About this channel
This Week in Startups follows the arguments, decisions and personalities shaping technology businesses. Numbered discussions sit beside shorter clips about fundraising, hiring and investment, with AI…
This Week in Startups follows the arguments, decisions and personalities shaping technology businesses. Numbered discussions sit beside shorter clips about fundraising, hiring and investment, with AI forming a substantial part of the episode selection. The channel brings practical founder concerns into the same conversation as company strategy and industry news. Speculation is also visible in the topics, including proposed acquisitions and predictions about how AI could affect legal responsibility.
A conversation involving Justin Kan and Brian Chesky looks at rejection in the stories of Twitch and Airbnb. That founder-oriented perspective appears elsewhere in advice about raising money and the difficulties around team interviews. These subjects deal with moments when a young company depends on persuading other people: securing support, finding colleagues or continuing after an unwelcome response.
The AI discussions take the conversation towards open-source development, agents and the consequences of autonomous systems. An appearance by a Hugging Face co-founder connects those themes to the wider technology ecosystem. Other episodes debate what Apple might buy or which kinds of AI businesses venture investors would back, making room for contrasting views about company direction.
Founders and viewers who follow technology investment can use the channel to hear how those questions are framed and contested. Longer conversations provide room for a company story or an industry argument, while shorter segments isolate a particular piece of advice or prediction. The appeal is the overlap between running a startup and interpreting the environment around it: how a founder's immediate choices relate to the products, funding decisions and competitive bets being discussed elsewhere in the industry.
Latest episode
Pregame Your Launch Before Your App Exists (w/ Amanda Bradford) | E2355
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Today’s show:
Amanda Bradford’s…
This Week In Startups is made possible by:
Odoo: https://Odoo.com/twist
G2i: https://G2i.co/twist
Rippling: https://Rippling.ai/twist
Plaud: https://Plaud.ai/twist
Today’s show:
Amanda Bradford’s “launch party” for her dating app The League actually extended for months.
She “pre-gamed” the app’s formal launch with months of mixers, boat parties, and free events, where the only ticket required for admission was having the app on your phone.
By launch day, she had a massive wait list, and still just let in 500 people, who ensure maximum buzz (and FOMO).
At LAUNCH’s first-ever Tactical & Practical live event from San Francisco, Amanda walks the crowd through how she built a vetted, two-sided dating marketplace as a solo founder, eventually getting prominent enough to attract the attention of Match Group. (She sold The League for ~$30 million in 2020.)
Hear exclusive tips you won’t get anywhere else, like how Amanda used a “fake paywall” to gauge willingness to pay for subscriptions, and how to time your rate of expansion into new markets.
Plus, an all-new Flashback segment, featuring Alex and Lon looking back at a classic 2017 interview between Jason and Stripe’s Patrick Collison.
Guests
Amanda Bradford on X: https://x.com/amandabradford
Book a Call with Amanda: https://intro.co/amandabradford
The League: https://www.theleague.com/
Patrick Collison on X: https://x.com/patrickc?lang=en
Stripe: https://stripe.com/
Relevant Links:
The League was called "elitist." Its founder says that was never the case (CNBC): https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/20/founder-of-the-league-on-dating-ambition-and-that-viral-ad-campaign.html
Alex Wilhelm’s Cautious Optimism: https://www.cautiousoptimism.news/
TWiST E723: Patrick Collison (2017): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-NepiMQGvY
Timestamps:
0:00 Amanda Bradford on building The League
4:30 Hand-reviewing early applications
6:40 Building an MVP with a rented co-founder
8:56 The VIP approach
13:10 Why Amanda only let in 500 people
15:44 The “Heavy Hitter” fake paywall test
16:44 Odoo: The all-in-one business platform. Your first app is free! Get started today at https://odoo.com/twist
17:46 Why live events are the real unlock
21:35 Controversy as a hook
24:22 Flashback to Patrick Collison in 2017
25:13 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off!
28:13 Stripe: Then vs. Now
30:53 G2i has been recruiting software engineers for over a decade. Go to https://g2i.co/twist to find out how G2i vets engineers, and can help you hire them in days, not weeks.
32:17 Why did PayPal stay PayPal?
37:50 Problem, not a product
44:33 Thanks to our partners at Rippling! Head to https://rippling.ai/twist and get the only AI built to give you full visibility across your startup and take complex actions across your entire business.
45:46 The outage nobody noticed
51:00 Why persistence beats pivoting
52:13 What’s left before a Stripe IPO?
Subscribe to our newsletters on Substack:
TWiST: https://twistartups.substack.com/
TWiAI: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/
TWiVC: https://thisweekinvc.substack.com/
Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp
Follow Lon:
X: https://x.com/lons
Follow Jason:
X: https://twitter.com/Jason
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis
Thank you to our partners:
Odoo: The all-in-one business platform. Your first app is free! Get started today at https://Odoo.com/twist
G2i has been recruiting software engineers for over a decade. Go to G2i.co/twist to find out how G2i vets engineers, and can help you hire them in days, not weeks.
Thanks to our partners at Rippling! Head to https://Rippling.ai/twist and get the only AI built to give you full visibility across your startup and take complex actions across your entire business.
Plaud: If your work depends on conversations — interviews, meetings, calls — you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://Plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off!
Check out all our partner offers: https://partners.launch.co/
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