New Markets & New Friends
How Volley helped me find both
Lidia Bit-Yunan. co-founder, Set Scouter
When featured on Volley stories, my ‘ask’ was “to discuss strategies for moving into new markets and creating remote offices while also maintaining a kick-ass company culture!”
Volley co-founder, Mike Murchison, helped me formulate that request. Originally, my post was long and confusing – reflecting what was going on in my head.
First, I would like take you through my thought process:
After successfully validating our marketplace platform in Toronto, my startup, Set Scouter is expanding into a new market within the next 6 months. As anyone who has built a marketplace will tell you, it is a constant exercise in human psychology – what will make people trust us; what will get them excited about working with the other users; how do we create a culture of open and respectful communication; and so forth.
Chicago is our next market and the thought of onboarding residential properties (our supply) in a new city came with its own uncertainties. Uncertainties like building traction in a city where neither myself, nor my co-founder, have a network. Many of the early steps in Toronto were reached because of our mutual professional network. Since this is our first expansion, we haven’t tested the hypotheses we hold for “unlocking” new cities (like the Uber playbook, for example). It feels as though we just got our footing here and now have to replicate it in another city.
Most importantly, from an operations perspective, are the founders required to move? Or is it best to hire someone to handle a region?
These questions prompted me to make a request on volley, and ultimately become featured on volley (along with a VERY large photo of…yours truly). Quite frankly, the opportunity to be featured brought on an exciting chance to expand my network. When you focus on the internal workings of a startup, you sometimes become disconnected from fellow entrepreneurs and mentors. This was a great opportunity to hear from those who had faced the challenges I described.
All in all, I received 10 replies from people wanting to chat. Most were serial founders living in the Bay Area with national (and international) offices. These founders built companies I admired, but was too shy to reach out to. Volley broke the intimidating barrier I had created. These awesome founders reached out to me to help my situation and share their advice.
Some of the discussions involved multiple markets, moving sales teams, timing the leap, and building great culture remotely. The connections made on Volley provided advice that could be instantly implemented.
Here’s what I find to be the interesting when sharing your experiences with other founders.
First of all, fellow founders don’t half-ass advice. They take on your questions and problems as their own. These individuals have done what you’re doing before or are doing it as we speak.
Talk with enough founders and you will find repetition, this is the time to start paying attention. They most likely know something you don’t.
I wanted a playbook. I wanted to learn my formula in Toronto and duplicate it over and over.
The advice I’m taking away from my conversations is that all startups work in cycles, not definitive stages. As you figure out one thing, you may need to look back to what brought you here and iterate.
Moving to a different city means starting again. Period.
Aside from looking at what we’ve done and whether it worked, there is no formula to follow with our first step outside of Toronto. If we do expand to Chicago successfully, the next city would have an example to follow. For now, we have to be ok with starting from scratch, get to know new clients again and do the work that doesn’t scale to build up their trust. It was a good lesson in always being ready to play in the mud again.
Personally, I’m amazed. Volley reminded me of the community which we’re surrounded by. I now have an open, honest, and experienced sounding board. I no longer feel hesitant of contacting these new connections as the startup moves forward. As a founder, it was another lesson in stretching resources – take a platform as simple of an idea as Volley and have it work to solve some far-fetched, complicated, not-yet-even-properly-worded problems.
