who Are You by Bob Proctor Stages of Awakening by Wayne Dyer (and/or) 10 Secrets of Success & Inner Peace Self Discipline by Jim Rohn Secret of the Ages by Robert Collier Competition Is For Losers by Peter Thiel Interview With Alex Hormozi Loving What Is by Byron Katie Reclaiming Our Misplaced Power by Sarah Blondin Exploring the Anatomy of the Spirit with Carolyn Myss
Don't waste your time building a product no one will buy or a service no one will care about. Make sure people are interested in your startup, and interested enough to pull out their wallets--prior to building. Here's how.
So you want to start a worthwhile business, right? But where are you supposed to get the idea? Luckily there are tools out there that make it easy to find startup ideas. Tune in to this week's episode to learn a few.
So you've got this great business idea, but you need money? Or maybe your startup has been functioning for a while, but it's time to add fuel for growth? Tune in for tips on where to find capital.
Ever thought about buying a business? As we head into a recession it might be time to buy into a cash flowing asset. Listen for more.
Is VC funding right for your startup? This week we interview Clay Gordan of Stout Street Capital, a Denver-based Venture Capital Firm. Listen in to get insider tips for navigating the world of fundraising as a founder.
Jody and Eileen walk us through navigating a family-owned creative business. They operate Groundplans, which is a custom rug manufacturing and design company. Tune in for a taste of the worlds of art and business colliding.
Starting a granola business based on a vivid dream? Meet Morgan Potts, founder of Granarly, which is an on-the-go snack company. They created the first whiskey baked granola.
Ready to get spiritual? Melissa Emily gives us the details of how to shift out of anxiety and into authenticity. Melissa is the founder and creator of Pepper Rose, which is a floral design business. She is also a trauma informed spiritual coach for women.
Ever thought of starting your own podcast? Join us as we interview Wil Slickers, founder of Hospitality.FM, a podcast network dedicated to bringing the best hospitality-focused podcasts to those in and around the industry. Wil built an audience as the host of the Slick Talk Podcast, and now helps connect brands with other podcasters in his industry.
Tune in for tips on navigating manufacturing challenges and jumpstarting a business from a passion. This week we sat down with Melanie Gluck, founder and CEO Hanakini Swimwear, with an interesting side hustle as a luxury reseller.
David Lopez is the cofounder and CEO of Gritly, a career placement platform. Join us for a slice of his story and some of his tips for becoming an entrepreneur.
Irene Walton is an internet personality with media outlets on Youtube, Instagram and her own podcast. She creates content around cooking. Tune in for tips on building your personal brand and for a slice of what it's like to be a full-time content creator.
Jeremy Becker and Adam Zucker are working to make government meetings more accessible to all with their company Cloverleaf AI. . Cloverleaf is a platform that transforms decentralized government meeting data into an actionable dashboard for government affairs teams.
Check out Cloverleaf: https://www.cloverleaf.ai/
Susie Lira-Gonzalez is a first-time founder who is changing the way that busy people continue their education with her company INDX. INDX is a social learning platform enabling users to save, organize, and share content from podcasts, articles and videos.
Check out INDX: https://www.getindx.com/
Ariela Safira is on a mission to make humans think and feel deeper than "fine". Ariela's company Real is reimagining mental health care and is not only “normalizing” mental health care; they are celebrating it.
Check out Real: https://www.join-real.com/
Chris Barton is one of the founders of the revolutionary app Shazam and is now a prominent innovation speaker. After leaving Shazam in 2018, Chris is using his time to build a new company, Guard, and share his wisdom on "first principals" and "creative persistence" with audience members around the world.
Check out Guard: https://guard.vision/
Check out Chris: https://chrisjbarton.com/
Vanessa Otero is the mind behind the viral Media Bias Chart and the Founder of Ad Fontes. Ad Fontes is a media company that is on a mission to make news consumers smarter and news media better. After a viral Facebook post, Vanessa is changing the way people watch the news.
