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early bird gets the worm.
well here's something that has been brewing for a while.
as someone who has worked in early stage companies all my life.
early stage marketing faces a fundamental issue, the issue being that startups focus on it too late in their building journey. startups are setting themselves up for failure by not doing marketing early.
which is why i've joined @early_partners where i'm going to work with @gautxm and @trippyhippy on insititutionalising fractional marketing for early stage companies and helping early stage companies grow with marketing strategy
Early joins the @TalentedAgency grid of companies.
i'm super excited to be on this journey and can't wait to see what the future holds.
if you'd like to know more. check us out below
early.partners/
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
🚨 Hiring a Growth Intern at @okto_web3 wallet by @CoinDCX
You'll work directly with me to scale a web3 consumer app that has 500k+ downloads and global userbase
It's a hands-on role so high agency folks preferred
DM me a short blurb on why you should be hired.
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
One of life's greatest blessings? Marriage.
Today marks 5 years with my wife - but our story began 8 years ago at Wood Box Cafe, Delhi.
Two dreamers on a date.
Me: aspiring entrepreneur.
Her: future musician.
Instead of dwelling on shortcomings,
we asked "what can we become?" as a couple.
1 year in:
Started a joint account for our wedding
2.4 years:
Self-funded our dream wedding - a Tamil & Anglo-Indian cultural fusion
Then COVID locked us in.
But we turned isolation into hyperbolic time chamber for dreams. She practiced relentlessly for her dream uni, also to become a great musician.
While I bootstrapped @spacekayak and started building capital firepower to support her, and our future.
Together, we skipped parties, every social gathering and chose focus over FOMO
Fast forward: She mastered Piano (Grade 6), Vocals, Music Theory, even picked up Violin. Cracked every uni she aimed for.
Sept 10th, 2023:
Two flights, two dreams
She → Liverpool Uni for Masters
Me → Bangalore for spacekayak IRL
Her recent wins:
Liverpool Uni Rep
Worked at Liverpool FC (yes, part of Klopp's farewell!)
Published groundbreaking research on AI x Music
Back in India, pioneering Music Tech
Not luck. 8 years of intentional work.
Compound interest of small actions,
patience & unwavering support
and a lot of love.
This morning she said:
"I want you to be the happiest man on earth"
Not richest. Not famous. Just happy.
And you know what? I absolutely am. ❤️
We are still in the "becoming" and feel younger than ever.
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
let’s see where this goes. anybody hiring for a founders office / chief of staff sort of role?
quick highlights:
• been president AIESEC in India managed ~5cr budget + ops + led 4000 people
• have led 0-to-1 product dev for Level Supermind (app of the year ‘23) + been content lead for the startup (~500 pieces of written + audio + video content created)
• delivery & ops optimization for 20+ brands for a large agency network—Zoo Media (currently work here in the founder’s office)
• running my travel biz ~₹34L rev last year
^tl;dr: business strat generalist. get things done. make money. enable kickass team culture. know well how to learn.
currently trying to design a lifestyle that enables travel, fitness & business.
dm or share with someone who might be hiring?
coaching a bunch of kids with Robert Pires while wearing enemy colors was something that i'll never forget
female founders, this a community that you need to be a part of.
the only place where you'll be amongst folks facing the same issues as you.
sign up now, limited spots only!
There is a unique, unnecessarily hard journey that a female founder takes. I found that out myself on my own journey and by talking to other female founders who very kind enough to talk about their struggles with me. We continue to build DESPITE the ecosystem and not because of it. But there is hope - I found that when women had women in their corner, they start to enjoy the journey and begin to thrive.
Sadly there's just not enough community out there and so... in the classic founder spirit of 'stop complaining, start creating', here I am today launching 'ThriveTogether' - a space for women across stages of their founding journey to come together and find support, insight and understanding.
If you're a founder + female the link to join is here - forms.gle/gF7t6nWvCiQG83S7A. Dive in the water's warm :)
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
A few months back, the gang at @TalentedAgency had a weirdly counterintuitive ask of our clients at Britannia in response to one of their briefs. We wanted them to actively invest in the worst possible outdoor media plan. For them to select the lowest-priced billboard properties with the worst visibility, particularly the ones blocked by trees. The kind of spots that no other brands or advertisers really cared much for. The ones that hadn’t been used in months, some of them years.
Over hundred years, @BritanniaIndLtd is a company that has shown real progress in sustainability - achieving milestones in plastic neutrality, water conservation, energy optimization among others. As an organization that has consistently allowed nature to influence its trajectory and decisions, it seemed fitting to let our advertising reflect this same philosophy when talking about it. ‘Nature Shapes Britannia’ is a series of outdoor hoardings designed to work around the shape of the trees next to them, establishing both metaphorically and visually, how one of India's biggest conglomerates adapts to nature and not the other way around.
So, for this campaign to help share Britannia's sustainability initiatives with the world, nature is the creative agency. The trees decide the art direction & typography of the billboards next to them: they decide how to ‘shape’ Britannia. Through high winds that couldn’t hold up these strangely shaped scraps of billboard and the frequent guffaws from hoarding mounters. Through the 73 trees that auditioned for this campaign and all the ensuing disappointment when selected ones ended up getting pruned down to achieve more visibility, we're calling this a true ‘pedh’ partnership.
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
I am rich and have no idea what to do with my life.
Where I talk about leaving Loom, giving up $60m, larping as Elon, breaking up with my girlfriend, insecurities, a brief stint at DOGE, and how I'm now in Hawaii self-studying physics.
vinay.sh/i-am-rich-and-have-…
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
Launching refersomeonegreat.com 🚀
Job hunting is mostly a daunting single player game. We're changing that by bringing the 1st degree into the fold.
Know someone looking to switch? Refer them!
We'll share leads, make intros & help find their next role, just like you would.
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
Please don’t say ‘marketing’ when you mean communications. Especially if a new founder who doesn’t come from marketing is listening. It hurts founders and early stage companies in many ways.
1) Founders don’t invest in marketing because they think of it as comms that come later and deprive their business of all the other really critical things that marketing does - like decoding demand and bringing those insights into product, business model, pricing etc.
2) They don’t hire trained marketers and instead end up with an SEO guy or a social media creative / strategist or a performance agency and cut to few months later they are wondering what’s the point of it all and why are we spending this money
3) They go from product development straight to GTM without a brand plan. A few years later you have a product that sells well with the performance tap on and virtually no brand strength to lean on when the tap is turned off.
Marketing begins when your business begins. Get it right early.
Kevin Kariappa retweeted
moving to Bangalore by the end of Jan & looking for a flatmate! budget is ₹45k+++ rent per person for a lovely flat (non-smokers only)
I bring
🌟 good conversations
📚 library of books
✍️ decent book/film recos
🚗 Late-night drives in my car
RT please?
only Jurel would have caught that
look how his eyes follow the ball almost all the way to his hand
any other fielder would have just stuck his hand out and hoped for it to stick
