Business
“If you spend a year or two working on something that you’re really interested in, & it doesn’t work out, it’s going to be totally doable for you to get back into an industry. Maybe it’s different if you’re 45 & you have 3 kids & a mortgage….but if you’re young, then I reckon just go for it. ” Dre Zhou is the co-founder of Askable, the ‘Uber’ for user-testing; which helps companies find & book participants on demand for market research & usability testing purposes. Askable has progressed from a mere incubator generated idea in mid-2017, to a thriving outfit with over 10 staff, six figures in monthly revenue & a laundry list of prestigious clients -- including Woolworths, Qantas, Dominos, Optus & Medibank to name but a few. For this episode, we sit down with Dre to discuss what every young entrepreneur needs to understand about risk, the realities of growing an early stage enterprise & the hard truths about what it takes to build a successful startup. To learn more about Dre & Askable, you can find them on Medium @DreZhou or Askable’s website @ askable.com. If you’d prefer to watch instead of listen, head over to my YouTube channel @carterlagana. Timecodes: 1:59 | The unspoken truth about ‘loving’ your job 3:27 | Dre’s philosophy on taking risks 5:32 | The best time to take on risk 6:36 | What Dre wishes he knew earlier in his career 9:54 | Dre’s advice for building an MVP 12:27 | Acquiring paying users via cold email 14:57 | Plugin to mine email data on LinkedIn 15:47 | Practical productivity tips for getting more done 19:59 | The realities of early stage entrepreneurship 22:00 | Key resources for learning more about startups 23:48 | An interesting insight for those interested in business Dre’s blog on selling via cold emailing | https://medium.com/@drezhou/how-we-got-our-first-100-paying-customers-at-askable-51246dfa143 Dre’s blog on productivity pt.1 | https://medium.com/@drezhou/improving-productivity-as-a-designer-part-1-336314410ab5?source=---------5------------------ Dre’s blog on productivity pt.2 | https://medium.com/@drezhou/improving-productivity-as-a-designer-part-2-4ad2d940973e Credits: Filmed | @Blackardt Crew | @BriannaBlack Crew | @SamuelJBernard If you’d like to keep tabs on what I’m up to, you can find me @carterlagana on all social media platforms.