Check out Ad Fontes: https://adfontesmedia.com/
Shayanne Wright is advocating for executive assistants and office ops to take their careers to the next level with her company Office Otter. As the co-founder and CEO of Office Otter, Shayanne and her team are working to optimize tasks and make businesses more efficient from the inside.
Check out Office Otter: https://www.officeotter.com/
Kirsten Moorefield is on a mission to energize the workplace with her company Cloverleaf, an automated team coaching platform that works to build the teams you have to their highest potential. By integrating with communication tools (email, calendars & Slack), Cloverleaf improves communication and builds better relationships.
Check out Cloverleaf: https://cloverleaf.me/
As a new mom, Monica Plath wanted to keep track of her kids after having a poor experience with a caregiver. After searching for that technology, and coming up short, Monica decided to build it herself. Enter Littlebird, the wearable toddler tracker that blends in with everyday life (say bye-bye to primary colors, and hello to cool neutrals!).
Check out Littlebird: https://littlebird.care/
Aaron Stachel is a Partner at FirstMile VC, a Colorado-focused venture firm who is betting big on the Front Range.
Check out FirstMile: https://www.firstmilevc.com/
Todd Mickelsen is the CEO of Converus, a disruptive technology in the lie detection space. With 25+ years of high-tech senior management experience, Todd knows what it takes to be an effective leader and the cultural importance of disruptive technology.
Read more about Todd at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/corruption-and-lies/
Check out Converus: https://converus.com/
Seth Levine is a founding partner of Foundry Group, one of the largest networks of entrepreneurs and early-stage investors in the country, and a co-founder of Pledge 1%, a global movement that encourages and empowers companies of all sizes and stages to donate 1% of their assets to charity.
To purchase The New Builders, visit https://thenewbuilders.com/
Check out Foundry + Pledge 1%: https://www.foundrygroup.com/
Ariana Ferwerda is CEO and Co-Founder of Halfdays, a women's ski-wear brand made for the modern women. Halfdays was co-founded by Olympic skier Kiley McKinnon, and fashion veteran Karelle Golda. The three founders have worked together to make a best-selling product and a game-changer in women's snow sports.
Check out Halfdays: https://www.halfdays.com/
Jeff Freeland Nelson is on a mission to make media more accessible to all. With the help of American Public Media Group and the Glen Nelson Center, Jeff is blazing a trail for both entrepreneurs and investors in the media space.
Check out American Public Media + the Glen Nelson Center: https://www.americanpublicmedia.org/ + https://www.glennelson.org/
Alex Ryden is the Founder and CEO of Guest House, a staging company that creates beautiful spaces anyone can shop with furniture from premium brands. Before Guest House, Alex was a powerhouse in the advertising industry and founded a leather bag company, his first company that he started his best friend.
Check out Guest House: https://guesthouseshop.com/
Matt Prados is the Founder and CEO of Review Wave, a platform that helps healthcare practitioners gain and retain patients with 24/7 online booking and personalized post-appointment messages. As a proud college dropout, Matt is a serial entrepreneur who is an advocate for unconventional founders.
Check out Review Wave: https://www.reviewwave.com/
Lee Mayer is Co-Founder and CEO of Havenly, a convenient, personal way to redecorate your home room by room, on any budget. After a career in corporate development and consulting, Lee founded Havenly not because she wanted to start a company but because she needed help designing her new home.
Check out Havenly: https://havenly.com/
Renji Bijoy is the founder of Immersed, a portable, distraction-free workspace powered by VR. Immersed is in partnership with Facebook, Microsoft, and HTC and is the best way to work remotely without sacrificing productivity. In 2021, Renji was featured in Forbes 30 Under 30 list and is a proud PhD dropout.
Check out Immerssed: https://immersed.com/
Swapnil Shinde is the CEO of Zeni, a company that he founded with his twin brother. Zeni is a full-service, AI-powered finance team created to help startups and small businesses manage their finances with 100% accuracy. Before Zeni, Swapnil founded two startups (also with his twin brother) and sold one to American Express.
