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Bianca Rangecroft is the Forbes 30 Under 30 Founder & CEO of Whering, the AI-enabled digital wardrobe and personal styling app with the mission of upending the buy-use-dispose model by helping Gen-Z fashionistas get the most out of their wardrobe.

Bianca has raised over £2.5 million in venture capital and now has 14 full-time employees, 150 brand partners and - most importantly - over 4M users. In this episode, you'll hear about: 👗 Bianca's experience on BBC's Dragons Den 👗 Going from scrappy bootstrapped startup to lean, mean, metric-focused scale-up machine 👗 Hire slow, fire fast: the mindset shift needed with talent and most overlooked aspect of dismissing staff 👗 Successful growth hacks with viral marketing (organic social done right!) 👗 The power of networking and Bianca's advisory board for life 👗 PLUS! What Victoria Beckham had to do with Whering! Download the app here: https://whering.co.uk/

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Mark Chaffey is the Co-Founder and CEO of hackajob, the candidate-centric platform for tech talent that puts the power back in the hands of the job seekers.

He co-founded the business straight out of university aged 20 and now leads the HRtech scale-up with $35M in Series B funding under his belt, a team of 150 staff, and turning over £10M ARR with world domination firmly on the cards!

Key points in this episode you'll hear about:

🚀 Biggest challenges as a young entrepreneur & first-time CEO 🚀 The sales strategy that took this business to $10M ARR 🚀 Expanding to the US and dangers of hiring too fast 🚀 Where Mark turns to for guidance & inspiration 🚀 Fundraising journey - 78 meetings to get to 5 term sheets - including a deal falling through at the last minute 😱

“This is NOT the TechCrunch article”

Learn more about hackajob here: https://hackajob.com/

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Liv Ferdi is the Co-Founder of TRIP, the UK’s number 1, best selling CBD drinks brand stocked in 25,000 stores around the UK including the likes of Selfridges, Ocado, Boots, Planet Organic, Harrods… Also in chains like The Ivy, Brewdog, Leon, Benugo, AND is the exclusive CBD supplier to Soho House!

TRIP holds 88% UK market share, has raised £10M in external investment and hired a team of 50 staff! Tune in to hear about:

💛 The benefit of coming in from the outside - from Liv's career in corporate legal to FMCG founder and the advantage of fresh perspectives 💛 How to win in becoming *category-defining* - even when you’re not the first 💛 How TRIP overcame performance marketing challenges as a CBD brand 💛 Building a 'cool' brand that respects the customer 💛 Cultivating an authentic, mission-driven business 💛 PLUS Strategy & Tragedy exclusive new announcement!

Get 20% off your TRIP order with the S&T podcast code: TRIPCALM20 Shop online here: https://drink-trip.com/collections/all or in-store at various retailers

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Emily is the Founder of Untangle, the go-to app for all of life's hard events. From sorting the mess of paperwork after a bereavement, to finding a community of other grief-stricken individuals, Untangle is there to help everyone get through the tough times. Featured in the Evening Standard and boasting <500k followers, Untangle is going from strength to strength as they now embark their new crowdfunding campaign.

But of course, it wasn't always that successful... In this episode, Steph and Emily discuss:

👼 Building a business around lived experience vs the market opportunity 👼 The validation process and data-driven tests along the way 👼 Emily's accelerator experience and reason for choosing Zinc 👼 Decision-making around tech stack for new startup (hint: Emily went with OTS) 👼 Finding PMF (product-market fit)

Untangle is crowdfunding! Get in on the action here: https://untanglegrief.com/coowners-club/

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En este episodio especial, Stephanie Melodia reflexiona en las varias conversaciones con empresarios de los últimos 20 episodios.

Escucha para descubrir las TOP lecciones del empresarialismo!

(¿Puedes adivinar cuales son?)

