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Kick off time with @jackbutcher and the @visualizevalue office hours with @mikaelcho of @unsplash - which is one of the largest licensed free visual content database..note each bar chart is 1 year, so it took 5 years of failed experiments
fun fact @mikaelcho is in Montreall!!! let's go 
- started from a point in life where he literally had to get his dad to co-sign his CC after moving up there....
- started from a point in life where he literally had to get his dad to co-sign his CC after moving up there....
He started working at a design agency, then applied for a 3 month program where he got $25k in exchange for equity to come up with a business, and then get investors...which they did for $500k, and even then they still had to pivot, iterate, scrap and restart with their ideas..
@mikaelcho decided that they had to build on something that they were interested in and he went back to his design agency days where it was matching high quality talent in the design industry and match them with amazing projects (finding projects was extremely hard)
when shooting photos for this new business @mikaelcho was like "can I even use these photos" why don't help others to do this, registered on @tumblr it on @newsycombinator and he got a call from a freelancer whose photo he used bc his phone started blowing up with msgs..
and @unsplash was born to simplify the licensing and use of photos for the internet - they got 30k downloads on the first day..grew the business 32x in 1-2 years, they moved off Tumblr because demand was so high - @mikaelcho's other business sold to dribble so they went all in..
until they sold their other business @unsplash was a 0 person team, talk about building it once, selling twice @jackbutcher - inspiring journey @mikaelcho
Q from @jackbutcher how did the structure of the team change as you grew features in @unsplash ?
a from @mikaelcho: We learned a lot about scaling too fast, is that you should do things in order and in sequence, instead of in parallel - bc you 100x your problems doing...
a from @mikaelcho: We learned a lot about scaling too fast, is that you should do things in order and in sequence, instead of in parallel - bc you 100x your problems doing...
too many things at the same time..so start by building a strong foundation. they would only hire when the person doing the work broke and at was full capacity..I like that you often hear hire fast to scale up..this is a more sound approach...
@jackbutcher kind of bonkers how @mikaelcho and @unsplash 4 people were servicing so many people, right now 43 people are supporting over 1 billion image downloads..holy shit...
"If I were to start another company again, I would find something that draws people in automatically" - @mikaelcho
The internet is so great, that you can be mediocre and make so much money - you have so much opportunity. The internet can you take you away from focussing not the right idea...
honestly I stoppe tweeting on this because there was so much wisdom being dropped in the Q&A with @mikaelcho and @jackbutcher on this one..listen to this
"with 3 other co-founders I don't care about being right or ego, it's about doing what's best for the business..."
"with 3 other co-founders I don't care about being right or ego, it's about doing what's best for the business..."