Check out Zeni: https://www.zeni.ai/
Max Elder is a Co-Founder and CEO of Nowadays, a plant-based meat that’s guilt-free and healthy for both you and the planet. Max has experience consulting across the global food value chain Before Nowadays, Max was a fellow at the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, research director at the Institute for the Future, and advised organizations like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Campbell’s, Hershey, and Google on the future of food.
Check out Nowadays: https://eatnowadays.com/
Mark Frank is a serial entrepreneur, Co-Founder and CEO of SonderMind. SonderMind is redesigning mental healthcare to make it easier to find and access approachable therapy with both online and in-person appointment options available. Mark's leadership style is well-known in the Colorado wellness space and beyond.
Check out SonderMind: https://www.sondermind.com/
Nick Cromydas is the Co-Founder and CEO of Hunt Club. Hunt Club is a new category of search firm that leverages the power of relationships and referrals to find you the best talent. Nick played and coached collegiate tennis and was an advisor and investor before founding Hunt Club.
Check out Hunt Club: https://www.huntclub.com/
Dave Salvant is the Co-Founder and President at Squire. Squire is the world’s leading and fastest-growing software technology platform for barbershops, making it easy for small business entrepreneurs to run and grow their business all in one place.
Check out Squire: https://getsquire.com/
This episode was recorded in Arizona at the UNMET AZ conference back in early October and will be a short, but inspiring look into impactful founders and notable people from the region. On today’s Slice’d Snippet we sit down with Gordon Shaefer, Founder and CEO of Fetch.com. Gordon attended the conference and showcased his company, a concierge-like delivery service that delivers anything and everything from hundreds of local businesses including restaurants, cafes, liquor stores, food trucks, grocery stores, and more.
Check out Fetch: https://fetch.com/
Michael Botta has been working to find solutions to healthcare’s biggest problems including health care prices, quality measurement, and competition since his undergraduate degree in Bio Ethics from Princeton. After a short stint at the White House and a couple of years working in consulting, Michael co-founded Sesame Care to tackle healthcare's biggest setbacks and has helped save American's money and time.
Check out Sesame: https://sesamecare.com/
This episode was recorded in Arizona at the UNMET AZ conference back in early October and will be a short, but inspiring look into impactful founders and notable people from the region. Today we sit down with Max Farrell, Co-Founder and CEO of Workhound. Max attended the conference and showcased his company, a real-time, anonymous feedback platform for frontline workers in the trucking industry.
Check out Workhound: https://workhound.com/
Rebecca Clyde is CEO and Co-Founder of Botco.ai, a conversational marketing platform enabling meaningful and intelligent conversations between businesses and their customers. Rebecca is an award-winning marketing leader and has been recognized as one of the Most Influential Women in Arizona in 2020.
Check out Botco.ai: https://botco.ai/
Arden Gilfillan and Margaux Reaume have been best friends since their freshmen year of college at the University of Arizona. During their time at U of A, the pair would throw dinner parties with their friends and soon developed a love for both hospitality and wine. Today, the two friends are the co-founders of Argaux, an online wine company whose mission is to provide wine for every table and every occasion through nationwide wine deliveries and their best-selling blind taste kits.
Check out Argaux: https://argaux.com/
This episode was recorded in Arizona at the UNMET AZ conference back in early October and will be a short, but inspiring look into impactful founders and notable people from the region. On today’s Slice’d Snippet we sit down with Andrew Bart, CEO of AlgoFace. Andrew attended the conference and showcased his company, an ethical, face-AI technology that can do everything from virtual makeup try on’s to face mask detection.
Check out AlgoFace: https://www.algoface.ai/
Jody Boyman is Co-Founder and Chief Purpose Officer at Hungry Planet. Hungry Planet is a chef-crafted plant-based meat that’s on a mission to bend the curve on personal and planetary health that's delicious and nourishing. With a wide (and impressive) variety of plant-based meats, Jody and her brother Todd are working together to bend the curve on personal and planetary health.
