20VC FF: Hiten Shah on VC Funded vs Bootstrapped Businesses and How He Decides Which Startups To Advise

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The Twenty Minute VC

Finance, Venturecapital, Tech News, News, Siliconvalley, Technology, Investing, Startups, Business

4.4 • 637 Ratings

🗓️ 4 March 2016

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Hiten Shah is one of the most prominent players in the data marketing industry having co-Founded both KissMetrics (raised $10m+ VC Funding) and Crazy Egg (bootstrapped), both wildly successful businesses serving some of the world's largest companies. Hiten is also an extremely successful angel investor with investments in the likes of Buffer, Mattermark and MessageMe (acquired by Yahoo.) In addition, Hiten is also a serial startup advisor having been an advisor with Linkedin, SlideShare and Wordpress' Automattic.

We would like to say a special thank you to Mattermark for providing all the data used in the show today and you can check out Mattermark Search here!

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Hiten made his way into startups and the investing industry?

2.) Why did Hiten decide to take VC funding for on startup and not the other? Did taking VC funding allow for much greater growth or make him less resourceful and creative?

3.) How have Hiten's entrepreneurial endeavours altered his attitude to investing? How does Hiten's large personal brand add to his investing style?

4.) Hiten has said before that he likes to ask founders 'what is their earliest most traumatic memory'? Why is that and what does Hiten learn from that?

5.) Question from Erik Torenberg @ ProductHunt: How does Hiten assess which startups he wants to spend time with as an advisor?

6.) Question from Ryan Hoover @ ProductHunt: What is the most counter-intuitive advice for this starting a company?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Episode:

Hiten’s Fave Book: The War of Art

Hiten’s Fave Blog: 731 Users Reveal Why Slack Is So Addictive

As always you can follow The Twenty Minute VC, Harry and Hiten on Twitter here!

If you would like to see a more colourful side to Harry with many a mojito session, you can follow him on Instagram here!

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is the 20-minute VC with your host Harry Stebbings, and sitting in the hot seat today,
0:04.6	I'm thrilled to welcome the incredible Heaton Shah. Now, I do have a hard time formulating an intro for
0:10.2	Heaton, as he seemingly has many hats, both as a phenomenal operator being the co-founder of Kiss Metrix
0:17.0	and Crazy Egg, and he's also a superb angel investor, having invested in more than 20
0:22.4	startups, including Buffer, Message Me, which was acquired by Yahoo, and our own favorite
0:27.8	Mattermark. I do also have to say, if you're big on SaaS, then you must sign up to his newsletter,
0:33.5	and the link for that can be found in the description and on the site at the 20 minute VC.com.
0:38.8	I also want to say that Heaton's advice is especially valuable and pertinent today,
0:43.3	as he has expertise in both the VC funded and the bootstrapped route with Crazy Egg and Kiss metrics,
0:49.4	and we dive into that and the pros and cons in the interview.
0:52.6	But before we do, I want to thank one of Heaton's
0:54.8	investments, which we just mentioned. What a coincidence that one is, in Mattermark for providing
1:00.1	all the data and analysis used in the show today. And it's another newsletter that you must sign up to,
1:05.3	being the Mattermark daily, really is the one stop shop for all VC and startup articles. It's my go-to every single morning.
1:12.4	But without further ado, I'm thrilled to welcome the main man, Heaton Shah, co-founder at Kiss Metrics
1:18.1	and Crazy Egg.
1:19.5	Three, two, one, zero.
1:24.9	You have now arrived at your destination.
1:31.3	Hitsen, it's absolutely fantastic to have you on the 20 minute VC.
1:33.2	Thank you so much for joining us today.
1:35.5	Yeah, I'm happy to be here.
1:39.0	Now, can you get the ball rolling for us by telling us a little backstory of how you made your entrance into the tech industry
	...

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