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'Estrategía y tragedía' es el podcast de Stephanie Melodia, orador y fundadora Top 20 en el Reino Unido, donde entrevista empresarios, inversores, y expertos relacionados al mundo de startups. El propósito fundamental de este show es compartir las mayores lecciones de los grandes errores que otros han cometido - otros que están en unos pasos mas adelante de ti - para que puedes aprender de ellos, y tener la mayor posibilidad de éxito con tu negocio.

También esperamos que puedes encontrar inspiración de estas anécdotas, y terminar los episodios sintiendo que tu vision es completamente posible realizar.

Quieres más? Sigue Steph en las redes:

🤍 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stephmelodia/

🤍 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephaniemelodia/

🎬 Ve el episodio en YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@stephmelodia/videos

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🎧 No olvides en subscribir y compartir con tu amigo empresarial!

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Stephanie Melodia founded Bloom, an award-winning marketing consultancy, in London of 2017.

Last summer, she announced the closure of her successful business, and - in this episode - she recounts what happened, and reflects on what went right, and what went wrong.

(After all, Strategy & Tragedy is about sharing *both* the highs and lows of business, the reality behind closed doors, the ugly truth behind the glossy veneer, and - most crucially - the lessons learnt from the experience. None of this is to put anyone off entrepreneurship, instead it's about empowering early-stage entrepreneurs to go in with eyes & ears wide open, learning from other people's mistakes who are a few steps ahead of you. Tune into Episode ZERO to hear more!)

What you'll learn in this solo episode:

🥀 What led Steph to ultimately close the Bloom chapter 🥀 Top 10 business lessons - 5 things that worked + 5 things that didn’t 🥀 Being "allergic" to stagnation, the concept of control, and importance of progress 🥀 The importance of carrying out a “pre-mortem” exercise on your own business. 🥀 Embracing a portfolio career post-Bloom

I'd LOVE to know, what resonated most with you here? Join the conversation:

Follow Steph on social media:

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Justin Fitzpatrick, the co-Founder & ex-CEO of Duedil, now FullCircl post-merger. Justin is now Founder of Outpost Advisors, the firm that helps PE- & VC-backed B2B software companies accelerate profitability.

In this episode, Justin and Steph discuss:

👉 The unexpected way Justin met his co-founder 👉 Key lessons learnt from scaling the B2B SaaS DueDil, which raised a combined $53.4 million in funding across 11 rounds 👉 Evolving B2B SaaS growth strategies - including 'slowing down to speed up' and overcoming painfully long buying cycles with enterprise clients 👉 The importance of UI and investing in your product 👉 The "wildcard" choice of Justin's university degree (tune into find out what he majored in!) and how it's helped him now 👉 The importance of value proposition refinement when it comes to effective business development.

Are you a leader at a B2B software company curious to learn more about boosting profitability? Connect with Justin here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-fitzpatrick-83a783/

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Maya Raichoora, the CEO and Co-Founder of Remap Mental Fitness, who envisions a world where mental fitness is as common as physical fitness. She helps CEOs, athletes & performers become the top 1% in their field through the power of visualisation.

Tune in for an interactive visualisation exercise and all of the below...

🧠 MAYA'S STORY:

✨ From being diagnosed with ulcerative colitis to being the most healthy and confident she’s ever been

✨ Self-confidence as a young brown woman without formal qualifications

✨ Her philosophy around 'compassionate discipline'

🧠 SCIENCE:

✨ The neuroscience behind visualisation

✨ Study examples in sport

🧠 RISKS:

✨ The difference between 'being confident' and 'having confidence'

✨ Avoid breaking promises to yourself at all costs!

✨ The trap of falling into victimhood

🧠 PRACTICAL TIPS:

✨ How to make space to practise visualisation

✨ How *detachment* to your current state can help achieve your desired identity

✨ Physical behaviours: look people in the eye, pause before you speak, stand a little taller

✨ Treat your time as valuable currency

Discover more here: https://www.remapmentalfitness.com/

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🎬 Watch the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@stephmelodia/videos

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🎧 Don't forget to subscribe, rate, review, and share with a friend!