Check out Hungry Planet: https://www.hungryplanetfoods.com/
This episode was recorded in Arizona at the UNMET AZ conference back in early October and will be a short, but inspiring look into impactful founders and notable people from the region. On today’s Slice’d Snippet we sit down with Christie Kerner, founder and CEO of My Little Mascara Club. Christie attended the conference and showcased her company, a monthly subscription box for makeup wearers to get fresh mascara delivered right to your door.
Check out My Little Mascara Club: https://mylittlemascaraclub.com/
Susan Westwater is the CEO and Co-Founder of Pragmatic Digital, a voice consulting firm that is helping brands identify where Voice fits in their marketing ecosystem. As a content strategist and speaker, Susan is advocating for the use of Voice in marketing and is the author of "Voice Strategy: Creating Useful & Usable Voice Experiences".
Purchase "Voice Strategy" here: https://www.amazon.com/Voice-Strategy-Creating-Useful-Experiences/dp/1675235031/ref=sr_1_4?crid=20V5HBTUJMX6B&dchild=1&keywords=voice+strategy&qid=1628284687&s=books&sprefix=voice+strategy%2Caps%2C201&sr=1-4
Check out Pragmatic: https://www.pragmatic.digital/about-pragmatic
This episode was recorded in Arizona at the UNMET AZ conference back in early October and will be a short, but inspiring look into impactful founders and notable people from the region. On today’s Slice’d Snippet we speak with Andy Lombard, Executive Vice President of Innovation and Venture Development for the Arizona Commerce Authority, and Mahati Sridhar, Vice President of Revolutions Rise of the Rest. Andy and Mahati were panelists at UNMET and provide us with a little slice of knowledge from the conference.
Check out Rise of the Rest and ACA: https://revolution.com/entity/rotr/ + https://www.azcommerce.com
Pierre DeBois is the founder and CEO of Zimana Analytics. Zimana is a software service that reviews websites and marketing to support business objectives through digital marketing tools, social media, and analytics. Pierre founded Zimana in 2009 and remotely serves clients across the nation.
Check out Zimana: https://zimana.com/
Happy Halloween from your friends at Slice'd! Join us as founders anonymously recount their personal horror stories from the past and present 🎃👻
Christian Dooley and Reyn Aubrey are the founders of PocketChange, a social media app where every like, post, and reply sends free money to charity at no cost to the user. Before Pocket Change, Reyn outsold the biggest retailer in the world in high school and Christen created music. The two became friends, and co-founders, after an entrepreneurship class at the University of Denver, where they promptly dropped out to pursue changing social media for good.
Check out Pocket Change: https://pocketchange.social/
Cindy Jordan is the Co-Founder and CEO of Pyx Health. Pyx a leading solution to Loneliness and Social Isolation through technology and human connection. Before Cindy founded Pyx, she worked as a police officer in the DC area, where she fully understood the definition of a “bad day”. Today, she and her team are working to help people feel better while lowering costs for employers and healthcare providers.
Read more about Cindy at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/believe-and-be-persuasive/
Check out Pyx Health: https://www.pyxhealth.com/
Bill Capsalis is the Executive Director at Naturally Boulder. Naturally Boulder is a community for the natural product industry in Colorado and provides a place for entrepreneurs, investors, brands, retailers, and industry experts to make Colorado the best place to launch and scale a natural products company. Bill most recently served as CEO at Haystack Mountain Goat Dairy and uses his experience to help natural food entrepreneurs thrive.
Jenni Lyons dropped out of high school after her first year and traveled around the world before starting her first business in holistic medicine. Now, she is the Founder and CEO of Happy Leaf Kombucha, an approachable probiotic drink that is local to the Denver health community.
Check out Happy Leaf: https://www.happyleafkombucha.com/
Aidan Chopra, Co-Founder, Chief Creative Officer and Explainer in Chief of Bitsbox, has always been creative. However, Aidan wanted to be a scientist. He chose to pursue the arts after a teacher told him that he could either be a "bad scientist or the most scientific artist". Bitsbox teaches kids to code through fun app-building projects that come in the mail every month. It empowers kids to“make stuff” from examples encouraging quick progress.
Read more about Aidan at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/have-a-co-founder-so-you-can-take-vacations/
Check out Bitsbox: https://bitsbox.com/
Joe Thurman is the CEO and Co-Founder of InterviewIA, a human resources SaaS platform with a mission to reduce turnover while increasing diversity in the workplace. Using deep learning Intelligence Amplification (IA) technology, the platform provides a unique and improved hiring process. Joe has over 15 years of experience in the human resources technology space, having founded three companies prior to interviewIA.
Check out InterviewIA: https://www.interviewia.com/
Before Cheddar Up, Nichole Montoya founded a luxury baby brand and discovered that she could be an entrepreneur. With over 15 years of growth and business experience, Cheddar Up is used by parents, schools and clubs all over the country to collect and track payments and information. She also is a founding mentor of a notable mentorship program in the Denver area and served on the advisory board for Denver Startup Week.
Check out Cheddar Up: https://www.cheddarup.com/
As a natural-born entrepreneur, it's no surprise that Jimmy Eberhard founded 12 startups prior to Fluid Truck. His ventures ranged from monetizing cell phone ringtones to a mobile donation solution that was used by the Red Cross after the Haiti earthquake of 2010. Fluid Truck is a groundbreaking mobile app that initially started as an "Airbnb for stuff". Eberhard pivoted the concept based solely on his customers. Today, Fluid Truck enables everyday people to share commercial vehicles like pickup trucks, cargo vans and SUVs.
Read more about Jimmy at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/lucky-number-13/
Check out Fluid Truck: https://www.fluidtruck.com/
From Egyptologist to entrepreneur, Jamba Dunn found himself stress brewing beer in his garage and distributing it to his neighbors. Prompted by a request from his three-year-old, he looked into brewing a non-alcoholic and tasty drink his daughter would love. After linking up with a microbiologist and a herbalist, they tinkered with a 2000-year-old recipe and added innovative combinations to an ancient beverage, kombucha. Today, Rowdy Mermaid has outgrown multiple warehouses and is scaling far beyond their Boulder, CO roots.
Read more about Jamba at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/the-most-complex-thing-ive-ever-done/
Check out Rowdy Mermaid: https://rowdymermaid.com/
When Sean Mehra started his education at Yale he wanted to become a doctor, helping people and saving lives. His career path changed when he discovered some shortcomings within the current healthcare structure. Motivated to improve the inefficiencies he had witnessed, Sean pivoted into... video games? While an unlikely choice, Sean managed a small team and in doing so, shifted his aspirations from med school to business school. In his first year at Stanford's MBA program, Sean became a founding member of HealthTap and fell in love with the company that mirrored his desire to care for more patients in less time. Today, Sean is the CEO of HealthTap and is working to make healthcare more accessible to all.
Read more about Sean at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/its-the-journey-not-just-the-destination/
Check out HealthTap: https://www.healthtap.com/
Bit by the entrepreneurship bug in 2007, Steve Swoboda founded SpotX, the first online advertising marketplace that is now utilized by premium publishers and broadcasters like Disney, Samsung, and Warner Media. Following the digital advertising boom years later, Steve and his co-founder Mike Shehan has built the company to $13 million and had an exit valuation of $1.2 billion. But Steve doesn't really care about the metrics. As a Colorado native, Steve attributes his overall success to the local culture and wears SpotX's roots as a badge of honor. While the billion-dollar exit is impressive, Steve cares more about the culture they have created than the money they have earned.
Read more about Steve at Startup Blogpost: https://startupblogpost.com/success-is-the-people-you-hire-and-the-environment-you-build/
Welcome to the Slice'd Podcast, where we take a slice of startup stories from founders, investors, and CEOs from across the globe.